I saw and heard and experienced a lot of things when I was in Haiti.

I saw towering piles of rubble and breathed in dust that coated my lungs and made my nose bleed for weeks after I arrived home.

I heard a little boy tell me that he had to give his mother his own urine to drink when she was caught in the rubble of the earthquake.

I saw dozens of people with missing limbs and dark, cruel scars on their bodies.

I heard a man quietly describe his own country as broken but beautiful.

I carry each of those sights, each of those stories in my heart.

But each time I’ve traveled overseas, there’s been that one thing. That one thing that burrows into my heart like a nettle, leaving the space around it inflamed and painful. That one thing is usually unexpected. Often unnoticed by my fellow travelers. I don’t usually talk about it.

But I feel like I need to share with you the one thing about Haiti.

My first day there, we bounced through rutted dirt roads on our drive to the hotel. I stared out of the window, my journal and pen in hand, ready to jot down my initial reactions to the country. Things that I knew I wouldn’t want to forget.

At one point, our van stopped at an intersection. I stared down an alley flanked by destroyed buildings. The streets were crowded, and a steady stream of people walked down the sidewalk, some cutting through the alley.

Something caught my eye. A man crouched on the ground. His shirt was barely held together gray tatters. His pants were shredded below the knee, revealing calves darkened by dirt and scars.

But it wasn’t his clothes that made me stare. They were similar to a dozen other people I had already seen that afternoon. What made me unable to look away were his actions. As I watched, he beat his head over and over against the crumbling cement wall he knelt next to. I couldn’t hear the sound, but I could imagine it.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

It was both violent and heart breaking. And not one person stopped. Nobody even looked at him. It was as if he was invisible. To everyone but me.

I’ve struggled to understand why that moment, which couldn’t have lasted longer than 30 seconds, was the one thing in Haiti. The one thing my brain keeps going back to.

Maybe because, in that moment, that man was Haiti to me. He was broken and battered. I wanted nothing more than to rush across that busy street, kneel down next to that man, and pour clean, cold water over his face, washing away the dirt and blood.

Haiti is a battered land. It is a country that feels ignored and forgotten. A year after the earthquake, and how many times have you, have I, “walked by” Haiti, ignoring it as it beats its head in frustration and anger.

We need to stop. I need to stop.

Look.

Kneel.

Pour cold water.

Wash away the dirt.

Wash away the blood.

Help Haiti heal.