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Differences don’t matter to Scarlet and Mowgli.

Scarlet doesn’t care that her best friend Mowgli the blind cat can’t see her face. And Mowgli doesn’t even notice that her dog buddy needs a little help getting around.

What matters to them is that the other is always there to cuddle and take adventures side-by-side.

Both of these disabled sweeties belong to Alison Smith, an animal lover who has dedicated her life to rescuing pets of all kinds, which are often among the last to be adopted.

Alison Smith and her husband Steve are the founders of Triple H Miniature Horse Rescue,...

Ok, so not everybody finds Kate Middleton endlessly fascinating. But, if she's so inconsequential, why the whole chapter about her? Author Joan Alison Smith calls Prince William's pregnant wife "unambitious, controversial and bland" in her latest book, The Public Woman, according to excerpts printed by London's Daily Mail. In a chapter titled "Queen Wag," referring to a slang term for the wives and girlfriends of prominent British men that originated among the football set, Smith writes, "By the age of 30, the new Duchess of Cambridge had done little since leaving university except play a supporting role to her boyfriend, marry him with great pomp and ceremony and...

Bulle Ogier and Jacques Rivette on the set of L'Amour fou

Photo by Pierre Zucca

In the last issue of Senses of Cinema, Daniel Fairfax reviewed Douglas Morrey and Alison Smith's Jacques Rivette, and now, for Issue 61, Mary Wiles has allowed the editors to choose a chapter from her forthcoming Jacques Rivette. Rolando Caputo's decided to go with the one on L'amour fou (1969) for a number of reasons, but primarily because "the film seems the point of historical conjunction between the end of one wave and the coming of a second wave of filmmakers that washed up in its undertow. At a stretch, one can see the shadow of this film on the cinema of Jean Eustache, Maurice Pialat, Philippe Garrel and others. L'amour fou is a great and wondrous film." And he's running Rivette's 1950 essay "We Are Not Innocent Anymore" as well.

Also in this issue: Marko Bauer,...

Wednesday (January 12) marked the one year anniversary of the devastating earthquake in Haiti. MTV News spoke to aid workers who have been toiling in extreme conditions in the impoverished country for the past year, as well as Tulane University medical student Alison Smith, who has made four trips to Haiti since January while providing us with periodic updates on what is happening on the ground.

Smith, 26, gave a sobering description of how things are slowly progressing in Haiti a year later, as the island nation struggles to resettle the nearly 2 million natives left homeless by the quake and deal with nearly 400,000 children orphaned by the natural disaster.

On Wednesday, Smith sent along a report from a friend of hers, Haitian-American Dominique Louis, who is the executive director of Green Children's House, an eco-friendly daycare center in Florida.

"One year after the devastating earthquake that left Haiti on life support, Haiti still remains in critical condition,...

One year after the disaster med student Alison Smith says Haitians are frustrated.

By Gil Kaufman

Haitians wait to be given food by the United States Army in Port-au-Prince in 2010

Photo: Joe Raedle/ Getty Images

It's hard to believe that it's been one year since the devastating earthquake hit Haiti on January 12, 2010, leveling much of the impoverished island nation's capital, Port-au-Prince, and killing more than 250,000.

The world came together in the weeks after the natural disaster, when Americans donated nearly $1.5 billion to help Haiti recover from the 7.0 magnitude quake. Another $5.3 billion was pledged at a donors conference two months after the earthquake. Every penny was needed, as nearly 2 million people were left homeless, many of them forced into ramshackle tent cities, and nearly 400,000 children were made orphans by the latest natural disaster to strike the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

The 12 ensuing months have not been any easier, with...

World Food Programme and Partners in Health have fed and cared for hundreds of thousands of sick and displaced Haitians.

By Gil Kaufman

Victims of the Haiti earthquake

Photo: MTV News

No one expected Haiti's problems to be solved just one year after a monster earthquake hit the island on January 12, 2010, leveling much of the impoverished nation's capital, Port-au-Prince, and killing more than 250,000.

The world came together in the weeks after the natural disaster; Americans donated nearly $1.5 billion to help Haiti and another $5.3 billion was pledged at a donors conference two months after the 7.0 magnitude quake. Every penny was needed, as nearly two million people were left homeless, many of them forced into ramshackle tent cities, and nearly 400,000 children were made orphans by the latest natural disaster to strike the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

The 12 ensuing months have not been any easier, with the combined force of hurricane season,...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who wrote on-the-ground reports from Haiti for the MTV Newsroom Blog in the days and weeks after January's devastating earthquake. She recently returned to the country with a medical team to set up a field clinics in the Central Plateau region and check up on patients in the capital of Port-au-Prince. With the rainy season about to start and more than a million Haitians still displaced, Smith passed along a dispatch from a friend who works with Haitian refugees and just returned from the island.

By Caitlin McHale

Project Esperanza began as a Virginia Tech student organization in 2005 and later evolved into a non-profit. We work to link the Blacksburg, Virginia community with the Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic community through service. I live in Puerto Plata and oversee our programs here, which serve the large Haitian immigrant/refugee population. After the January 12 earthquake,...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who wrote on-the-ground reports from Haiti for the MTV Newsroom Blog in the days and weeks after January's devastating earthquake. She returned to the country this week with a medical team to set up a field clinics in the Central Plateau region and check up on patients in the capital of Port-au-Prince. With the rainy season about to start and more than a million Haitians still displaced, Smith reports that much work is still left to be done.

By Alison Smith

After a successful six days of clinic in the Central Plateau, our 13-person medical team saw over 1,100 patients in the makeshift clinic we set up. I departed from the group a day earlier to go to Port-au-Prince to see the city and the ongoing relief efforts. Over the last two months, I have relived the post-earthquake experiences over and over again in my head.

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who wrote on-the-ground reports from Haiti for the MTV Newsroom Blog in the days and weeks after January's devastating earthquake. She returned to the country this week with a medical team to set up a field clinics in the Central Plateau region and check up on patients in the capital of Port-au-Prince. With the rainy season about to start and more than a million Haitians still displaced, Smith reports that much work is still left to be done.

By Alison Smith

Today we treated 200 people in a remote village in the Central Plateau called Savon Rouge. We came across a lot of very ill people with many diseases like tuberculosis, cancer and malaria.

I went to the hospital again to check on people we took yesterday and to bring over two more patients — one with potential metastatic ovarian cancer and one with a broken hip.

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who wrote on-the-ground reports from Haiti for the MTV Newsroom Blog in the days and weeks after January's devastating earthquake. She returned to the country this week with a medical team to set up a field clinics in the Central Plateau region and check up on patients in the capital of Port-au-Prince. With the rainy season about to start and more than a million Haitians still displaced, Smith reports that much work is still left to be done.

By Alison Smith

I am back in Haiti with a group I have put together of nine medical students and three doctors, two months after leaving from the earthquake-ravaged island. The situation is much more difficult, the people are much more sick and the challenges are even greater than ever before. Millions are homeless. The coordination of relief efforts has been met with...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who has been posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog. Today she talks about her conflicted emotions about leaving Haiti after nearly two weeks of tending to patients at General Hospital and the small signs of hope she sees in the chaos that has surrounded her.

By Alison Smith

I am getting ready to depart and it is very difficult. The needs here are different than when I first arrived. Most of the acute medical cases have been treated, but many people are coming back with fractures or open wounds that were not properly treated and now need more in-depth medical attention. We still have carloads and ambulances full of sick people, but the weakest are perishing en route to the hospital. This is going to be the continued situation for a very long time.

The General Hospital is finally functioning adequately.

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who is posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog. Today she offers her final thoughts on her time at General Hospital and the importance of "mountains beyond mountains."

Saturday, January 23, 8:37 p.m.: We began to realize the great need that exists outside the hospital. There are so many communities that have been cut off from aid. If they do not receive aid soon, there will be more casualties. People out there are dying from injuries that we have the necessary means to treat now. Today I connected with a Haitian drummer, Daniel Brevil, who is a friend of a friend from the United States. His community, Carrefour Feuilles, located in Port-au-Prince, has not received any aid. He brought three people with him from his community to the General Hospital to receive medical care. He told me...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who is posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog. Today she offers us some amazing stories of survival and updates on the slowly improving situation on the ground.

By Alison Smith

Friday, January 22: I have almost been here a week, and today I felt very emotionally exhausted from everything. We are sleeping a couple of hours a night and not really eating much — tonight was my first meal in two days. There were two aftershocks early this morning when we arrived at the hospital. People went crying and running for cover. So many people are terrified to stay inside or to be near buildings. We had to permanently evacuate one of the hospital buildings that has become structurally unsound, so more patients are being cared for outside.

The best doctors from the United States, France, Norway and Switzerland are here.

The week was only four days long, but it ended up being one of the busiest weeks in the history of the MTV Newsroom blog. It's easy to see why, as we had constant updates from the ground in Haiti, tracked the end of the war between Conan O'Brien and NBC and caught up with Nick Jonas, Rivers Cuomo and Prince. Before you speed out to see "The Tooth Fairy" or crank up your copy of the performance's from "Hope for Haiti Now" (available on iTunes for $7.99), check out the links below for anything you might have missed this week.

» If you haven't been following along with all of the reports from student volunteer Alison Smith and the MTV News team in Haiti, be sure to check out all of their dispatches to get a sense of what's going on in Haiti and what still needs to be done.

» And...

Handwritten letters and radio serve as primary means of communication in impoverished nation.

By Gil Kaufman

Louiny Fontal broadcasts from Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Photo: Nicholas Kamm/ Getty Images

While the world tweets, texts and blogs about the aftermath of last Tuesday's 7.0 earthquake in Haiti, the massive destruction of the island's infrastructure has left many Haitians scrambling to communicate with and find loved ones.

Cell phone service has been spotty on the impoverished Caribbean island nation, and even those lucky enough to still have mobile phones that work are having trouble finding a way to charge the devices due to the massive power outages.

"What's really interesting is how people have cell phones but no electricity in their homes, so they carry their chargers around and plug it in whenever they find an outlet," Scott Sundick, a surgeon from New Jersey who has been in Haiti helping the sick and wounded for the past week,...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who will be posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog this week. She is also forwarding reports from some of her peers, who are doing medical work on the ground in affected areas.

Jessica Schuster, 25 and 2007 Tulane University, grad is the executive director of the Bicol Clinic Foundation, a non-profit that does work in Nepal and the Philippines, Wednesday (January 20): "On day one, we flew into Santo Domingo and as we were leaving the airport, my dad met another doctor and a nurse and invited them to fly on our charter plane (along with three photo journalists and two Haitian-Americans). They offered to work with us as translators and also provided us a place to stay at one of their aunt's guest homes. We all sleep outside in a tent as no one is safe to stay indoors.

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who will be posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog this week. She has also forwarded reports from some of her peers, who are doing medical work on the ground in affected areas.

By Alison Smith

The General Hospital in Port-au-Prince is slowly becoming more organized. When I think of how it was the first night I arrived (no physicians and no real medical care) to what we have now (seven operating rooms, medicine wards, a pre-operation and post-operation area, a pediatrics area), it is amazing.

Thanks in part to the media attention we got from Bill Clinton's visit yesterday, the U.S. has designated the hospital as the central medical facility in the city. We will not be able to deny any medical care to Haitians, which is much better because some people were being diverted...

Alison Smith is a medical student at Tulane University who will be posting frequent reports from Haiti to the MTV Newsroom blog this week. Today she offers us some stories from the victims of the earthquake and volunteers at the hospital where she is stationed.

By Alison Smith

Julian, Age 27

"The whole situation here is very sad. I was in my house when it happened. I didn't get trapped, but the house is all broken. Some of my family is hurt with crushes, scratches. People in the U.S. can help rebuild our country. Bring medical help, food for the people. I want everyone to help. Do it soon to help put it back together. We have nothing."

The following two accounts are from two sisters who lost their mother who were asking U.S. Army troops for help because they didn't know where to go to get assistance.

Linda,...

One week after devastating earthquake, survivors and rescue workers experience strong aftershock.

By Gil Kaufman

A woman is pulled out from the rubble after the initial earthquake in Haiti.

Photo: Lisandro Suero/ Afp/ Getty Images

The strongest aftershock to date hit Haiti early Wednesday morning (January 20), rattling nerves and sparking fears of renewed damage and casualties one week after the island was devastated by a 7.0 temblor. According to CNN, the 6.1-magnitude aftershock, which struck just after 6 a.m. Et, was located about 6.2 miles deep, with an epicenter about 35 miles west-southwest of the decimated capital of Port-au-Prince. It was the latest in a series of dozens of aftershocks that have hit since the January 12 quake that destroyed much of the capital and took at least 72,000 lives.

In addition to causing panic and distress among the more than 3 million survivors who have been battling to stay alive in dire conditions amid the rubble of the original earthquake,...

By Alison Smith

We witnessed a small miracle Monday morning.

I was trying to organize the people outside the door to the hospital when a man came running up and placed a baby into my arms. The child had just been pulled from beneath the rubble of a collapsed building. I rushed to clean all the debris off of her and get her some oral rehydration solution. She started to come around and began to cough and wake up. We were able to find her mother and she stayed with her and fed her until she was strong enough to leave the hospital. We learned her name was Stacy. She was a bright light of hope amidst all the suffering and death.

We have about seven operating rooms at the General Hospital now, and three wards for patients. We are trying to have Haitian nurses and doctors take over the...

By Alison Smith

Port-au-prince, Haiti — We spent all day working in the General Hospital here in Port-au-Prince. We have doctors from the U.S., Switzerland, Norway and the Canadian Red Cross. Since this is one of the biggest hospitals, people keep coming here, bringing people on mats, in wheelbarrows, in cars.

I spent all day triaging people and trying to get those who need emergency surgery to the operating rooms. We are mainly doing amputations; so many people have lost limbs from getting crushed.

We had somewhat of a riot from people being frustrated about not getting care. They are angry at how slowly the aid is coming. The Army finally went out today.

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of people outside needing urgent care but they will have to wait until we deal with the major trauma cases. The morgue is nearby and littered with bodies. We have had...

By Alison Smith

Port-au-prince, Haiti — We left Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, this morning. There was little sign of a mounting relief effort there — no large groups or supplies, only a single truck with bottled water.

We were cleared to land at Port-au-Prince airport solely because of our medical supplies. They tried to deny us but we told them that we had I.V. fluids and antibiotics. It was like a war zone on the runway, with planes and helicopters everywhere. The airport itself was badly damaged, and completely chaotic. It was dark, and the floors were covered with water.

We spent three hours at the airport just trying to find a ride. The crowd outside was a disorderly but somewhat controlled by Army soldiers.

Port-au-Prince was strangely calm in some sections, much as it seemed on my previous trips. In others, though, there are still people climbing onto the roofs...

By Alison Smith

Enjoying the last comforts of the Us — the food, the electricity, the order to everything. Tomorrow night will be a shock. My name is Alison Smith, an MD/PhD candidate from Tulane University. I am preparing to go into the unknown: Haiti in the aftermath of one of the worst natural disasters in recent memory. I depart from a city, New Orleans, which has its own battle scars from Hurricane Katrina not so long ago.

People in New Orleans understand in a way few can what Haiti is facing. I came to Nola three years ago for medical school because I wanted to help rebuild this beautiful place and to learn from its people. I have faced many daunting situations due to a lack of resources and infrastructure that have both saddened and encouraged me to work harder. Today I depart for Haiti not sure of what to expect.