Today was our 2nd medical clinic and as far as we were concerned it was a great day! We started our day off at the registration table which was perfect for use since we got to meet all of the patients. It was an eye opening experience all around, but especially when we meet our […]
...continue readingDominican Medical Trip - Second Medical Clinic
Published by August 29th, 2011 in FB, Participant Blogs and Dominican Republic. 1 CommentDominican Medical Trip - First Medical Clinic
Published by August 25th, 2011 in FB and Dominican Republic. ClosedWe woke up this morning a tad anxious but full of excitement about our first clinic of the trip. Knowing that we only had a certain amount of time to be able to run our first clinic, we left the resort with determination so we could be back with ample time before the weather started […]
...continue readingHero Holiday Medical Team and Hurricane Irene
Published by August 23rd, 2011 in Participant Blogs, FB, Dominican Republic, Hero Stories, Mainpage, Staff Blogs and Featured. 0 CommentsToday was very gut wrenching! (to say the least). As some of you may know, Hurricane Irene hit the coast of the Dominican Republic last night (August 22nd). While all of our team members stayed safe and sound in the resort, which is a strong cinder block structure built to withstand hurricanes, we couldn’t help but think of many of the families in the community of Neuvo Renacir where we’d been working. These families live in conditions that are difficult at the best of times, and during hurricane season, many of them lose or sustain serious damage to their homes. As we compared stories in the morning, the team found that most of us did not sleep because the rain, wind, and waves were so loud. I myself kept thinking about what it would be like to be a mother with children in either Nuevo Renacir or La Union, villages where many of the houses are made of wood and metal scraps fashioned together that simply cannot withstand extreme weather. It would have been truly frightening.
This morning our team leaders thought it would be better that we all stay in while people were cleaning up the streets and any power lines that had fallen. We cancelled the clinic we had scheduled for the day, as most people were not in the frame of mind to attend it, as they were more focused on cleaning up the streets and their homes.
In the afternoon we headed over to the village of Nuevo Renacir to see how we could help. Most of the community was fine and the rain water had receded but as we turned the corner to get the ocean all you could see was garbage and debris everywhere. Some of the houses we had seen just three days ago were half gone. The waves were still really big too, most of us got splashed once or twice by them and got soaked. We divided into two groups and helped to move three families’ belongings out of their destroyed homes and into a dry church around the corner. Everything they owned was wet and dirty. They had all the garbage that was washed in from the storm by the ocean in their houses too.
I got to sit down with the mother of one of the families, Margalina, and asked her how she felt about what had just happened. Margalina, her husband, and two children, have lived in their ‘ocean view’ house in Nuevo Renacir for the past three years. Whenever it rained their house and belongings would all get wet and ruined. There have been times when the waves have gotten close to their home in the past too. She said that the storm had started around 8pm for them, and a cousin later came and got the family to stay in his home during the storm, as it was further away from the water. They did not sleep the entire night because of the noise and fear for their home. Now that their house has been destroyed and all their belongings damaged, Margalina seemed like she was in shock, and yet said that the family plans to fix and clean the house and move back in when it is ready.
Our team also spent some time moving large logs, rocks, tires, and other debris that the ocean had washed ashore in order to build breaks so the waves would not wash up into the homes even more. Water logged branches are heavy!! By the time we left the waves were being held at bay. I am so proud of our team, they worked their butts off!!! On the bus ride home everyone was pretty sober. One team member, Alex, had this to say:
We all struggled to hold back tears as we transferred anything salvagable to a church near by. Were are fortunate enough to be able to return to a comfortable hotel after a few hours of work but the people of Nuevo Renacir never have that option.
Hero Holiday is committed to the community of Nuevo Renacir, and while we are happy to say that all of the homes we built this summer are still standing safe and strong after Hurricane Irene, there are so many other families in this village who constantly live at risk of devastation by natural disasters such as this. The silly thing is that it’s entirely preventable. If families have homes that are well-built, with proper materials, and are located far enough away from shore, they would be able to avoid all but the most extreme catastrophes.
Hero Holiday is determined to give the people of Neuvo Renacir that chance. Right now, we’re going to do what we can to meet the immediate needs of this community as they clean up and salvage what is left. But we will continue to build homes for deserving families in this town so that they won’t have to face the next hurricane in fear, and we need your help to do it! Please consider supporting us by clicking on the ‘donate’ button above, or think about attending a Hero Holiday trip yourself! You can bring hope, love, and change to this community!
- Nettie Brown, Hero Holiday Adminstrator
Working in the tomato fields was probably the most emotional and hardest thing that I’ve done in Mexico this year. It began with the 4:30am alarm going off in the guys room. From the moment we got off the bus I could tell that this was going to be quite the culture shock. I took […]
...continue readingBoston Pizza Final Day - Happiness and Bright, Cheerful Paint!
Published by August 15th, 2011 in FB and Dominican Republic. ClosedToday we were so excited to go back to the homes we worked on, as after we leave every day the contractors work on the houses for about 3 more hours and we never know what they will have accomplished in our absence. This was our final day to work on the houses and we […]
...continue readingBoston Pizza Day 4 - Making Friends in the Garbage Dump
Published by August 15th, 2011 in FB and Dominican Republic. ClosedLast nights’ debriefing, unbeknownst to us, was an excellent preparation for today’s experience at the garbage dump. Talking about the sights, sounds and smells was one thing, but actually experiencing was something else. With anxious anticipation we loaded into the back of our open-aired truck, and bumped over the dirty and dusty road. No matter […]
...continue readingBoston Pizza Day 3 - Cinderblocks, Gringos, and Kung Fu Panda!
Published by August 11th, 2011 in Participant Blogs, FB, Dominican Republic, Hero Stories, Student Zone and Featured. 1 CommentOur days start at 9am with an open-aired, windblown truck ride to our work site where we’ve spent the last two days. What started as three skeleton buildings are transforming before our eyes into homes for our new friends. Each home is no bigger than 250 sq.ft., but surprisingly, the number of people working in the congested area work cooperatively and functionally to reach a common goal.
I had no idea there was a tradesman inside me. I’ve learned to build walls with mortar and cinderblock; mix concrete, and haul it by bucket-loads; and sieve sand for wall mud. But, what surprised me even more was the participation of the community, who join us each morning with smiles, to work hard to build homes for their neighbours.
Our labour intensive days are broken up by time to play with the children and interact with the community. While most of our Spanish vocabulary is limited to “Hola” and “Por Favor”, the children are most receptive to the universal language of “play”. Game boys, Ipods, and gaming systems are substituted by basic skipping ropes, colouring books, and frisbees, bringing joyful shouts of delight from the children and “gringos” alike. By the end of the day we climb back onto our trucks, tired, dirty and sweaty, but a happy crew.
This evening we were treated to an open-air theatre in a small Haitian/Dominican community. Each one of us had at least one or more children in our laps to share the movie experience with. Half-way into the movie I recall looking around, and thinking that there was no other place I’d rather have been at that very moment. I was covered in sweat again, but this time not from the sun or the hard work we’d been enduring all day long, but from the body heat generated from the four little humans that surrounded me. A blue tarp was laid out on the ground in front of a big white screen featuring “Kung-Fu Panda”, where we sat still for the next two hours under the star and moon lit sky. I’m not sure who enjoyed this evening most…
Julie
Boston Pizza Foundation - Dominican Republic August 7th-16th, 2011
Published by August 11th, 2011 in FB, Testimonials and Featured. 0 CommentsDay 1: Awareness Tour
Well the time has come and our 26 participants and 4 interpreters and 4 Hero Holiday leaders boarded the open air trucks and began our 1st annual BPF Hero Holiday.
This afternoon would introduce us to to three families and some other projects that Hero Holiday has worked with in the past. Our first stop, with excited anticipation, was a town that had previously been called Augas Negras, also know as “Black Water”. The town’s name reflects the awful reality of what happens when the rains come and the river floods leaving the community and its inhabitants in six inches of septic water. This community has recently been renamed Nuevo Renacir, which means “rebirth”, and we are so excited to be able to be a part of the transformation in the lives of the families living there. Our three house builds will include raised foundations, providing a safe home for these families we now call friends.
The anxiety of our participants was quickly relieved as children and families welcomed us with open arms. On our quick walk through the town it was not long before every participant was holding the small hand of an excited child or arm and arm with smiling teenagers. As one participant said so eloquently, “we felt as welcomed in this new place as a family member would be welcomed back at home.” In this town we also met Marie, (the mother of one of these three families), and when asked if she had anything to say to the group the only words she could get out were “thank you for making my dreams come true.” As tears were shed we boarded the buses and headed off to destination number two, the community of La Union.
La Union is community made up of Dominican and Hatian individuals who work predominantly in the garbage dump, a one hour walk from their homes. As this is a town that the Hero Holiday teams regularly partner with, the noise of the trucks brought out all the children, excited to meet the new “Gringos” (foreigners). As we exited the back of the trucks each participant was met with open arms, warm smiles, tight embraces, and hands to hold. Young men and women eagerly piggy backed, tossed in the air, and cuddled each and every child that came their way. It was very clear just on day one that this experience would change our lives forever. Shortly after our tour of the village we met the “Mayor” Beto, who welcomed us so graciously and thanked us, even thought we didn’t bring anything but ourselves! This stop also was all too short and soon it was time for us to get on the truck and depart to the next destination. As our truck drove away tears streamed down participants faces as they wrestled with the harsh reality of what they had seen.
Our third and final stop was Arroyo Seco, a town built and proudly led by a saint called Pastor Garica. Arroyo Seco has been the recipient of help and support from Hero Holiday for a number of years and the people of this community reflect a feeling of hope. Arroyo Seco is made up of over 800 people who live in just over 250 dwellings. Pastor Garcia is the ambassador of hope and change and now most in the community are able to read and write and enjoy many opportunities that have been made possible by the love and support of this very giving man. During our short time at the church and community centre, playing on the newly built basketball court, the laughter and the smiles of all the children who had now gathered truly reflects that the community that has strong ties. We played basketball, jumped rope, threw frisbees, inflated beach balls, pushed children on the swings, and we just held hands. All too soon it was again time to leave and as we lined up the children to receive our last small gift of a candy, many familiar with the children exclaimed, they have never seen them sit so well!
It was a very special day and we look forward to many more on this journey!
Emotionally exhausted but happily content, we could tell that this trip was going to be so much more than anyone anticipated and as one participant said, “we have been doing this only one day and it is already more than I had ever thought it would be!”
Cheryl and Michelle
Follow Grace Baptist Church as they are building 3 houses in Mexico right now!
Published by July 20th, 2011 in Participant Blogs and Mexico. 1 Commenthttp://www.gracebaptistmexico.blogspot.com/
...continue readingScout Canada’s Build a Home Challenge!
Published by July 15th, 2011 in FB, Student Zone and Featured. ClosedAn awesome group of scouts and leaders from Manitoba joined Hero Holiday in Mexico this summer for their ‘Build a Home Challenge’! While they’ve been keeping their own blog on www.scoutchallenge.ca we wanted to highlight some of their stories here, but make sure to check out their own site for the full versions!
First Post From Mexico!
Today is our second day in Mexico! So much has happened so far! After 2 days, we have put up the walls and most of the roofs on the houses. Each house is slightly different in it’s completion so far, but we are making good progress. Tomorrow our goal is to shingle the roofs, install the paneling/trim, and re-paint. We still have to build and paint the additional interior wall. The families are great, and have been so willing to help, and have been so happy, it has been just amazing. The awe and excitement in each family member just makes you smile, Even though most of us cannot speak Spanish, it has been incredible how easily we have been able to communicate with each other. (We do have a translator, but he is not always present). The contrast between life here in Mexico, and life in Canada, is just…unfathomable. The sheer poverty here is overwhelming, and the lack of hope can crush even the strongest soul. By building these homes for this family, we are giving the a step up from the deep pit of poverty, and giving them the means to make for themselves a far better life. We are giving them hope.
House build Complete!
We have completed the construction of the houses today! Some of our team members went shopping today for the new beds, mattresses, and other furnishings for the home, all of which we will be installing tomorrow. The plan is to take the families out for ice cream while other members move in all the furnishings, and that way they everything will be a surprise. Each family will also be getting somewhere around 2 roosters, 8 chickens, and 5 fruit trees, each. We also found out today that each family is behind in payments for their land plots, and all chipped in money (about $750) to split between helping each family with their rent. On top of all that we brought a bunch of gifts for the families from Canada, which we will also be presenting to them. One thing that touched me in a special way was how hesitant each family was when asked if they wanted anything extra. Santiago (our translator, sorry if I messed up the spelling buddy!) had to really coax an answer out of them. Tomorrow is going to be a very emotional and overwhelming day for all of us.
Today we also went to a local graveyard. Over half of the bodies buried there belonged to young children. It was very sobering to see the numerous graves of the babies who died on or close to the day they were born. It makes you realize how different life is here than from Canada. Our translator, Santiago, has a child buried there, who passed away 15 hours after it was born because it was born slightly premature. If that child had been born in Canada, it would have almost certainly survived. I heard today that many parents avoid becoming too attached to their children until they are 4-5 years old, because the survival rate is so low. It really drives the term “absolute poverty” home. The line between life and death that they walk in Mexico is a lot thinner than in Canada. They don’t get the “second chances” that we do. The amount of things we take for granted, such as water, shelter, income, hairdressers, shoes, holidays, clothes, healthcare, schools, consumable entertainment, food. The people here posses few, and work unbelievably hard for those that they do.
On the brighter side, it is amazing how happy people are here! They always seem to be smiling and laughing. Everyone wants to put in a helping hand. Kids from all over the neighborhood would come to the job site everyday and try to help out, be it with painting, or hammering, or whatever job we put them too. Some of our members have been spending most of the work day just mingling and playing with the kids. Everybody has utilized their own special talents in this build, whether it be building, entertaining, communicating, photographing, etc. Everybody has been doing their share, which is awesome!
Dedication Day
Here it is! today is the day the families get their new homes!! First stop was both the yellow and green homes, where we dropped off the groceries and got the beds delivered and started building them. There were a few complications like having an important piece missing from one bed and not having the correct bolts for the bunk beds :p in the end it was accomplished! When the families opened their doors and we saw their faces, there were no words to describe the joy that they had! There were tears of joy and it seemed that a huge weight was lifted up off their shoulders all the girls were extremely happy to have their own beds - they showed us where each one was sleeping and they really enjoyed their little gifts we got them! After all the dedications were finished we all gathered, and the families cooked us all a fantastic meal. There were three different kinds of chicken, one was deep-fried, fried, and BBQ. There were potatoes, two different tomato salsa, pasta salad, egg salad, and coke to drink. It was all very delicious! We said our goodbyes and gave hugs and then we were on our way.
