By Karen Gaulette Curtiss, FFP Campaign Advisor:
In September of 2011, 16 Food For The Poor employees set out on a mission trip to Haiti, my homeland. Some of us went out of curiosity, others went because every day we are told of the extreme poverty in Haiti, but like many, we questioned the level of it.
Upon arriving to Port-au-Prince, my camera and I were ready and eager to zoom and shoot. The images seen here are through my eyes; from the pain of a child who had lost all hope to the devastation of a country that Food For The Poor has devoted years to repair.
Our group was so moved by the work of Food for The Poor in Haiti, that we wanted to be part of the movement. Upon returning to the states, William Casanova (one of the participants) suggested we begin a Champion Page, www.stage.foodforthepoor.org/hope. Our goal is to build three homes in Haiti.
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We each started by donating funds out of our pockets, and we told our friends and relatives, but this did not seem to generate enough funds. We needed to be more creative:
• William made Christmas ornaments shaped as wooden houses that did well.
• January 2012: I was asked to be a speaker at Florida Gulf Coast University and speak on the anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti (2010). There I spoke on our mission trip and shared our pictures and submitted booklets with our Champion page information for donations. This was good: The school want me to be an annual speaker during the anniversary.
• In February 2012, we had a Valentine’s Day bake sale which Susan Carignan & Eltricia Cooper led. That was great.
• In June, we had a raffle & bake sale: Susan Carignan wooed the staff at FFP with her rum cake & coconut ice cream, and we had a donor match our sale up to $300 which was awesome!
• Now, in the month of August 2012, we are having a Rainy Day Sale, consisting of books w/book marks, cocoa & tea mugs, soup mugs, game boards and Susan’s rum cake & coconut ice cream.
Our desire is not to forget our experience but to maintain the fervency we had upon returning from Haiti.
We coined the saying: “Piti piti, pay pa pay, zwazo an fe nich Li” or “Little by little, straw by straw, the bird makes her nest.”
