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« A Review of The Corporation | Part I: Haiti beckons to Valley Efforts improve outlook for country By Cindy Corell • ccorell@newsleader.com • December 27, 2009 »
Part I: Haiti beckons to Valley Efforts improve outlook for country By Cindy Corell • ccorell@newsleader.com • December 27, 2009
Patrick Eugene studies computer science at James Madison University, but teaching comes naturally. His father teaches math and history in the family’s native country, Haiti. His parents asked each of their five children to get as much education as possible — then come home. Haiti needs them. In his classroom in Staunton, however, Eugene does not employ computers or any technology, just a textbook, a small whiteboard and a room filled with students of all ages eager to learn Haitian Creole. They each have ties to Haiti, most of them service-oriented. Haiti needs them, too. Across the Shenandoah Valley, dozens of organizations are helping in Haiti. Most of the groups are churches, but there are also civic groups, schools and colleges. In this series, we tell the stories of a handful of those groups, how Haiti beckoned them to her shores and why they continue to return. Haiti needs them, but in many ways, they have grown to need Haiti as well. It’s no small thing, going to Haiti. Anti-malaria pills and inoculations against typhoid and hepatitis are advised, and it’s not uncommon to learn a violent uprising will postpone a planned journey. Every few years, the U.S. State Department advises against travel because of political turmoil. However in spite of the challenges, Americans go to help establish businesses, treat patients and dig wells. They usually are drawn because someone they know has gone or because there is so much to do. About the size of Maryland, Haiti makes up the western third of the island of Hispaniola, and it is the very description of destitute.Most of its 9 million people live in dire poverty, making less than $2 a day if they’re lucky enough to find work, and maybe eating one meal a day. Parents sometimes send children as young as 6 to live with families in the cities in hopes they will be given sufficient food and housing. About 225,000 of these child servants, known as restaveks, perform household duties in urban homes, and in many cases, are beaten and sexually abused. http://www.valuadder.com/glossary/business-goodwill.html “Goodwill is the one and only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.”
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