Cherish your Relationships

Today I had the privilege of taking a walk around one of the villages where our work site is located. This is my second year on a Hero Holiday and I have returned once more this July as a summer intern. The last time I had been to this village was a year ago, and it’s funny how much the people stick in your memory. Our building project here this time is to build an addition on to a school, and I spent most of my time shoveling a ditch at the back of the school along with the rest of my team.While on my walk it took a few minutes to recognize David, a man I had met last year at the same village. It was in fact, David who recognized me first. He even remembered my name! David speaks French and Creole (Haitians speak Creole and it very similar to French) and since I also speak French we are able to converse with ease. He asked me how I had been over the past year, and we got talking about his present life. David is lucky enough to have been educated in Haiti, but since living in the Dominican Republic for two years he has trouble finding a good paying job. He told me that to acquire a proper worker’s permit, it cost between $200-$400. When I said that was really expensive, he just laughed, indicating that it was completely infeasible for him. He told me that he would like to learn English, and said that in Haiti he studied computers and house building.  He asked me what I was planning to do when I graduated, and when I told him I’d like to study Human Rights he said that he too felt obligated to return and help the people of Haiti.It really touched me that someone I had only met once for a short while would be caring enough to remember me. The amount of  love and respect that the people here put into their relationships is so inspiring that it makes me realize something… Just as much as we have many things to offer them, there are equally as much things we can learn from the people we are helping here. There is a certain dignity allowed in their relationships with one another that we do not seem to posses in North America. David reminded me of how much it can mean to a person to simply remember their name, or inquire into how they have been. He allowed me to see that we must cherish and nurture every single human interaction that we experience, for this is how we show our love for one another.~Emma, a Hero Holiday Dominican Summer Intern