Happy Tears - My Part in bringing Hope to Haiti

“Once you choose hope, anything's possible” Christopher Reeve

They say dream big... a dream is where everything starts with... We started in 2011 on a bare field and two years later with all your wonderful support the Jacmel Children Center is finished…

You are curious what happened? So here is our story:

As many of you know I lost my heart in Haiti, to clearify this, in a city in the South of Haiti, called Jacmel. During my three Volunteer Trips down there after three - thanks to you - successful fundraising campaigns I worked in Haiti for and with orphans. Many of them lost their home, lost their parents in the terrible earthquake in Haiti in January of 2010.

Let´s get back a bit in time:

Inspired by Misha Collins and his charity Random Acts I started fundraising in March 2011 for a project called Hope 2 Haiti. I learned about Bonite Affriany, a Haitian woman who gives her life every day to help her people. She feeds 300 kids every day, some of whom walk 2 hours barefoot to her place, because they know that they can get food there. But in the evening she had to send them all out on the streets again. She could not give them all a home. Her dream was to build the Jacmel Children Center, providing a home for many of these kids giving them a place to live and get an education. So Random Acts made a shout out to encourage people to fundraise for this cause and everybody reaching the level of $5000 earned a spot on a team that travelled to Jacmel.

I have always believed that those of us with financial security can achieve so much by being generous to others. This project of Random Acts seemed like a great opportunity to do some good. I wasn´t sure if I would reach the $5000 Dollars mark, but I thought that it would be awesome to try, so that I could visit myself and help with my own hands.

I wished to make a difference, to be part of something special, to help sweet kids in need and to come out of the experience more focused and strengthened. I was open for everything this journey would bring; I thought that it would not only make an impact on somebody else’s life but on mine as well. What I didn’t expect was that not only did I become a part of the project but the project became a part of me, of my personal development. I felt in love with those kids in Haiti and more and more with the project. I didn´t need to think twice about trying again for Hope to Haiti 2012. Once again with the generous help of my wonderful supporters, I made the fundraising goal. When I went back that year with Random Acts I found out that not only had I left a piece of my heart in Jacmel, that not only did the kids have a place in my heart, but that we all found a home in their hearts as well. I think one of the most touching experiences was coming back and seeing the kids running to me, saying my name, giving me hugs, like they’d been waiting the whole year for us to come back. For me and the other returning volunteers it was like we’d never left, like the year in between didn’t exist; we just picked up where we had left at the end of our first trip with Random Acts in 2011. We knew already that we’d created lasting bonds among teammembers, but now we realized that the same happened with the kids we had to leave back in Jacmel. That has motivated me even more. Everything we do, everything Random Acts does through Hope to Haiti is for THESE amazing kids, who opened their hearts and let us all in. This feeling got even stronger after returning again last summer in June 2013.


This is the moment where I come to our pet project, the Jacmel Children’s Center (the inspiration for Hope to Haiti and the vision of some wonderful people I truly admire... see more in the project area)! Last year we walked over an empty field, carrying the first rocks. In the 2nd year we found the walls up. How that place has changed since we entered it for the first time and how amazing it was to see the progress that had been made. It brought tears to eyes – and the feeling and confirmation that we all together could MAKE A DIFFERENCE! I still see me walking through the future rooms of the Children’s Center, imagining how wonderful it will be when the first kids finally move in. As we returned in 2013 a huge dream became reality, there it was – the beautiful and strong Jacmel Children Center, built so well and with so much attention to make it a safe place to live. I had to cry a little bit as I saw it completed for the first time, it was breathtaking. This is what we made possible with the help of our wonderful supporters. A strong and beautiful home for orphans in Jacmel, Haiti. You all were with me there in my heart, soul and mind when we celebrated a wonderful touching ribbon cutting ceremony and finished what we all started a few years ago….

Without you I would not be standing here…