Growing Generosity at SAKALA!

News for a Better World from the SAKALA community center in Cité Soleil, Haiti.

This time of year I am always reminded of a Christmas celebration a few years ago at SAKALA.

   An organization had come to give toys and cookies and candy to the children.

  I sat back and watched the kids’ excitement and joy at receiving these gifts, which may have been the only Christmas presents they got that year.

   Just watching this happy scene was a great gift to me because I will say – with maybe some bias :) -- that SAKALA’s kids are the greatest kids in the world and they deserve all the good things, all the joy, all the best gifts in life.

   When the celebration ended, a few of the children ran over to me, jubilant. I thought that they were going to show off their gifts to me and I was happy to share in their joy.

  But, no, what they wanted to do was share their gifts.

  Each was excited to have me choose a cookie or a piece of candy as their Christmas gift to me.

  They did this spontaneously, no one whispered in their ear that they ought to share their gifts.

  No, their joy came from having something precious and then rushing to give it.

  Since then, I have seen these children as role models, inspiring me not only to give, but when I am so blessed to be in the position, to rush, to skip, to bound joyfully whenever the opportunity arises to give what maybe only I in that moment can.

  I fall short a lot of my role models, but the memory of the best Christmas gift I ever got still inspires me.

I say the kids at SAKALA are my role models, so too are the staff – who from the tutors and coaches in the after-school program to SAKALA’s leadership – have created an atmosphere of generosity, kindness, and comfort despite an immediate world outside that these days seem to be anything but.

   In 2019, SAKALA’s leader and co-founder, Daniel Tillias, was named a CNN Hero. If you look at this CNN video you can see the stark conditions in Haiti they were up against at the time, making the protected space of SAKALA all the more important.

“We’ve been trying to get a cooldown in Haiti for months,” Daniel said then, “but it’s always something. Unrest against hunger, against the waste, against the cost of fuel in the country. Armed groups fighting against each other, barricading, blocking the streets with tires and fire. It is hard for the children to go to school. We can’t let the children of Haiti lose the only thing they have left, which is their hope.”

   More than four years later, we think of 2019 as days of relative stability in Haiti. I have stopped saying that it can’t get worse, that we have finally hit bottom, because I have been proven wrong too many times.

  But despite that seemingly endless downward spiral — in happy defiance — life, learning, and hope goes on at SAKALA.

   Every week I get pictures proving this. This week, 11 of SAKALA’s chess players participated in a national online tournament.

  Here they are practicing.

Earlier this year, one of SAKALA’s soccer teams won a regional championship.

  Here they are celebrating.

Every weekday, children learn in SAKALA’s after-school program, which with the instability and violence in Haiti is sometimes the only school they get.

  Here they are studying.

Every day, the children learn new skills, like this girl showing off proper volleyball form.

Here she is playing.

Every day, SAKALA’s youths care for Jaden Tap Tap, now Haiti’s largest urban garden, planted adjacent to SAKALA by the generation of SAKALA kids before them on what had been an old dump site, but which is now an oasis of green, birds and butterflies.

Here they are growing.

It is SAKALA’s staff who make this possible every day despite living under extremely difficult conditions where their homes, families, and livelihoods are constantly under threat from everything from extreme violence to extreme inflation.

So, this year’s holiday giving campaign is focused on them.

If you are able, please leap joyfully to give a gift that will go toward year-end and holiday bonuses for SAKALA’s staff so that they can feel a little of the kindness and generosity of spirit that they put out in the world every day.

You can donate through SAKALA’s website or, if you prefer, by sending a check to SAKALA International and mail it to P.O. Box 490, Camden, Maine 04843 (USA).

As always, thank you for your solidarity with SAKALA.

Wishing you much peace, health, and the happiest of holidays.