Weary Haiti braces for Hurricane season

GONAIVES, Haiti -- Joicilia Mercius, a frail-looking woman who lives in a hillside tent city of canvas and soiled bedsheets, feels a sense of dread at even the slightest hint of rain.

First her heart leaps. Then her mind flashes back to last September when she grabbed hold of her four children and trudged through waist-high water that swallowed her humble home and buried it in mud.

''If we get the same kinds of storms we had last year, I will die. I've accepted that,'' said Mercius, 56, among more than 400 families living in a sprawling encampment on the eastern edge of this flood-prone Haitian city.

''I can't do it,'' she said. ``I don't have the strength to run to the hills.''

As the Atlantic hurricane season kicks off Monday, Mercius and countless other desperately poor Haitians fear an environmentally fragile Haiti is no more ready to weather this season's storms than last year, when a succession of tropical storms and hurricanes in a span of 30 days killed almost 800, left hundreds of thousands homeless and caused $1 billion in damage.

''I can't say we are ready. But we are better prepared than we were last year,'' said Haitian Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aimé. ``The government has made more of an effort . . . to control the risks from flooding, because we learned a lot.''

In the past few weeks, millions of dollars worth of heavy machinery has been dispatched to vulnerable cities like Gonaives in the northwest, Les Cayes in the southwest and the small town of Cabaret, just north of Port-au-Prince, where the bodies of dozens of children washed up following the fourth storm, Hurricane Ike.

The Bureau of Civil Protection, led by the country's lead disaster coordinator, recently launched a campaign asking the question, ''Are We Ready?'' And volunteers in several communities have been armed with bullhorns to alert of looming disasters.

''We are making a huge effort to try and develop the kind of culture we want to have,'' said coordinator Dr. Yolène Surena, who concedes the plan is far from perfect but a good start. ``We want people to understand they live in a country at risk, and if they live in a high-risk country they need to have a certain kind of attitude.''

Heavy rains this year already have killed at least 11 people, and left more than 600 newly homeless.

Rains in the southeast washed out a critical road that a U.N. World Food Program (WFP) truck used to deliver food to Baie d'Orange, where dozens of children died last year from storm-related malnutrition. WFP is now trying to find other means of reaching the isolated community.

In the Artibonite Valley, where barren mountain slopes surrounding Gonaives have left the city vulnerable to lethal flash floods, recent rains triggered such a panic that residents ran to rooftops and into the hills. The city, which sits like a clogged bathtub, has the added problem of bad drainage and accumulated earth that quickly turns to mud.

''The season could be very tough,'' said Myrta Kaulard, the WFP representative. ``Because people and infrastructure have not recovered yet from last year and are more vulnerable, a small rain can have the impact of a storm.''

That reality is not lost on the people of Gonaives, where eight months after Tropical Storm Hanna, bulldozers are still trying to remove millions of cubic millimeters of mud. The city is one of several that authorities have targeted for intense hurricane preparation. The focus has turned the city into an oversized construction pit with workers feverishly trying to unclog canals blocked with mud and debris, repair three major drains and expand and deepen miles of the La Quinte River, the principal waterway that runs through the city.

Haitian President René Préval traveled to the city three times in recent days to oversee the work. Among his concerns: the La Quinte River, where dredging only recently began and has been hobbled by a dispute between Haitian authorities and the international partners also involved in the work. Critics say the European Union and U.S. Agency for International Development, which agreed to finance a portion of the river's rehabilitation, are taking too long to get the job done.

Meanwhile, donors have expressed their own concerns, including whether a government-run construction outfit known as CNE is qualified to take on such huge infrastructure assignments. They complain that while the outfit has the heavy machinery -- the government bought $90 million worth after the storms -- vehicles are always lacking gas, and there is not enough technical expertise.

Frustrated, the government recently directed CNE to begin work on the 1.5 mile stretch of the river that CHF International was supposed to begin work on under the $16 million bid it won from USAID.

CHF Country Director Alberto Wilde said the delay was because of a required environmental impact study, and by the bidding process.

''People tend to rush into things. They want to see action but sometimes the preparation takes longer than the execution itself,'' Wilde said. Wilde and others say that the decision to widen the river to 40 meters instead of the 25 meters is contrary to the recommendation of a July 2008 EU study.

''There are environmental implications when you do anything with rivers,'' said Alex Deprez, USAID acting deputy mission director. ``The work needs to be done based on sound environmental and engineering studies, and it takes time to do work that will stand the test of the next storm season.''

Haiti's Agriculture Minister Joanas Gué said the decision to widen the river is based on Haiti's own study. ''What is important for us is protecting lives and investments, and limiting the risks,'' Gué said. ``CHF had money in their hands and up until now, they are not ready. We have no choice but to take the lead in Gonaives. Any little rain, people put their suitcases on their heads and start to run.''

Still, Haiti is treating the symptoms of the problem rather than the cause -- its deforested mountains.

''After the river has been high and some houses have been flooded, that is when you see them coming with their bulldozers to try and do something, after the damage has been done,'' Gonaives Pastor Michel Morisset said.

Morisset's Mission Evangelique Eben-Ezer church sits just off the national road, still buried underneath a newly formed lake, forcing visitors to take a grueling, 25-minute detour in or out of the city. Across the street from the church, three dozen families are living in tents.

''It's not safe,'' Morisset said of the blue tarps he recently got upgraded with a zinc ceiling and concrete slab floor. ``But it's a lot better than the [other] tents. It's not anything close to what the people need to feel safe. It's not a home.''

Further inland, dozens of residents complain that they are living in misery.

''Hunger is killing us, misery is killing us, the rains are soaking us,'' said Antoinette Paul, a 48-year-old who had to scatter her eight children around town. ''They say they would like to do this for us, discussions go back and forth but nothing is resolved. They say we don't have any problems. That is a lie,'' she said.

``You are sleeping, scorpions are biting you; snakes are crawling on top of you. The misery is just too much for us.''

Bien-Aimé said everyone living in temporary shelters was given money by the government to return home. The state, he said, can't afford to keep taking care of storm victims, but added those still living in tents will be relocated.

''They all have pretty words, but we haven't seen any action on behalf of the people,'' said Osnel Clairilus, 20, adding that they last received potable water in February from a government truck. ''Giving us a few dollars doesn't solve the problem. What we need is a place to live,'' he said. ``We have children we have to clothe and feed and send to school.''

Still bad news for Haiti and the Dominican Republic

Nearly two weeks of heavy rains in Haiti and the Dominican Republic have left at least 16 people dead, a national official says.

Emergency Management chief Alta Jean-Baptiste said 13 people were confirmed dead in Haiti. She could not confirm Haitian radio reports out of the southwestern town of Jeremie that three more deaths had occurred there, the Latin American Herald Tribune reported Sunday.

In addition to the deaths, about 2,000 Haitian families have been forced from their homes.

At least three people have died and 4,170 others have been left homeless in neighboring Dominican Republic, emergency management officials there said.

memorial for those who died at sea

Haitian religious leaders hold memorial for migrants who died at sea

Haitian religious leaders held a memorial Mass in Little Haiti for nine migrants who died off the coast of Boynton Beach

A child's coffin placed atop an adult coffin draped in Haitian flags stood before an alter inside Notre Dame D'Haiti Catholic Church.

Monday evening, despite the rain, hundreds of people filed into the Little Haiti church to grieve on a day that is supposed to be festive -- the 206th anniversary of the Haitian flag.

May 18 marks a day of pride when Haitians in Haiti and the diaspora pay homage to the red and blue flag with great fanfare. A flag firmly connected to a history of conflict and liberty.

''But today,'' Jean Souffrant said, ``we come to mourn the death of our brothers and sisters at sea.''

The empty coffins at the interfaith memorial service were symbolic of the of nine Haitians who died in the waters off Boynton Beach on May 14 in what authorities have confirmed as a smuggling operation.

Among the fatalities: a 1-year-old child and a woman who was eight months pregnant.

''Though tears are in our eyes, we continue to hold our heads high,'' said Rev. Reginald Jean-Mary to the crowd.

Most in the audience never met the deceased or even knew their names, but like Annette Jean, they wanted to pay their respects.

''We are one family. When one Haitian suffers, we all suffer,'' Jean said.

The message, both spiritual and political was a rallying cry for Haitians to unite in their fight for temporary protected status for an estimated 30,000 Haitians living in the United States.

TPS would allow Haitians to apply for U.S. work permits during times of civil strife or natural disaster on their island nation.

''The Haitian community is missing the political clout the Cubans have. The Obama administration has not felt the pressure,'' said activist Marlene Bastien, on why TPS has not been granted after Haiti was battered by two consecutive tropical storms last year.

During a candlelight vigil during the service, emotions ran high; cries and prayers alternately spilled from the audience. One woman with tears streaming down her face shouted, ``Why the baby, lord? Why?''

''We pray for all the families who are suffering and the ones who paid the ultimate price,'' said the Rev. James Saint-Julien of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Orthodox Anglican Church.

After the memorial, pallbearer Hans Mardi said granting TPS would allow family members in the United States to send more remittances to their homeland, deterring people from attempting the deadly trip.

''We don't want any more caskets,'' he said, ``We want people in Haiti to stay in Haiti.''

Heavy rains

Officials in Haiti say several days of heavy rains have killed at least 11 people, with nearly half the deaths occurring in the northern Artibonite area.

Authorities said Thursday that hundreds of homes have been flooded or destroyed by the torrential rains pounding Haiti ahead of the Atlantic hurricane season, which starts June 1. Last year, four storms devastated Haiti, killing hundreds of people and wiping out 15 percent of the country's economic output.

Haiti is the Western Hemisphere's poorest country. It is vulnerable to floods in part because of massive deforestation and poorly constructed houses.

In April, Haiti received $324 million in new aid commitments from international donors. Earlier this week, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon named former U.S. President Bill Clinton as his special envoy to Haiti.

Both men visited Haiti in March to refocus international attention on restoring economic security to the Caribbean country.

Happy flag day and hopefully some good news for Haiti

Add another country to the former president’s future travels.

The United Nations, according to news reports, plans to announce on Tuesday that former President Bill Clinton will become a special envoy to Haiti, which has been ravaged by a series of storms and hurricanes that left nearly 1,000 dead.

Mr. Clinton visited the nation along with United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon a few months ago, and he appealed at a donors conference here for contributions to help with disaster aid as well as investment aid.

While the former president’s actions are independent of his wife, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, she, too, visited Haiti briefly in mid-April to call attention to the nation’s plight and to pledge rebuilding aid.

In a statement he gave to The Miami Herald, he said he would be employing the Clinton Global Initiative, his far-ranging philanthropic effort, to try to help Haiti rebuild.

It's not right

Fla. Haitians mourn 9 migrants who died at sea

MIAMI (AP) — The Rev. Reginald Jean-Mary's voice faded as he contemplated what to tell his parishioners at a prayer service Friday for the Haitian migrants aboard a boat that capsized off Florida's coast.

Hope dissolved into grief after the U.S. Coast Guard suspended its search Thursday night for more survivors. At least nine people died, including a 1-year-old girl, when the boat carrying as many as 35 people capsized early Wednesday. Sixteen others were rescued that day about 15 miles off the coast of Boynton Beach, some 60 miles north of Miami.

It's a familiar service for Jean-Mary: In 2007, a dilapidated sailboat filled with 101 Haitian migrants finished its three-week journey just north of Miami. One died, and the rest faced deportation. Each year, boats packed with migrants from the Caribbean nation make similar treks. An untold number perish along the way.

"It's not right. It's not right," Jean-Mary repeated Friday, each phrase softer than the last. He paused, then forced out the words again behind a weary sigh. "It's not right."

The migrants hope to escape Haiti's oppressive poverty and chronic instability, worsened last year by four tropical storms and hurricanes that killed 793 people, caused $1 billion in damage and crippled agriculture in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Since October, the Coast Guard has stopped 1,377 Haitians trying to get to the U.S.

Jean-Mary's parishioners at Notre Dame d'Haiti, a Roman Catholic church in Miami's Little Haiti, grieve not only for their dead countrymen, but also for survivors who often are deported. They hung their heads at a Mass on Wednesday night, when Jean-Mary broke the news about the nine deaths.

"People began to cry. You could hear the whispering of despair and frustration, the sadness in their voices and in the prayers they addressed to God," Jean-Mary said.

Family members and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were working to confirm the identities of the dead, said Tony Mead, operations manager for the Palm Beach County medical examiner's office.

The Coast Guard identified 11 survivors who had been held aboard a cutter, saying they were in good health and taken ashore Friday. They were to be processed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents, along with five others who were already ashore.

Geraldene Lubin rejoiced at the news that her cousin, Gibson Jean-Louis, was alive.

"If he'll be able to be released and come back to his family, that will be even better," she said.

Advocates asked the Coast Guard to give survivors access to immigration attorneys.

U.S. authorities were investigating whether the trip was a case of immigrant smuggling or if other criminal activity was involved. Relatives and community leaders said the migrants likely saw the trip, even aboard an overloaded vessel, as a light at the end of a dark tunnel through poverty and constant strife.

"You can blame the smugglers, but you can't put all the blame on them," Jean-Mary said. "If in Haiti we could find better ways of living, the smugglers would not be able to find them, to manipulate them, to take them to die."

Advocates and lawmakers have asked the U.S. government to grant temporary protected status to Haitians, which blocks deportations to countries hit by natural disasters or political upheaval. A handful of African and Central American nations have such protection, but President George W. Bush denied requests for similar protection for Haiti last year.

Pierre Massillon of Loxahatchee believed his 25-year-old cousin, Frencintte Belizaire, was among the migrants on board seeking a better life. Another cousin in the Bahamas told him Belizaire left Bimini on Tuesday aboard a boat bound for Miami.

Belizaire wanted to go to college, but there was no money for more schooling with seven siblings to support in Jean-Rabel, in remote northwestern Haiti. Massillon said he warned her four years ago to find another way.

"I told her, 'If you come here (by boat), there are two chances: You might not reach here because of the high risk, and if you reach here they might deport you,'" he said. "She said, 'Whatever it takes.'"

What a sad day for Haitians

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (AP) - A boat overloaded with around 30 people, possibly Haitians being smuggled to the U.S. from their desperately poor country, sank off the Florida coast early Wednesday, dropping the occupants into the sea. The Coast Guard rescued 16 and was searching for others but at least nine died, including one infant, said Petty Officer Nick Ameen.

The search was expected to last overnight, and although the Coast Guard hadn't figured out exactly how many people were aboard or how many might still be lost at sea, it appeared certain that it fit the profile of migrant smuggling.

"The boat was obviously overloaded," Coast Guard Capt. James Fitton said. "It's a tragedy that someone would be so callous with human life."

For those familiar with the plight of Haitians, the escape attempt was no surprise.

"The economic conditions in Haiti are deplorable, and I don't see them getting any better any time soon," said Andy Gomez, a University of Miami expert on Caribbean migration. "And the Haitian-American community has developed a pretty good network here in the last five or 10 years, just as the Cuban-Americans have done, so there's more of a reason to come."

Four tropical storms and hurricanes battered the Western Hemisphere's poorest country during last year's harvest season, killing 793 people, crippling agriculture and causing $1 billion in damage to irrigation, bridges and roads.

In January, United Nations-sponsored groups said more aid was urgently needed to stave off famine in several areas of the country.

Fitton said the boat apparently left Bimini in the Bahamas on Tuesday night and was believed to have capsized or collided with something at about 2 a.m. Officials didn't learn about it until another boater called more than 10 hours later.

The boat has not been found, and is thought to have sunk because it hasn't been spotted from the air. Fitton said all those rescued were expected to recover. Besides children, women also were aboard, including a pregnant woman.

Six women, two men and the infant died, Ameen said. He said there was some confusion in the numbers because of the crossover of agencies working on the recovery.

Two Coast Guard cutters, one helicopter and one jet were still searching late Wednesday about 15 miles off the shore of Boynton Beach where water temperatures by the afternoon were in the high 70s.

Since October, the Coast Guard had stopped 1,377 Haitians, up from 972 during the same seven-month period last year.

The ship's sinking came as Haitian-American leaders met in Washington on Wednesday to lobby for temporary protective status, or TPS, for those from the country who make it to the U.S.

It would be an emergency measure to keep people from being deported to their homeland so they can help their country recover following a natural disaster or major political upheaval. It has been granted to countries including El Salvador and Nicaragua but never to Haiti.

"If not now, when?" Cheryl Little, executive director of the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center, asked of potentially granting Haitians protective status. "The longer it takes the administration to decide whether to grant TPS, the more people may decide to attempt to make it to our shores."

Night fell on Riviera Beach, where numerous bodies were zipped into silver bags and wheeled off on gurneys after being unloaded from a Coast Guard boat.

The Coast Guard said it was not known whether the boat's captain and any crew members were among those found and survivors haven't indicated who may have organized the trip.

"We haven't even asked those questions yet," Fitton said.

___

Associated Press writers Lisa Orkin Emmanuel, Laura Wides-Munoz and Jessica Gresko in Miami and Hilary Lehman in Riviera Beach contributed to this report.

(This version CORRECTS Corrects per updated Coast Guard numbers that 9 dead, 16 rescued, reason why the change. AP Video.)

International Adoptions?

Madonna’s quest to adopt a second child — a 3-year-old girl — from Malawi has once again put the celebrity in the spotlight and stirred debate about international adoptions.Save the Children (U.K.) has said that the girl Madonna wants to adopt and children like her would be better off in their home countries, and that most children in orphanages have extended family. This view of international adoption is also held by Unicef. the news media often distorts some aspects of international adoption, but can at the same time bring needed attention to important realities the biggest problem in international adoption is that many who call themselves advocates for children’s human rights press for legal restrictions that limit the ability to provide homes to children in need. Thus Save the Children calls for denying Madonna’s second adoption based on interpreting a residence requirement so as to prevent virtually all international adoption. Some 67 children’s rights organizations went into court to oppose her first adoption. Unicef calls regularly for restrictions limiting international adoption to at best last-resort status.

Many millions of children worldwide are living and dying in orphanages or on the streets, with no possibility of finding homes in their own country. Unicef argues for the creation of foster care and social welfare programs, but these things will not happen overnight, and foster care generally doesn’t work nearly as well for children as adoption.

International adoption provides good homes for the children lucky enough to be placed, and brings significant new resources into countries to improve orphanage conditions and help build welfare programs for the future. Celebrities like Madonna and Angelina Jolie have provided many millions of dollars for such efforts. While few individual adopters have their resources, many develop comparable interest as a result of their own adoptions in contributing what they can to help those children left behind. I agree with this point on International Adoptions this is what helped me and Dave see what was going on in Haiti.I know when I tell people about Haiti they are shocked they never really heard on seen images of Haiti.once they are informed they are all ways willing to help our orphanage or what ever group we know that is helping this country.So I think judges in these country's should really take in the child's life and all that the adopting parents can do to help this child plus the country they are adopting from.

Violent Past

carlos Nerilus, a Haitian man living in the Dominican Republic’s capital, Santo Domingo, was lynched and beheaded last week by an angry mob. The incident was allegedly sparked by the stabbing of a Dominican man by a Haitian worker in the Buenos Aires neighborhood.

Police say that an "inflamed throng" got a hold of Nerilus and proceeded to lynch him before gruesomely beheading him. Onlookers cheered, applauded and laughed, and some even took cell phone photos and videos of the incident.

There is a history of violence between the neighboring countries, with this incident causing tensions to run particularly high. Kély Bastien, president of the Haitian senate, insisted that due to the gravity of the crime his Government “must go beyond an official protest” and “call the Haitian ambassador in Dominican Republic to Port-au-Prince.” Dominican Foreign Relations Minister Carlos Morales has since condemned the act and pledged to prosecute the responsible parties.
Do you think Dominicans and Haitians will ever be able to move past their violent past?

What a Thing Haiti had to do!

Mexican government officials have expressed hope that the worst may be over, but fears over travel, goods and products related to Mexico appear to persist.

Haitian officials turned back a Mexican ship laden with corn, wheat, beans and medicine, a move that Calderon decried Wednesday as "the fruit of disinformation or of ignorance."

"Where the people are truly dying, not from the virus, the people are dying of hunger, we have sent aid systematically to Haiti," Calderon said.

This is one thing Haiti would not need in their country.They all ready have so much to face with no safe water to drink and parasites and other terrible disease.I understand why they had to make this choice.

What you can do with just a little amount of money!

Before and after eating FMSC rice!

Have you ever thought that $5.00 could feed a child for a month! Well it can and I have personally held a little boy that was 4 yrs old and very close to death from not having any food.WoW, it was alot to take in. but after receiving  these boxes and loading them into a suitcase is a very strong and emotional experience. But I am so thankful for it.If every person gave $1.00 to a great cause that really cares about the people it is serving WOW it could change so much so we as Americans Have so much but lets give $1.00 and see what a difference it can make . I wish the U.S. had a program where we as Americans had to visit a 3rd world country  to see how great a country we have. who cares if we vote republic or democrati!. what really matters is starving kids or starving adults who watch there family not make it to the age of 56 yrs old. I know most parents are older then that in this country,can you Imagine not having your mom or dad around to see the milestones in your life! well right know take that dollar off your floor or out of your car that you just have laying around and feed a child! 

No matter how old you are you can make a difference

Bilaal Rajan can't meet tomorrow, his mother, Shamim Rajan explains, as he has a previous engagement: He has to go to the zoo. He can, however, squeeze in a late dinner interview at his favourite Toronto restaurant, Richtree Market. (He loves the potato rosti and schnitzel.) Just prior to our rendezvous, Bilaal's assistant sends me a list of suggested talking points. Apart from the fact that Bilaal has braces, arrives to the interview with his mother and an exchange-student friend, Sam, and manages to consume an Everest-worth of rosti with the appetite and velocity of, well, a 12-year-old boy, I might as well be meeting an elected official.

Bilaal, who cites Gandhi and the Aga Khan as his heroes, is an activist, Unicef children's ambassador and motivational speaker. He has raised funds of nearly $5-million for causes that range from the victims of hurricane-ravaged Haiti to HIV/AIDS orphans.

He's just written his first a book, Making Change: Tips from an Underage Overachiever. Last month, he convinced a few thousand people to go shoeless with him for National Volunteer Week to raise awareness of the suffering of children around the world.

"The Aga Khan devoted the last 50 years of his life to helping humanity. And if one man can serve the world for 50 years, why can't I do it for a while?" Bilaal tells me. When he grows up he intends on becoming an astronaut, an activist and a neuroscientist. He wants to go to Harvard University, where he would like to study business, economy and astronomy. "Oh, and neurosurgery!" he adds, as though he were just adding another topping on his favourite pizza.


Bilaal Rajan, who started fundraising when he was 4, foresees a future as an astronaut, an activist and a neuroscientist.


He started fundraising eight years ago, when he was 4, for the earthquake victims in Gujarat, India. He explains the light-bulb moment with a been-there-done-that practised aplomb: "I saw a picture in the newspaper and it was one of total devastation. It simply put one thought into my mind and that was: Because you live in a different place, it shouldn't mean that you have to suffer such a tragedy." This thought came to his four-year-old consciousness at the breakfast table while he was eating a clementine, so he decided to raise money by selling clementines door to door. "I raised $350. It was a small spark that lit a huge fire underneath me and I've kept the ball rolling ever since," he says flatly. By age 8, he was raising $50,000 for hurricane victims in Haiti, by selling cookie boxes with his friends.

Bilaal felt equally impelled to help victims of the 2004 tsunami. He heard about it as he was dozing off in the back seat his parents' car. It was late and the Rajans were heading back to their home in Richmond Hill, Ont., after spending Christmas break in Niagara Falls. Bilaal recalls: "I fell asleep thinking about the tsunami, woke up and said, 'I'm not going to let this one go, either!' " So Bilaal approached Unicef and launched a challenge: for every child across Canada to raise $100. "My goal was to raise $1-million. We ended up raising $4-million," he says, then picks up his straw to peer through it like he would a telescope, giggles and flashes a silvery smile.

Since then, Unicef Canada named Bilaal its national child representative, he spent a summer volunteering in rural Tanzania, teaching children about HIV and AIDS, and travelled to Ecuador to help build schools.

He puts down his straw and continues: "Fundraising has always been my passion."

His Barefoot Challenge was an attempt to build empathy with underprivileged children around the world. "I found that the best way to get people up to date," he explains, "is by giving them first-hand experience." By grace of a Facebook e-mail blast, Bilaal galvanized people in 12 countries to give up footwear for a week. "I stepped on broken glass, got four blisters and seven spider bites," he tells me with pride - each casualty a miniature badge of courage. The pain was the point, he explains.

"Challenges are something we'll face," he muses, "they're part of life." Some other challenges he's faced have come from some of his classmates, less keen on his altruistic mission. "You do get negativity sometimes," he says. Some kids have sent him rude notes on Facebook. "But that doesn't hinder me at all."

He prefers to focus on positive things. And he shares his yes-you-can philosophic imperatives with the kind of certainty that is the happy province of childhood. "I tell this to everyone because I think it's really important," he says. "There are three steps to being successful." The first - find your passion - must be followed by taking action, Bilaal counsels me gravely. He cautions: "You may find your passion, but you're not going anywhere without acting on it."

Before Bilaal makes it to the third step, his mother, who has been sitting quietly until now, interjects softly: "Bilaal, you are not eating enough protein tonight," she says.

"It's okay, Mom," says Bilaal, anxious to get back to a crucial moment in his doctrine on life. "So: Take action!" he resumes insistently. "As Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, there are many ways to move forward and only one way to stand still. And it's absolutely true."

Having said all of that, he takes a deep breath and is ready to field questions. He's used to questions since he gets them often when he lectures. (The following day, he's speaking at a local elementary school, and the day after that, he'll be speaking at Lakefield College in Peterborough, Ont., where the headmaster went barefoot in response to Bilaal's challenge.) He doesn't get nervous, he explains. In fact, he's not really scared of anything. "Maybe skydiving?" he says, looking searchingly at his mom, "And I don't like insects. But I'm not really scared of them."

Over three scoops of Oreo cookie ice cream, Bilaal tells me about what he does when he's not sending e-mail blasts, raising millions or doing homework: He loves to read Harry Potter and autobiographies (past favourites include Richard Branson's Screw It, Let's Do It and Bill Gates's The Road Ahead). When he watches TV - which is almost never - he favours the Discovery Channel ("I like watching programs that give me something to think about") and, as for music, he likes U2 and Sting ("I like them because their music has messages"). He explains his thoughts on playing in an alarmingly non-playful fashion, as though he were outlining his political platform: "For me, playing is not about video games. I do like being physically active, though." Bilaal takes his last forklift-sized bite of ice cream.

I suggest he probably needs to tuck in soon, given his busy day tomorrow - he's lecturing at 8:15 a.m.

But before he can answer, his mom's cellphone rings. It's the next interviewer calling.

"Bilaal, it's for you," she says, "It's Singapore on the line."

What a blessing!

I have been thinking the last couple of days how blessed we are to be born where we are born. I have been thinking a lot about my grandma and grandpa they both where born in Mexico and I truly believe they both fell in love with each other quickly when they came over to the U.S. and they both knew that lifestyle and education where very important. They did not want their kids and grand kids growing up being known as lazy Mexicans and they never wanted their kids or grand kids to only know Spanish since they where in the U.S. they taught us to learn and respect the U.S. so unfortunately we do not speak Spanish. I will always respect my heritage and want to learn as much as I can about it because it is part of me. As we work through this I know I want Nerlande and Yonelson to know about their country and lifestyle because our homeland and heritage makes our world be the way it is. For some reason Mexicans always seem to be degraded and spoke of in a negative light in this country.

While I am sure that their are those who deserve the negativity that gets directed their way I know that people who feel this way never met my grandma and grandpa. One of my favorite memories of my grandma is when Dave and I finally received our Patriarchal Blessings. When Dave and I moved back from Montana we moved into an apartment complex in South Salt Lake. We were struggling to make it as Dave tried to figure out what he was going to do with his future after deciding that running call centers was not something he wanted in his life. Like I mentioned we struggled to try to make ends meet during this time and had no idea the blessings that were in store for us. As we settled back into life in Utah we hit the radar of the LDS ward that served the neighborhood we lived in.

Now it is important to mention here that while Dave and I had both been raised LDS we had gone through periods of inactivity in our lives and both had not regularly attended church for years. So when the Home Teachers started knocking on our door we were more inclined to hide behind the couch and tell the kids to stay quiet then answer the door and let them in. I have to share with have a testimony that Heavenly Father knows what and who we need in our lives and he sent us a couple of Home Teachers that wouldn't give up. One night they finally yelled through the door ' we know your in there" and our days of hiding from the home teachers were over. In time we were invited to attend church and found a part of our life and our marriage we never understood. We now talk about our first marriage (civilly) and our real marriage for time and all eternity that happened several years later. Anyway when we went to receive our Patriarchal Blessings we met my grandmas last bishop, he was now the Patriarch of the ward and shared with us a story that will stay with me forever. He explained that he met with my grandma and asked her why she attended church when she couldn't hear very well or see anymore. Her answer stuck with him ever since and he was moved by the opportunity to share it with us. She told him that she attended church each Sunday even though she didn't really know what was going on because she wanted the lord to know which side she stood on.

My grandparent were immigrants from Chihuahua Mexico and love our country. My grandpa worked hard every day of his life in a coalmine and spent his off time building a house for my grandma with his own hands from a picture of a house in a Sutherland's Lumber calendar. The house still stands years after they have both passed as a testament to the fact that love and hard work can extend far beyond the time we have here on earth. I guess my point is that there is good and bad to every race on the planet and we need to judge people by their actions not by the place they were born. Somehow many people think it’s so bad when we cannot keep up with our neighbors in worldly things. We spend little time thinking about what it would feel like to watch your family starve because you couldn't find a way to feed them. We never consider the pain one must feel watching loved ones die because you can't afford to get them the medical help they need. Imagine being one of the people living in one of these third world countries whether it is Haiti or the slums of Mexico. Imagine a life where you see the life people in the U.S. are blessed with as you watch your family struggle to just stay alive. What would you do, would you just sit back and let your kids die because of the place you were born or would you do everything you could to make a better life for them. Would you stay at home and wait for the inevitable or would you fight for your kids and do all you can to make it into a country where you could at least pick fruit to make enough money to feed your kids. Would you run, swim and risk it all for your family? Would you build a raft and risk your life to try and drift from Haiti to Florida? Would you do everything and anything to provide food for your kids who are crying from hunger and illnesses that we have long forgot about?

I believe that most of us would do these things and so much more in order to save our families. So I have a hard time understanding why we push the rafts back and kill people at the border who are just trying to save their families and take jobs most of us don't want. Sure there are added expenses that come from these people being here but how is that different than anyone else here. This country was built on the backs of our ancestors who were nearly all immigrants, we are all pretty much illegal’s if you look back far enough so why do we punish others because they showed up a little later than our families did.

We all should take great pride in our heritage and I am determined to make sure that Nerlande and Yonelson have great pride in the country they were born in. While Haiti has some very difficult issues they also have a very proud past. They hold the distinct honor of being the only place where slaves actually took control and changed the future for them. Our kids come from a beautiful country that is struggling with challenges most have no idea how to fix. Our commitment is to make sure that they are knowledgeable and proud of their heritage and that they understand the struggles of others who take great risks to make a better life for themselves and their families.

No Winner?

Voting had been marred by a boycott by supporters of ousted former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, whose popular Lavalas party was prohibited from running by electoral officials because official papers did not have his signature, as well as a halt to public transportation in Port-au-Prince by authorities in an attempt to preserve order, and a raid and shooting of an election official at one polling station by protestors. (File photo)
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, April 29, 2009 - With no clear winners coming out of voting in Haiti's Senate elections, 11 of the 12 seats that were up for grabs earlier this month will remain on the table in runoff election in June.

Haiti's provisional electoral council has released the results which show that none of the candidates received the majority vote needed for an outright win in the April 19th poll.

During the polls, voting for a 12th seat from the rural Central Department was ended after demonstrators ransacked polling places. Another date will be set for an election for that seat to be filled.

It was also revealed that there was a mere 11 per cent voter turnout for the elections.

Voting had been marred by a boycott by supporters of ousted former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, whose popular Lavalas party was prohibited from running by electoral officials because official papers did not have his signature, as well as a halt to public transportation in Port-au-Prince by authorities in an attempt to preserve order, and a raid and shooting of an election official at one polling station by protestors.

Food riots, deadly storms and political infighting has left Haiti's 30-seat Senate without a full house for more than a year.