I was born in a little Caribbean Island nation of Haiti and was adopted by an Australian family at the age of six. I am now 30 years old and married to my lovely wife Ada. We have 3 beautiful children, Maliq 10, Naimah 5 and Amali 3. I am currently living in Brisbane running my own business. In November of 2007, I was sponsored by Tony Wehl of RPQ to be reunited with my birth mother which was foll
owed by the ABC TV program “Can We Help’. Most recently I returned to Haiti with my adoptive parents and my Haitian siblings, with the Channel 9 program ’60 Minutes’ after the earthquake hit in January 2010. Both of these experiences have changed my life forever and have inspired me to do whatever I can to help not only my birth family but also the wider community where they live. The Home for Haiti project exists because more than 2 years on from the 7.0 magnitude earthquake which hit Haiti on Jan 12, 2010, there are still millions of family’s living in tents all across the country. The aid is not getting through fast enough and we are going in to do what we can to speed things up. Due to a chronic lack of local resources in Haiti, we are collecting RECYCLED demolition hardware from the generosity of Australian builders, RELOCATING it by shipping containers, and REBUILDING two villages near natural infrastructure which can be used sustainably to maintain long term prosperity. The land for the ‘Australian Village of Hope’ has been purchased, and houses will be built and maintained using funds raised by Australians. Local builders will be trained to build earthquake safe infrastructure, under the guidance of qualified volunteer tradesmen & women from Australia and U.S. Thousands of tonnes of 100% reusable building materials are dumped every year. Australians are more than willing to donate them to a good cause rather than it go to waste, and we are putting in the hard yards collecting and sending it to Haiti to create livelihoods and opportunities for those in need. We educate and create jobs in construction. We are generating income opportunities to help Haitians regain independence and pride. We house family’s and help fight disease with sewage systems and harvesting clean drinking water. We are starting from the ground up.
