Haiti Awareness and Benefit Event

Lincoln University students Tasha Saint-Louis and Constance Ebienfa partnered with Dr. J Cupid to present an event on bringing Haiti Awareness with a guest speaker Rachel Augustin came to speak to students.

This event focused on the importance of how important it is that we come together as a family and support each other all around the world. We all are going through similar struggles or fights that helps us be relatable, rather they was born in the United States of America we should come together to help them because everyone has turned there backs to Haiti. Haitians go through a strong battle of denying there culture because they are ashamed of the way they look, people bully them because they look like they are fresh off the boat. But we in America fail to realize that the crime rate is high in Haiti but its also places that are beautiful like America but they feel like prisoners because the big gate, its children who aren't in school because they can not afford uniform. It's people who have to share beds because it they don't have enough money, this is sad and warms my heart because they been through so much and I remember that students kept saying that they are beggars they can don't help us but want help and to me this event helped me get that out of my idea what we all thought. So yes we should come together because they was the first to gain freedom as a free country and they take everyone no matter your race, they came from paying France for freedom where in America we take it for granted. Life is what you make of it are you living for purpose or doing your purpose in the world with helping out.

Why Haitians are made to feel ashamed of where they come from? In the video you will hear what Rachel went through to accepting her heritage and also in a article about United States singer Devyn Rose. Many similarities between Haitian parents and other "Carribbean parents" that I notice is that they all if not most grow up in strict households that didn't influence a lot of what Americans are use to with listing, watching, doing what we wanted at times. In the article Devyn Rose talks about how she would perform in front of siblings, after joining the school choir music "took a complete hold" on her and by the time she was 16 years old she recorded her first demo.

Just to give you some background about Haitians pretty much like a Jamaicans was called the evil ones because they practiced voodoo and spoke creole a language many do not understand. Creole was stigmatized as the language of the poor and not embraced in schools, and not embraced in schools, although all Haitians spoke the language. Students were allowed only to speak French, the language of the colonizers, this was the considered the language of those who are in power and have put down our people, it has more influence, said Wynnie Lamour, founder and professor of the Haitian Creole language Institute of New York. Haitian mother tongue brings people back to their roots

At this event they talked about "Disaster Preparedness in Haiti" from the American Red Cross Website at Red Cross says "Although major disasters like the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti are often the most visible in the international media, Haiti faces frequent natural disasters, including floods and hurricanes. Building on our experience around the globe, the American Red Cross launched a disaster preparedness program in Haiti that has reached hundreds of thousands of people." Now this was written on there website March 2013 and you know what changed between now and then Haiti became dependent on the help; and the money raised by American red cross became questioned "500 million in Haiti Relief" when that big earthquake that took on mainstream millions of people had donated to what appeared to be a good trustworthy company "American Red Cross." The charity raised almost half a billion dollars, which out of all charity helping to raise money was the most successful.

The American Red Cross made an promise to help Haitians rebuild, but after five years the Red Cross 'legacy in Haiti is not new roads, or schools, or hundreds of new homes. It's difficult to know where all the money went. Now to me after this who can say that American Red Cross didn't do anything to help. NPR and ProPublica went in search of the nearly $500 million and found a string of poorly managed projects, questionable spending and dubious claims of success, according to a review of hundreds of pages of the charity's internal documents and emails, as well as interviews with a dozen current and former officials. The Red Cross says it has provided homes to more than 130, 000 people, but the number of permanent homes the charity built is six. http://www.npr.org/2015/06/03/411524156/in-search-of-the-red-cross-500-million-in-haiti-relief
The Red Cross long has been known for providing emergency disaster relief food, blankets and shelter to people in need. And after the earthquake, it did that work in Haiti, too. But the Red Cross has very little experience in the difficult work of rebuilding in a developing country.

10 Disturbing this Pro Publica/ NPR learned investigating the Red Cross "Sandy Relief Efforts

1. children were sheltered next to sex offenders
2. red cross took emergency vehicles away from aid work and used them as props at press events
3. storm victims starved (35,000 danishes thrown out, red cross unsure where to delivery them)
4. disable victims were stock sleeping in wheelchairs for days
5. didn't give out flashlights because the lack of batteries
6. supplied meals that included pork to jewish retirement home
7. wasn't just sandy. The red cross disputed 80 emergency response vechiles after Hurricane Isaac but they were nearly empty
8. sent hundred of volunteers to a city that wasn't in Isacc's path
9. red cross officials on the ground say they were undermined by headquarters