My friend who lives next door to me put a sign outside his door that read, “HUGS $1, benefits my service trip to Philippines.”
I can buy two hugs from him or one share of Bear Stearns . In our society, when things are hitting us from all different directions bear-hugs bring a much greater return.
Most of us were probably too young to remember the first time someone hugged us.
Last Thursday’s Quick Center speaker Jean-Robert Cadet, a former Haitian slave and current college professor, remembers the first time that arms embraced him with warmth.
He was in high school at the time. Cadet had to wait longer than most of us because he comes from a place that we sometimes substitute for the word hell: Haiti. He was never a boy in Haiti; he was merely a piece of property.
Cadet talked about how tears came to his eye the first time he sang “Happy Birthday” to his child.
Cadet, himself, has never had a birthday. He has no idea how old he is and can only reason that he was born during the Mangrove season.
Haiti is the only nation that the United Nations lists under the Least Developed category, according to the U.N.’s Human Development Index.
But the sad part about this story is not just Cadet’s story. More than 300,000 youths between the ages of 4 and 15 are still in slavery – only 700 miles from Miami.
While we sympathize with nations like Ecuador and Jamaica, we need to understand that Haiti is on another level of the problem.
One Fairfield student who resides in the Dominican Republican approached the microphone to ask Cadet a question. He called Cadet his brother and said that he felt guilty that his country did nothing to help their neighbor.
The Haitian situation is devastating, but its neighbor to the east cannot extend a helping hand across the boarder.
The key catalyst of Cadet’s life came when his family moved to America. He started to attend high school and found a teacher who changed his life. Cadet’s education became the thing that would take him, as his book’s title communicates, “From Haitian Slave to Middle Class American.”
Cadet’s decision to become a teacher was an easy one, not because it changed his life, but because it created a life for him. In looking back on his life, Cadet said that he would never have survived if he didn’t gain an education.
But how can we educate such an under-developed society? According to Cadet’s Restavec Foundation, Haiti has a 49 percent school attendance rate and a 59 percent literacy rate.
As we gain the same education that Cadet fought for his whole life, our generation will be challenged to figure out how to “save Haiti.”
But how can we start to resolve such a crisis? Does Haiti need an economy or a hug?
If the market value for an American hug is valued at $1, then what is the cost of loving Haiti?
If the all the people in the Quick Center crowded to buy his book at $20 a pop, they would have had to send a professional hugger down to Haiti to show 20 restavecs – the name of a child slave that literally means “to stay with” – the love that they have been waiting their entire lives.
Now, the only question for tomorrow’s leaders who we educate on this campus is: How do we get Haitian children that dollar?
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