RIESTER

Roy Dufek is a popular young man at RIESTER. He is part of our information technology team, rescuing RIESTERites from technological headaches.

Roy is in his early twenties. He’s tall, clean cut and never seems to be in a bad mood—though if you don’t know him well he can be quiet and shy. Once you get to know him, you see his wicked and quirky sense of humor.

In the summers of 2004 and 2005, Roy joined a youth group and volunteered his time by traveling to Haiti. He spent two weeks there each summer, and he says that his time in Haiti gave him a new perspective on the world.

Never had he seen or imagined poverty like he saw in Haiti. His trips there revolved around three orphanages. One of these orphanages is called Wings of Hope—they take in disabled children and children with special needs.

Poverty, poor health, the dangers of childbirth and disease have long conspired in Haiti to leave hundreds of thousands of children without parents. Some parents simply can’t care for their children in the poverty-stricken nation. The children at Wings of Hope with their special needs had found a refuge in a country with few resources to care for them. These are the people Roy was there to help by doing service projects.

The youth group he traveled with took the maximum number of bags they were allowed to carry–loaded with basic supplies including toilet paper. It was difficult to ship things to Haiti because packages were regularly ransacked, misdirected or simply stolen.

In Haiti Roy saw open sewers for the first time—ditches on the roadsides with raw human wastes exposed to the open air. He saw a lot of other things too. Roy referred us to this report to read more about some of the problems in Haiti: “Paradise Lost: Haiti Without Trees.”

Roy says his time there was “eye opening.  It changed my life and how I think about things.” When he came home, things that used to bother him, or that might upset his friends, didn’t seem as important anymore. After observing extreme and widespread poverty first-hand, the world just felt different. It all made “me happy to have what I have,” he says. “We have so much here, and they have so little.” Through reaching out to others, Roy felt he had made a difference. He was inspired by the work of the orphanages in Haiti where he was helping. “Never underestimate your ability to make a difference, small acts of kindness make the world a better place.”

Pam Doan, one of Roy’s colleagues at RIESTER, describes him as a young man with an old soul. He’s a great guy and his perspective on Haiti has given all of us at RIESTER insight into that stricken nation.

The RIESTER Foundation is raising money for an orphanage in Haiti that was badly damaged during the quake.

Some of the girls from the Hope Center for Orphaned Girls--the orphanage the RIESTER Foundation is raising money for. Their conditions are rough, their home from before the quake is unusable. Never lose faith in the ability to make a difference in the lives of others. Photographed this week in Haiti.

Click here and then scroll down to read all of our posts on Haiti and learn how you can help.