HUMANITY FIRST: HAITI AND BEYOND

“More than anything else, The concept is to leave something behind once everybody else has packed up and left.” 

Ahmadiyya Times | News Staff | Canada
Source & Credit: The Suburban News
By P.A. Sévigny | Quebec

As if the recent earthquake wasn’t bad enough, easy access to drinking water is often a big problem for many of the people who live in Haiti’s countryside.

“It’s one of the poorest places in the world,” said Quasim Sayed. “and it’s only a couple of hours (on a plane) away from Quebec.”

As a working charity project, Humanity First is based upon nothing more than eight young people who share a common desire to make a lasting difference in their world.

“If we can do it,” said Callum Biddle Patrick, “anybody can.”

Once their idea took root, Sayed, Patrick and six friends began to do their research. While the planet’s poverty often seems to be an insurmountable problem, they soon discovered how simple and relatively inexpensive initiatives can make a big difference for people in their immediate environment. The students were also surprised to discover how access to drinking water often reduces a district to abject poverty because of the time and effort required to find it and bring it home. As much as there might be water in the local aquifer, the district is often too poor to find the funds required to dig a proper well. When a local NGO (Non Government Organization) working in Haiti offered to dig the well if the eight could find the money to finance the initiative, the only question left was to know how much. When compared to the millions pouring into the country after last week’s earthquake, they learned it could be done for not much more than $5,000. They got to work and created Humanity First which is their working organization. In order to finance their first project, the budding philanthropists decided to hold a community dinner at a community centre in Montreal North.

“The food will be fantastic,” said Adnan Janjua. “It’s only $50 per ticket and we’ve already sold more than half the available places.”

In collaboration with community activist Bashir Hussein’s Alliance of South Asian Communities, the dinner will be held on the 30th of January at 5 p.m. in the St. Michel Community Centre’s main hall located at 9899 Boul. St. Michel north of Metropolitan Blvd. Humanity First is also working hard to produce a mini-documentary about their efforts to raise the money required to dig the well. Once the edited work is uploaded onto the web, they believe others will see how easy it can be to take the first step towards solving some of the world’s problems.

“More than anything else,” said Patrick. “The concept is to leave something behind once everybody else has packed up and left.”

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