Hearts with Haiti

Hearts with Haiti Resurrection Dance Tour Highlights



photo by Teri Lathrop

Haiti Dance Troupe to Perform for Students, Public

Sun Journal Staff, New Bern, NC
The Resurrection Dance Theater from Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, will be making a stop in New Bern from Sept. 13 to 15, including performances for 2,500 school children and a public performance at Garber United Methodist Church.
The internationally recognized dance troupe is made up of orphans, former street children and child slaves in Haiti who have performed all over the United States and Canada, including a performance before the Pope on World Youth Day in Canada.
Garber has been active with Haiti relief for many years, dating to before the earthquake. The congregation is providing transportation, meals and housing for the dance troupe while it is in New Bern.
The dancers includes Bill Nathan, a former child slave and professional drummer, whose life story was featured in the book “A Crime so Monstrous,” about child slavery by Benjamin Skinner.  During the Haitian earthquake, Nathan fell from a seventh-story roof and was badly injured. With the financial support of an anonymous donor at Garber United Methodist, he was able to get out of Haiti to the U.S., where he was treated for his injuries.
The troupe of 11 dancers and drummers are all from the St. Joseph’s Home for Boys in Haiti.   The St. Joseph’s family was hit hard by the earthquake in January 2010 and two of the homes were severely damaged and are no longer habitable. Although their homes were lost and their lives changed, the young dancers didn’t lose their determination to make a difference.  They sewed new costumes, repaired damaged drums and are now celebrating their “Resurrection from the Rubble” through dance.
The troupe will perform for students on Sept. 13 at Parrott Academy in Kinston and J.T. Barber Elementary School in New Bern. The performance at J.T. Barber begins at 1:15 p.m. and will include a presentation of $1,000 raised by the children of the school. Other performances for area children will take place at Garber on Sept. 14 and 15.
 The public performance, which is sponsored by Hearts With Haiti and Garber United Methodist Church, will be in Garber’s Morris Hall at 7 p.m. Morris Hall is located at 4202 Country Club Road in Trent Woods.
For ticket information, contact the church office at 252-637-4022. Tickets for the public performance are $5 and credit card payment is accepted by phone. All proceeds from the performance will be donated to the St. Joseph’s Home for Boys to help rebuild their home in Haiti.
For more information about the performances of Resurrection Dance Theater in the New Bern area, contact Mary Coleman at Garber United Methodist Church at 252-637-4022.
For more information about St. Joseph’s Home for Boys and the Resurrection Dance Theater, visit heartswithhaiti.org.

photo by Teri Lathrop


“Resurrection from the Rubble": North Carolina Hearts go out to Haitian Dance Troop

by Chelsea C. Stith, Classical Voice of North Carolina
September 17, 2010, Raleigh, NC: As a part of North Carolina State University’s yearlong emphasis on Haiti, the organization Hearts with Haiti presented the Resurrection Dance Theater from St. Joseph’s Home for Boys. Under the direction of Michael Geilenfeld, these remarkable young men, former street children, child slaves, and orphans, tell their stories through song, drums, and dance, raising money to support the ministry of St. Joseph Family in Haiti and to rebuild their home in Port-au-Prince. The troop combines irrepressible enthusiasm with technical prowess and a buoyant, catching optimism.
After a rather extensive introduction, Walnes, Eddy, and Gerald performed an interpretation of “A Change in My Life.” Their dancing was fluid and highly interpretive, showing influences of modern, classical ballet, and jazz, but was not precisely what most of the audience had been expecting. The real excitement began, however, with “SHINE,” an interactive narrative of a young shoe-shiner. Three of the ensembles’ drummers, Tiboudo, Lele, and Bill, exploded onto the scene with rousing, virtuosic rhythm. The rest of the group created a typical Haitian street scene and told the story of a wealthy businessman, a young shoe-shiner, and a policeman. The dashing, purple-suited businessman had his shoes shined, but refused to pay. When the shoe-shiner stole his hat in revenge, Mr. Purple Suit went for reinforcements. Excitement reached its highest pitch when Didi, the shoe-shiner, dashed into the audience, trying to escape the policeman. A young woman — who had unwisely chosen an aisle seat — was coaxed onstage to provide a spirited witness in the boy’s defense, aided by the vociferous crowd. Reparations were made, to the chant of “Pay him! Pay him!”
The next number was an extraordinary drum piece. Bill and Lele starred on two djembes, but the entire ensemble’s performance was impressive. Bill’s career, which began with a six-year-old child slave pounding on an upside-down bucket, has launched him to worldwide fame. He has studied in Africa, participated in international conferences, and performed and traveled extensively. When you listen to him play, you can tell. His story, his virtuosity, and his charisma are equally compelling.
Didi, the youngest member of the troop and a clear crowd favorite, performed a hysterically funny and impressively true-to-life Michael Jackson imitation to “Beat It.” If the ten-year-old can polish up his moonwalk, we may have an upcoming heir to the Jackson legacy.
The other group dances, “Farm Dance,” “Shango,” “Freedom Reclaimed,” and the finale, were dominated by the compelling power of narrative. Even through these young men are gifted, their abilities never overshadowed the overall story. Reginald, who only has one arm, held his own with some fancy footwork. Walnes’ athletic jumps were spectacular. Jackie, Eddy, and Gerald especially are gifted dancers, and the support of the full drumming section — Bill, Lele, Tiboudo, and Roland — was exceptional. The entire group shows an unusually high ability to connect with the audience.
Even so, the talent of this ensemble is not their primary focus. They are, as indicated in the program, “the very best of servant-leaders.” The Resurrection Dance Theater is here to tell their story and to help children who are in the same situations that the members once were.
For those interested in more information or making a donation, please visit http://www.heartswithhaiti.org.

\

Bill Nathan Plays a Drum in Haiti. Haitian Dance Troupe Forges Family Bonds in Face of Their Nation's Earthquake Disaster

By SUSAN BROILI

Special to The Herald-Sun

DURHAM -- For members of The Resurrection Dance Theatre of Haiti, every performance means much more than a show. It represents the bond of family they found at St. Joseph's Home for Boys in Port-au-Prince after living on the streets or working as child slaves.

It gives them a chance to shine and uplift others. And, since the earthquake devastated their county on Jan. 12 and demolished their home, it offers an opportunity to raise money to rebuild. That's why they call their current touring program, "Resurrection from the Rubble."

Since the earthquake, most of the boys have been living in tents at a second boys' home in Jacmel. The St. Joseph's Family also lost their Wings of Hope building in Fermathe that houses disabled boys and girls.

The 11-member troupe recently arrived in the Triangle for shows that include Sunday performances at Duke University's Duke Chapel and Reynolds Theater.

"We want them to know that even though we lost two of our buildings, we still have the spirit ... We're touring to raise money to rebuild the two homes. We want to show them we were broken one time and now look at the beauty," lead drummer Bill Nathan, 25, said in a telephone interview.

Four years ago, Nathan became director of St. Joseph's Home for Boys.

"When we came to St. Joseph's, we came with our heads down. There, we were told, 'Guys, there's a lot you can do.' We started to lift our heads up and look people in the eyes," Nathan said.

Street children, child slaves and those with disabilities are generally looked down on in his country. St. Joseph's and Resurrection Dance Theatre enable them to be their best even if they have physical limitations. Nathan spoke of one member of the troupe, Reginald Mayant, who performs despite having lost an arm. Now 14, Reginald was found at age 4 by a garbage dump and brought to St. Joseph's, Nathan said.

Reginald performs along with others in "Shine," a dance that depicts the life of street children, who work as shoeshine boys.

"This is how we stick together. It shows me I'm really part of a family," Nathan said of being in the troupe. "We share our story through dance and music."

Michael Geilenfeld started St. Joseph's in 1985 as a way of bringing street children into a family setting. To help them learn to work together after scrapping for survival on their own, he had them perform plays and music. Prior to that, Geilenfeld had served for 11 years with the Missionaries of Charity Brothers, an order co-founded by Mother Teresa. He continues to supervise the three homes in Haiti.

When Nathan first came to St. Joseph's, he found a family and encouragement to play the drum -- something he had wanted to do since age 6 when he beat on buckets because he had no drums. When his mother died a year later, a woman took him in but after a year, forced him to do all the cleaning and other work. When nuns learned of his plight, they arranged for his rescue from enslavement and he came to St. Joseph's. There, he learned discipline, the power of prayer and to celebrate the good in himself and others.

Now, he said, "Drumming, it's a kind of therapy for me." He continues to heal from broken vertebra as a result of jumping off of St. Joseph's seventh floor as the building collapsed during the earthquake. Hearts With Haiti, a Raleigh-based nonprofit formed in 2001, managed to get him to the U.S. for treatment.

All 20 St. Joseph's boys survived but the earthquake claimed the life of Ben Larson, 25, a Lutheran seminary student from Iowa, who was staying at the home. Nathan had played a role in sending five boys to safety when he found them playing cards on the top floor shortly just before the earthquake struck. He says God told him to go up there.

When Hearts With Haiti development director Jennifer Neibert visited Haiti for the first time in June on a mission trip by Garber United Methodist Church in New Bern, she witnessed both devastation and determination. In meeting some of the St. Joseph's boys, she was especially struck by "their spirit of wanting to succeed" and the gratitude they expressed at being able to go to school and be a part of the dance troupe. The eight boys who returned from Jacmel to go to school in Port-au-Prince pitched in after school to help Neibert and the mission team clear rubble from the St. Joseph's site, she said.

"From the hardships they experienced early in life, they were able to become whole. They are surviving and thriving," Neibert said.

That's why the troupe's performance ends with "Freedom Reclaimed."

GO & DO

The Resurrection Dance Theatre of Haiti performs a number of times at schools, churches and public shows in the Triangle over a two-week period.

Public performances this weekend include appearances in Durham on Sunday at the 9:45 a.m. and 11 a.m. services at Duke Chapel and at 4 p.m. at Reynolds Industries Theater on Duke University's West Campus. For tickets for the 4 p.m. show, call 919-684-4444 or at www.tickets.duke.edu

Today at 7:30 p.m., Hearts With Haiti St. Joseph's benefit gala takes place at the J.C. Raulston Arboretum in Raleigh. For tickets, call Hearts With Haiti at (919) 758-8085.

For more information about Hearts With Haiti and Resurrection Dance Theatre of Haiti, go to www.heartswithhaiti.org

photo by Teri Lathrop


Arisen from Life on Haitian Streets

BY YONAT SHIMRON - Staff Writer Raleigh News and Observer
RALEIGH -- To fend for themselves, Haitian street children often resort to shining shoes.
But what happens when a rich man smoking a fat cigar doesn't pay a 10-year-old shoe-shiner? That's the subject of one of the skits in the latest Resurrection Dance Theater of Haiti production.
Life in the dusty neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince is transformed into art by the 10-man troupe of boys and young men who once knew those streets all too well. Thanks to the St. Joseph Home they can make a future for themselves by drumming, dancing and storytelling.
The troupe, now touring Triangle schools and universities, performed at the Magellan Charter School in North Raleigh on Thursday, igniting a frenzy of applause.
"This was the best thing I've seen here," said fourth-grader Reed Shannon, who could hardly sit still watching the troupe dance and play drums. "It was awesome."
The St. Joseph Home - a multidimensional mission that serves as a home for boys and for mentally and physically disabled children, and a school for girls - has been enthusiastically embraced by a host of Triangle-based organizations. One of them, Hearts with Haiti, helped arrange for the latest tour to raise money to reconstruct two buildings damaged in the January earthquake.
"We've watched these kids grow up and seen the things they're doing," said Cheryl Proctor, a nurse practitioner in Raleigh who helped start the nonprofit Hearts with Haiti eight years ago. "This is why we feel so strongly about the mission of this family."
During their Triangle stay, the troupe is being fed and housed by local residents who have contributed to the home.
For at least two troupe members it is a return trip. Bill Nathan, a former child slave, and Walnes Cangas, whose parents could not afford to care for him, have been to the Triangle numerous times.
Both men grew up in the home, earned a high school diploma and are now directors there. Two summers ago, they participated in the Duke Youth Academy, a two-week program run by the divinity school that is intended to train promising high school students in the life of the church.
Injured during quake
Nathan was here for most of the winter, too. He fell 75 feet when one of the St. Joseph homes collapsed during the earthquake. Airlifted to the United States, Nathan was treated by a Duke Hospital doctor for multiple broken ribs, cracked vertebrae, and torn ligaments. He returned to Haiti this past spring, and is the chief drummer in the show.
The 25-year-old St. Joseph Home is not an orphanage. Although some of the children who live there are orphans, the aim is not to place them with adoptive families but to nurture them in a community that cares for their well-being. Encouraging the arts is one way the children can express themselves and give back to society.
"The children have very low self-esteem living on the street," said Michael Geilenfeld, the founder and director of the St. Joseph Home. "One way to affirm them is through theater."
The troupe has been helped by professionals. Chuck Davis of the African American Dance Ensemble is a mentor. One member of the troupe, Jacky Asse, performed at the American Dance Festival and the troupe participated in Dance Africa, an annual series of performances in New York, Chicago and Washington.
But the children's own experiences growing up on the streets of Haiti form the basis for the troupe's dance routines.
"This is how we share our story," Nathan said, "through dance and drumming."

photo by Teri Lathrop


Haitians Get a Taste of Home in Cary

BY ANDREW KENNEY, Staff Writer Cary News
CARY - The dancers and drummers of The Resurrection Dance Theatre of Haiti crowded the Donovans' kitchen and refueled with plates of rice, beans, vegetables and spiced chicken - tastes from home, 1,300 miles removed.
The young men joked in Creole and shared their stories with the other dinner guests. For Taki and Bill Donovan, the meal was a rare moment with an extended family they joined years ago.
"Bill's never been able to go to Haiti," Taki Donovan said later. "It's really great that Haiti came to him."
The dance troupe at their table was drawn from the St. Joseph's Home for Boys, an organization in Haiti that fosters children and hosts a school for girls and a community center.
The Triangle was a stop on the tour they've undertaken to repair two St. Joseph's buildings that were badly damaged during the Jan. 12 earthquake. That disaster killed at least 230,000 people in their country and left millions homeless. And while the tragedy weakened a nation, the Donovans' Haitian relations have strengthened.
It's been eight years since Walnes Cangas, now a St. Joseph's leader, met Taki and her daughter, Allie Donovan, during their visit to Port-au-Prince. They still remember the night he described his dream wife as they lay on the roof of a building later ruined by the terrible quake.
In the years since, the Donovans have supported the group through Raleigh-based nonprofit Hearts with Haiti. They've watched through phone calls, e-mails and visits as their boys became men.
They watched, too, as the world around St. Joseph's shifted. Cangas, 25, stood guard against looters after the earthquake. Bill Nathan, another long-time St. Joseph's friend, was badly injured when he fell 75 feet from a St. Joseph's roof during a tremor.
But both made it to Cary for dinner, and a whirlwind of patted backs and handshakes marked the brief pause in their odyssey. That week, nine of the St. Joseph's travelers stayed at the Donovans' for five days, and two stayed with neighbors Randy and Karen Bosse.
"They open their home," Cangas said.
The troupe is on tour for a month. The tour includes dozens of performances. In the Triangle, the Donovans and others shuttled them between performances by way of Apex United Methodist Church's short white bus. At each show, they collected money to repair the St. Joseph's buildings. And through their narrative dances, they tried to show another face of their home. "We're trying to tell stories of our country, stories of our lives in Haiti," Cangas said before dinner one night. "We're only shown on the news when something bad is happening."
In the other room, 10-year-old Didi Samlouis slipped and slid across the house's hardwood floors, then plopped down to flip between a Charles Bronson film and the N.C. State football game. In the kitchen, Reginald Mayant tried to ask Bill Donovan for butter for his bread.
A few of the troupe grew up on the streets of Port-au-Prince, or in the bonds of child slavery, but they seemed at home as cultures melded on Bordeaux Lane.
"There's a lot of energy when they're around," Taki Donovan said.
The Donovans' neighbors, the Bosses, hosted St. Joseph's founder Michael Geilenfeld, and Bill Nathan, now a director with the organization. It was the Bosses' first St. Joseph's experience, but "Randy Bosse is just ready to get on an airplane and fly down there," Taki said.
That's how it works, apparently: one encounter and you're hooked. "Those guys kind of come in with a can opener and your heart is open before you know it," Taki Donovan said. When they do, they make themselves as comfortable as old friends.
A couple years ago, Cangas's love for ice cream sandwiches became family legend. He ate seven of the things during a single day of his stay in Cary in 2008, Bill Donovan recalled. As he told the tale, Cangas pondered the freezer.
andy.kenney@nando.com or 919-836-5758

Photo by Teri Lathrop


Eastern Carolina Non-Profits Support Haiti Relief

Public Radio East
NEW BERN, NC (pre) - Area non-profits are raising money to help Haiti rebuild after an earthquake in January. © Copyright 2010, (10-09-27)

Eastern Carolina Non-Profits Support Haiti Relief

WNCT Greenville, NC Interview with Walnes Cangas and Bill Nathan