Lamou se yon Fanmi (Love is a Family)

Family.

That’s a powerful word.

What do you think of when you hear that word?  Do you think of your parents?  Your brothers and sisters?  Do you see their faces? Hear them laughing?  Are you reminded of the time your sister borrowed your favorite shirt, then accidentally spilled spaghetti sauce on it?  The time your brother gave you a hand-made birthday present?  The time your parents pinned you to the ground and tickled you until it hurt?

That’s what many of us think of as family.

Unfortunately, that’s not what everyone thinks of when they hear the word family.  Not everyone knows what a family is.

I work at an orphanage where kids come from all sorts of complicated situations.  Some were orphaned with no family to turn to and no one to care for them.  Some were abandoned by the only relatives they have.  Some have been passed from one orphanage to another their entire lives.  Some were sold into slavery.

You see, when you teach at an orphanage in Haiti, and you get to the part in your curriculum where you talk about family, you have to go into it realizing that to many of your students, the word “fanmi” (family) is an abstract – even non-existent – concept.

To approach the topic of family, my class read books about different types of families – big families, small families, biological families, adoptive families.  We discussed what families do together and how you don’t have to be biologically related to be family.  We emphasized the point that it isn't blood-relation that makes you a family.  It's love that makes you a family.

After one of our lessons, I sent the kids to their seats to draw pictures of what they like to do with their families.  That’s when Jo (the biological daughter of two of the foster parents in our children's village) looked at E (one of the residential children) and said enthusiastically, “that’s my brother!”

My heart melted.

When Jo looks at E, she doesn’t see a classmate who comes from a different town.  She doesn’t see a guest in her house or just another kid who lives with her.  She doesn’t see an orphan.

She sees a brother.

She sees family.

She sees love.