Leader-Post: Regina group helped build El Salvador homes

Farm Credit Canada employees from Regina pose during a recent trip to
Guadalupe, El Salvador where they built homes for Habitat for Humanity.

Photograph by: Courtesy Carmen Cochrane, handout

After spending a week doing hard labour under the beating sun in a foreign country, the only thing on Robert Jerrett’s mind was how much he learned.

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The team



One of the work sites in Guadalupe, El Salvador.

Photograph by: Courtesy Melanie Lightfoot, handout



Team leaders

• Greg Stewart, President and CEO, Farm Credit Canada (also on the Board of Directors for Habitat for Humanity Regina)

• Rémi Lemoine, EVP and Chief Operating Officer, Farm Credit Canada





Volunteers



The Regina team pose during a recent trip to Guadalupe,
 El Salvador where they built homes for Habitat for Humanity.

Photograph by: Courtesy Melanie Lightfoot, handout

• Derwin Arnstead

• Kim Belhumeur

• Thomas Blair

• John Boyle

• Derek Cherneski

• Carmen Cochrane

 • Adam Coons

• Nadine Frank

• Elizabeth Henry

• Rosalie Higgins

• Robert Jerrett

• Melanie Lightfoot

• Kara Martinson

• Katharine Vander Laan


Exclusive additional comments

Robert Jerrett: "You come home here in Regina and we just take for granted that when you go into the bathroom, you turn the faucet and water’s going to come out or things like that."

The team moving the cement mixer to the next work site in
Guadalupe, El Salvador.

Photograph by: Courtesy Melanie Lightfood, handout

Carmen Cochrane: "I learned about my limitations and my ability to move past those. I did some physical things that I never thought I’d be able to do last week and I lifted things I didn’t know I could lift and I carried bricks I didn’t think I had the capacity to carry.

"The thing I learned most, though, was about how connected our cultures are, even though we’re very, very different."

 

John Boyle: "It was something I was thinking of maybe trying later in my life, but the opportunity came up with two people who live in Regina who were going to lead a team to El Salvador and that was maybe a safer way to try it."



A local girl in Guadalupe, El Salvador where
 the team helped build homes for Habitat
for Humanity.

Photograph by: Courtesy Carmen Cochrane,
handout



Boyle said it was a good experience.

 “(It was) an extremely rewarding and a solid check on reality and what really matters in life," said Boyle.

“We could see that we made a visible difference for those people, if nothing else in that being a sign that they aren’t alone in the world.

"So when you look at the work that we accomplished, it might not look like that much, when you measure, you know, we made some progress on three different houses, but I think from their discussions with us that it’s important that they see the rest of the world as helping them. That they aren’t alone in the world in spite of their disasters that they’ve suffered.”


A local boy in Guadalupe, El Salvador where the team helped build homes for
Habitat for Humanity.

Photograph by: Courtesy Carmen Cochrane, handout