Just two months after surviving two Category 5 Hurricanes, we are finally beginning to recover.
In the days following the devastation of Hurricane Irma we drove around the island to witness the damage it had done to many homes and businesses. People were distraught and a sense of hopelessness hung over the entire island. We knew that one of the major necessities would be food.
We began to ask everyone if they would donate the perishable food from their refrigerators since there wasn’t any electrical power and it would eventually spoil. And we just started cooking and didn’t stop. We set up a “Sit and Eat, Meet and Greet, Tell Your Story” where members of the community came and received a hot home cooked meal and shared their stories of loss, frustration and gratitude.
Who would’ve imagined that helping the community would turn into the amazing Robin Roberts of Good Morning America coming to our home here on St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands to spend time with us and talk about the volunteer work that we have been doing within the communities on the island.
Robin is now officially an Honorary member of Opi’a Taino International!
Hahom (Thank you) to everyone that has helped us on this journey thus far.
I do not even know how I ended up here, but I thought this
post was good. I don’t know who you are but definitely you’re
going to a famous blogger if you are not already 😉 Cheers!
We at Opi”a Taino are humbled because when we started cooking it was simply out of the need to help. We remembered after hurricane Marilyn in 1995 we sat waiting for the Red Cross Soup truck. Some days it did not show up a d we went hungry. I did not want that for anyone after Irma and Maria. Thank You Robin and everyone at Good Morning America along with all the viewers who made it all worth it.
Ps
I love the new footage