In late February Ben and Esther took a trip to work with Patrice Millet, founder of of an innovative sports project in Port au Prince, currently supported by Children on the Edge. Here they talk about some of their experiences. 

"I thought I was already very familiar with the work of Patrice, having spent the last few years writing about the project" said Esther, "But actually seeing the massive impact a simple football project can have on children that vulnerable was amazing". 

The purpose of the trip was for communications and some general capacity building, so the start of the trip involved going along to a series of the football training sessions to get a feel for the day to day work. Each session was extremely professional and disciplined. Patrice always finished with an awesome pep talk, often focussing on good citizenship, working as a team and respecting others. The boys were completely transfixed throughout and always clapped at the end, which is a rare sign of respect in Haiti, meaning ‘I have learnt something, thank you for teaching me’.  

The discipline is well balanced with a good dose of fun. One session ended with piggy back races and spontaneous singing, spilling out into a Conga. At Children on the Edge we talk about bringing ‘life, colour and fun’ to children living in the worst conditions, and here it is really brought to life. Children living in abject poverty, living with loss, disease and violence, all in a conga line on their way to pick up a sack of food from the back of Patrice’s jeep. 

"The food parcels are given at the end of each training session and we can’t stress enough how vital they are" says Ben,  "We interviewed 8 boys who live in the tents and many of them said they only eat once a day". They also talked to one boy’s mother at her home in the camps. She described how she wakes up every day worried about where she will find food to cook for a family of seven. The parcel her son brings home will feed them for two days. 

One of the most moving experiences of the visit was taking 20 boys from the slums for the trip of a lifetime in the mountains. Patrice had described how these children had never been out of the city. Where he was taking them was to a place owned by a friend of his, who let us use it for the morning. It was a place that closely resembles paradise, with a beautiful pool overlooking breathtaking scenery.  

The whole morning the boys were yelling with excitement, splashing, playing, singing and dancing. Esther described how "With charity we usually give second hand shoes, send clothes that we don’t want or things we don’t need. There’s a place for that, because it’s practical, but here it was amazing to be able to take children who live in the worst of the worst conditions, and actually give them the best of the best". 

As a sobering contrast to this experience, the following afternoon consisted of a trip to the ghettos to visit one of the older boys. He lives in one tiny hot room, with one bed. Most of the 8 people that he shares with just sleep on the floor, and it was hard to imagine how there was even room for that. 

It costs about £100 to do one of these trips for 30 children. Obviously there’s various ways you can quantify what £100 can do in Haiti. It would buy around 16 food parcels or 15 footballs, but to be able to give these boys the time of their life for a day is priceless. 

Please find out more about the project we support in Haiti, or consider donating to the work out there. 

As 2011 drew to a close there was plenty of good news for Patrice Millet and his sports programme in Port au Prince. Children on the Edge supports Patrice with this innovative project which gives over 400 children in the slums of Haiti the chance to play football, be coached and encouraged, and receive a food parcel at the end of each training session to take home.

Not only was Patrice nominated as a top ten CNN hero but he was featured on Russell Howard’s Good News where all of the footage taken by CNN was screened on prime time BBC!

There’s also been some good news on the ground where it really matters. Recently funds have been raised for a bus, which has been desperately needed for years on the project. Not only does it help get the children to training and matches, but it enables Patrice to take them out on trips further out from the slums, to places they’ve never been able to see before.

“The kids had never been to these places yet so they were very excited and very, very happy to discover new landscapes,” says Patrice. “They are so happy and really enjoy the trips”.

We still need your support. Running costs for the bus are expensive and each daytrip means that food needs to be provided for the children.  Please take a moment to read more about the project and consider donating. 

US cable news channel CNN have this week selected Patrice Millet as a ‘CNN hero’. Their CNN hero awards are set up to honour everyday people who are changing the world, unique individuals who have made remarkable achievements for the benefit of others. 

Patrice set up the work we support in Haiti, and is a true hero. Five years ago, Patrice was told he was in the advanced stages of a rare bone cancer.  The Haitian businessman went through a stem cell transplant procedure in the US and after nine months of treatment, his cancer was in remission. 

When Patrice returned to Haiti he was determined use the time he has left to make a difference. He turned all his attention to helping children from the poorest slums in Port au Prince to have a brighter future.

"Every day you see so many kids in need, so many bad stories, tragic stories," said Patrice,  "All my life, I wanted to do something good for my country, for the kids. I said, 'This is the time. I have nothing to lose."

Patrice sold his construction supply business and started a project called FONDAPS, which stands for Foundation Notre-Dame du Perpétuel Secours (Foundation of Our Lady of Perpetual Help). The program uses football to help children stay out of trouble and learn valuable life skills. Patrice calls it "education by sport."

He braved dangerous areas and befriended the locals in some of the worst ghettos of Port au Prince, eventually building up a sports programme for 600 children who are are coached in football, receive free football kits and are given food parcels to take home. 

We support this remarkable programme as it helps some of the most vulnerable children in the world. Children in the slums of Haiti endured grinding poverty and were at risk from criminal gangs even before the earthquake hit. After the tremors they were made doubly vulnerable. 

The work Patrice is doing is a lifeline. He says; "To see the joy in the face of a kid when you know what he's living through ... that makes me happy.  It's so wonderful to see the progress they make in soccer, in their own life, in everything."

Read the full story on CNN and contribute to our work with Patrice.