Humanitarian experience for youth

By Deidre Fanene 08 August 2016, 12:00AM

The residence of a family at Alamagoto was a place of joy and excitement on Saturday.

It was where volunteers, families and friends witnessed the official handover of a home built by the Humanitarian Experience for Youth. The project cost $19,835 and it took only eight days to build.

Humanitarian Experience for Youth (H.E.F.Y) is a non profitable organisation in the United States.

It unites young people who travel to different places in the world to help. They are in Samoa this week.

Group leader, Jacob Earnest, said they build a fale in Samoa every time they come.

“There are four groups that come during the summer and this is the fourth fale that we have built and the next one will be built by the next group when they come,” he said.

“It is an L.D.S standard but it’s not officially affiliated with L.D.S but it’s church standards and the kids come for two weeks and they spend their own money to come here.

“So we come and we spend two weeks building the fale and interact with the community and it changes our lives forever.”

So how do they pick the families to help?

“We have a coordinator here in Samoa Molesi Vaoga and he works with the local community and the local L.D.S Wards to find out which families are most in need,” he said.

According to Mr. Vaoga there are certain criterias each family must satisfy.

“The most important qualification that each family have to meet is that they must own the land and the property that they are living at,” he said. “If the family have no source of income but the land that they are living is not theirs, then they will not be qualified for the project.

“So owning the land is the most important qualification with this project.”

By Deidre Fanene 08 August 2016, 12:00AM

Trending Stories

Samoa Observer

Upgrade to Premium

Subscribe to
Samoa Observer Online

Enjoy unlimited access to all our articles on any device + free trial to e-Edition. You can cancel anytime.

>