They’re
sort of there, but they’re not. They had about as
much relevancy to my life as the Mars rover. Until two
weeks ago. It turns out that those British officers didn’t
forget. They remembered the children. Their follow-on team
got in touch with me two weeks ago. The new batch of them,
here for a training exercise for the Georgian army, wanted
to see Dzegvi for themselves. So they did.
They
are from a unit called “The Rifle Volunteers”.
To me, used to such ordinary names as 1st Division, 2nd
Armored and the like, that is a real army name. A bunch
of them are in Iraq these days, but these guys were here
from England to train Georgian infantry. They are from
the southwest five counties of England. Their officers
are Eddie, Mick and Spanner. Spanner. Now there’s
a grunt’s name. Their sainted quartermaster is Brian.
I have disgracefully forgotten the name of their sergeant-major.
I can only apologize and hope that someone will remind
me. Tall, strong impressive fellow (aren’t all sergeants-major
impressive?), covered with tattoos, “evidence of
a misspent youth” he says. Yeah, that’s the
guy. There’s one in every movie, right? The guy who
said to me, when there weren’t very many children
there at the start of our visit, “Good thing, too,
or I might cry me eyes out”. No kidding. Tough guy.
We
took them out to Dzegvi twice. You should have seen them.
Several of the photos turned out better than I could have
hoped, but there is one in particular: Eddie, in fatigues,
is bending way over to spoon-feed a little girl. It will
be on next year’s calendar, if Eddie allows me. It
will be on my wall at home for the rest of my life. Did I
mention that these guys all have serious combat experience?
They do, much of it in the hellholes of Northern Ireland.
They know what the worst of the world looks like. They’ve
been there. They are also shining examples of how we can
all, any of us if we really want to, come out of the worst
of life and still offer the world a glimpse of the best.
Then they had to go home. If I’m really lucky, I’ll
get to meet them again someday. Before they went home they
visited me at the hotel. Twice. Well, not exactly visited.
Twice they brought a truckload -- truckload – of things
like food, supplies and warm things for the kids. Right now,
as I’m writing this, I can look around my room at all
the things they brought, piled high in every corner. Although
they couldn’t get out to Telavi, they OK’d my
request to divide the goodies up between the two homes. So
now, two homes will benefit from their loving generosity.
What’s more, their lads – they say things like “lads”,
and “cuppa” and my own favorite “you lot” – gave
extravagantly from their own pockets. When times get cold
and lean this winter, we’ll have some extra cash to
help the kids make it through. British cash, from British
soldiers, most of whom never got to see even one of the children
they helped.
There’s still more. The British embassy’s defense
attaché here, Chris (that would be Lt. Col. Chris
Nunn, OBE, Royal Marines – also a helicopter pilot,
poor lad) is coming with us on Wednesday when we take the
donated supplies out to Dzegvi. Another tough guy, Falklands
and Northern Ireland vet and God only knows where else. It
will be his first visit to one of the homes and he wants
to see what all the fuss is about. Tough guys are such easy
touches. There is a chance that this may be the start of
a partnership with Brits here and in England. We’re
not counting our chickens just yet, but I think we may have
something good going with these fine folks.
Pat
Shearing, a kind and terrific British military advisor
here (could I make that up?) is coming with us to Dzegvi
on Wednesday, too. She went way out of her way to help
her lads help our kids. She told me a story tonight about
a soldier in The Rifle Volunteers who was here. Enlisted
woman, young mother, an Army cook, working very long hard
hours for darn little pay. She wanted to do something for
the kids. So she did. She donated a hundred bucks. A hundred
bucks. Her comment? “These
kids don’t have anything. I’m going home and
I’ll get some more money.” Ma’am, from
all of us, and from all of the kids who have no way to say
it, thank you and God bless you.
Here’s just one more anecdote. The Brits gave some
of their own uniforms to the kids. Well, mostly to the kids.
There is a volunteer doctor at Dzegvi, name of Kakha, who
lives the same poor life as the children. Kakha got a fatigue
shirt. He was so proud and happy. The sergeant-major called
him over, took the rank insignia off of his own uniform and
put it on Kakha’s new fatigue shirt. If Kakha was proud
before, he was absolutely beside himself then. That’s
the kind of guys these Brits are. They would give, they did
give, some very poor people the shirts off their backs. You
just can’t make up those kinds of stories.
All
of this – food, warm things, money, shirts off
their backs – and what was Eddie’s parting comment? “I’m
just sorry we couldn’t do more.” You did your
share, mates, and more. It’s enough for today. I hope
you had a decent trip back. The people you touched here will
never forget you. God willing, we’ll meet again.
Best wishes to all.
Love, Chuck
