Happy Birthday, GTLI!

Four years ago, on October 3, 2007, GTLI was incorporated. I searched for a name that would reflect who we were – what we did – and was easy to remember. Guess which one of the three GTLI is not!!

It was just me – and several wonderful friends who agreed to serve on our Board because they believed my dream could come true. We wanted to:

1 – Figure out how to provide an option for the Hamar to have a healthy life.
2 – Create a model for sustainable development - measuring impact vs. tangible deliverables.
3 – Provide an easy “safe” way for people lucky to be born in a free society to assist people not so lucky in birth.

I never focused on "how much there is to do." I just started doing - and later realized the tremendous amount of assistance and broad-based involvement necessary to really make a significant impact, not only in the lives of the Hamar, but in the way development assistance is doled out. And, I truly didn’t know the “right” way; I just intuitively knew what didn’t work.

It’s one thing to have faith in one’s ability to make things happen. It’s something else, however, when the right people show up at the exact moment when you most need them. And believe me – I am definitely needy!

So, I’d like to say thank you to some of the people around the world who have not only helped my dream take shape, but who truly make us a Global Team: Margaret from Australia, Henrique from Brazil, Delphine from France, Peter from Germany, Weynshet, Solomon (pictured above with his helpers), staff from Ethiopia, and my wonderful family and friends from America.

I’m sure Asia will soon join our team but what about Antarctica??