Giving Advice for Employment

Heroes Remember

Giving Advice for Employment

Transcript

One of my favourite ones is being confronted with a machete wielding crowd in Haiti. My job as the engineer responsible for rebuilding the national power company had me in the slums of Haiti quite regularly and one day I came across a crowd of folks who were waving machetes in the air. So I stopped the truck and I got out and I walked over to them to ask them what they were doing and they said, “Well we’re unemployed and we want jobs.” And my response to them was that you’re in the slums there’s nobody here to do anything for you. “Tell you what to do, make up some signs and go two kilometres down the road to where the presidential palace is and have your little demonstration there.” So they thought that’s not a bad idea, we’ll listen to the Canadian. And off they went. I didn’t see them again until I ran into one of the folks about two weeks later and I said, “So how did it go?” And he said, “Oh it went great, we’ve all got jobs!” The interesting point is at the time that I was in Haiti it didn’t take a lot of cash for a fellow to keep body and soul together. For a single individual it took about five dollars U.S. a week and by the time you made ten dollars a week you were looking to get married and start a family. So, you know, what they didn’t need in Haiti was an awful lot of machinery, what they did need was an awful lot of manual jobs so, you know, things like rebuilding the roads with shovels, picks and wheelbarrows was the way to go for those guys.

Description

While travelling through the slums of Haiti, Major Mac Culloch provides advice to the locals with regard to finding employment.

Wayne Mac Culloch

Wayne Mac Culloch was born in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, in 1953 and grew up in Quebec. He began his studies at the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario, at the age of 18 and would serve as a military engineer in the Canadian Armed Forces for more than 40 years. During his long and varied career, Mr. Mac Culloch served across Canada and took part in three overseas deployments to the Balkans and one to Haiti before being medically discharged with the rank of major. Still having a passion to serve, he went on to work as a civilian employee with the Department of National Defence. Since 2004, Mr. Mac Culloch has volunteered his time and talents to help deliver the “Peace Module” during the Historica Encounters with Canada program in Ottawa. Week after week, he has engaged with youth from coast to coast and educated them about the sacrifices and achievements of Canadians who have served in uniform over the years.

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