One little act of kindness can go a long, long
way Two little acts of kindness can brighten
anyone's day Three little acts of kindness can
make a beautiful sound Many acts of kindness
Hi, and welcome back to season two of Tell Me
What Happened, the podcast that features people
from all walks of life talking about childhood
experiences that have impacted them as an adult.
I'm your host, Jay Rehack. And like you, I've
had my share of childhood experiences that have
impacted who I am today. Some of them great,
some of them not so great. Tell me what happened
is sponsored by Sidemind Ain't Publishing, publishers
of quality books, including Susan Salador's classic,
I've Got Peace in My Fingers. I have as my guest
today an old friend of mine. Actually, he's a
student of mine from 35 years ago. I met him
at St. Thomas of Canterbury when he came to our
school as a sixth grader. Many years have passed,
and I'm going to let Lawyer Darfor tell us his
story. Welcome to the show, Lawyer. Thanks very
much. Glad to be here. I'm really looking forward
to hearing your story, Lawyer. I'm so happy that
you're willing to do this, kind of reconnect
with me after all these years. I haven't talked
to you since whatever, probably eighth grade
when you graduated, I would say. I don't know.
It's been a while. And I'm hoping you're doing
well. Yes, I'm doing good. Fantastico. Well,
are you ready to tell your story? Yes. All right,
I'm going to get out of the way, lawyer. At the
end, I'm probably going to ask you how what you've
told us has impacted your life as an adult. But
take it away, lawyer. OK, so my name is lawyer
Darfur. And as Jay said, I was a former student
of his. back in 1986, in the sixth grade. And
basically, I just wanted to tell my story of
what's been going on in my life. So at the time,
I was a transfer student to St. Thomas at Canterbury.
So it was my first time at the school. I didn't
really have a lot of friends. I was trying to
get used to just a totally different environment.
I had originally grown up on the south side of
Chicago in Hyde Park, where it was predominantly
black or white, not too many other nationalities,
races. And I came to St. Thomas and living on
the north side, I was all of a sudden thrust
into a situation where I was around many different
people that I never... you know, had any type
of contact with. So, you know, I had, you know,
I knew or I should say that there were classmates
who were Hispanic, who were Asian, Indian. So
it was a new experience for me. Kind of hard
to all take in as I guess you would say a 12
-year -old who had never been exposed to any
other different cultures and nationalities to
be thrust into a classroom with people of many
different nationalities. So I think that was
an adjustment for me. It took a lot of time,
I would say, at least probably about three years
to understand and feel a little bit comfortable
with the people that I was around. At the time,
during the summers, I would go off to a summer
camp in Wisconsin. And when I aged out of being
a camper, they had a program for campers that
wanted to become junior counselors. So I was
signed up for the program and I did the years
worth of training. And at the end, I was officially
a junior counselor and my job at the time at
the camp was to be a cabin floater, which meant
that I was going to be assisting counselors with
the kids in those cabins. That same year that
I started as a junior counselor, They the camp
itself decided to start a pilot program of international
staff. So they had people coming from many different
countries, basically to learn what it's like
to live and work in America and just basically
dealing with with American kids. So they were
counselors and we were tasked with helping them.
It was. an eye -opening experience for me at
the time because up until that point, I had never
met anyone from Australia or from England for
any different country that I had seen on television
for that matter, except the kids in my classroom.
So it was a different experience for me. And
at the time, I thought it was kind of unique
and cool that I could be around those people
and kind of learn what it was like for them growing
up and how they did things and just hearing the
way that they spoke and learning their slang
and nomenclatures for a variety of different
things that we have in America. At one point
in life, I thought that I wanted to become this
world famous architect and It was actually what
I wanted to do was become an architect and just
build, you know, design and build buildings.
But after meeting people who were from different
countries, I decided, well, maybe I don't want
to just design and build stuff in the US, but
I want to be able to design and build stuff all
over the world. Well, going into high school
and doing an architecture program and realizing
that, okay, after I graduate, our instructor
told us, well, this is the same stuff you're
gonna see in college, so just be prepared. We
kind of scoffed it off and said, yeah, whatever,
we know this stuff, they're not gonna make us
do it over again. But it turns out that we did.
And at the time, I was not too thrilled about
that. I remember reading an article and it was
talking about construction management as a new
emerging career field. So right then and there
I decided, hmm, maybe I want to actually be involved
with the construction process and have more freedom
and liberty to move around the world basically
and manage projects. So I switched over to construction
management and During the time that I was in
the program, I met a girl who was part of an
exchange student program and she was from the
Philippines. So we started dating and when college
was done, she was going back to her country and
she invited me to come visit. So I decided, yeah,
I'll go and visit. Well, I went and visited.
I loved the environment of the Philippines. I
thought it was something new and different. And
her parents at the time owned a construction
company, a fairly large one in the Philippines.
And I asked her, would you be able to get me
a job? So she spoke to her parents, and her dad
offered me, I guess, a pseudo internship. And
the rest is history from there. I worked there.
And upon returning to the States, I got to work
for a number of different companies. doing a
variety of different projects. And I basically
got to travel the world and meet a lot of different
people. I would say that I also got to experience
a lot of different cultures. Just from my career
experiences alone, I've had the opportunity to
build projects in 10 different countries and
four different continents. I've worked on projects
in 22 states and in six Canadian provinces. And
so in all my travels, I learned a lot of different
things. And one of the things I can really take
away from my experiences is that no matter where
you're from, what your background is in life,
anywhere in the world, people still hold the
same values that I would say all of us seem to
share, and that's family values, friendships,
life, kids, the cultural environment. It's all
the same no matter where you go. Sure, people
might be from a different country and we might
think that you know, well, because they're from
here, they don't seem to hold the same values
for a family or for kids or whatever, because
of, you know, let's say how they might raise
them in a certain particular sense. But that
doesn't mean that we don't share those same values.
I mean, everyone, regardless of where you are
in the world, still fundamentally knows, okay,
my parents are here. It's my job, my duty as
a child that when I get older, I should take
care of my parents. It's also their duty and
their responsibility to take care of their own
children as well. We go to work, we socialize,
and I don't think that there's any differences.
I would say the one thing that I've learned throughout
my journey, though, is that it's important for
us to understand each other, regardless of what
our religious beliefs are, regardless of the
color of our skin. We're all people. That's pretty
much it. There's no difference. And we're friends.
And I think we should try and treat each other
as friends all the time because I've made tons
of friends in my travels. Some of them I still
keep in contact with, I still see them, or we
exchange phone calls, birthday greetings, everything
under the sun. And I personally think that it's
nice that regardless of where I go in the world,
that I know that there's someone I can contact
with, I can contact and ask, hey, would you like
to grab a bite to eat for lunch, meet up for
dinner, do? little outings with them and their
families. And I think that that is important
for us as human beings to have these social interactions
with others and to value others in their personal
opinions and in their lives. Now, that's well
said, my friend. Well said. Listen, I got to
ask you one question. You've already answered
how it's impacted your life because you're a
guy who started off on the South Side and sort
of within a two cultural world maybe. And now
you've gone all over the world and you've experienced
a tremendous amount of multiculturalism and variety
of different human beings in terms of that and
understanding how close we are to one another.
But the one question I gotta ask you is, are
you still in contact with that? With that woman
from the Philippines who sort of got you on your
international journey or is that over? No, so
actually we're still in contact with each other
with the pandemic. I can say that we haven't
actually had a chance to. You know, just hang
out in the past four years, but we still do keep
in touch. Will exchange emails. Chat regularly.
And. That's about it, really. That's great. Well,
listen, I want to thank you, lawyer, for coming
on the show. I do want to especially thank you
because, to be honest with you, I messed up the
recording last week when we were doing this,
and you were kind enough to come back on and
do the show again. So thank you very much for
being on the show. I'm really happy that you're
doing well. Where are you right now, by the way?
You're not in Chicago, are you? No, I am currently
in Granger, Wyoming, which for those of you who
may not have a clue as to where Granger is, it
is on the southwest portion of Wyoming. I am
about two hours west of Salt Lake City. Oh, wow.
Wow. And then with your job, you travel all over
the world, you know. Where you go next or you
just wait for somebody to tell you hey, we need
you someplace else. How does that go? Most of
the time I would say that it's Hey lawyer, we
need you here on X date So I will get a little
bit of a heads up and other times it will be
Hey, you know, we have a project that's going
on just outside of Salt Lake City It's about
an hour east of Salt Lake City or an hour, sorry,
north of Salt Lake City. And since you're already
in Wyoming, could you shoot over there and take
a look at that project and possibly stay there
for a week or two? So usually that's what happens.
Well, thank you so much for coming on the show.
I really appreciate it. I really appreciate reconnecting
with you. It really brings me a lot of joy to
know that you're doing well. And I knew you would
because I knew you back in the day when you were
in sixth grade and you are a very, very intelligent
young guy. And now that you and I have talked,
I do remember you kind of transferred in. Truth
be known, I started at St. Thomas the Canterbury
approximately the same time that you transferred
in. So we both sort of were new to the school
at the time. And I'm glad you're doing well.
Thank you very much, and I'm glad to be a part
of your show. I hope that everything is going
well for you as well. I'm sorry for the technical
difficulty that I had on my end with my iPad
overheating and basically kicking me off and
trying to get back on again, hoping I didn't
screw everything up. Not at all, not at all.
Well, that's our show. I'd like to thank my former
student, Lawyer Darfur. for taking the time to
be on Tell Me What Happened. I'd also like to
thank our sponsors, Sidelining Publishing, publishers
of quality books. And finally, I'd like to thank
our listeners for tuning in. If you have a childhood
story you'd like to be on Tell Me What Happened,
just contact me at j -a -y -c -r -e -h -a -k
at gmail .com. That's j -a -y -c -r -e -h -a
-k at gmail .com. I'd love to hear from you.
Well, I'm going to end this show, as I often
do, with Susan Salador's one little act of kindness.
Until next time, this is Jay Rehack asking you
to stay safe out there and try not to hurt anybody.
of kindness can go a long, long way. Two little
acts of kindness can brighten anyone's day. Three
little acts of kindness can make a beautiful
sound. Many acts of kindness help the world go
round. One little loving word can go a long,
long way. Two little loving words can brighten
anyone's day. Three little loving words can make
a beautiful sound. Many loving words help the
world go One little seed zone can go a long,
long way. Two little seed zone can brighten anyone's
day. Three little seed zone can make a beautiful
sound. Many a can brighten anyone's day. Three
little children's laughter can make a beautiful
sound. Many children laughing help the world
go round. And many