Joy Hardt starts orphanage in Ghana

“I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything. But still I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” – Helen Keller

When faced with a seemingly insurmountable task, 22-year-old Joy Hardt didn’t give up.

During the summer of 2006, Hardt, a Spokane nursing student, went to Kpando in Ghana, Africa, as a hospital volunteer. She found grim conditions.

Appalled, she watched a newborn needlessly die because of inadequate staff nursing skills, despite her own intervention. “It was a ‘you’ve got to be kidding’ moment,” she said. “I couldn’t believe this still happens in the world.” There, AIDS victims and their children (some infected), are outcasts. Disabled children lack access to the most basic therapeutic help.

Hardt became friends with Richard Edem Adjordor, a well-connected, youth-involved Ghanaian. “We began diagramming an AIDS orphanage and farm for Kpando while on a hellish 14-hour bus ride,” she said. Hardt spent the next two years and $10,000 of her own money bringing her vision to life, sometimes feeling overwhelmed.

She traveled twice more to Ghana to slog through endless bureaucracy, unkept promises and a maze of details. Finally, the HardtHaven Children’s Home opened this past June.

“HardtHaven offers a loving home, treatment and education to AIDS victims’ children 15 and under.

Wisely, Hardt didn’t go solo, but found support and assistance from her parents Peter and Carlene Hardt, friends, hundreds of Americans and several Ghanaian nationals.

The orphanage Web site, www.hardthaven.org, reveals Hardt’s compassion and grasp of practical details. The Keller quote above is HardtHaven’s motto.

Hardt, a graduate of Cheney High School, doesn’t draw on sentiment for her Ghana project. “I don’t see myself as a caring humanitarian, a cuddler,” this pragmatist explained. “I care, but I’m a doer. Something needed to be done.”