From sleeping under a tree to feeding hundreds, a philanthropist’s story

Donahue Nelson knows all about survival. At age 10, he slept under a tree after being kicked out of the house by his grandfather.

His stepgrandmother never wanted him in her house, and so he found a tree close to a gully in the community of Moores, Clarendon, where he sought solace.

After seeking shelter in the outside kitchen of his grandfather’s home and being discovered there early one morning before he could slink away, he received a thrashing he can still recall, leading to his sleeping under a lime tree close to a gully.

Thankfully, his grandmother’s house was finally completed and he could go live with her, but the abuse he suffered saw him acting out during his teenage years.

“By then I was like one of those kids out of control, and she couldn’t really control me. I go to school when I feel like. I hung with the boys, them. I’d rather do that than go to school, but I end up in the gully cooking with guys and all that,” he reminisced.

Nelson is thanking God for the persons during his early years in Moores who ‘had his back’. He said that had it been a different community, he might have ended up with a police record or possibly dead as during his ‘wild years’, the respect residents had for his grandmother saw them treating him differently.

“My grandmother was like a mother to persons in the community, always assisting, so they had a lot of respect and love for her,” he shared.

Nelson said he started out working as a chef and later became a security guard, a job he had to ‘con his way’ into.

“After trying to get into the programme, and they asked my age, and I said 17, they told me I had to wait another year,” he said.

However, Nelson said he couldn’t wait that long, so he borrowed his friend’s birth certificate and got the job.

Recalling with humour how his youthful exuberance almost caught up with him, Nelson said there were times that they shouted his friend’s name and he couldn’t remember that he was supposed to be that person.

Nelson said his life has seen God’s hand at work from day one. After getting married and migrating, Nelson eventually started his own business as an events promoter.

Near misses

He has experienced many near misses, including beating cancer and surviving a bike crash that left him with broken ribs and a long road back to recovery.

Fast-forward to 2021, and Nelson is now into year two of an outreach exercise he started in his community of Moores, where he has been issuing care packages, feeding hundreds.

He said the idea to issue care packages to needy residents came after he decided to host a fundraiser in his backyard for a friend who had a medical condition and needed money to keep up with the treatment.

The fundraiser netted $11,000, and it was then that he thought he could do the same thing to help those in the community he was from.

With sponsorship from Sampars and proceeds from a fundraiser, Nelson presented 150 care packages last week to residents.

The packages contained, among other things, chicken and bread. In addition to the packages, recipients received, which Nelson gave from his own pocket.

Looking beyond the outreach, he is urging others to follow his example and give back if they can.

“It’s always good to try and give back. For me personally, I look at myself and I say ‘God comes to Moores and pluck me out and he takes me and helps me’, so it is only natural that I give back.”

cecelia.campbell-livingston@gleanerjm.com