Mayor John Warner, Hanging out at The Grace

Most Amazing Grace regulars are familiar with the many hats of John Warner:  co-founder of Summit Huts, Town Mayor, dentist, early AM Peak 8 skinner, civic-minded citizen, enthusiastic participant of many Bump Buffets – the list could go on to fill a page.  The staff at the Grace also knows and loves Warner for his generous contributions to our workload:  He’s the only Mayor we know who leaps in to help bus tables, greet customers, and wash dishes if he happens to be here when we get slammed and in the weeds.

Warner thinks of the Grace as a community asset;  we like to think that Warner, likewise, is a kind of touchstone for our town. In recognition of his generous spirit, the Grace is shining a light on his good deeds for our upcoming “Good At The Grace” community philanthropy day. Dr. Warner will be returning to the Highlands region of Guatemala in May 2011 to work with Global Dental Relief, a Denver-based non-profit with whom he previously worked in 2006 at a New Orleans East Side clinic after Hurricane Katrina. The focus of the Guatemala clinic will be restoring teeth for villagers who otherwise could not afford dental care.  Warner expects to treat 15-20 people per day.

The 2010 Winter GOOD AT THE GRACE day will be on December 26^th, 2010, which, incidentally, is John’s 60^th birthday. Come on by and see us- all net profits and donations to the Tip Jar will go towards Dr Warner’s May 2011 Global Dental Relief trip.  Read up on his upcoming trip below!

You’ve traveled several times to Guatemala to offer free dental care to poor communities.   Why Guatemala?  And how does this work fulfill you?

I have always been interested in Central America, especially Guatemala, because of their decades long civil strife and suffering and the USA’s clandestine involvement via the CIA. The people who I have met and treated are wonderful. They are happy with a simple life and simple things. They have a grace and serenity that is important for a North American like me to experience.

What are the biggest needs of the people you treat?

Guatemalan dental patients are like any patients in that they need preventive care with an emphasis on education about diet, nutrition, and home care. The culture of extracting teeth vs. restoring teeth needs to change as well. I would really like to see more outreach from the urban centers into rural Guatemala, but unfortunately Guatemala is torn by discrimination against the rural citizenry by urban citizenry. Additionally, rural youth ought to be invited to the urban centers and trained in all types of health care. Perhaps a “Physicians Assistant” like model for medicine and dentistry in rural Guatemala.

Last August, a longtime volunteer and Dental Director of Global Dental Relief, Dr. Thomas Grams, was killed in Afghanistan while working with the International Assistance Mission. How do you think this will affect Global Dental Relief’s work around the world?

I never met Dr. Grams, but he was beloved and very devoted to the dental needs of the impoverished world. I am sure he will be missed not only for his vision and work, but because of the sheer numbers of people he cared for over the years. I’ve probably cared for 300 patients in my work in Guatemala; this pales in comparison to his contribution. He has probably touched the lives of tens of thousands of people.

Is there a specific story from your volunteer that’s struck a deep chord in your heart?

I have become a Facebook friend with a young man from Guatemala. His name is Benedicto and he lives on the non-resort side of Lake Atitlan. He is an artist, community activist, and volunteer for his region of Guatemala. He is worldly because he has been to the US and elsewhere to study English and develop his art, yet he always goes back to his region/village to assist his community as much as he can. He cares for a disabled brother, several sisters, his parents, and his community. He always has a big beautiful smile and a terrific attitude about his life and his circumstances.

PJ Visits With A Former Patient in the Langtang

Doc PJ recently returned from a month-long trip back to the Langtang. We wanted to share a glimpse  of the work which your generous donations helped support.   Pre-natal vitamins and Safe Delivery Kits were distributed to 100 pregnant women; nine thousand people were given treatments of parasite medicine , Vitamin A, and toothbrushes; 900 consultations for more substantive treatments were provided, and a handful of patients were sent on to Kathmandu for conditions that could not be treated in the field.

Here at The Grace, we’re deeply humbled by the spirit of service of so many of our customers, and  proud they call the Grace their home away from home. On this day of thanks, we want to extend ours to all of you:  For your continued patronage of the wonderful, crazy mix of stories, laughter, conversation and good food that makes up The Grace, and for your wonderful, generous support of the good deeds of our great customers.  We hope all of you enjoy a beautiful day of grace.

Several weeks ago, I sat on the edge of a rim high above Moab and cheered on friends running the Red Hot, a 31-mile trail race west of town.  Snow blanketed the landscape in all directions; the slickrock was coated with mud, snow, and ice.

About two thirds of the way through the pack, we watched a runner come striding by.  His gait was different than the others: he had a prosthesis from the knee down.  In Breckenridge, thanks to the vision of our local adaptive sports organization, we see disabled athletes every day on the ski slopes.  In 30 years of long distance trail running, I’d never yet encountered a runner with a prosthesis on the trails.

As he ran by us, he stopped, looked out over the miles of canyons and mesas to the west, and smiled vibrantly. “Wow. Now that’s an amazing view!” he offered.  In reply, a friend and I, who’d just run up along the edgy Portal Trail, said “It is!  But you should check out the other side as well.”  He took our words to heart, and scrambled up the slickrock behind us to the cliff edge. He peered over it to the expansive view of Arches, the La Sal Mountains, and the Colorado River to the east.  “Holy Crap! “ he said,  awed by the exposure and beauty.  “You weren’t kidding!”

As the guy with the prosthesis took off down the trail, we marveled at his speed and dexterity on the icy slickrock. He ran beautifully. But what was also beautiful was the way he immediately embraced the suggestion to check out a different, potentially beautiful new view. Watching him reminded me that though the challenges we experience while competing in the sports we love might shift because we’ve lost a limb– the beauty and joy, adrenaline rush, and sense of accomplishment we experience remain.

With a bow of respect to that unknown Moab runner -and all the other athletes who have adapted so courageously to new lives- Amazing Grace is dedicating our spring “Good at the Grace” donation day to the Breckenridge Outdoor Education Center (BOEC).  In conjunction with the BOEC’s upcoming March 19th Banff Film Festival fundraising event at the Riverwalk, we’ll be dedicating all of Amazing Grace’s net profits, tips and salaries from Tuesday, March 23rd to this local organization, whose mission is to expand the potential of people with disabilities and special needs through meaningful, educational and inspiring outdoor experiences.

On Tuesday, we’ll also be celebrating the launch of our new website- www.amazinggracebreck.com- crafted for us by our wonderful partners, Wilson Lass. The site will feature a growing collection of stories on other inspiring locals and organizations this summer, so we hope you’ll check us out online!

You can learn more about the BOEC’s work at www.boec.org. In addition, you can find thoughtful and inspiring photographs capturing the talent, courage and grace of current Paralympians, elite athletes with physical disabilities,  on the galleries of photographer and longtime BOEC staff Joe Kusumoto at www.kusumotophoto.com. Joe is currently in Vancouver, documenting the Paralympics.

Adaptive Sports (Costume Race Day), Durango. Kate Lapides, 2001

We started this blog as a way to spread the good we’ve been cookin’ up just a little further afield. We want to share the other things the Grace is passionate about. Mostly, we want to talk about our amazing customers, to shine a spotlight on their stories of adventure, beauty, and grace. We feel privileged to know many incredible thinkers, creatives, athletes and deeply humble, altruistic souls. We’re honored that they are part of the extended Grace community.

Our first feature, an interview with local Breckenridge physician and loyal Grace supporter Craig Perrinjaquet -”Doc PJ”, took place in September, 2009.  One of PJ’s volunteer projects -a small medical clinic in the Langtang region of Nepal established in 2006, will also be the beneficiary of a new philanthropy project we’ve started at the Grace.  Called “Grace For Good“, we’ll be choosing one day a season to donate funds to a non-profit who‘s a little bit like us- small in stature, but enthusiastically spreading some goodness through the world in a joyful, big-hearted way.

On December 22nd, 2009, we’ll be donating 100% of our net profit, tips and pay to the Langtang clinic, which  provides free basic medical care to approximately 1500 Nepalis annually.  We hope you’ll enjoy this small glimpse of the good Doc’s good work around the globe.

Come and visit us next Tuesday, December 22nd, to delight in our good-for-you food, while helping us spread some goodness across the globe!

COMPASSION = ONE SKINNY LOCAL WITH A BIG BIG HEART

What do Tamang tribesmen, bugles, Pygmies and Alexander Graham Bell have in common? Local physician Doc PJ’s goodwill.

Physician and longtime local Craig Perrinjaquet (Doc PJ) pedals into Amazing Grace every morning before work to scarf up a fresh-from-the-oven scone. Then he grabs the bugle that lives on top of the Grace’s aging fridge, leaps out the door, and trumpets out his daily enthusiastic endorsement:  “Fresh Buttermilk Mango ( or buttermilk strawberry, or chai chocolate chip ) scones!  They’re really, really, really good!”

Twice a year PJ misses his morning ritual in order to spread a different kind of message. When he boards his flight to West Africa next week, it will be simply one more leg on a long, altruistic journey of extending medical work to communities in need.  He’s worked with refugees in Darfur, with tiny collectives deep in the Honduran jungle, and Buddhist villages in Nepal. For our first issue,  PJ discusses two decades  of dispensing his version of grace.

Much of your volunteer work has been in Honduras.
I’ve been going to Honduras since Hurricane Mitch. Last spring was my 15th trip. I go to a very remote area of the Patuca National Park, near the Nicaragua border, that has no access by road.  So we go by 4WD vehicle, and then mule, and then canoe, and then hike a day or two (through the jungle, by machete) to deliver some very basic health care to people who don’t have access to it.  We provide mass treatment for parasites, dispense Vitamin A, treat whatever acute infections there may be. Provide birth control to women that request it. Prenatal vitamins. Do public health education.  Long term- we’re bringing nurses from the regional health centers out there to do more women’s health care and vaccinations.

My nickname was “El Coleta “- which means the the guy with the ponytail.  I think it took them a couple of years before they knew I was the same white guy coming back. But now they definitely recognize me and are very warm to my returning. It’s very fun.

Can you speak a little about your upcoming trip to West Africa?”
I’ll be going to Cameroon to work with a tribe of Baka Pygmies.There’s a mining company that by law, has to provide some development back to the local community.  And the local community are these 40 to 60 tribes of rainforest people, And they’re tiny.

It will be a bit of a scouting mission to find out what the needs of those communities are, and to find out what resources are available there. And then to help both sides of that equation- the people with the resources, and the people that need them -work out a system where they can be delivered in a sustainable way.
A number of years ago, you worked in Nepal…
About 10 years ago.  Karen Lapides and I went to Nepal, and we worked in the hill country. We had some extra time, and explored up into the Langtang area…and found that they had no medical care either.  And we did a little bit of medical care, a little bit of education, with some Tibetan Buddhist Tamang tribes..

A couple of years later, when they got  a telephone, the only telephone number anybody had was mine.  I felt like Alexander Graham Bell:  I get this call in the middle of the night:  “Hello this is Thiley Lama!  I am calling from Langtang!  How arrrrre you!”   Then, sometime later, another call- asking if I would send his son to medical school.   I thought about it for a about a minute, and then said “Sure. “

I was able to send some money to a Nepali medical school to cover his son’s tuition. His family paid for all his other living expenses. Now, he (Mipsang, the son) is finished his medical school and his residency, and we’ve built a small building in an ancestral home of his great great grandfather to be a clinic.  We’ve rebuilt the home: It’s a very auspicious place for him to use as a clinic to serve the local people.

That’s just been a fabulous project.  It’s kind of been a dream.  When people try to do development, the challenge is always getting the people trained in an area where they are going to want to stay to work.  If anyone’s traveled to a Third World country,  they’ve seen schools and clinics that have been built with good intentions that have been abandoned or are in disrepair – because they haven’t developed the human resources. So to start with the human resources, and then have the local people build the building, has really been a great success story.

And several years ago you worked in the Sudan….
Two years ago I worked in Darfur, which is in the western part of Sudan. I had just come back from Honduras and had read  a book called The End of Poverty. They talk about the  one out of six people who live on less than a dollar a day, people who just have no opportunity to even get a hold of the bottom rung of the ladder to pull themselves out.  I decided I needed to  go work somewhere really really poor, really really bad.

It was pretty bad:  Refugee camps with hundreds of thousands of people: the violence was still fairly intense. There were some days when I had to stay in the bunker and couldn’t really go out. It was a fascinating experience for me.  But frustrating  in a way- because of the violence, I wasn’t able to work and do as much as I would’ve liked to have done.  In the middle of a war zone it’s really hard. I mean, one skinny white guy showing up with dental tools to pull teeth isn’t enough;  you need big government interventions to make those kind of changes.  Like United Nations, UN Peacekeepers- on a bigger scale then I can really be involved with.  But …pygmies?  A little group of pygmies? I think I can help ‘em a lot. So that’s where I’m headed next!

The goal with all of these projects, really, is to find people within the country that can do the work, and just need a little boost – need a little money from the outside, or a little bit of expertise from the outside. And sometimes, just kind of enthusiasm and encouragement from the outside to create some structure for them to be able to take care of themselves. So, I ‘m always looking for how I can be obsolete ….as soon as possible. That’s really the goal.

Doc PJ article, PDF