Choose your cliché:
Good things come to those who wait. Patience is a virtue. Anything worth having is worth waiting for. Or perhaps, no good deed goes unpunished.
Naugatuck’s Bryan Nurnberger epitomizes all of them.
In his effort to help Casa Hogar, a struggling Mexican orphanage for special needs children, Nurnberger left Naugatuck in July aboard a yellow school bus filled with medical supplies, toiletries, clothing, toys – and 80 individually personalized quilts for each child.
But while the first leg of the trip – from Naugatuck to Texas – took only a few days, the last leg – from Texas to Oaxaca, in the central Mexican mountains – took more than six months. That’s how long it took the stubborn, determined Nurnberger to wade through a sea of red tape.
The paperwork snafu developed because no one had ever tried to do what Nurnberger was trying: haul a busload of donated goods across the border into the heart of Mexico. There was no rule book for this, no set of established regulations to adhere to.
Mexican officials literally were making it up as they went along, at least in part, Nurnberger believes, to discourage him.
Fat chance.
“The Mexican government is hoping we’re going away and we won’t,” he declared during an interview in January, when he briefly returned home.
Instead, having jumped through every hoop, dotted every i and crossed every t – and sometimes doing it all over again – it was Nurnberger who had Mexican officals saying, “No mas.”
So, on Jan. 22 with a “several hundred-page permit” in hand Nurnberger and his bus finally crossed into Mexico.
Nurnberger who publishes a Web log complete with pictures on his organization’s Web site, www.simplysmiles.org, picks up the story from there:
“With Mexican permissions in hand, the Mexican customs officials pulled us aside and we went in to wrap things up with Alma, the customs agent who has been our salvation through al of this. Since our application was all in order, we proceeded to the unloading dock for our inspection.
“Alma warned us that she has seen the inspectors pick through every item and scrutinize the smallest detail. Prepared for this, we sat and watched them cross check the vehicle ID number on the bus, the title, and the application. When this was done, to our absolute delight, they said that we were good to pass as soon as the boss signed our permit.
“Well, we waited three hours in the bus, thinning all along we were waiting for this signature. As it turned out, word had gotten out of our project, and two Mexican newspapers were there to cover the crossing, and we were waiting not for the signature, but for them to arrive.
“Kind of goes to show how unique and groundbreaking this endeavor was , and just why they had to invent the wheel to get us across.”
The best was yet to come, but before the bus actually pulled into Casa Hogar it would take some 26 hours of nonstop driving. Interstate 84 at rush hour was never like this. (Well, maybe a little like it.): “Potholes the size of pools, Cliffside roads with no guardrails, double tractor trailer trucks coming at you at high speeds on a narrow road, a desert, a jungle, mountains with snow, teenagers with guns, burros, bikes, walkers, fires in cans to mark drop offs…”
But nothing was going to stop Nurnberger from his appointed round. Pulling into the orphanage compound on January 24 made it all worthwhile.
“The kids have been waiting since July for this moment, and they lined both sides of the road, screamed as we passed and ran behind the bus as we drove it into the center of Casa Hogar. When the door opened, all the children rushed in, hamming into the bus, yelling, and piling on top of us with hugs and a million questions.
“Simply put, the actual moment went way beyond any fantasy of what it would be like.”
Finally at his destination, Nurnberger could have gloated over his victory, accomplishing something truly noble and remarkable despite the immense odds and towers of paperwork stacked against him.
It just isn’t him, though. Instead, he thanked others.
“As I walked into Casa Hogar this morning, there was for the first time a feeling that this endeavor had finally bore fruit…
“All of you made this happen, and all of you are responsible for the improvements in the lives of these children that this bus and its cargo are making possible. Thank you doesn’t even begin to express our gratitude or show what exactly you have done…
“Inadequate as it may feel right now, I thank you and the children thank you.”
David Krechevsky, Naugatuck Valley bureau chief, can be reached at (203) 729-4756 or by e-mail at dkrechevsky@rep-am.com
