HESSTON, Kansas - It's left tens of thousands of lives in ruin, but for 7 Haitian orphans, the devastating earthquake has led to new lives here in Kansas.
"This is my little boy," exclaimed Wanda Miller shortly after seeing 17-year-old Junior walk off a plane at the Kansas City International Airport.
Wanda and Scott Miller started the process of adopting Junior when he was just ten years old and living in an orphanage in Haiti where sometimes he was given a meal every other day.
"Oh I'm happy! Very happy!" said Junior Miller through a thick French accent during a party at his new home in Hesston welcoming him to Kansas.
The Millers' heard about Haiti Lifeline Ministries through their church several years ago. A political uprising and an unreliable Haitian kept delaying the adoption. They were able to finalize the paper work back in November and were waiting word on when Junior would come to the United States.
Then the earthquake struck. "If we don't get him now, we'll never get him," Scott Miller remembers thinking.The team of Americans working on the adoption was ready to fly back to the U.S. empty handed until a woman with the team fainted from the heat. The woman and a handful of Americans missed the flight. They used the extra day to successfully lobby the Haitian government to let Junior and the other orphans leave.
"If the girl wouldn't have fainted it wouldn't have happened," said Scott Miller. "They'd still be there. That's how close this thing was - how much of a miracle."
"It's a miracle of god," added Wanda Miller.
The Millers' say when Junior saw his new bedroom; his eyes welled up with tears. His homeland may be in ruins but now for the first time he has a home.
