Alcan Cares :Bringing Family Together

Well, this feels either like a page one photo piece, or something, but, it is wonderful to find caring people hidden amoung large, impersonal corporations---people who bring alive values that companies profess to have...

Anyway, an 85 year old man I know was admitted to a care facility, after suffering a major stroke. "Joe's" memory is poor, he has trouble reasoning, he is weak in one hand. He doesn't understand who is taking care of his finances, or who put him there. It is a struggle for him to trust that his things and his money are all right; he needs lots of reassurance and kindness. And time.

Joe has no family here ; he left his native Balkan country after the war. He had been forcibly conscripted into the German army when they invaded. He escaped, was hauled back, and fought right up to the fall of Berlin. He had lost contact with most of the family in the old country except for a brother. Even the brother had not heard from him for several years.

He told me he had once worked for Alcan, up in Kitimat. He had come down to Vancouver many years ago but on a whim, I called Kitimat Alcan, and asked if they had a record of him with a next of kin.

I was put onto a woman in H.R. . She investigated, and found that they did still have a record, and an old address. She invited me to send her the letter, and she would send it on to the brother.

I wrote the letter and send it to her, enclosed in another envelope. Several weeks later, I got an email from the brother in ---. It had his address and phone number. I emailed the return., I printed out a copy for Joe. Since then, there have been phone calls and more emails, and offers of help and love from a family which still exists.
So, thanks, Alcan.