My friend from Haiti, who now lives in the U.S., posted about the recent earthquake in Haiti and asked about charities she could support to help those in need. I logged her request in my mind, made an inquiry to a friend who once lived in Haiti, and moved on to other things.

Then I heard a word. Nūälä. I’d never heard it before. I didn’t know what it meant. I dismissed it, but it came back. I tried to continue what I was doing, but the word wouldn’t go away.

I typed n-u-a-l-a into my search engine wondering if I’d spelled it correctly. How would I know? I’d only heard it in my mind. Next to it, I typed ‘Haiti’ and hit Return. There was exactly one hit. When was the last time you searched the internet and got a single result?

I saw a blog post from Nuala describing her visit, as a board member of an Ireland-based charity, to an orphanage in Haiti. It was titled, “How We Spend Your Money.” I was dumbfounded. 

Though stunned by the chain of events, I didn’t want to contribute to a charity or recommend it to a friend without more information. I sleuthed around the internet, sent off a few emails, and soon found myself on a Zoom with Nuala, a spiritual, funny, engaging woman who lived in County Cork where my O’Driscoll ancestors came from. 

“It’s pronounced Nūlä,” she said, correctly my pronunciation. “You probably heard it the way you did so you’d spell it correctly when you typed it into your computer.”

If these things didn’t happen to me, I might not believe them. We are all so much more connected than we realize.