In this sea­son of giv­ing, car­ing and shar­ing Guardian Me­dia Lim­it­ed has dis­trib­uted ham­pers to the less for­tu­nate, putting a smile on each of their faces.

The items in the ham­pers were do­nat­ed by mem­bers of staff.

The plights of three of the four re­cip­i­ents were fea­tured in the Trinidad Guardian and broad­cast on CNC3 News in 2024.

Char­maine Sa­hadeo ex­ud­ed joy when she re­ceived her ham­per last Fri­day.

In April, Sa­hadeo who suf­fers from neu­rofi­bro­matosi- a ge­net­ic dis­or­der that caus­es tu­mours to form all over the body- had a ma­jor trans­for­ma­tion when doc­tors based in the Unit­ed States re­moved a large por­tion of her over­sized growths.

For more than two decades, Sa­hadeo’s life had been a roller coast­er, as she strug­gled with the bumps which re­strict­ed her move­ments and caused im­mense pain.

“All these years. I wait­ed for this. So this is a per­fect Christ­mas present to get all those bumps off so I could be able to see and breathe. I could not have asked for a bet­ter Christ­mas.”

Sa­hadeo thanked GML for the ham­per, promis­ing to spend her Christ­mas with fam­i­ly and loved ones.

The jaws of strug­gling sin­gle par­ent Ke­ston Et­ti­enne and his 14-year-old- twin daugh­ters Shan­tai and Sheimia dropped when their ham­per was de­liv­ered to their Laven­tille home.

The twins came to the na­tion­al spot­light af­ter their Rose Hill Pri­ma­ry School, grabbed head­lines in 2022 for the rapid gun­fire it faced by war­ring gangs in their com­mu­ni­ty.

The con­di­tions un­der which the Et­ti­ennes live are al­so not ide­al.

But de­spite their chal­lenges, the girls passed for Bish­op’s Cen­te­nary Col­lege af­ter sit­ting the Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment ex­am­i­na­tion.

“Re­spect to the givers and those who tru­ly lend a hand in help­ing oth­ers,” Ett­ti­enne said.

“This ham­per means a lot to us.”

When the twins were asked what gifts they want­ed for Christ­mas, Sheimia re­spond­ed, “All we want is for dad­dy to be hap­py. We have a roof over our heads and our fa­ther. Noth­ing else mat­ters.”

Pauline Bharat smiled from ear to ear when her ham­per was dropped off at her Cou­va home.

Bharat’s world was turned up­side down when her six-year-old son Sean Luke was mur­dered in a cane­field me­tres from her home.

The mur­der which at­tract­ed re­gion­al and lo­cal at­ten­tion was record­ed as one of the coun­try’s most bru­tal.

Still await­ing jus­tice for the sav­age killing, Bharat, 62, is faced with an­oth­er bat­tle. 

Her vi­sion is fad­ing in her left eye fol­low­ing an in­jury.

Bharat ap­proached the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices for a food card and dis­abil­i­ty grant but was re­ject­ed.

The min­istry re­ject­ed Bharat’s claim on the grounds that she has the abil­i­ty to earn a liv­ing, de­spite a re­port from a pri­vate oph­thal­mol­o­gist which showed that both of her eyes had di­a­bet­ic mac­u­lar oede­ma (DME) with ex­u­dates.

DME is an eye con­di­tion that de­vel­ops when ex­ces­sive flu­id builds up in the mac­u­lar caus­ing it to swell. It may al­so cause vi­sion loss.

Bharat who lives alone said she ap­pre­ci­at­ed the ham­per, stat­ing she would pre­pare her­self a meal of fried rice, mac­a­roni pie and baked ham.

“It shows there is still love out there. I just want to wish every­one a Mer­ry Christ­mas.”

The fourth re­cip­i­ent was Crys­tal Grif­fith of La Hor­quet­ta.