The LoHud Yankees Blog

Here’s the latest announcement from the Yankees about today’s HOPE Week event. Best one yet? Might be. Here’s the press release from the Yankees.

—

The New York Yankees are proud to continue HOPE Week 2011 (Helping Others Persevere & Excel) on Friday by celebrating 21-year-old John Lahutsky.

In the company of Yankees Manager Joe Girardi, John will be reunited on the TODAY show with Andrei Sullivan, 19, who was his best friend from the Moscow orphanage they grew up in. John and Andrei have not seen each other in person since Andrei was adopted in 1997.

Neither of the young men know they are about to be reunited. John has been told he is going on the show solely to speak about his experiences in the orphanage, and Andrei (whose entire family has been flown in from Michigan) has been told that his hotel gave his family free tickets to see the TODAY show.

Following their initial reunion, John and Andrei will take an hour-long NBC Studio Tour before joining Yankees players Mark Teixeira, Brett Gardner and Hector Noesi and Yankees coaches Kevin Long and Larry Rothschild in touring the Central Park Zoo followed by an outdoor lunch on the grounds. In the evening, they will be guests of the team for its 7:05 game vs. Baltimore at Yankee Stadium.

Please note that this reunion would not be possible without the support of Delta Air Lines, which has provided complimentary air transportation for the entire Sullivan family, including Andrei, his parents, Tom and Roslyn, his brother and sister, John and Sarah, and two teenage Russian orphans, Mikhail and Alexander, whom the family is hosting in their Michigan home this summer.

THE STORY OF JOHN LAHUTSKY

John Lahutsky, 21, was born prematurely at 6 months, weighing just two pounds. At 18 months, he was placed by his birth mother in the Russian orphanage system, which considered him an “incurable” due to his cerebral palsy.

His “Baby House” offered him no education or physical therapy. From the time he entered the facility until he was 5 years old, he was never taken outside the walls of the building.

Despite the horrendous treatment he received, he always looked after his best friend in the unit, Andrei, even teaching Andrei how to talk after picking up Russian from the few nurses that treated him with decency. Andrei was adopted in 1997, but John had to wait until 1999 before being adopted by Paula Lahutsky of Bethlehem Township, Penn., who read about him in a church newsletter.

John recently wrote a book, The Boy from Baby House 10, which details his experiences in the Russian orphanage system. His hope is that by telling his story, he can prevent the abuses he suffered from happening to others.

It’s an off day for the Yankees, but HOPE Week continues this morning on Staten Island where a lemonade stand is about to to get the Yankees treatment. Here’s the announcement from the Yankees. This one should be pretty incredible, and not only because there are supposed to be Sports Illustrated swimsuit models in attendance.

—

The New York Yankees are proud to continue HOPE Week 2011 (Helping Others Persevere & Excel) on Thursday by celebrating Megan Ajello.

Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman and Yankees players Robinson Cano, A.J. Burnett, David Robertson, Andruw Jones, Boone Logan, and Eduardo Nunez, along with coaches Mick Kelleher and Rob Thomson, as well as advance scout/head video coordinator Charlie Wonsowicz will visit Megan at her Staten Island home to help her raise money for the Special Olympics.

Brian Cashman along with Yankee Stadium carpenters will surprise Megan at her Staten Island home prior to her sixth-annual street-side charity lemonade sale with a custom-built lemonade stand. Yankees players, coaches and special guests will join her Staten Island community in helping Megan raise money throughout the day.

Food, karaoke and music will fill the street, and a dunk tank will be brought in for neighbors to dunk Yankees players for charity.

THE STORY OF MEGAN AJELLO

Megan Ajello, 17, is her neighborhood’s fiercest volunteer and community activist, donating presents from her Sweet 16 to Marine Toys for Tots and fighting for handicapped-accessibility for her local playground.

Her biggest battle, however, is against cerebral palsy and scoliosis, which have necessitated six major surgeries, including a spinal fusion. Since 2006 she has hosted a charity lemonade stand outside her home, which has grown from a gathering of neighbors raising a few hundred dollars to a must-attend event for people from as far away as upstate New York, which raised $4,000 last summer.

The latest Yankees announcement for the third day of HOPE Week was kind of lost in the shuffle because the team played a day game this afternoon, but here are the details from the Yankees.

—

The New York Yankees are proud to continue HOPE Week 2011 (Helping Others Persevere & Excel) on Wednesday by celebrating the Haitian refugees, aged 7 to 13, taken in by Ss. Joachim and Anne’s School in Queens, N.Y. following the country’s devastating January 2010 earthquake.

The Yankees will host the Haitian refugees for Wednesday’s 1:05 p.m. Yankees game, after which Yankees players CC Sabathia, Jorge Posada, Freddy Garcia and Bartolo Colon, along with Yankees coaches Mike Harkey and Tony Pena will join them for a Gray Line New York double-decker bus tour of Manhattan leaving directly from Yankee Stadium.

Stops will include the United Nations, where representatives of the body will greet the children, followed by the Empire State Building, where the children will participate in a ceremonial lighting of the building followed by a photo opportunity with the Yankees from the observation deck. The children and Yankees will then reboard the bus to visit Times Square.

The final stop will be at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, where Archbishop Timothy Dolan will give a tour of the building and have dessert with the children in his private residence.

THE STORY OF THE HAITIAN REFUGEES OF SS. JOACHIM AND ANNE’S SCHOOL

For 15 child refugees who endured the devastating earthquake in Haiti on January 12, 2010, it was the loving arms of Ss. Joachim and Anne’s School in Queens Village, N.Y., that took them in.

The children, now aged 7 to 13, arrived in New York with nothing, having lost loved ones and been witness to unspeakable horrors. All have taken to their new home and cherish their opportunity at an education. One child walks 45 minutes each way to school and another, who lost both of his parents, dreams of becoming president of his homeland so he can rebuild his nation. Even the school’s parochial vicar, Rev. Jean-Moise Delva, 34, was not spared tragedy as his Haitian elementary school collapsed, killing the parish priest who was his mentor.

Here’s the Yankees latest release about today’s HOPE Week event.

—

The New York Yankees are proud to continue HOPE Week 2011 (Helping Others Persevere & Excel) on Tuesday by celebrating the Tuesday’s Children Mentoring program.

Yankees players Mariano Rivera, Curtis Granderson, Phil Hughes, Cory Wade and Steve Garrison along with former Yankees Manager Joe Torre will honor Tuesday’s Children by surprising them at the Beekman Beach Club at the South Street Seaport for lunch, games, and a ride on the Delta Baseball Water Taxi. The boat ride will take mentors and mentees past the Statue of Liberty and on to Yankee Stadium, where they will be the Yankees’ special guests for their 7:05 p.m. game vs. Seattle.

THE STORY OF TUESDAY’S CHILDREN

During the tragic day of Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of children lost their parents and thousands of parents lost their children. As the 10-year anniversary of that dark day approaches, the voids created from the losses continue to be immeasurable.

Tuesday’s Children was founded in the year following the terrorist attacks to promote healing and recovery. The organization established a unique mentoring program that has helped to heal still-open wounds. Serving the greater New York tri-state region, its mentorship program supports relationships between affected children and adult role models who themselves have lost family as a result of tragic circumstances. To date, more than 175 children have participated in the program, including 50 who are currently part of active mentoring relationships.

The relationships support the emotional and social growth of the mentees as their mentors share coping skills and act as a shoulder to lean on. The pairs meet at least twice a month, and the get-togethers are informal, involving anything from going to the movies, playing at a park or just hanging out in the house.

For the mentors, the pain of losing a family member did nothing to dry up the reservoir of love in their hearts.

MENTOR OF THE YEAR PRESENTATION: During the beach party on Tuesday, Keith Pryde [R] from Middletown, N.Y., will be honored as Tuesday’s Children’s “Mentor of the Year.” He was matched with 10-year-old Robert in February 2008. One year earlier, Keith lost his sister in the April 2007 Virginia Tech campus shootings. His mentee, Robert, was born a month before his father, a foreign exchange broker at Cantor Fitzgerald, was killed on Sept. 11. Keith and his fiancée, Rebecca, are engaged to be married in September 2012, with Robert set to serve as their ring bearer.

This is the first day of HOPE Week. As usual, the Yankees have given the media some advance notice about their plans, but the details are embargoed until noon on the day of each event. Here’s the team’s announcement about today’s first event. As always, these are incredible stories.

—

The New York Yankees are proud to kick off HOPE Week 2011 (Helping Others Persevere & Excel) on Monday by celebrating Daniel Trush and Daniel’s Music Foundation (DMF). Yankees players Russell Martin, Nick Swisher, Francisco Cervelli, Hector Noesi and Chris Dickerson will celebrate the honorees by surprising them at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre prior to their Broadway debut. The players will rehearse with DMF singers and musicians, then take to the stage as part of the performance. The Yankees will then invite the group back to Yankee Stadium to sing the national anthem and attend that evening’s 7:05 p.m. game vs. Seattle.

The Yankees will be joined by former Yankee and Latin Grammy Award nominee Bernie Williams, Broadway stars from Anything Goes, Book of Mormon, Catch Me If You Can, Million Dollar Quartet and Wonderland along with other special guests, who will all lend their talents to the performance.

THE STORY OF DANIEL TRUSH AND DANIEL’S MUSIC FOUNDATION

In March 1997, one of five undiagnosed arterial brain aneurysms burst inside the head of then-12-year-old Daniel Trush. When he awoke after a 30-day coma, he could not speak or move, remaining largely incapacitated throughout his 341-day hospital stay.

Music was the most important part of Daniel’s healing process from Day 1. His father, Ken, sang to him in the hospital and kept music constantly playing on a bedside stereo. Upon returning home, Daniel embarked on music therapy classes, which sparked his mind, body and soul.

His transformation was so incredible that in February 2006, his family established Daniel’s Music Foundation (DMF), a not-for-profit organization which provides free music instruction to individuals with disabilities in the five boroughs of New York City. Programs are open to the widest range of individuals possible without limitations on age, disability or talent.

From one five-person class five years ago to 150 people in 26 on-site and three-off site classes today, DMF serves those with such disabilities as blindness, paralysis, autism, cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, brain injury and other developmental disabilities. Classes regularly perform outreach at their twice-yearly music celebrations and offer customized performances at schools, hospitals, rehabilitation centers and nursing homes.

The entire Trush family participates in DMF, including Ken, who oversees the operations and finances of the foundation, Daniel’s mother Nancy, who supervises the functioning of the classes, and Daniel’s brother Michael, who serves as a mentor and informal counselor to many of the participants. Daniel focuses on the music itself in addition to being the life force of the foundation.

“Daniel could have been a victim,” Ken said. “He could have been a cheerleader, giving motivational speeches about how far he has come. But that Knute Rockne stuff only goes so far. He works with our students every day. He gives those with disabilities a forum where they can prosper and be the people they were meant to be.”

On this Friday of HOPE Week, the Yankees are reaching out to the Arias sisters – Johanna and Melida – who have worked through hardships and homelessness to make their lives better through education and hard work. Alex Rodriguez, Robinson Cano, Ramiro Pena, Francisco Cervelli, Sergio Mitre, David Robertson and Tony Pena surprised Melida at her job at Wendy’s this morning, and the group will take both sisters on a surprise shopping spree at DKNY in Manhattan to outfit Melida for her freshman year of college and Johanna for future professional opportunities.

This one’s a pretty powerful. From the Yankees, here’s Johanna and Melida’s story:

For 16 years, the Arias women traveled from boardinghouse to rented room to homeless shelter and back again. While they never had much during that time, they always had each other.

Melida Arias, her older sister, Johanna, and her mother, Maria, were inseparable, pooling their change to put food on whatever makeshift dinner table was in front of them. They never went hungry, even if it meant tuna fish and rice every day for a week at a time.

Despite the obvious hardship of their situation, the sisters’ dedication to academics did not waver, and they remained committed to creating a better life for themselves someday. For many homeless teens, college is a fairy tale in a book kept on a shelf. For Melida and Johanna, it was a fixed object in the distance, becoming clearer and closer every day. If they continued to apply themselves, they would become the first members of their family to go to college.

As a freshman in high school, Melida confided the intimate details regarding her homelessness to fellow classmates, who then posted her personal secrets for the world to read online. Shamed by the gossip of her peers and angered at such a cruel betrayal, Melida decided to rise above the bullying and intimidation. Rather than letting the talk of others steal her self-worth, she left her school and transferred to Bronx Leadership Academy High School, where she immediately thrived in accepting and supportive new surroundings.

With the assistance of the organization Women in Need, the Arias women finally found housing during Melida’s junior year. Ever since, the scars of their experience fade by the day. But their triumph has not come without sacrifice. Soon after Johanna was accepted to Syracuse University two years ago, her mother became physically unable to continue her job as a cab driver. So instead of embarking on what is often described as the best four years of a person’s life, Johanna began working at McDonald’s in a job she still has today.

In June, Melida graduated in the top third of her class at the Bronx Leadership Academy, and she begins the next step of her education next spring with her freshman year at highly regarded Baruch College in Manhattan.

Her compassion is reflected in her course load as she embarks on the road to becoming a school psychologist. Her dream is to help children who are growing up under challenging circumstances, similar to herself.

According to the Yankees press release, eight players were supposed to be on the field for this afternoon’s game with kids from the Beautiful People program, which gets disabled and special needs kids into team sports. Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada, A.J. Burnett, Phil Hughes, Lance Berkman, Javier Vazquez, Boone Logan and Austin Kearns were supposed to be there along with Yankees coaches Dave Eiland, Mick Kelleher and Rob Thomson and former Yankee David Cone.

Joe Girardi was also there. So was Alex Rodriguez. Joba Chamberlain was running around having more fun than anyone. There were probably others who I missed. The Yankees seemed to be having a great time, and it was all happening while the writers were finishing their stories in the press box. It was really great to watch the Yankees help — and sometimes be told not to help — these kids play baseball.

Here are some Associated Press photos along with three AP photos from yesterday’s HOPE Week event with Mohamed Kamara at the United Nations.

Jorge Posada, A.J. Burnett, Andy Pettitte and Joba Chamberlain participating in today’s HOPE Week baseball game.

Derek Jeter and Curtis Granderson at the UN podium,  group shot of the Yankees with Fatmata Kamara, left, Mohamed Kamara, center, and Sierra Leone’s ambassador to the United Nations Shekou M. Touray

First, a picture of Joe Girardi with yesterday’s HOPE Week honoree Jane Lang. It’s a picture from after the game when Girardi took Jane around the field and back to home plate. 

HOPE Week continues this morning. A little before 9 a.m., Derek Jeter, CC Sabathia, Marcus Thames, Curtis Granderson and Brian Cashman took Sierra Leone-native, civil war survivor and recent high school graduate Mohamed Kamara on a surprise tour of the New York Stock Exchange. Later this morning, the group will go to City Hall where Mayor Michael Bloomberg will meet with Mohamed and the Yankees.

From the Yankees, here’s Mohamed’s story.

Mohamed was born in 1992 in the midst of civil war in his West African homeland of Sierra Leone. Any semblance of a normal childhood was unavailable to him. As the oldest of three brothers and two sisters with an absent father and a mother suddenly ill, he was forced to become the “man of the house” at age 9, providing for his family by foraging on his own to prevent their starvation.

When the war subsided approximately six years ago, Mohamed, who did not speak English at the time, made the difficult decision to come to the United States to join his aunt and uncle in an impoverished section of the Bronx.

Since arriving in the United States, Mohamed has simultaneously created a life for himself and improved the lives of others. He graduated in the top quarter of his class at Bronx Leadership Academy High School and earned a partial scholarship to Johnson & Wales University in Rhode Island, where he will work toward a business degree.

Over the last four years, he has remained the breadwinner for his family in Africa despite being a full-time Bronx high school student, working as a caddie at Montammy Golf Club in Alpine, N.J., which requires him to wake up for work at 4:00 a.m. and spend nearly five hours a day in transit in an effort to send every last possible dollar back to Africa.

He also displays selflessness in his treatment of his peers. He became a mentor and sounding board for other African students in his school, and he founded the Sierra Leone Gentlemen, which organizes benefits at his local church to raise money for children in his homeland to attend school. Despite being a student in name, his actions prove he is a teacher in life.

Associated Press photo

HOPE Week continues this afternoon, and this time it’s the Yankees who are tagging along with a fan, not the other way around.

Joe Girardi, Joba Chamberlain, Chad Gaudin, David Robertson, Kerry Wood and former Yankee Tino Martinez have joined Morris Plains, N.J., resident Jane Lang, who is blind, for her trip to Yankee Stadium. Using the public transportation route Jane has followed hundreds of times, the Yankees will travel with Jane to the stadium where she will receive a private tour of Monument Park to feel the monuments for the first time. She will then go on a private tour of the Yankees Museum and feel the 2009 World Championship Trophy as well as one of Babe Ruth’s bats. Jane and her family and friends, as well as members from The Seeing Eye will then attend tonight night’s game. Jane will also be recognized with a special pregame ceremony.

From the Yankees, here’s Jane’s story:

Blind since birth, Jane Lang has been to hundreds of Yankees games. What makes her special is that she travels to the Stadium via public transportation on her own – walking to her local train station in Morris Plains, N.J., before taking two separate trains with her Seeing Eye dog, Clipper.

At age 5, her family enrolled her in the Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, Mass., the same school that Helen Keller attended in the late 1800s. Though she learned as a young girl how to navigate around a city using a cane, she would eventually seek out the use of a Seeing Eye dog after a couple of key incidents left her stranded and helpless.

In June 1965, at age 22, Jane arrived at The Seeing Eye in Morristown, N.J., which is the oldest existing dog-guide school in the world. After four weeks, she finished training with her first dog, Sandy, and had met a new instructor at the school, Pete Lang, whom she wed just three months after their initial introduction.

After raising their three children, Sharon, Danny and Billy, along with owning and operating both a knitting business and a chair-caning enterprise, Jane decided to expand her life even further. In 2000, she and her guide dog Laramie learned how to navigate from their suburban Morris Plains, N.J., home to Yankee Stadium, solely using public transportation.

The trip begins with a walk to her local New Jersey Transit station, where they board the train for the 70-minute ride to Manhattan’s Penn Station. From there, they head up to the street and walk from Seventh Avenue to Sixth Avenue, where they descend underground again to catch the D train for the 30-minute ride to Yankee Stadium.

Prior to leaving the house, she places eight pieces of candy in one of her pockets. As the D train makes each of its stops along the way to Yankee Stadium, she moves one piece of candy to her opposite pocket. When there’s one candy left, it means the next stop is the Stadium. More than 250 solo trips to the Bronx later, the Yankees will join Jane in her trek to Yankee Stadium.

HOPE Week began about 15 minutes ago, and what a way to start.

Mariano Rivera, Nick Swisher, Brett Gardner, Dustin Moseley, Kevin Long and Mike Harkey surprised 13-year-old quadruple amputee Jorge Grajales with a pool party in New Jersey.

Jorge and his foster parents, John and Faye Dyksen, live in North Haledon. Family friends hosted the pool party, where the Yankees players and coaches surprised Jorge. The group of friends and family will be invited to tonight’s game at Yankee Stadium where Jorge will throw out the first pitch.

As provided by the Yankees, here’s Jorge’s remarkable story:

When Jorge Grajales was an infant in Panama, a gangrenous infection left doctors with just one cruel option: amputation of all four limbs. His birth family immediately realized it could not provide him the expensive, technical care he would need as he grew older, most notably the resources required for prosthetic fittings and maintenance. With limited social assistance available in his home country, his future was bleak. In all likelihood, he would eventually have to become dependent on begging for survival.

It was at this point that John and Faye Dyksen of North Haledon, N.J., entered his life. At the time, they already had five children, ranging in age from 12 to 21. They volunteered to host Jorge through their involvement with Healing the Children, a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization dedicated to providing free medical care to needy children around the world. They had previously opened their hearts and home to two young girls with physical disabilities before Jorge’s plight came to their attention.

The original plan in June 1998 was for Jorge to spend six months with them while a charitable medical group made and fitted prosthetics for Jorge. Twelve years later, most people in North Haledon have come to know Jorge. Since age 3, he has spent three-fourths of each year with the Dyksens because he cannot receive the medical care he needs in his homeland. Summers are spent in Panama with his biological parents, brother and sister.

This fall, Jorge, now 13, begins eighth grade at High Mountain Middle School in North Haledon. He attends classes just like any other student and has learned to do almost anything without having hands, including writing, typing and playing video games. He loves swimming and soccer and spends his Friday evenings from November through March serving supper to the homeless at his local church.

“I think it has made a big difference to treat him as another one of my kids,” Faye said. “For the most part, I encouraged him to do everything that anyone else can do. He has a lot of things to overcome, but God has given him the personality to make him soar.”