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Boys to Men
Two Georgia Grads Become Heroes to Children Affected by AIDS
By Lissa Poirot
Imagine life 25 years ago. “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “On Golden Pond” ruled the box office. “Amadeus” and “42nd Street” were the lullabies of Broadway. Disco had died and Olivia Newton-John was telling us to get “Physical,” while “Jessie’s Girl” and “Bette Davis Eyes” were making stars of Rick Springfield and Kim Carnes. And an unknown disease was raising alarm, largely among men in big cities.
When HIV/AIDS (Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) first appeared and became a growing epidemic, Garrett Gravesen was taking his first steps and Ryan Gembala was cooing in his mother’s arms. As infants, Gravesen and Gembala couldn’t realize this was such a health scare. It didn’t exist in their world, or even 10 years later when people began to fully understand the disease and what it could do to a person, plus how it spread and how it didn’t discriminate.
The campaign to control the spread of AIDS worked so well in the United States that although the disease has no cure, the spread of it no longer compares to the mass quantities of the ’80s and early ’90s. What was once an instant death sentence has now become a chronic disease that people can control for a longer life. But with these thankful advances, we’ve been left with less publicity about HIV and AIDS, and as Gravesen and Gembala went to high school and college, they didn’t understand how devastating the disease could be. Or that one day it would affect their futures.
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Changing Course
Gravesen and Gembala were star students destined to lead successful lives. Gembala, who still lives in Lawrenceville where he grew up, attended St. Pius High School, while Gravesen, who still lives in his hometown of Marietta, attended Wheeler. Excelling at already exceptional schools, they joined the student body of The University of Georgia (UGA), where Gravesen became president of its 30,000-plus students and Gembala led the campus’ largest international club.
“I had been preparing myself for a career in international business ever since the Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996 opened my eyes to the world,” Gembala said. “When I went to college, that’s where my focus was — business and languages.”
As the business world beckoned, Gravesen followed economics and accepted school internships and summer jobs working abroad in Hong Kong and Kenya. Gembala became fluent in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese and worked in Spain and Sicily before heading to Brazil for new opportunities. Both could have accepted full-time positions in foreign lands upon graduation, guaranteeing six-figure incomes. But both encountered children with AIDS and their lives have never been the same.
“We had two separate but similar international experiences with AIDS orphans, which made us stop the business track and focus on what’s important and why we had these experiences,” Gravesen said. “It’s funny how the world works. I went to Kenya to help with public relations for an IT firm in Nairobi. HIV and AIDS affect about 30 percent of the people in the country, and the office I worked in had three women affected by HIV. The only time I had ever heard of HIV and AIDS back home was when my hero Magic Johnson admitted he had AIDS. I thought I [should] at least go to an orphanage to see what it was all about.”
Gravesen’s orphanage visit changed his life. “There were no moms, no dads, no nothing. The kids couldn’t pronounce my name, so they called me GG. A little boy named Martin, who was 10 years old, tugged on my shirt as I was leaving and said, ‘GG, everyone says they’ll be back. Will you really come back and see us?’ That one visit turned into Saturdays; Saturdays turned into Sundays, and before you knew it, I was volunteering more time at that orphanage than I was working at my job. At the end of the summer, Martin’s best friend ended up passing away. I went to a funeral with 80 kids with no one to turn to and it just became real,” he recalled.
Meanwhile, across the ocean in South America, Gembala was having a similar experience. “In Brazil, you hear about HIV and AIDS all the time. The government has really done a wonderful job about raising awareness; there are billboards and commercials, and it’s a topic of conversation. That was so foreign to me because I don’t remember one time in my life growing up in Atlanta that I ever had a conversation about AIDS. I decided to visit two orphanages,” he said.
Gembala brought treats for the children like chocolate, balloons and bubbles. Simple gifts that children all over the world adore. While the Brazilian children were happy to receive the chocolate and balloons, Gembala received nothing but blank stares when he produced a bottle of bubbles from his pocket. “I started blowing bubbles and their little eyes lit up like Christmas lights, and they started laughing and screaming and cheering. The next two hours were spent blowing bubbles with these children. And that made me realize that AIDS can take away just everything from a child. It can take away their mom, their dad, their health, and any chance they have to enjoy what all kids should have and that’s their childhood. That’s what made it real for me,” he said.
Gravesen and Gembala created H.E.R.O. for Children. H.E.R.O., which stands for “hearts everywhere reaching out,” concentrates on quality-of-life care for children living with or affected by HIV and AIDS.
Running With the Big Dawgs
Returning to Georgia to finish their senior year, Gravesen and Gembala, still affected by what they saw in Africa and Brazil, decided to look into Georgia’s own AIDS community. The number of children affected shocked them.
“When we had these separate experiences with AIDS orphans overseas, we were curious to know if our own state had a problem like this,” Gembala said. “We found out that Georgia has 9,000 children affected by AIDS and the ninth highest rate of pediatric AIDS in the nation.”
That was just too much to bear, knowing children in their home state desperately needed help. So they decided to organize a nonprofit organization dedicated to the children of Georgia living with and affected by HIV and AIDS. They didn’t have a plan. They didn’t have any money. All they had was a dream. Knowing they needed help, they turned to their campus, the only community they knew. First, they knocked on the door of Mark Richt, head coach of the Georgia Bulldogs football team. And they begged for help.
“It was obvious that Ryan and Garrett had a passion for these children,” Richt said. “Here these boys received a top education, were top of their class, and have the opportunity to make big money. They turned it all down to do something more worthy. You wish more people would take the time to do something like this.”
Richt, who lost a brother to AIDS (something he’s not even sure he has shared with the duo until now), decided Gravesen and Gembala’s passion was worth his time, name, contacts and effort. He became their first board member. “It didn’t matter if they succeeded or not — well, I want them to succeed — but they are diligent, passionate and it’s a good cause,” said Richt when asked what made him commit.
When Richt signed on and believed in two students without a penny to their name, he was more than happy to open the door to his boss Vince Dooley, the former head football coach and then-Athletic Director for UGA. Dooley sided with the enthusiastic duo and signed on to be a member of the board, as well.
“Mark Richt and Vince Dooley are the two biggest guys from UGA that anyone could pick to help get it started,” Gravesen said. “They believed in us. When we first went in there, we were a little nervous. These are big, huge mythic figures in our state. We were just two guys with a lot of passion and a dream.”
Although not knowing entirely what to do with that dream, they knew they needed money. Again, they targeted the school by peddling red-and-black bumper stickers and the chance to win an opportunity to be on the field during UGA’s largest football game against the University of Alabama in front of 90,000 fans. “Coach Dooley said we really did shoot for the moon when we asked him if we could raffle that off,” Gravesen laughed. Their fundraiser paid off. They raised $50,000.
That initial success was enough to convince Gravesen and Gembala that their dream to do something important could actually work. After graduating, they moved back home with their parents, remaining unemployed while they promised to make a difference in the lives of children living with and affected by HIV and AIDS. They were 23 and 22, respectively.
“My mom was petrified,” Gembala said. “She thought I was out of my mind. She had seen my preparation for a career in international business, and now it was going to be put on hold,” he said, adding that his friends also didn’t understand his decision. “Everyone thought I’d wind up overseas. I spoke four languages and [had] worked in three different countries. Now I was in Lawrenceville driving a Buick and living at home with my parents.”
“I think my parents were definitely nervous,” Gravesen added. “Most parents want their kids to get the job after college, the safe income, the salary. But our parents understood that we had been successful in other parts of our lives and other things we had done and knew if we came together and really put it on the table for these kids, it would work. We give our parents a lot of credit because they were the ones in the beginning who said, ‘Hey, you’re right. This isn’t the safest move you can possibly make, but we are willing to help you make it happen.’ ”
Creating Superheroes
With two football legends serving as board members, $50,000 in the bank, and the support of their parents, Gravesen and Gembala created H.E.R.O. for Children. H.E.R.O., which stands for “hearts everywhere reaching out,” concentrates on quality-of-life care for children living with or affected by HIV and AIDS.
“Twenty-five years ago, when this whole epidemic started, the government’s response was to keep the people alive. Food, housing and medicine were the basic needs. Fast-forward 25 years. These people are living longer lives, at least in the U.S., and it’s not about death and dying, it’s about living,” Gravesen said. “Quality of life is that key component and the next phase of the epidemic. We sat down with people at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Emory School of Public Health to develop our grand vision to create the first curriculum around quality-of-life care for children infected, affected and orphaned by AIDS.”
The pair took a two-pronged approach to complete their vision: connect passionate members of the community who want to help those who need it, and develop the curriculum to address the children’s needs and allow them to become productive members of society.
Gembala’s passion is evident when he explains the reason behind their quality-of-life program. “Seventy percent of our children have severe learning disabilities because of HIV in their bodies. Half of our kids lost one or both parents to AIDS. Ninety percent of our children come from families that make less than $10,000 a year because the financial burdens of AIDS are so extreme. Those are the stats. But internalizing it for our kids, [they] deal with so much anger and guilt, not understanding why this disease is affecting them and why their parents are no longer with them. [It’s] so much grief and loss at such a young age,” he said, adding, “This leads to feelings of hopelessness. They wonder what kind of life they can have. They almost feel forgotten about in this world and wonder why should they even try. Those are heavy issues for kids to deal with. If there is no intervention, no hero for children, what kind of productive member of society are these kids going to become? Now we can allow these kids to live not with a death sentence, but with a chronic disease that can be managed. These kids can have a life worth living.”
The first event the young men organized for the children was a holiday party with the Jerusalem House. The party’s goal wasn’t to simply bring light into the dimmed eyes of children feeling alone and deserted, but to gain trust and entry into the AIDS community.
“At that point, we were still very new to the AIDS and HIV organizations,” Gembala said. “We weren’t social workers. We weren’t medical students. We were business guys that raised money and wanted to help kids. The organizations just didn’t know who we were and how we were going to help.”
And like each endeavor before them, the party was a success. Once the community understood these young college graduates meant business, the dynamic duo began organizing their mentoring program, connecting passionate people to the children who needed to know people still care for them. They call their mentors their superheroes.
But in order to really help the children, Gravesen and Gembala needed to raise more money for the fun and enriching programs they wanted to provide. They decided on local fundraising campaigns, because the funds would stay here in Georgia. In 2004, they began to organize their first Golden H.E.R.O. Awards Gala.
The Gala was held in May of 2005 and raised $90,000, which was unbelievable to the twosome that immediately plowed into organizing their 2006 event with a goal of raising $125,000. Working night and day for their cause, never mind forgoing social lives, the young men were surprised that their $2,500-a-seat reception raised nearly $300,000 through ticket sales and auctions. Surprised and relieved. The success means there is enough money to continue growing and have an impact on more children across the state.
“These past three years, it’s just been Ryan and I trying to juggle every hat and business,” Gravesen said. “We have so many wonderful programs that need and desire attention. The money we raised means we can finally have people help us in that direction.”
Spread the Love
Gravesen and Gembala won’t ever forget their first experiences in the orphanages abroad — Martin’s hope and the Brazilian children’s giggles over bubbles. With the more-than-steady growth of H.E.R.O., one day, the duo may spread their project across the nation.
“Our involvement began outside of Georgia,” Gembala said. “From that experience, we wanted to do things for kids in our state. But always in our hearts has been this notion that it started in other places, and we’d love to expand and help kids wherever they may be.”
Earlier this year, both men were invited to New Delhi to speak about their program in front of the United Nations and hundreds of people and corporations, including Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft. Maybe, Gravesen and Gembala think, they can even grow H.E.R.O. beyond the States to span the globe, giving the worldwide community more than just the basics. They want to give the children hope and a future they can look forward to.
Big dreams for men of 26 and 25. But as the saying goes, “All men who have achieved great things have been dreamers.”
Fiery Fundraiser
Don shades of crimson and scarlet for Code Red on Saturday, Nov. 11. In collaboration with Dave FM, this fashionable event for Atlanta’s young professionals benefits H.E.R.O. for Children and boasts top entertainers, athletes and celebrities as guests. Enjoy gourmet cuisine, complimentary cocktails and a live DJ from 8 to 11 p.m. at the Fever Ultralounge on Cheshire Bridge Road. Tickets are $55 in advance and $65 at the door. For details, visit www.coderedatlanta.com.
H.E.R.O. Needs Mentors
Interested in becoming a superhero for children living with and affected by HIV and AIDS? Join H.E.R.O.’s mentoring program. Mentors, who range in age from 22 to 55, must be able to dedicate two Saturdays per month to the kids they are connected with by the organization. No time? Fundraising efforts help pay for mentoring activities and outings. To learn more about the program or how you can become a superhero, volunteer or patron, visit www.heroforchildren.org.
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