Today we’d like to introduce you to Cedrick Ted Registre.
Cedrick, before we jump into specific questions, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I moved to Texas in 2011 to attend college. As a native of Haiti, when I moved here, I quickly realized the lack of Haitian people in Texas. There were no Haitian stores, neighborhoods, or businesses for that matter like I was used to seeing in places like Miami, New York or Boston. So my college roommate Jamesnel (also Haitian) and I decided to start a Facebook page called the Haitian Social Circle in Dallas. Our goal was to find other Haitians or people of Haitian descent in Dallas. The page at its inception only had six likes. All of which were either Haitian students on our campus or our siblings.
We decided to host small gatherings for our very small group every once in a while: Friday nights (traditional Haitian fried food), and game nights. But things took a major turn in 2016. Haiti was hit by the terrible hurricane Matthew, and we decided with our limited resources to organize a relief effort to help in the recovery process. We recorded a video and posted it on our page. The next morning, I woke up to missed calls from NBCDFW, ABC, and other radio stations wanting to help share our story. After that interview aired, our following grew exponentially. People started to reach out, people were liking the Page, and our events started attracting a larger crowd. Some of them have been here for over 30+ years, but have never met any other Haitians.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Growing our community has not been easy. The majority of the time, I was in school. We didn’t have a team from 2012 until 2016. It was the two of us, and after James graduated and was offered a job in Florida, it was a one-man team for a couple of years. Our lack of funding or access to proper funding held us back for many years, as we self-funded our growth for many years. But I can say that we have made a lot of progress. Our goal has always been and remains to represent the side of Haiti that you don’t see on television. It is to bring our culture to the people of Dallas. And I can say that thanks to our team now, we’ve made a lot of progress towards that. We now have a team of individuals that are highly talented and knowledgeable, and we work tirelessly to bring the best experiences for our community.
Please tell us about The Haitian Social Circle.
The Haitian social circle’s main focus is to provide a sense of home away from home for Haitians that have relocated to Texas or people of Haitian descent here in Texas who may simply want to learn more and experience what the culture is like. Each year, we organize a formal event in Dallas called ‘One Night in Haiti, ‘ which exposes our rich culture to the people of Dallas. They get to taste our delicious food, they listen and dance to our music, and they learn about the work that we do here and back in Haiti through our affiliated nonprofit DIF (Diakonos International Foundation).
We also partner with other nonprofits such as Haiti Cardiac Alliance, Childspring International, among others, and provide translation services as well as lodging and transportation services free of charge to their Haitian patients in transit in Dallas for treatment. We have an ESL class for people in Fort Worth and We organize social events for the community. Anything from movie screenings, to game nights, to brunch, dance classes, etc.
One thing that I can say sets us apart from others is our approach to reaching out to our community. We make sure everything we put out is professionally done. All of our events are family-friendly, and we treat everyone like family.
What were you like growing up?
Growing up in Haiti and even after moving to the US, I was an introvert. I was always shy. Public speaking was a thing of nightmares for me. Whenever I had to do a presentation in school or at church, I’d sweat excessively, I would stutter heavily and on some occasions, I would forget how to speak English. My parents, on the other hand, were social butterflies. My mother is an educator, so she has it down to a science. My father was also an instructor. They both mastered the art of networking and being around people. I grew up always wanting to one day be like them and being able to comfortably interact with strangers, but that took years.
With such a personality, I turned to books as a way of escaping the real world. I read a lot at a young age, and my parents noticed. They would buy me multiple volumes so I could read and my father would go as far as assigning us homework to summarize the books by the end of the week for him.
I loved soccer, and if I was not reading a book, I was on a soccer field somewhere playing with other kids in the neighborhood. We traveled locally a lot, whether it was to visit family in the countryside of Haiti or simply for local tourism, my parents always wanted us to see as much of our country as possible and I believe that is where my love of the culture came from.
Contact Info:
- Phone: 682-263-6992
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cedrick_ted/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HaitianSocialCircleInDallas/
Image Credit:
Max Sejour Photography. Endypluviosephotgraphy
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