Sharon Lee-Brun was born in Georgetown, Guyana and has lived in Port-au-Prince, Haiti since 1990, when she married her Haitian husband, Patrick after graduating from college in the USA . Living in Haiti for 27 years, Sharon has deeply embraced Haiti’s culture and its people and has firmly established her roots in the country. She has been in the retail business for 25 years and owns a home and garden store in Port-Au-Prince.
Recently, Sharon became a food and life style blogger and uses her extensive knowledge and experience in food preparation and entertaining to highlight foods of her native country and her ancestry as well as the flavors and tastes of her adopted country. She is a self-taught cook and baker and has a depth of knowledge of world cuisines due to her multi-ethnicity. Her blog Guyanese Girl Haitian Soul also draws parallels and bridges the two cultures through her personal experiences both from her childhood and in her adulthood in Haiti. She seeks to share a positive light to her experiences living and working in Haiti by accentuating the positive factors of her adopted country.
Having a deep love and respect of nature, Sharon is also passionate about the environment and its preservation. Along with her husband, she has been involved in a reforestation project in the hills of Belot. Over a period of 18 years, they have transformed a barren area with over 10,000 trees, which today has become a farm growing fruit and vegetables, as well as raising horses and other animals.
Transformative change in Haiti through Education is yet another of Sharon’s interest and pursuits. She is involved and supports school and educational projects such asThe Haitian Project and the boarding school, Louverture Cleary School in Santo, Haiti for 360 of the brightest young minds from grades 6-12. The students come from some of the most challenging circumstances in Haiti, and their education through this program is a game changer in the lives of these youths. The EGI (Economic Growth Initiative) program is also one which she supports as a mentor and is a professional program geared at fomenting and facilitating local businesses started by graduates of the LCS school.
Sharon is mother to three children, two boys and a girl ages 25, 23 and 13; a cherished role which she is most passionate. Her eldest son is well known International music producer and DJ, Michael Brun, and her second son Pascal Brun graduated in 2016 from USMA at West Point and is currently serving in Haiti.
“ I firmly believe that during my life, I have to make a positive contribution to Haiti. I have lived through some of the most challenging times here and I know that Haiti’s biggest resource is its people. We have to find ways to make the Haiti of the future one where we can channel all of the creativity of its people and strengthen institutions to create a country in which all Haitians are proud to be citizens.”
Sharon has a BA in Marketing from the University of Miami and is fluent in English, French and Haitian Creole.
www.guyanesegirlhaitiansoul.com