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Did you know there’s a Cape May County Village in Haiti?

Since 2006, a group of local residents, including Marilyn Ciccarone and Ann Herron, of Cape May Court House, and Avalon’s Diane Finore Hurd, have raised more than $100,000 to not only build a 15-house village in Haiti, but to make sure the families there are educated and nourished by paying for schooling, books and food and even supplying the village with goats, cows and bulls.

Cape May County Village’s fundraising efforts continue Saturday with Zumbafest, which will take advantage of the popular Latin-based aerobic exercise to keep the village’s students educated with a $20 donation. Classes will be held at 9, 10 and 11 a.m. at Avalon Community Hall.

“We find it very rewarding,” said Herron, who went to the village with Ciccarone in January on a mission trip with Food for the Poor, an international relief and development charity. “We take it one family at a time, and we are making a huge difference in their lives. The whole idea is to make them self-sufficient. It’s named Cape May County Village because if it weren’t for all of the people in Cape May County, this wouldn’t be possible.”

Lifesaving cliche

Is there a doctor in the house? It’s something that most people say only in movies. But when Egg Harbor Township’s Don Hurley yelled the cliche in a packed theater, it saved someone’s life.

The retired Atlantic City police officer was at a benefit at the Tropicana Casino and Resort. After a reception, Tropicana President Mark Giannantonio invited Hurley to the benefit performance of “Fame” in the casino’s theater.

About 15 minutes into the show, he saw a disturbance. When he went to see what was wrong, a man was sitting upright in his seat with no pulse and wasn’t breathing. Hurley laid the man on the floor, began CPR and yelled, “Is there a doctor in the house?”

“It was like a scene out of ‘Airplane,’” Hurley said. “You would never think you would yell something like that. And everything you say, something happens. Within seconds, there was a doctor in the house. She took over the CPR and saved the man’s life. They even stopped the show. Mark told me it was the first time he ever saw a show stopped in all of his years there.”

To fulfill another cliche — “The show must go on” — the cast resumed the performance.

Short Story

Absecon’s Matthew Bakalian will show off his magic skills and make his Atlantic City debut at the Tropicana Casino and Resort’s Trickzone Magic Theatre inside The Quarter from Friday to Sunday. The 22-year-old’s finale is “removing my head from my body.”

Everyone Has a Story appears Sundays and Wednesdays. To share your story, call Scott Cronick at 609-272-7017 or e-mail him at scronick@pressofac.com.

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