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Monday, March 18, 2024
March 18, 2024

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Off Beat: ‘Frozen’ namesakes pulling guard duty in Haiti

By , Columbian Science, Military & History Reporter
Published:

It would be appropriate if trespassers encountering the Rolling family’s new security force were frozen in fear.

Meet the members of the team: Elsa, Anna and Kristoff.

A week ago, we caught up with Chris Rolling’s efforts to help impoverished Haitians drink water that doesn’t make them sick. Chris, a 1993 graduate of Hudson’s Bay High School, and his wife, Leslie, lead the nonprofit Clean Water for Haiti.

As part of his update, Chris Rolling said that their move to a better neighborhood cut their security costs from $1,200 a month to $100. And, he added, “most of that is for dog food.”

That’s right: These echoes of the “Frozen” film are dogs.

When you think about Haiti, a film about a Disney ice princess is not what comes to mind. But that’s only part of their story, Leslie explained.

“We actually adopted them from another missionary family that had rescued them when they were only about a week old,” Leslie wrote in an email. “They had been badly abused, so the family nursed them back to health for two months.”

Chris had figured on getting a couple of guard dogs, but he didn’t want puppies. Then Leslie showed him a Facebook posting with their photo.

“The picture of the three of them kind of tugged at our heart strings. We figured we might as well take all three since we were planning on getting two, anyway.”

Since they were free, Chris figured if something happened, “he wouldn’t feel as bad about it as he would if we’d spent $400 on a pure-bred security dog.”

And the names? The family that had rescued the dogs had two kids that were the same ages as the Rollings’ children, 4 and 8. Those kids had named the dogs, Leslie said. “Obviously, they were ‘Frozen’ fans.”

The dogs “are very loving and have great personalities, which is amazing after the abuse that they went through so young.”

Off Beat lets members of The Columbian news team step back from our newspaper beats to write the story behind the story, fill in the story, or just tell a story.

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Columbian Science, Military & History Reporter