Elite Traveler September-October 2017

elite traveler SEPT/OCT 2017 55

hospitality industry could do well to watch. “We are expanding now and it feels good. Five of our guests decided to throw a fundraiser for the foundation on their own and they raised $70,000. Where have you been in the world, where people meet at a hotel, get together as a group of friends and decide to have a party to raise money and change the lives of a lot of people off their own backs? I mean it just blew me away. So beautiful, right?” Is placing philanthropy at the heart of business an approach Burch feels inspired to include in all his projects? “I would only do it if it was totally real. I’m really not into these companies who use so-called philanthropy as a way to sell more product. I think philanthropy is critical to how you build a business, but it has to really come from the heart, changing the people’s lives without interrupting their society. Sumba will be a hard one to match, but every hotel I build we will involve the community. So even if we open a city hotel, I want to offer free nursery to local kids.” As the conversation draws to a close, Chris shares that his happiest moments are spent at Nihi Sumba Island, trekking back from the waterfall and then heading for a massage. “And conversations like this,” he says, “the intelligent questions you’ve asked, the way you have woven this conversation into a story that flows like water, that makes me feel happy, relaxed. Relaxation is not a space but a human.” By the time we hang up, I’m grinning from ear-to-ear, shoulders tall, floating in a bubble and I realize I have been completely Chris Burched. He has connected so effortlessly, pin-pointed my passions, that I leave the call wanting to work with him and for him, to help and support this man with a miracle mind for clearly understanding and raising up humanity. “What does success mean to me?” Chris explained, “It’s that moment when someone goes ‘Ah, wow! He really got me.’”

Graves in 2001 in an effort to lessen poverty on the island. Since then, the foundation has provided healthcare to over 25,000 people and is responsible for reducing the rate of malaria by 85 percent, as well as building 300 wells and watering holes and supporting 16 schools by delivering lunch to otherwise hungry kids. Now responsible for some

400 islanders and their families, Nihi Sumba Island is the largest employer on the island and the impact it has on the lives and futures of the people there is markedly prominent. A trail map for how foreign-led projects can ignite and engage with local communities rather than simply benefiting from labor and resources, it’s one that the luxury

Clockwise from top: The stunning view from Nihi Sumba Island; Chris Burch; one of the lodge’s deluxe abodes

Photos Tânia Araújo

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