By Elesha George
Bram Sanderson’s departure seemed inconceivable, as if his life’s story had been prematurely severed. His sister Sawana Fabien is still in disbelief that he is no longer among the living.
“It just doesn’t seem like that’s the way the story of such a young man ends, but I’m really happy that God loaned him into my life and he would have really been a testament of the truest virtue of perseverance, and drive, and confidence,” she reflected.
Sanderson was a national athlete in his home country of Dominica, becoming the first Dominican to participate in cycling at the Commonwealth Games, representing his nation at the 2018 games in Australia and the first Dominican to compete on the global stage in the sport of kayaking. He was overall a multi-faceted athlete.
“Even when I heard about his death, I just couldn’t believe it because he was so, so great at everything. It felt like if he was ever in an accident, he would walk out of the accident scotch free. You know, he would like do some sort of like Superman kind of matrix and like flip with the bike but was able to do like a somersault and like walk out of the accident untouched because that’s the invincible person he always was,” she said.
Bram, who died at the age of 30 on Sunday morning, was adopted at the age of eight by Sawana’s mother – the late principal of the school he attended. But he never forgot the village of Wesley where he came from and loved his own mother dearly. When she died in 2021 during the Covid-19 pandemic, his sister remembers how hard he took the news.
Besides sharing a birth month in October, Sawana said the two developed a very close bond because of her brother’s unique personality and his story.
“I mean, I just think about two years ago, when I was supporting him with his mother’s funeral. How sacred he felt that funeral was, how angry he got sometimes with people not being solemn enough or not respecting the solemnity of the occasion. But he was just a ride-or-die, a die-hard sort of person. If he was with you, he was with you,” she recalled.
“Even if he was adopted or fostered for a while, he never forgot his roots. Never, ever, ever, ever forgot where he was from — the community of Wesley. He never ever gave up on his mother. He never ever gave up and that’s the beauty of him.”
Bram is known for excelling in athletics but outside of his physical ability, his sister shared that he was able to take on any task and do it exemplarily. He wanted to represent people like him, who did not have much early in life. He wanted to show them that they, too, could be successful.
“So, he’d run and he’d run forever. He would climb, climb until there is nothing else to hold onto to climb, and he was always climbing,” she said in a sad voice.
Always with the hope of becoming an Olympian, Sawana said it feels like Bram’s story has not yet ended though his life on earth has. “It’s almost like having a book that has a part two or it should have a part two but it has ended and you want more but you can also concede that whatever you’ve read already is enough to take you through life.”
Sawana will forever equate her brother’s name to the vibe that the word ‘bram!’ invokes in Dominican parlance – meaning a loud noise or a sudden shift.
Bram relocated to Antigua and Barbuda from Dominica after Hurricane Maria in September 2017 to help with rebuilding efforts in Barbuda. He remained in the country until he died in a vehicular accident on August 13, 2023.
