The Flood & It's Little Army

What does it smell like there?

23 Aug 2010 14:41:00 GMT

Written by: World Vision
Written by: Mike Bailey, World Vision Advocacy Manager

Akhtar Soomro / Reuters

Another blogger about the flood in Pakistan, writing about the horrific conditions there due to disease, lack of water, food and medical care...and if you didn't know about "scabies," read on so you may know what these people are going through:

"Claire, one of World Vision's health specialists explains what scabies is. "Little mites burrow around under your skin. They defecate there causing inflammation and intense itching. You scratch and get them under your fingernails and so they spread. They also get into the seams of your clothes and only boiling or hot ironing will kill them. If you brush your infected arm against someone else the mites pass to the other person". In the overcrowded conditions of the displaced people in Sukkar and Khaipur and where the floods have struck all over Pakistan, scabies is spreading like wildfire. The treatment is a pesticide solution you paint on your skin. It only works if you break the chain of infection by boiling all the clothes and bedding of the whole family and of everyone else you are rubbing against every day."

Read the entire blog at http://www.alertnet.org/db/blogs/53806/2010/07/23-144142-1.htm

New York education...

Here's an article from The New York Times about the latest test scores: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/education/01schools.html?_r=1&hpw

Here's a few tid bits that struck me and I had to post them (but I do recommend you read the article!):

"There were large drops in passing rates across New York, reflecting new requirements intended to correct for years of inflated results. The exams, state education officials said, had become too easy to pass, their definition of proficiency no longer meaningful."

• Inflated results and become too easy to pass?? Could this be said for other states as well?
  

"The charter school run by the local teachers’ union, the UFT Charter School, showed one of the most severe declines, to 13 percent of eighth graders proficient in math, from 79 percent. "

• 13%...13%?! This is what is happening; these are the young people who are growing up and going to run this country. Now, I just finished a bachelor's degree and had an awful time trying to learn all that would be forgotten, but I passed the tests...
  

"Much of the city’s progress in reducing the achievement gap between minority and white students was eroded by the new numbers, revealing that more black and Hispanic students had been barely passing under the old standards. The percentage of black elementary and middle school students proficient in math fell to 40 percent, from 75 percent, while among white students, passing rates declined to 75 percent, from 92 percent."

• I would suggest reading Jonathan Kozol on the disparities in urban/suburban education.
  

"More than five times as many third through eighth graders — 63,400 compared to 11,800 last year — failed to reach the city’s minimum standard for promotion to the next grade on the English test. Most will still be promoted, but will have to attend summer school in 2011 if they do not improve, education officials said."

• When I had an issue with the way my son was completing homework (or wasn't), I told the teacher I would just give him a failing grade as he had multiple chances to complete his work. I was told that in fifth grade, the important aspect is that he learn the concept and not just flunk him. So this is what is going on...pass the students on, although they have not learned what they need to. Then when they try to learn concepts based on the previous ones they didn't get, they are going to struggle then, too. How many kids are going to summer school? How much does it cost to go to summer school? Wouldn't the system save money by concentrating and getting extra help during the months schools are open and running instead of opening them year round? With severe budget cuts, wouldn't summer school be the last option in the minds of those dealing with the budget?
  

"Yet the new scores also strengthened some Bloomberg administration arguments, underscoring, for example, the weak performance of some schools it has sought to close. At the Choir Academy of Harlem, the percentage of eighth graders passing the English test dropped to 6 percent, from 44 percent. At the Academy of Collaborative Education, also in Harlem, eighth-grade math passing rates fell to 2 percent, from 49 percent. "

• SIX PERCENT OF EIGHTH GRADERS PASSED ENGLISH?! ARE YOU JOKING?! Obviously education should be on the forefront of everyone's minds, whether you are a parent or not. Education should be given ultimate attention, yet look where we are. Who is going to run the country in 30 years? Who will be our doctors, teachers, those in the military, take care of our aging population--if kids aren't learning now?!

Touchy subject for me, so I apologize. This obviously riles me up!

2010 Realities Cup Invitational Golf Tournament

Photos courtesy of Dion Dolva * www.DionDolva.com

Jessy Pratt, founder of Who Cares? llc, middle row, second from left (only one with glasses!)

Woo-hoo! What a fantastic day it was volunteering at the 2010 Realities Cup Invitational Golf Tournament, a fund raiser for Realities For Children. It was endearing and wonderful to see so many sponsors and golfers come out to support the Realities For Children Emergency Fund. About this incredible nonprofit:

"MISSION STATEMENT

Realities For Children Charities is a 501(c)3 charitable organization dedicated to serving the unmet needs of abused and neglected children in Larimer County. United with Realities For Children’s alliance of 150 local business Members which underwrite the administration of all programs and services, this charity is uniquely able to ensure that 100% of every dollar donated is able to directly benefit abused and neglected youth locally. Partnered in service with 18 local ‘Affiliate’ Youth Agencies and Programs, Realities is able to create an effective safety net of services, for the most vulnerable members of our community, through the provision of our Core Services." http://www.realitiesforchildren.com/

You can also find them on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fort-Collins-CO/Realities-For-Children-Inc/62434656065?ref=search#!/pages/Fort-Collins-CO/Realities-For-Children-Inc/62434656065

Go out and volunteer! Someone needs you!

Best to all,

Jessy

Oh mosquitos and malaria, how I hate thee

It breaks my heart that such a small little pest can cause so much pain, suffering, and death. Please read this article Battling a Scourge by Alex Perry in Time magazine at http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1995199_1995197_1995176,00.html

Here are some things that really struck me:

• Dr. Matthew thought I should see some statistics. Apac is home to 515,500 people. Between July 2008 and June 2009, 124,538 of them were treated for malaria. That meant 2,000 to 3,000 patients a week for Dr. Matthew and his three fellow doctors, and the number rose to 5,000 in the rainy season. Of Apac's malaria patients, nearly half were under 5.
• Doctors here don't see that many patients-how can they ever keep up and also be able to provide adequate medicine? So many little babies...
• Signboards erected by the side of the road announced the presence of two foreign-assistance programs. One was a European-funded child-protection group, which had no malaria component to its program. The other was the National Wetlands Program (NWP), funded by Belgium. Partly because of NWP's influence, the draining of malarial swamps is banned — which amounts to preserving wetlands at the price of human life. Spraying houses with insecticide — which in 2008 cut malaria infections in half — is also forbidden. Why? Because of objections from Uganda's organic-cotton farmers, who supply Nike, H&M and Walmart's Baby George line. Chemical-free farming sounds like a great idea in the West, but the reality is that Baby Omara is dying so Baby George can wear organic
• So you read it here: Nike, H&M and a clothing line from Walmart place a demand to not spray for mosquitos. Who is placing a demand that others die? WE ARE if you participate in buying from these companies. I will have to look further into this to see what other companies are putting their profits before people (I know it's going to be a long list).
• This, too often, is how aid goes: good intentions sidetracked by ignorance; a promising idea poorly executed; projects that are wasteful, self-regarding and sometimes corrupt.
• Ah, yes, a line that explains much in death stricken areas around the world, due to poverty, lack of food, shelter, medicine, education, work, and so on.
• The logistics of such a plan are less complex than they seem, because while malaria affects half the world's countries, just seven — the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, southern Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda — account for two-thirds of all cases
• [M]alaria has been at least halved in nine African countries since 2000.
• In 2005, Chambers was looking at a photograph of sleeping Mozambican children taken by his friend the Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs. "Cute kids," he remarked. "You don't understand," replied Sachs. "They're in malarial comas. They all died." Chambers was mortified. "So I said to Jeff, 'I'd like to kind of come up with business concepts to see if we can't save 1.3 million children a year.'" The next year, he established Malaria No More — a group that raises money, implements programs and stands as a case study of how aid can change.
• http://www.malarianomore.org/
  

If you would like to help, check out Malaria No More at the link above. You can also think of smaller organizations, such as Think Humanity, who distributes nets (and does other things) for those in a refugee camp in Uganda: http://www.thinkhumanity.org/about.html . I've met Beth, who travels back and forth with what she can for those in the camp.

I know I'm in the tee-shirt business, but Overlooked has an awesome shirt that you'll be educating others and supporting the cause against malaria: http://overlooked.storenvy.com/products/14776-malaria-kills-clearance

I also have tees available that support World Vision, who does so much work in Africa and also distributes nets:

All tees are 100% cotton; they tend to run a little bit bigger than the size you would normally wear, as they are uni-sex shirts.

All tees are $18 and up to half of the net profits go to the organization where the statistic came from.

Email me at whocares_llc@yahoo.com and we can arrange payment and either delivery if you live nearby, or sending your order through the mail.

New book to the list

The Things They Carried
by Tim O'Brien

"Though it's odd, you're never more alive than when you're almost dead. You recognize what's valuable. Freshly, as if for the first time, you love what's best in yourself and in the world, all that might be lost. At the hour of dusk you sit at your foxhole and look out on a river and go into the mountains and do terrible things and maybe die, even so, you find yourself studying the fine colors on the river, you feel wonder and awe at the setting of the sun, and you are filled with a hard, aching love for how the world could be and always should be, but now is not."

Pg 88-A novel about soldiers in the Vietnam War

Whether you agree or not...

War is an awful thing on all sides. Whether you are on the offensive or defensive, someone is dying, missing, away from family, and there are those who are left behind, whether they are grieving a life lost to the war, or waiting for their loved one or friend to come home. There is always someone out there dealing with the aftermath, and it's brutal.

Here in the U.S., there are so many who oppose the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and so they then oppose the military and their families as well. I can't help but have a heart for those who choose to do what I could not-do a job in which I may one day be asked to go to war.

Over the past two or three years, I'd say, I've tried to make it a point to shake hands and thank whomever I encounter in uniform or if I somehow find out that they serve or have served in our military. For something so simple as a handshake and a thank you, you would be surprised at the reactions I get.

On campus one day, I stopped by two recruiters to do the usual shake and thank, and they asked me to sign up. "No way-one, I have cystic fibrosis, so the military wouldn't take me anyway, and two, I just couldn't do it." He asked if I have children. "Yes-I have a son." "Would you let him sign up when he is older?" "No-I wouldn't want him to." "If not him-who?" "Well-good question." Every soldier is someone to somebody. Anyway, I asked them how the day was going. They said I was the only person to thank them; they are prone to swears, name-calling, even spitting. I'm sorry, but just because someone in the White House or the Pentagon thought it was a good idea to get this ball rolling doesn't mean these two men signed up for that (or maybe they did). But I don't think they deserve to be spit upon.

During my to-be sister-in-law's bachelorette party at a hockey game, we ended up sitting behind several military guys. When they left for drinks*ahem*another man commented that we were sitting behind some "joes." I didn't even know what that meant (and it was explained to me!). After they returned, I tapped the guy in front of me on the shoulder and shook his hand, told him that I wanted to thank him for serving his country. He gave me a quizzical look and turned right back around to watch the game. About half a minute went by when he turned around and said, "I want to shake your hand. You are a real American. No one does that." Later on he showed me a picture of his child. He didn't say much (maybe that's because his friends were doing all the talking!), but just that short exchange with him change my night.

It is Saturday morning as I am blogging, and earlier I was online and on the phone looking for a group that volunteers to meet military personnel at airports and greet them home. Fort Carson is the closest one to me, which is a bit out of the way, but how much has that soldier gone out of the way for you and me?

The Rich get Richer & the Poor get Poorer: in Democratic Republic of Congo (and elsewhere)

In the article "Blood and Treasure," author Adam Hochschild tries to tell the story of what has and is happening on the continent of Africa: exploitation of the poor for corrupt government or outsiders. He writes about the oh-so-now-known as "blood diamond" industry. It is a lengthy article, so I am just going to link it here and let you read it: http://motherjones.com/politics/2010/02/congo-gold-adam-hochschild


In a subset "The Blood Diamonds Myth: Why boycotting "conflict minerals" won't help Congo" (blue underlined is from Mother Jones' website and not my noting)

IN THE 1960s, many Americans boycotted California table grapes to help farmworkers unionize; in the '70s and '80s, we boycotted South Africa to help the anti-apartheid movement. In the late 1990s there was the push to ban "conflict diamonds," which led to the 2002 agreement, now signed by some 75 countries, to boycott diamonds produced by armed rebel groups in Africa and elsewhere. Shouldn't we help war-torn Congo by boycotting "conflict minerals"?

Unfortunately, it's not clear that a boycott would do much more than put tens of thousands of miserably paid miners out of work. Take the rather toothless conflict diamonds accord (which came about only because the international diamond cartel saw "blood diamonds" undercutting its inflated prices): It already applies to Congo, but makes no practical difference since the country's diamonds, like the overwhelming majority of its other exports, don't come from areas currently at war. And even when there is a direct connection between war and mining (as with the minerals sold by the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda, the genocidaires who have taken refuge in Congo), those exports are vexingly difficult to trace. You can quickly tell where an imported automobile was manufactured, but even the best laboratory tests cannot easily prove where an ounce of gold comes from. Congo's lengthy borders are impossible to police, and certificates of origin are easily forged.

The real problem is not conflict minerals, but the fact that Congo's long-suffering people reap only a tiny share of their country's vast wealth. Yet an alternate example is only a few hundred miles away from Congo's southern border: Diamond-rich Botswana has used its mines, which are partially owned by the state, to fund infrastructure, education, and health care, as well as set aside a rainy-day fund of nearly $7 billion. A recent joint venture between the government and the diamond giant De Beers is even bringing in some of the cutting and polishing work that used to be done in London, generating thousands of jobs. But Botswana has something essential Congo does not: a government known for being both functional and honest.

The author makes a few good points that have crossed my mind many times when it comes to my own "age-old" question of buying either FAIR trade products that come with a heftier price tag thus creating more of a financial burden on me, or buy FREE trade products, which usually come from companies that participate in the RACE TO THE BOTTOM in search of cheap labor:

1. "...it's not clear that a boycott would do much more than put tens of thousands of miserably paid miners out of work." Yes, do we give them at least something instead of nothing?
2. "...Congo's long-suffering people reap only a tiny share of their country's vast wealth." This seems to be a trend throughout the ages and we will continue to see it. The question is what can we do about it? I'm not sure, because I think Americans are seeing it too, just not in this way.
3. "But Botswana has something essential Congo does not: a government known for being both functional and honest." Ah, yes. This seems to be missing in many parts of the world.

Anyway, there is another subset: "Breaking the Curse," for you to read of you want an idea of how to help.

Should we ban shopping?

Today my son and I went to the Memorial Day Program at the Grandview Cemetery. He asked if he could go to a particular store that I have particular negative feelings about in quest of the latest Lego set (but having grandparents that live far away, he is never short of having a gift card to this store). Once we experienced the march of the bag pipes, the Color Guard, the Honor Guard, a variety of other groups (that I posted on an earlier blog), and the death-frightening firing squad (that's what they call themselves on the program flyer), I decided: NO.

I'm thinking of banning shopping from certain holidays. Never mind that I try to shop at our local Ten Thousand Villages (http://www.tenthousandvillages.com/home.php) for fair trade items (http://www.tenthousandvillages.com/php/fair.trade/fair.trade.fairprice.php) for those special birthdays and thank yous.

Today being Memorial Day, we are suppose to be thinking of those in service who paid the ultimate price: his or her life. Think of one individual in your life (perhaps this is real for you) and this one person is missing because he or she chose to defend our country. This person will miss weddings and children being born, baseball games and cookouts (as many of us did today), and will miss graduations and funerals. They never come back, and should we be "cheapening" their death by the "big Memorial Day sales?"

Can you really not live with yourself if you miss out on a 40% of all shoes at Macy's? Half-off everything in the store from noon to midnight at Kohls?

Alas, that Lego set will still be there tomorrow. And that store that I hate, it'll still be there in the morning. But today, I chose to honor our fallen by not handing one dollar to a store that thinks it's more important to make a sale, than to know what Memorial Day is truly about.

Memorial Day May 31, 2010

My son and I attended the service honoring fallen United States military members at the Grandview Cemetery in Fort Collins, CO at 10:30 am. What an honoring and sentimental service to those who have gone before us and have done so while serving our country. While I can't list deceased service members buried here (perhaps I could if I spend some time doing research), I would like to thank those who were there to honor those who are buried there, around our nation, and those who are MIA:

FLEET RESERVE ASSOC AND AUXILARY-BRANCH & UNIT 21
MARINE CORPS LEAGUE 785
GOLD STAR MOTHERS
DAR (Daughters of American Revolution) CACHE LA POUDRE CHAPTER
VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars) AUXILIARY POST 1781
AMERICAN LEGION AUXILIARY UNITS 4 & 187
DAUGHTERS OF UNION VETERANS
FRA (Fleet Reserve Association) UNIT 21
COLOR GUARD
HONOR GUARD
COLORADO PATRIOTS DRUM AND FIFE CORPS
AIR FORCE ASSOCIATION CHAPTER 372
DISABLED AMERICAN VETERANS AND AUXILIARY
SONS OF THE LEGION SQUADRON 4
AMERICAN LEGION RIDERS GROUP
KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS

Individuals:
SGT. OF ARMS: MAC MCCORMICK-MARINE CORPS LEAGUE 785
Invocation: JOHN RINNIE-MARINE CORPS LEAGUE DET 785
keynote Speaker: COL. JOE CASSIDY-US ARMY RETIRED
Benediction: JOHN RINNIE-USMCL-DET 785
Honor Guard: FORT COLLINS ALL VETERANS HONOR GUARD
Echo Taps: SAM TRUJILLO JR & TOM ECKRICH
Amazing Grace: PETE LONG-BAG PIPES

There were also some AMAZING youth there to add to the services, and while I will not post their names for the sake of internet safety, know that your presence meant so much:

National Anthem: FT COLLINS HIGH SCHOOL-GIRL STATE DELIGATES
Reading of "A Gold Star Mother": AUX UNIT 187, JR MEMBER & STUDENT FROM O'DEA ELEMENTARY
Recessional From The Five Nations: AUX UNIT 187, JR MEMBER & STUDENT FROM POUDRE HIGH SCHOOL
Reading of "In Flanders Field": Boy Scout from Troop 96

The Boy Scouts also placed many, many flags out among the graves of deceased military around Fort Collins.

This is a day to remember those who were born before us, lived and learned before us, built a nation before us, and have died before us. We have much to be thankful for.

Back in the saddle again...

It feels good to go back to volunteering again! Had a volunteer training tonight to get started at The Matthews House and I'm very excited. I put off volunteering this last year and a half to get through school and all of my other responsibilities, and I almost think it's part of my lower Maslow's Hierarchy of needs...I have to do it!


So after looking at places around Fort Collins and thinking of places to volunteer, The Matthews House really struck me for a number of reasons. First, I've already volunteered at a domestic violence agency, a senior center, a prenatal program for low income women, and various agencies on a one or two time basis-I would like to try something new. The Matthews House works with youth that need positive adult interaction. They may need to learn that not every adult is going to let them down, that they do have positive qualities, that they can succeed at something; they may need to learn vital life skills such as graduating high school or getting a GED, applying/keeping a job, cooking, balancing a checkbook. Volunteering for an agency that takes this on appeals to me because there were many people in my life that took me in and taught me many of these things and they were not my parents.


Here is the website to The Matthews House: http://www.thematthewshouse.org/

Check them out. If you live in the area and can support them, please do!

If anything, be inspired in your own way to give back to your community by volunteering.

Poll Results-What's the most you've ever spent on a handbag?

So Fort Collins isn't New York or LA where men and women are spending enough money on bags that could provide antiretroviral AIDS medications for 17 people for an entire year in Sub Saharan Africa (or maybe it's our followers?), but here are the poll results of what's the most you've ever spent on a handbag:


Free-$30: 57%

$31-$50: 28%

$51-$100: 14%

$101-$200: 0

$201+: 0


Have you become a "follower" of the Who Cares? LLC blog? I am trying to come up with fun new polls, and we need participants to make it FUN! Invite your friends while you're at it!

Peace to All,

Jessy

Healing Rape Survivors in the Congo

From Utne Reader March-April 2010

Eleven years ago, the Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, the capital of the South Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of Congo, was built to be a maternity center—a place of healing for women displaced by war. Its medical director, Denis Mukwege, an obstetrician and gynecologist, wanted to stem rising maternal and infant mortality rates and repair fistulas. As the hospital opened, however, it became evident that it would fulfill a different need: Today 70 percent of its patients are survivors of rape.

Tens of thousands of women and girls have been raped in the Congo in the past decade. In South Kivu alone, 14,200 rape cases were registered between 2005 and 2007. This extreme violence is not a side effect of a country in conflict: It is “the use of rape as a strategy,” reports The Progressive (Nov. 2009). Local armed groups and Rwandan militias use rape to systematically destroy communities. Populations are terrorized; families collapse as a result of the stigma; sexually transmitted infections spread. At the Panzi Hospital, one of three places in South Kivu equipped to handle such physical and psychological trauma, staff admit around 20 survivors a day. A third of them need major reconstructive surgery. One in ten will return after she is raped again.

Mukwege is undaunted. “[He] personifies a social movement that is taking place on the ground,” Brad Macintosh of SAFER (Social Aid for the Elimination of Rape) tells The Progressive. “He’s far too humble to admit it . . . but he is leading this social movement.” At Panzi, treating survivors of rape goes beyond tending to physical and psychological trauma: It means preparing for women’s reentry into society by coordinating with vocational programs; challenging a legal system that allows rapists to rape with impunity; and campaigning to raise global awareness.

“People need to see this,” Mukwege tells The Progressive. “I don’t want the U.S. or Canadian governments to say they don’t know. We appreciate the supplies and aid because there are shortages of everything here . . . but what we really need is to stop the war.”

http://www.utne.com/Science-Technology/Healing-Rape-Survivors-in-the-Congo.aspx

Bringing Glasses to the Masses

From Utne Reader March-April 2010

It’s estimated that 158 million of the world’s citizens experience vision loss and don’t have access to glasses. And the impairment doesn’t just affect a person’s quality of life—it has an economic impact.

Johns Hopkins Public Health (Fall 2009) reports that economist Kevin Frick and his colleagues studied the effect of poor vision on productivity and discovered that the global economy loses $121 to $269 billion annually due to a lack of corrective eyewear. To put it another way, for every person denied a pair of glasses, $1,000 is lost.

The problem is most prevalent in the developing world, notes physics professor and social entrepreneur Joshua Silver. He tells Ode (Nov. 2009) that “in some parts of sub-Saharan Africa there is one optometrist for every 8 million people.”

Silver has invented “Adspecs”—simple, highly affordable, nonprescription spectacles with adaptive lenses controlled by chambers of silicone oil. “If you fill the chamber with oil, the lens curves out; if you let the oil out of the chamber, the lens curves in,” he says, stressing that with just a few simple directions most anyone can adjust these glasses.

So far Silver has distributed about 30,000 Adspecs, which run about $19 a pair and are paid for by donations to his nonprofit, Global Vision 2020. The goal is to distribute a billion pairs in the next 10 years.

http://www.utne.com/Science-Technology/Bringing-Glasses-to-the-Masses.aspx

What's on your shoulder?

Glamour April 2010 page 83 Versace bag (cute!) Going price: $3,950

"Malaria is one of the deadliest diseases impacting poor children around the world. The disease kills more than 2,000 children every day and now is the #1 killer of children in many of the places where World Vision works.

Every $6 you give will provide a long-lasting insecticide-treated bed net that will protect the life of two or more children from this deadly disease. Since these nets can be used for approximately four years, that means you will save the life of a child for only 6 cents a month! It's one of the best investments you’ll ever make!" http://donate.worldvision.org/OA_HTML/xxwv2ibeCCtpItmDspRte.jsp?funnel=dn&item=1849059&go=item&

One cute Versace bag = 658 treated mosquito nets = the potential to save a minimum of 1,316 children.

Getting back into the groove of things...

Graduation is over. I am now trying to catch up on all the things that went on the wayside while trying to do so. That means that the Who Cares? LLC website will be taken down as the host server is changing things, and I am going to take that as an opportunity to do some changing of my own.

I am going to start reading and blogging. I will still have items for sale, so if you are interested, please feel free to email me (since the site is down, I will have to use my personal email as well: jessicakristy@hotmail.com). I will try my best to figure out how to utilize this blogging site to make it easiest for you to learn, get motivated, purchase products for causes you want to support, and for you to spread the word about social issues that you care about.

Thanks for your understanding and support.

All the best to you!

Jessy