Charity & Volunteering 01 (Jun 08 - Mar 11)

[winston]

Support UNICEF by Bob Tschannen-Moran

I don't know about you, but one of my long-time charities has been the United Nations Children's Fund otherwise known as UNICEF. Created by the United Nations General Assembly in 1946 to provide emergency food and healthcare to children in countries that had been devastated by World War II, UNICEF has grown into a permanent part of the United Nations system, providing long-term humanitarian and developmental assistance to children and mothers in developing countries.

The UNICEF website highlights the following focus areas:

* Child survival and development
* Basic education and gender equality
* HIV/AIDS and children
* Child protection
* Policy advocacy and partnerships

And the following reasons for doing what they do:

* Because children have rights
* Because the world has set goals for children
* Because children demand a voice
* Because poverty reduction starts with children
* Because the people of the world say 'Yes' for children
* Because children should not be dying from preventable causes

As one of the primary responders to the tragedy in Haiti and as one of the leading development organizations in the world today, I encourage you to find out more and to support them as best you can. Support UNICEF

Source: Life Trek Coaching

.

[winston]

China tells schools to shun relief agency Oxfam

China tells schools to cut ties with relief agency Oxfam, says it has hidden political agenda

CHRISTOPHER BODEEN
AP News

Feb 23, 2010 07:36 EST

China is telling schools to sever all ties with the international relief agency Oxfam and bar its campus recruitment efforts, accusing the group's Hong Kong branch of having a hidden political agenda.

Oxfam Hong Kong — which oversees the group's mainland China operations — is a "non-governmental organization seeking to infiltrate our interior," according to a notice attributed to the Education Ministry seen Tuesday on a job services Web site hosted by Beijing's Minzu University.

It called the group's chairman, public affairs consultant Lo Chi-kin, a "stalwart of the opposition faction," employing language more commonly associated with communist political struggles of the past.

The statement gave few details of the allegations against Oxfam, which has operated in mainland China for 20 years and works in cooperation with the government's poverty alleviation department.

China's authoritarian communist government remains deeply suspicious of most independent social organizations outside its direct control and sets strict limits on activities of international NGOs.

Oxfam Hong Kong's China Unit Director Howard Liu said the agency has never done anything to challenge Beijing's policies or laws and is only interested in alleviating poverty. He added that the notice appears to refer specifically to an internship program that places social work majors from Chinese universities at NGOs.

Messages left for Lo at his office weren't immediately returned.

The charge against Lo was apparently directed at his membership in Hong Kong's Democratic Party, which advocates direct elections and other political reforms opposed by Beijing. China took control of the former British colony in 1997 but allows it to retain its own legal, economic and political systems.

However, Democratic Party legislator James To said Lo was viewed as a moderate with ties to China and not part of the party's core leadership.

"We are shocked by the accusations," To said.

Oxfam Hong Kong board members also include prominent pro-Beijing figures, including former Secretary of Justice Elsie Leung and Bernard Chan, a member of China's national parliament.

Only a handful of well-funded and politically prominent organizations, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, have met the financial and administrative requirements to register in China. Similar organizations that lack such clout have in the past found themselves suddenly banned after operating for years, with no clear reason given.

"The government is wary of these kind of organizations establishing themselves without direct supervision," said Shawn Shieh, a visiting scholar in Beijing who researches Chinese NGOs.

The ministry statement, dated Feb. 4, ordered schools to sever all ties and cooperation with Oxfam. School administrators must ban all campus volunteer recruitment efforts run by the group's Hong Kong office, the statement said.

"All education departments and institutions of higher education must raise their guard and together recognize and take precautions against the unfriendly intentions of Oxfam Hong Kong's recruitment of college volunteers," it said.

A receptionist at Minzu University said all staff were on leave until Thursday, and the Education Ministry did not immediately reply to a list of faxed questions. The statement was taken down from Minzu's site shortly after the school was contacted, a possible indication it was an internal notification not intended to be made public.

Oxfam — a confederation of 14 national organizations that works in about 100 countries — was founded in Britain in 1942.

___

Associated Press writer Min Lee in Hong Kong contributed to this report.

___

On the 'Net:

Oxfam International: http://www.oxfam.org

Source: AP News

[kennynah]

if only have small sum of money for charity....the best is....take some money....walk into heartland....look out for the needy people...buy them a meal...give them some money....

if money big big...set up a bursary....set your own criteria....have social workers operate it and dole out money to the needy for education, healthcare, food, etc....

if wana just give money blindly to red cross, oxfam, kidney foundation, this and that.... then have to accept slippages and possible mismanagement of charity funds...

but foremost...imo, we best make sure our loved ones are taken care of first.... like MM say, some sons dont even give allowance to their parents...settle this homely issues first.... charity for recognition is pure hypocrisy...

[millionairemind]

Last call, last call...

This year's program started last Saturday and will run thro' the year till Nov.

It's the start of a new school year. If you have sometime on Saturdays..

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED

Do you like working with children from 10-12 yrs of age?

Do you feel like contributing to society but do not know where to start?

Do you have a couple of hours every Saturday to help out an underprivileged kid from a very low income family and become his/her mentor??

If you answered YES to the above, WE NEED YOU

The Supervised Homework Group (SHG) from CDAC at Marsiling MRT branch is short of adult volunteers. The kids who come to the center from 1-4pm every Saturday are from low income families. Quite a few of them are from single parent homes or families with alot of problems.

Between 1-3pm, we coach them in their studies (Math, Science and English). From 3-4pm, we play games with them and act as mentor. Don't worry if you feel that you might not be able to coach them, we have guide books, WE JUST NEED YOU

As all of them come from low income families with few means, this 1-to-1 attention hopes to provide good mentorship/tutoring. We have kids who failed every subject and after attending the classes for a couple of years, got at least 3 out of 4 subject passes.

If you think you are up to the task, please PM me here or email me at [email protected]

If you are still unsure but would like to help, y don't you come in for a couple of sessions to see if this is your cup of tea. If after a couple of sessions, you find that you don't like to continue on, that is fine too.

Thank you

[winston]

Unlikely heroes

Lee Siew Hua sniffs out the hero who has trained rats to weed out landmines.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SQUEAMISH me. I never thought I'd find anything at all to love about rats.

But now I can call them HeroRATS, a transformational name coined by Bart Weetjens. The innovator trains giant African rats to sniff out lethal buried landmines in Mozambique, so people can move back to their land. And the nation can move on.

Rats are a powerful conceptual leap from the practice of sending humans into danger with clunky mechanical detectors or dogs. The good thing is, rats are too light to trigger bombs. Maybe they are not as affectionate as dogs, but they are less pricey to house, feed and transport.

Skype-ing with Bart - a Belgian based in Tanzania but travelling in Colombia - he shows me the flipside of a problem: Opportunity.

For Bart, 43, has made a virtue of vermin, which is plentiful in the Third World. "Social change is often based on turning problems into opportunities," he remarks.

He believes new opportunities can arise from the troubles of our time: growing population, climate change, urban waste, for starters. But turning vast problems around needs an innovative spark plus heroic persistence, despite loud ridicule.

"People laugh at you in the beginning if they think it is a strange idea," he says. "But if you have persistence, the results of your action can be enormous."

Supporters are certainly vital, and our homegrown Lien Centre for Social Innovation is one. Bart is one of eight winners of the centre's Lien i3 Challenge, a global contest that seeks and scales up social innovations that can impact Asia. The contest offered a S$1 million purse to spur innovative non-profits.

Winners like Bart create much impact from very little, observes chief judge Willie Cheng, who chairs the Lien Centre.

Casting light on the innovative spirit, which the Lien Centre hopes to fan, he adds: "Much of what makes a solution work is not new in itself. If it was, it would be an invention, not an innovation. Innovation occurs when someone takes an existing tool or technology and sees for the first time how it can be applied in a new way."

All the winners did that, with imagination and efficiency. They show that solutions can lie inside very messy problems. They convince us that even the small and despised things of the world may not be what they seem, if we choose to be creative and attentive.

Even rats can change the world. So what about people? There has to be a changemaker inside us.

http://blogs.straitstimes.com/2009/10/2 ... ely-heroes

[winston]

Taiwan triad boss leaves millions to poor

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Family members of a mafia boss in Taiwan have donated NT$60 million (HK$14.6 million) to charities to fulfill the gang leader's dying wish.

Lee Chao-hsiung, an influential triad leader in central Taiwan, died of liver cancer on March 11 aged 73.

His son donated the money in his name to disabled people and low- income families as well as four leading religious organizations, the Taichung city government said. About 1,000 people, including gang bosses, helped set up a shrine for Lee - the "mafia arbitrator" - the Apple Daily said.

His funeral in late April is expected to draw more than 20,000 people, making it one of Taiwan's largest-ever mob funerals.

Source: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

[Aspellian]

Taiwan triad boss leaves millions to poor
His funeral in late April is expected to draw more than 20,000 people, making it one of Taiwan's largest-ever mob funerals.

wow... so drama, really like Mafia movie - all will come in black suits and slick hair. Hope these guys can donate more even before they leave this world.

[winston]

U.K. millionaire to move to mud hut
Business tycoon to sell house, start charity in Africa
updated 6:49 p.m. ET March 10, 2010

LONDON - A 41-year-old millionaire businessman who nearly died in a car crash eight years ago is leaving behind his exquisite 16th-century farmhouse and lavish lifestyle to move to a mud hut in Uganda and start a children's charity.

Jon Pedley plans to sell his telecommunications businesses, a $1.5 million Essex farmhouse with a 1-acre garden and his furniture to raise cash for African orphans, the U.K. Daily Mail reported Wednesday.

His charity, Uganda Vision, will send troubled British children to Uganda where they will help locals orphaned by AIDS and poverty.

The self-made tycoon has a troubled past that includes a criminal record, alcoholism and affairs. He says a serious car crash in 2002 in which he almost died led him to find God.

"I've lived an incredibly selfish existence," Pedley, of Finchingfield, Essex, was quoted as saying in the Daily Mail. "I've been convicted of crime, slept rough, been an alcoholic, had affairs, and damaged people's lives including my own. I've always put the pursuit of money in front of everything else."

In college, Pedley said, he began smoking and drinking and stealing from shops and his parents. After leaving school, he received a suspended jail sentence for fraud and theft after scams including selling the furniture at a rented flat, the Daily Mail reported.

Pedley married, continued to drink heavily, cheated on and later divorced his wife.

In 2002, he had been drinking when he fell asleep at the wheel and crashed into a van. He was in a coma for six weeks.

After making a full recovery he said he found religion and gave up alcohol.

'I'm now teetotaler and I try to live my life in a way that pleases God,' he told the Daily Mail.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35804710/ns/us_news-giving/

[winston]

Building free homes for wounded vets By Kathleen Toner, CNN

Dan Wallrath gives Alexander Reyes an unexpected gift: a new home, mortgage-free.

* Dan Wallrath's organization built four houses for wounded vets in Texas
* Retired homebuilder started program after meeting father of wounded Marine
* Wallrath's team remodeled house for free to make it handicapped-accessible


Houston, Texas (CNN) -- Alexander Reyes' boyhood dream of a military career ended when he was hit by an improvised explosive device during a patrol two years ago in Baghdad.

"Laying in that hospital bed ... sometimes I felt I'd rather [have] died," Reyes said. "My life came to a complete halt."

Reyes sustained severe blast injuries that led to his medical discharge; he's on 100 percent medical disability. Like many soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan, Reyes, now 24, found the transition to civilian life difficult.

But he and a handful of other injured veterans are getting help from what may seem an unlikely source: a custom home builder in Houston, Texas.

Dan Wallrath recently presented Reyes and his wife with an unexpected gift: a home built especially for them, mortgage-free.

"Thank you. That's all I can say," Elizabeth Reyes said, sobbing and clutching her stunned husband's arm as Wallrath surprised them with the house.

For Wallrath, giving wounded veterans a place to call home is his way of saying thanks. Since 2005, his organization has built four houses. Five more are under construction, and he's expanding his idea into a national campaign called Operation Finally Home.

Do you know a hero? Nominations are open for 2010 CNN Heroes

Wallrath spent 30 years making upscale clients' dream houses a reality. But he found a new mission in 2005 when he met with Steve Schulz about a very different type of project.

Schulz's 20-year old son, a U.S. Marine, had been gravely injured in Iraq. Schulz desperately needed to remodel his house to accommodate his son's wheelchair.

"I had no idea how I was going to pay for it," Schulz said. "I just knew that I had to get it done."

Wallrath went to advise Schulz on remodeling his house as a favor to a friend. It was a meeting that changed Wallrath's life.

He remembers Schulz showing him photos of his son Steven.

"He was a big, strapping Marine," Wallrath said. But the pictures he saw of Steven taken after his injury told a different story.

"He was ... half his size. It was so sad," he said. "It dawned on me that people are facing this all over the U.S."

Wallrath mobilized an army of carpenters, plumbers and suppliers who took on the remodeling job for free. They widened doorways, built a ramp to the back door and made the bathroom handicapped-accessible.

"Anything that needed to be done, Dan said, 'We'll take care of it,' " Schulz recalled. "It was just a huge, huge relief."

When the work on Schulz's home was complete, Wallrath realized he was just getting started.

"It really broke my heart to think [about] these young men and women," he said. He decided the best way he could help wounded veterans was by doing what he knew best: building them homes.

"It was like someone hit me upside the head with a 2x4. ... I just felt like this is what God wants me to do."

He took his idea to his local trade group, the Bay Area Builders Association, and convinced members to start a home-building program for wounded veterans.

With donations from suppliers and contractors, Wallrath said, the group can build a $300,000 house for $25,000 to $50,000. Each house is fully furnished and customized to meet the needs of each family and is mortgage-free. The group also covers the taxes and insurance for two years.

Wounded veterans or their spouses often have to find a new career or go back to school, making it hard to make ends meet, Wallrath said.

"If you can alleviate a financial burden off these young kids where they can concentrate on rebuilding their lives, you can really make a difference," he said.

Lt. Erasmo Valles is one such story. As a Marine, he was injured by an IED in Iraq in 2004 and ultimately had one of his legs amputated. Returning to civilian life was hard, and his family rapidly burned through its savings.

"We'd saved money for rainy days, but ... it was raining," Valles said.

Receiving a home from Wallrath in November 2008 turned their fortunes around. Valles, 34, is now studying for his doctorate in public safety; his wife earned her master's degree and is now a special education teacher.

"It saved us," he said. "We're moving on and moving forward. ... For someone to think about me and my family ... to build a home -- wow. That's a hero."

Wallrath is determined to help as many families as he can. He's trying to enlist builders' associations across the country to join his crusade, with the goal of building 100 homes. His program got tremendous interest at an industry event in January, and it soon hopes to break ground on a house near Chicago, the first outside of Texas.

Considering the industry was hard-hit by the recession, Wallrath says he's been heartened by the response.

Now retired, Wallrath dedicates about half of his time to this effort without pay. He says it's the least he can do to repay some of the more than 30,000 troops who've been wounded in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"These kids ... they're doing it for me and you," he said. "So we're the ones that need to step up and do something."

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/03/11/cn ... index.html

[kennynah]

"These kids ... they're doing it for me and you," he said.

such a misguided mind...