Hi Raymond, I think you're off track and I'm sorry I didn't provide the whole context. Sending the t-shirts over the Cambodia is only the tip of iceberg of my personal involvement (and that of many volunteers who are connected to the Sharing Foundation) in Cambodia. I am on the board of the Sharing Foundation (http://www.sharingfoundation.org)- an NGO that works in country to provide services to many poor children in Cambodia.
Some of the work we do in country: -Support over 1,400 kids for education, from pre-school to college scholarships. This is done mostly in Roteang Village where have reburbished the school buildings (including a building a new library and stocked it lots of books all hand carried over from US and donated by people), a computer school, a state of the art rain water collection system, provided support for teacher salaries and training, school supplies, and school uniforms. We also provide school uniforms to thousands of kids out of the village, in collaboration with an nGO that supports street kids. Many kids in Cambodia can't attend school without a uniform. Through our vocational sewing program where we train and provide employment for young woman who make the uniforms - we distribute thousands of uniforms. I have taught ESL in the village school ... -We're supporting about 20 kids for college now - my family is sponsoring a young woman and I raised the money for her tuitution off my blog earlier this year (http://fundraisingwidget.org -HIV medications and support for pregnant women with aids. We have a program in Phnom Penh that supports young pregnant mothers with HIV. We provide housing and medical care and meds - the meds reduce the transmission of aids. We provide training in hygeine so they can bottle feed the infants without them getting sick. -Farming project - we have a farming project in the village where we provide training and land for 40 of the poorest families. They money they make from selling vegetables help them make a sustainable wage for their families. The "profits" from the extra vegetables sold goes in a micro financing loan pool and we provide housing improvements. This past year we installed state of the arts rain water collection systems in their houses - because the wells had levels of aresenic. This way they get clean and safe water. You can see some photos of the project here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cambodia4kidsorg/sets/1655610/ We also built a project head start in the farm area so the children of the people working in the fields could attend school - http://www.flickr.com/photos/cambodia4kidsorg/sets/272831/ -There are like 20 kids we sponsor for College, including Leng Sopharath. I raised money from my blog to support her college - http://www.flickr.com/photos/cambodia4kidsorg/sets/72157594372769597/ -- Read the letter from her about how much an education means. You'll also notice that she is wearing a pink t-shirt that someone donated and that was sent to Cambodia. -We run an orphanage in the village -- most of the kids have special needs - aids or other illnesses, At the orphanage, they receive medical care and loving care. You'll see a set of photos below of one child in the orphanage, named Tep Vuthea. (Notice his green t-shirt, I think it is a base ball t-shirt) - Anyway, he also has some talents as an artist. We provided art lessons - he draw illustrations that we made into cards and sold - the money is now his a college fund for him - http://www.flickr.com/photos/cambodia4kidsorg/sets/72057594070960552/ Right now we're in the process of organizing project where we will vacinate all the children in the Roteang Village - all 527 of them! -There's many more projects that we do, and I could on and on and on but you get the idea .. We don't just send t-shirts over there ... All the projects are managed by Cambodians in country, thus providing employment. We make regular visits to oversee the projects. This is how supplies from the US are carried over -- items such as clothing, books, or whatever is needed. (The last few trips, we've been bringing over reburbished laptops for the computer school) T-shirts (it is really hot in Cambodia) are in high demand and very much appreciated. We've had lots of people donate new and gently used t-shirts. We like to thank our donors and will take photos of people receiving the items donated. As far as a video blogging project in Cambodia - I personally would love to see that -- however, these things take a lot of time. I wanted to see a computer school ever since I got involved like 7 years ago - but we had to deal with a lot of basic needs first. We're trying to build in sustainability in all our work in country -- that takes time, patience, learning, money, and other resources .. Hope that answers your question. B. -----Original Message----- From: Jay dedman [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 8:41 PM To: [email protected]; Beth Kanter Subject: Re: [videoblogging] old Vloggercon t-shirts > Am I the only one who finds this just a Bit distasteful? To send a > bunch of branded t-shirts to Cambodia because our geeky females > didn't take all of them last summer in San Francisco? > And then to ask for a picture to top it off? How are they to respond > to this? "Ooh, the nice people in America have sent us t-shirts about > videoblogging. Let's smile for the Americans"? > This is really making me upset > IF we are going to send VloggerCon t-shirts to poor non-Caucasians in > Cambodia, we might just as well Really get involved there. Get > involved with their local community. Find ways that we as privileged > westerners can really help. Just sending them 50 t-shirts because we > can't find ways to distribute them among ourselves feels wrong. > If we at all care about youth in Cambodia (and I am Not saying that > Beth Kanter doesn't care), we should get involved, try to do > something, maybe set up a project a la http://swajana.com/ where we > can give them a chance to put their voice out there. Give us Their perspective on life. > Give them a voice amplifier. Don't give them a frigging t-shirt and > let them smile to the camera so we can tell ourselves and each other > how international we are as a vlogosphere. > Am I off track here? :) i hear you raymond. i guess my asking for a picture could have been in bad taste. none was meant. I think Beth is the best one to answer this question. I certainly am not coming from the perspective that these people in Cambodia are starving and dying and we're giving them t-shirts. these are just people on the other side of the world who Beth knows. Beth? As far as starting a Swajana.com project in cambodia, Beth and I have talked about it offlist. the issue is a couple things: money....equipment...and more importantly, available time of the people in Cambodia who would teach the videoblogging workshops. Raymond, remember when we sent that camera to your friend in nepal? what were the issues that kept him from videoblogging? these issues still exist. this is one reason why we started http://havemoneywillvlog.com. often, these projects need money, and champions to invest their time to make it happen. jay -- Here I am.... http://jaydedman.com
