Archive for October 2008
Blog Action Day 2008 | Poverty
With the global recession looming above our heads, certainly many among us have turned to our balances choosing to spend more wisely than in years past. Inspired by capitalist greed, U.S. banks gave countless thousands to those vulnerable Americans who wanted a house, when they couldn’t actually afford the one for which they were signing a mortgage. Preying on the desires of the weak has led to the downtown where banks are seized left and right and the volatile stock market resembles a roller coaster more than a leisurely hike.
As markets collapsed, governments seized banks, and the Dow crashed (it’s biggest single-day loss clocked in at 778 points), I felt a moment of relief. Maybe now, we’ll get it.
But, let’s be honest, we’ll never really get it. Surrounded by newly-minted graduates and other 20somethings in New York City, it’s a refrain hard to forget: “I’m broke.” Yet we live in apartments where families were pushed out to make room for us. We live in apartments where families slept two and three in the closet-sized bedrooms we proudly call our own. We spend $10 on a cocktail and complain when we could just as easily give $10 to someone who would spend it on building wells for clean water. We’d rather not have low-flow shower heads or ones you can stop mid-bath while you shampoo and lather because it’s too much work to hit one button and who cares how much water we waste.
Sadly enough, the only times developing nations have graced our conversations is when, having read the day’s news, we’re talking about the crippling violence they endure or (on perhaps a slightly more optimistic note) the countries we’d like to visit some day. While I’m certainly not beyond exploring the depths of this awe-inspiring planet on which we all live, I have no urge to take from places who have been robbed and continue to be robbed by superpower nations lacking foresight, integrity, and kindness.
Helping the impoverished is a combination of concentrated efforts by a spectrum of people and ideas. Today, I’m employing two of them. I participated in Blog Action Day to raise awareness and I’ll be donating all of today’s income to micro finance a loan through Kiva.
For all of this year, I’ve said I would donate a portion of my monthly income toward a cause – global or local – one I believe in to lift up others in the way that I have been allowed to empower myself. As usual things get in the way and I had not donated yet to a single cause. This post is just as much about encouraging you as it is about me taking responsibility for a promise I made to myself. I’ve taken a lot from the people of this world and the world itself in my 23 years of existence and now, it’s due time I start giving back in more than one way. I talk of these issues on a regular basis, now I’m putting my money where my mouth is. Soon, I hope to be helping in an even more direct way.*
Read others blogging to raise awareness.
Direct way yet to be identified; however, related to life long goals thus must be accomplished. Taking suggestions.
Fashion Forward vs. Tried and True
The latest trend
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As most readers are well aware, I’m hardly your go to girl for fashion. I can walk in and out of a store, having scanned any interesting merchandise in less time than it takes most people to take a shot. And the bane of my shopping existence? Having to try on clothes.
However, dear Internets has provided me a much easier to way shop: by asking other people what I should wear. (Then, quite possibly making my own stubborn choice but none of you know which it is do you.) So, help a girl out.
Vote today to make your voice count in my fall fashions.
No registration needed. All voters must live anywhere in the Universe and have access to the internet.
