After
many struggles to contact EC professionals in other countries, I have come up
dry, and will be using the alternate assignment.
This
week I listened to a podcast via the World Forum Foundation radio website http://www.worldforumfoundation.org/wf/radio.php. The podcast I listened to was with Mr.
Meridas Eka Yora. He is the founder and
director of Fajar Hiayah for Islamic Education and director of the Yayasan
Fajar Hidayah Foundation. As many of us remember,
there was a great earthquake in 2004 located in the Indian Ocean. Indonesia was the closest land to the epicenter
of this earthquake, and the territory of Aceh was devastated. 225 Indonesians died and 500k were left
homeless. In the wake of this devastation,
what are homeless orphans to do? Where
are they to go? This organization ran
preschools for these orphans. They also
had nurses and psychologists for the children.
Yora spoke of a holistic approach to care. He said it gives a family-feeling to the
children.
I
hoped to find information about Indonesian childhood poverty from the CHIP
organization (http://www.childhoodpoverty.org/), but I saw
information for China, India, Kyrgyzstan, and Mongolia. I chose India because it is on the Indian
Ocean like Indonesia, and unlike the other three options. Also, we have a large Indian population in
Richmond, VA.
I
learned that India is home to the majority of poor people in South Asia. Almost half of the population is under the age
of 18, and half of those children are malnourished. India is also home to the largest number of
working children in the WORLD…nearly 1/3 of these children are under 16 years
of age. This makes me uncertain if I
should buy thing “made in India” to support these poor souls, or abstain from
buying these products to boycott child labor.
I am amazed at the poverty level in this country…more than 25%. Surprising enough as this is, the poverty
level in Richmond, VA is 25%. I live in Henrico County (neighbor to Richmond
City) and our poverty level is 9%, with a state-wide poverty level of 10%. I can’t imagine if my entire country operated
at this level of poverty.
(Poverty statistics for Virginia retrieved from www.census.gov)
Yes, Rene it is sad to here these iusses of our wonderful world, but it has been great information to know, and I can now do what I can with the programs I have gain kwonledge of. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteRene,
ReplyDeleteI listened to the same podcast as you this week. I think many young children suffer traumatic experiences as the children in Indonesia did due to the tsunami, which affect further development. This is a major hurdle to overcome and provide supportive services so children can flourish. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for many of those children to take the place of lost parents, or to be completely orphaned and try to regroup and focus on education, when survival is so difficult.