Heat the World - Help Norway this Christmas

Heat the World
This Christmas Africa is returning the favour. Norway has helped them out in the past and so as Norwegian children suffer from frostbite, Africa has launched a campaign to send heat to Norway and assist the children of Norway.

Who ever said Norwegians don't have a sense of humor? Just in time for the holidays, a Norwegian group calling itself Radi-Aid has launched an appeal to ship radiators from Africa to Norway. Their cause is the plight of freezing children during Norway's harsh winter months. It's complete with a new music video, and incorporates all the right tropes (see here,here and here) — some people might miss the satire.

These people aren't playing around though. Their effort is a serious critique of misguided development, and of the Western media coverage which often accompanies it. What they want:

1. Fundraising should not be based on exploiting stereotypes.

2. We want better information about what is going on in the world, in schools, in TV and media.

3. Media: Show respect.

4. Aid must be based on real needs, not "good" intentions.

It looks like we're not the only ones to be fed up with poor spokesmenand seriously misguided aid efforts (H/T Rishita Nandagiri). Hallelujah; we here at Africa is a Country couldn't be more thrilled. Also, in preparation for spending this Christmas in Stavanger, I'm curious as to whether I might qualify for a radiator, or at least a new fleece & a bottle of Aquavit?

Just in case you think this is an isolated incidence of Scandinavian brilliance, we were also referred today by Norwegian Magnus Bjørnsen to artist Morten Traaviks' "pimp my aidworker" project, "a mock fundraiser for Western aidworkers."

I trust you take the time to educate yourself on pressing issues in Norway. Because it is really cold there folks, but it's also entirely lovely. And put the song on repeat.

Community Development in the 21 st century

I have had an interest in Anabaptism since 1980 meeting some when working in a refugee camp in Thailand. The Australian Anabaptist Association publishes a newsletter and I have reviewed a book DOWN UNDER - In Depth Community Work. A snippet from the book is published as is my review on page 17.
On the Road 54

As of December 2007, children under 15 accounted for 290,000 deaths worldwide and 420,000 children were newly infected with HIV– the vast majority through mother-to-child transmission of the virus.

http://www.unicef.org/aids/index_youngpeople.html

An anthropologist proposed a game to children of an African Tribe. He put a basket of fruit near a tree and told the kids that the first one to reach the fruit would win them all. When he told them to run they all took each others hands and ran together, then sat together enjoying the fruits. When asked why they ran like that, as one could have taken all the fruit for oneself they said, "Ubuntu, how can one of us be happy if all the others are sad? "Ubuntu is a philosophy of African tribes that can be summed up as "I am because we are".

African AIDS Foundation is proud to partner with African communities who share what little they have to assist the whole community. This in evident as they care for child headed households and assist people with AIDS maintain their medication and look after them when they are sick.

African AIDS foundation was established in response to the AIDS pandemic in Africa. In Australia and other developing countries, depression is a major source of people attending medical practitioners. This video is a light hearted look at the problems faced by us in the developed world and is shared with you to put into perspective the problems we have compared to those in the developing world.

While we in the developed world consider ourselves to be struggling consider the above stats. In Australia most people including those dependant on assiatnce from government and social servie agencies are in the top 10% of the world's richest people by income. If you live in Sydney and own a house you are likely close to the top 1% of the wealthiest people on the planet (that is 70,000,000 people who comprise 1% of the world population).

Gardens provide impetus to set up a business

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?shva=1#inbox/139aab48c8353a89
African AIDS Foundations latest newsletter has an incredible sory about a man who opened a shop after setting up a garden with support from African AIDS Foundation

SBS Radio UWS Medical Student interview

On 20 April 2012 SBS Radio Australia interviewed a student, one of four UWS Medical Students who spent five weeks at Emmaus Hospital as part of their medical studies
http://www.sbs.com.au/yourlanguage/african/highlight/page/id/212291/t/African-Aids-Foundation

SBS Radio interview

UWS Medical Students in South Africa

In December 2011 four Medical Students from UWS spent five weeks at Emmaus Hospital in South Africa. Read their stories by clicking the link below
http://www.africanaidsfoundation.org.au/emmausuws

Unamed student, Dr John Schwarz, Julia New-Tolley and Kat Irwin on return sharing their stories with AAF

HIV Expert new World Bank Chief

New world Bank Head is an expert in HIV/AIDS and a development expert to boot

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/23/jim-yong-kim-world-bank_n_1374923.html?ref=fb&utm_campaign=032312&utm_medium=email&utm_content=NewsEntry&utm_term=Daily+Brief&src=sp&comm_ref=false#sb=2939720,b=facebook

Following are five facts about Kim:

- Kim has an M.D. from Harvard Medical School and a Ph.D. in anthropology from Harvard. He received a coveted MacArthur grant in 2003.

- Kim was born in 1959 in South Korea, moved with his family to the United States at age 5 and grew up in Muscatine, Iowa. His father, a dentist, taught at the University of Iowa.

- He was quarterback of the Muscatine High School football team, and was also class president and valedictorian, ranking tops academically in the graduating class.

- Kim was director of the Department of HIV/AIDS at the World Health Organization. He developed a key treatment for a form of drug-resistant tuberculosis while working in Peru in the mid-1990s.

He was executive director of Partners in Health (PIH), which serves impoverished communities in Haiti, Peru, and elsewhere. He co-founded the organization Partners in Health with Paul Farmer, who was a classmate at Harvard Medical School. The work of PIH received wide publicity through the book "Mountains Beyond Mountains." 

Dr John Schwarz visits African AIDS Projects on Annual Field Trip

Dr John Schwarz and wife Rosalie are travelling in Africa at present visiting African AIDS Foundation projects.
Follow their trip on twitter - twitter@DrJSchwarz