the daily post...

As part of the agreement for sponsoring our flights to Haiti, I'm going to be responsible for some daily reporting of the situation on the ground and our work there. It needs to be readable by my work colleagues, so I'll probably set up another blog and will post a link here so anyone who reads my meandering thoughts and periodic fits of lovelorn anxiety can follow me in professional mode on the Haiti blog. Watch this space for a brand spanking new link :-)

i gotta feeling...

so everythings in place to leave for Haiti with one exception. We're waiting to receive Visa's for our colleagues in the phillipines who are joining us at a meeting point in the U.S. before we journey together to the dominican republic and then to Haiti. I'm supposed to leave on thursday.

finding the stress balls

Years ago I picked up a gift for my brothers in China. It was two beautiful little red boxes, embossed with traditional chinese designs, containing two perfectly round silver balls each. When you placed the balls in your hands you could turn them over and over with your palm and feel a light tinkling inside. The motion if handling the balls, the feeling of smooth, cold, metal, and the light vibration from the tinkling sound was supposed to bring relaxation and stress relief. Since my brothers were wrapped in asian martial arts culture at the time, I thought it might be an apt present. It was a little superfluous for them, to some extent, because the martial arts was the larger stress relief. But they did actually enjoy playing with them for a long while after I brought them as a gift.

I'm stressing today as the rain comes down and there's much on my mind.

Later tonight, I'm headed to a "Call for Action" roundtable on improving health for Arab women in Israel which will take place in Jaffa. I spread the word to many of my friends who will be attending sessions as well. I hope they have a good turn out for the larger conference because the planned agenda looks fascinating and is a perfect opportunity for civic mobilization in the furtherment of coexistance.

friends of ours?

The Israeli ZAKA (emergency rescue and first aid team) that handles recovery of remains, flew directly to HAITI after a mission in Mexico and has been working almost non-stop since arrival. their only break was taken last shabbat when they paused to break bread and drink wine with colleagues from egypt and qatar... Disaster breeds anarchy, chaos, and... cross cultural closeness?

esthers lesson

"For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father's family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?....."

so basically we owe it to ourselves and the world to do something and not sit idly by when things disintegrate around us. Even more so when we have a "royal position" ie. a skill set or a comfortable state in life that allows us to reach a little bit further.

Blinded by the light

No one is ignoring Haiti. It seems to me that the entire worlds attention is now wrapped around this tiny nation, whose government has retreated into non-existance. Money is flowing in from everywhere but no one is quite sure how to administer it. The Americans are busy trying to ensure security in a historically highly volatile nation. As usual the security and logistics efforts threaten to consume the humanitarian efforts.

Since Israel is experienced in disaster management and we believe in the concept of "Tikkun Olam", which is something like healing the world, we're able to set up quickly and fill the health gaps left when the entire world has no choice but to focus on security. To some extent, our constant preoccupation with preserving our existance, has enabled us to walk a fully functional balance beam of administrating health care and managing human welfare in a secure environs while threatened.

One one matter truly irks me and that is the matter of everyone's neighbour and his sister wanting to help Haiti while ignoring all the other regions that need help. Sudan has fallen off the media radar. No one pays attention to the Congo anymore. Rwanda has lost it's luster. Shall I go on? It's a huge world with many problems...why must everyone choose to focus on the same one? Help Haiti but don't forget the other 7 billion living on the planet.

pride without prejudice

I'm so proud of Israel and now I'm just as proud of my place of work. Sometimes it makes worklife easier when your personal motto matches with the mission statement at your workplace. I've just been notified that we have approval to organize a six person medical delegation to send to volunteer in Haiti for two weeks. Plane tickets will be purchased and salaries paid for the duration of the outreach trip. In addition, the team will be bringing over needed supplies to help stock the already established field hospitals.