In March of 2005 I found Bono's acceptance speech for the TED awards, on the internet. After watching the entire speech, I was dumbfounded. Somewhere between Live Aid and growing up, I lost my compassion and became cynical towards humanity in general. His speech was like a kick in the gut - like he was speaking directly to my lack of compassion and caring and it was a wake up call! I googled as much as I could about Africa and Aids and extreme poverty and the One campaign, and the more I dug, the more I realized I had to do something... anything... to help and to be part of the push to end poverty.

People starving in this day and age is just wrong. People dying for lack of cheap drugs or clean water is just wrong. Children dying because their HIV infected mothers can't get access to a simple pill to prevent mother to child transfer of the disease is wrong. We can send people to the moon, but we can't find a way to end this? I know we can. I'll continue to do whatever I can to spread the word, to get others involved to end this.

(all proceeds from this page will go to Kiva)

There are many things people can do to help..you dont have to be rich or have a lot of time to do something..every little 'something' helps in the end.

what my friends and I are doing:

-collect empty pop/soda cans and juice boxes at work and return for refund.. the money can go to Kiva for a loan, World Vision has a gift catalogue; Save the Children, African Well fund...whoever you feel comfortable giving it to (ours went to a loan for a lady looking after 4 of her own children and 2 of her deceased sister's children, to help increase her business)

-we knit dolls for a charity called ICross. They're called Comfort Dolls and ICross uses them as padding when they ship medicines and medical equipment to Africa - once the crates are unpacked, the dolls are given to the local kids... you can find a pattern HERE

-if you or your company shop online at places like Staples or Office Depot, if you buy things on line from Gap, Old Navy, Amazon.com (all those lovely inspiring books I've listed below!) before you go to their website, go to Shop online for Africa Aid first. If you enter participating shops through Africa Aid's front page, up to 5% of your purchase price gets donated to Africa Aid!

-i have a penny jar (an empty pickle jar) on my desk at work. When people come into my office to visit, or for advice, i smile and point to the jar. Last year the jar raised enough to buy vitamins for numerous kids, as well as 4 bed nets (from the World Vision Christmas Catalogue). This year so far we've raised enough to help finance two loans with KIVA. The cool thing about a KIVA loan is once its paid off, you can reinvest the original $25 back into a new loan, which we've already done!

-we write letters... and we send email letters any time that ONE or Make Poverty History (MPH) Canada or MPH UK emails us to do so. We call politicians when asked to do so. Its not just us doing this in our own country, but we send such letters to other G8 world leaders as well.. telling them that the World is watching them, keeping tabs on them, and expecting them to keep the promises of Aid and Fair Trade they made at the Gleneagles G8 Summit.

-Forego birthday, christmas + anniversary gifts. Tell your family and friends to sponsor a child in your name, send a gift from the World Vision Catalogue, or donate to the charity of your choice instead.

-NEW - my friends and I are purchasing our Christmas cards at Hallmark, and buying (RED) cards this year. They are abit pricier than your dollar store boxed cards :) but 8% of the product price will go to the Global Fund to help fight AIDS in Africa.

Do 'something'. A small something is better than nothing