What I wouldn’t give up…

Interview last week was fantastic and I have been so hopeful. What do you do while you wait for the callback after meeting your soulmate? Well I’ve not quite figured it out, but here’s what I have tried so far:

1. Try getting back into running. First run in months yesterday. It was fantastic! Now if I can convince myself to go for a second one within the next month, that will be miraculous!
2. Start making plans for the road trip to Oregon. Set the date, getting excited! Know anyone who lives in Arizona/California that might let three girls stay with them at the end of May for a night as they make a light-speed trip? Meaning we would not expect more than a place to park the car and sleep indoors for one night before dashing out again.
3. Write a blog post.
4. Make plans for what to do with all the spare weekends after the presentations and homework assignments and internship things are all completed.
5. Read The Locust Effect by Gary Haugen (IJM founder)I just read a chapter and they made the comparison between pay grade of lawyers and the amount a person most likely spends on coffee in one month ($100) which reminded me of fundraising for the Batwa Identification campaign not so very long ago. Yet ages ago… The story talks about how the court system in Malawi is SO back logged that the holding cell literally has no room for people to sit down. (There are 10 police prosecutors to serve all of Malawi’s 15 million people and about 300 total lawyers. As compared to the U.S. with more than 10 prosecutors for every 100,000 people.) The only way to leave is when you leave your body for dead. One man, Lackson, has been imprisoned for 6 years for a charge that the court has no record of, therefore has no reason to charge him and without being able to afford a lawyer, he will have no way of advocating for himself or his release and will be one of those leaving the cell not under his own power. He’ll die in prison, waiting.
6. Waste time on Facebook? Yup. Just enough to see this:

”I would be dead ”, said Chantal Bakobwa, a mother of four children, living in Mwendo village located in Muhanga commune, Kayanza Province. Because of poor housing, source of all diseases stemming from poor hygiene, Chantal since the month of January has gone to the Clinic four times since when she has got a medical card issued by #ASSEJEBAassisted by African Road before getting it she claims that she was unable to seek medical care from the doctor, she used traditional medicines, a fact that prevented her from recovering. 
She continues to mention that even if she used those traditional medicines, she had no hope of living because she had seen that most of her neighbors who used these medicines died in great numbers.
”Now I have the hope of living because I can be attended and recover, but in the last years, it is hard to know whether you will recover when you got sick” .

I am hereby grateful from my heart to those who provided us with the medical cards because they have chased death from our homes and now we have spent more than five months without any death incident reported whereas before, we went for burial every month. 
For instances last year prior to the cards, I lost my two siblings who died in one month because of lack of money to go to the hospital . We extend our heartfelt thanks to those who assisted us because they have added up the number of living days for us. With the #Agriculture project we have a food, our kids go to school we live like others even if the problem still about our houses. We really have many blessings from our friends who live in #America. God bless them.” Said Chantal.

Much thanks to save the life of the poor people, To give hope for hopeless :
TOGETHER WE CAN CHANGE THE LIVES OF BATWA WOMEN AND CHILDREN.

 

How cool is that? YOU Helped start that! You saved those lives. Remember that time when I was offering to Give Up Mexican Food for the Batwa people and now here I am practically in Mexico… And raising hell about the things we deny immigrants. Hey, did you see that the Cubans in Nuevo Laredo protested? To say if America is really going to help people fleeing violence, why are they being denied entry into the country? Nah, America wouldn’t not want to protect people  whose lives are in danger…. As long as we can be sure they have never broken a law, have lots of money to invest in the economy, a perfect bill of health, know the history of the U.S.A (ever tried taking the exam required to become a citizen? Try it!) and can speak multiple languages fluently– as long as one of them is English. Ya’know, all the things that make perfect American citizens.

7.  Spend time with Jesus! Because I really have no control of the plans coming down the chute….

8.  Hang out with the awesome creatures in the barnyard. Horses, dogs, and horned owls! Look how cute they are! Ok, hard to see, but they’re there and they’re so awkwardly adorable!

9.  Complete the school stuffs! Last week of class is here! Just submitted the abstract for the paper I am presenting as my final project “Community Led Transformation” and am preparing the presentation materials for two other presentations next week. Oh, if I haven’t mentioned it recently enough, I graduate in less than a month!!!! Maybe that should be, number ten, but I have one even better:

10.  Hang out with friends, enjoy Texas brew, write letters, take pictures, and collect memories, because I may never see fireflies again. All of which I would give up if it would save a few more Batwa-esque lives.

Ok, enough procrastinating. IJM is surely in bed by now and won’t be emailing me anymore tonight. And the thunderstorms have started to let up, too.

Love and hugs to you!