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Blog Action Day: Fighting Poverty

October 15th, 2008



I just found out that today is Blog Action Day: Fighting Poverty.

I grew up in Colombia, South America. My parents are missionaries and they have working at fighting poverty in Colombia for over 37 years (read my dad’s blogpost about poverty and what they’ve done to help). Many people in the United States aren’t familiar with real poverty. We may know someone who can’t afford to have a car, or that needs foods stamps to help pay for their food. While that is a form of poverty, it isn’t the same depth of poverty that the majority of the world lives in.

According to the Global Rich List, Mr Chiots and I (and the majority of Americans) are in the top 1% of the world wealth-wise because of our income. Check out how you rank, I bet it will be in the top 1% as well. So what can we do as the top 1% of wealthy people in the world? Obviously we can donate money to one of the many organizations that helps with poverty relief around the world like Heifer International, Kiva, the Grameen Foundation, or Oxfam International. Mr Chiot’s and I choose to donate to pay for the education of poor children in Colombia.

We support a school in Colombia that provides a free or low cost education to the children of the very poor. Through their education they will be able to rise up out of poverty. They’ll never be able to make it into the top 1% of the world wealth-wise, simply because they don’t live in a country like the United States, but they might make it up into the top 25%. We don’t just support with money, Mr Chiots and I have traveled to the school several times to make videos for them to help raise funds. I also work to raise scholarships for a lot of the children at the school.

What else can you do to help fight poverty? You can get involved in local program like a food bank or a homeless shelter or perhaps an after school program for lower income families, or get involved in the world-wide peasant movement, or support better working conditions for farm workers. It doesn’t really matter what you do, just do something.

This is the face of poverty in a poor section of Bogota, Colombia Mr Chiot’s and I visited in February.

What does the face of poverty look like to you and what are you doing about it?

2 Comments to “Blog Action Day: Fighting Poverty”
  1. Tom Humes on October 15, 2008 at 2:34 pm

    Nice Site layout for your blog. I am looking forward to reading more from you.

    Tom Humes

    Reply to Tom Humes's comment

  2. Joe on October 18, 2008 at 1:32 am

    That is so amazing that you grew up in Colombia. It must have been incredible experience. You have taken excellent pictures.

    Reply to Joe's comment

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This is a daily journal of my efforts to cultivate a more simple life, through local eating, gardening and so many other things. We used to live in a small suburban neighborhood Ohio but moved to 153 acres in Liberty, Maine in 2012.

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