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As the 2022 draws to a close..

My life devoted to helping the children of this world started exactly 17 years ago on this day with Children International. Initially I was looking for a child sponsorship program through UK based organisation because every $ or £ I donate the UK government would have added 25% on top (as opposed to less Income Tax taken off from your earnings in the USA). In other words, living and working in the UK, yet supporting a charity outside the country won't have any tax benefits to either myself or CI. It was a big decision for me personally. I did my research and decided to go with CI and another international program based here for a year just to compare the services. CI stood up to my expectations despite losing that extra governmental support. It was very different or (should I say) the golden time of this organisation. Today, my sponsorship world spans across 3 continents with CI and 3 other local NGOs based in Bhutan and Sri Lanka. In fact my Bhutanese sponsorship inspired by a sto
Recent posts

Newfound friendship

Luz is my newest child joined back in last July. She is the only daughter in a single parent family of 3 from Jalisco. The life has been harder for them especially when mum lost her job due to the pandemic. They now depend on financial support from Luz's maternal grandfather. In spite of the difficulties, Luz values her education. She's in grade 8 of school year spanning September through June. Luz enjoys going to church to learn catechism. At her age, I too went to study Buddhism at our local temple every Sunday. She also likes fishing in a faraway dam. Dams are great places to catch fish. Once upon a summer day, I too went fishing with my neighbor at a nearby lake. It was wonderful experience – I told her. Anyone heard of ' Mi Burrito Sabanero '? Apparently a popular children song in Latin America, and Luz was rehearsing it for the school Christmas concert last year. So as our journey begins.. talking and getting to know each other. And where will she take me next? (q

Making sense of US sponsorship

Living in the US is so much more expensive than the other countries where Children International operate, so that sponsoring a child in the US will require multiple sponsors, whereas one sponsor per child from outside. In other words, our sponsor dollar would have much greater impact on a child living in poverty outside of the USA. Gross domestic product per capita is the purchasing power parity value of all final goods and services produced within a country in a given year, divided by the average (or mid-year) population for the same year. Here are the GDP per capita ( IMF estimates equivalent to USD for 2021) in CI countries: 1. USA = 69,380 2. Dominican Republic = 20,940 3. Mexico = 20,820 4. Colombia = 15,920 5. Ecuador = 11,530 6. Philippines = 8,900 7. Guatemala = 8,890 8. India = 7,310 9. Honduras = 5,770 10. Zambia = 3,410 So, you can buy more things with one dollar (or the purchasing power of the dollar is higher) in Zambia than you can in any other

Jorge's godmother!

Five months ago, the 12-year old Estephanie (my former sponsored child) has become one of the youngest CI sponsors to a little boy called Jorge (8) from Chimaltenango, Guatemala through my 'gift sponsorship' – (meaning everything financial covered by me). She has just received the below WG follow-up report from her 'godson'. Estephanie was happy for me to share it with the forum. (Google Translation) Jorge's family is very grateful for receiving the support, Jorge is very happy because they were able to buy him clothes and shoes and also share basic necessities with the family. They are very happy for the support received. "Hello dear godmother! I am very excited and very grateful to you, it was a very great emotion to have bought food and shoes and clothes and to know that you have sent me this help, which is a great blessing for me and my family. Since this is very helpful in my life since my father does not have a stable job. And for that I thank y

World of Delicious Recipes

I recently asked the children in my second 'group letter' to write a recipe for a healthy dish. They were asked to imagine that one day I travel afar from Scotland to come see them, and they are going to make a special dish just for me. Before my travel, a food bag will be delivered to their home, which contains the following items & ingredients costing total of less than $10. 1) Mix vegetable packet, 2) Pack of tomatoes, 3) Packet of red onions, 4) Rice packet, 5) Tinned salmon, 6) Olive oil bottle, 7) Curry powder, 8) Chilli powder, 9) Fresh green chillies, 10) Cooking salt. Assuming they have all the pots/pans/utensils, the challenge was to write a set of instructions for preparing their dish but only using the above list, name the dish and finally, as a paying customer how much would they charge me for the meal. I was looking for their best of culinary skills to prepare a recipe for a nutritious and tasteful dish. To my astonishment, Aaron from Guayaquil has