Feed My Starving Children-International Aid Organization

This is the logo from Feed My Starving Children's website*.

Feed My Starving Children was founded in 1987 by a local Minnesotan who had the urge to feed God’s children. The full story is on FMSC’s history page. Through trial and error they found an effective and cheap way to do so. After my research I think I will go there soon. I just saw a sign in my school yesterday to sign up and go volunteer. What a perfect opportunity!

About the organization:
Feed My Starving Children (FMSC) is a Christian organization. They strive to feed the world’s starving children in countries that have or are experiencing disasters such as war, natural disaster and economic failure. Not only do the feed the children nutritional meals, they feed their spiritual self as well. Barb, a volunteer at FMSC, says the spirituality of the organization gives the children hope (Shimshock). The organization works to sustain the children’s food source as well not just feed the child one meal.


Volunteers at the 6 sites plus their mobile site, pack the food to be shipped. Last year, over 500,000 volunteers packed over 124 million meals to needy countries (Shimshock).  Volunteers also donate their money to help to food program and 94% of their donation goes straight to it. Under a simple section called Our Mission on their website it states: “Feeding God’s Starving Children Hungry in Body and Spirit.”

This is the orientation video for Feed My Starving Children volunteers.

 They have a photo gallery on Flickr. I picked out a two of the pictures from the gallery that immediately stood out to me.

This picture makes me see how big an impact this simple food has on these children. The boy with the empty bowl in line make my heart feel sad for him. Another thing I liked about this photo was that the pot on of food is as big as the little boy. Imagine how many kids are going to eat from it! Amazing!

This little girl in her pretty dress was just so adorable. She grins as she eats perhaps her only meal of the day. It makes me grin as well when I see such a precious child being helped. Who knows how much  better her future will be because of the food she received.

FMSC is helping solve a global problem. In America people find it is hard to believe that about 1 out 7 people in our world lack food and clean water. “146 million children under age 5 are underweight and 10.1 million children under age 5 die every year, over half of hunger-related causes” (Hunger Facts).  Every 6 seconds a child dies of hunger.

This photo just shouts help.Your can see the life draining from her eyes from lack of food and malnutrition. Her bones are visible through her beaten up skin. This was one of the more bearable images. Some of the others freaked me out.

The statistics and images are breathtaking but it is good to know that Feed My Starving Children is doing something about it. The meals they provide prevent the very preventable diseases that cause the deaths of these children. These include diarrhea, acute respiratory infections, or malaria all associated with extreme malnutrition (Hunger facts). FMSC website and videos also back up these stats. The Food was formulated “by scientists at both Cargill and General Mills” and provides enough nutrition for a child in case it is their only meal for the day (Shimshock). There are three different meals that are produced. They are Manna Pack, Manna Pack Potato-W, Manna Pack Potato-D. They are very easy to prepare and even better, they are cheap to produce. One bag has 6 meals and it costs about $1.44 to produce. 


I emailed FMSC for my interview. Barb Shimshock, Development Advisor, replied to my questions. She has been a volunteer for a few years and said she loves it! She answered some statistical and factual questions of which I quoted a few above.  From the interview I also got a personal feel for the volunteering that goes on at the organization. Anyone from any religious group is allowed to volunteer at the organization. The age requirement is 5 years or older but a chaperon to kid ratio is established for each age group to make sure things are safe and run smoothly for the volunteers. She said that when she and others volunteer they get a sense of satisfaction in knowing they are doing something good. They also enjoy themselves greatly. “It’s amazing to see the children in our communities (in MN) reach out and donate their money to help other less fortunate children.(Shimshock)” One interesting thing I found out about the organization was that they don’t serve children in America. She replied, “We do not. Generally we don't see the severe malnutrition that exists in developing countries. Also, there are other resources available such as the food shelf, etc. These don't exist in developing countries.” This makes sense. I still think that if this much food is being sent out, it would be nice to see at least a little go to needy kids in our country. Or maybe at least organizations in America should adopt similar methods of feeding the poor.

The food is distributed to almost 70 countries in the world. These include:

Afghanistan, Angola, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Belarus, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Jamaica, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mexico, Mozambique, Myanmar, Gambia, Niger, North Korea, Pakistan, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Ukraine, Zambia, and Zimbabwe

 This is a map of the countries they serve that is on the website. As you can see the only dark green on the map is Haiti (very small). For this reason I am going to focus on this small country that has received so much aid from this organization.

I read a folktale from Haiti called, “Why Dogs and Cats Never Get Along”:


The characters in the story are Mr. Cat and Mr. Dog. They each have an idea about weather god should allow dead people to come back alive or not. Each one races to God to tell them their idea. Mr. Cat is clever and sets a few bones along the path to distract Mr. Dog. Mr. Dog tries to distract Mr. Cat with a bowl of milk along the path as well. Mr. Cat didn’t fall for it and Mr. Dog did. Mr. Cat got to God first and said, “God I don’t want you to bring dead people back to life,” and good complied. When Mr. Dog got to God he was furious that Mr. Cat had got there first. He never forgave Mr. Cat and this is why Cats and Dogs never get along.




This is a video of kids in Haiti singing and dancing. Chances are they were aided by some organization like FMSC. It is uplifting to see them with uplifted spirits and smiles.

Works Cited
* All information not cited on in the paragraphs came from Feed My Starving Children's Web page.

Feed My Starving Children. Feed My Starving Children | Volunteer Work Opportunities. 2011. Web. 11 May 2011. http://www.fmsc.org/.

"Hunger Facts - Evangelical Lutheran Church in America." Home - Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Web. 11 May 2011. http://www.elca.org/Our-Faith-In-Action/Responding-to-the-World/ELCA-World-Hunger/Resources/Hunger-Facts.aspx.

Shimshock, Barb. "Feed My Starving Children Information." E-mail interview. 9 May 2011.

Topic for Final Blog Post

***I remember reading somewhere that this was supposed to be a blog post but I can't find it anywhere. Well I forgot to do it so just thought I would do it now in case it was due. I had it posted on the discussion boards for sure but thought this would be a nice preview of whats to come!

Feed My Starving Children

I choose this because this is an organization I am familiar with. I have gone twice to a packaging site before and had a great time and was very happy to be helping out. 94% of donations go to their food programs. They are a Christian organization trying to feed the world’s children with food and spiritually as well. They’re organization is simple in its goal. They feed and try to maintain feeding children who would otherwise starve to death. The food is of the highest nutritional value (and doesn’t taste all that bad either). They are a very trusted organization and millions of people help pack food or donate money to purchase food. “Diarrhea is the number one cause of death of malnourished children. Diarrheal diseases accounted for 16% of deaths among children under the age of 5 worldwide in 2004” (FMST). Every 6 meals only cost 1.44!  They are packed with nutrition and potatoes and rice that prevent diarrhea.  Here is there website where I got a lot of these facts from: www.fmsc.org

Analyzing Artifacts of a Subculture

For this activity you’ll focus on the artifacts that seem central to the subculture you are

studying, and you will try to analyze what those artifacts reflect about the subculture.

Choose three artifacts from the subculture you are studying.

Phone

Booze, cigarettes

Makeup

Explain why you chose the objects you did.

I choose these because they reflect  this group of girls. They are also the stereotype to this group so I think it would be good to touch on these items.

What do you already know about this object? How does that affect your interpretation of its significance in the subculture?

Phones are used to communicate with friends. Makeup is used to make girls look older or better. Booze and cigarettes are a sign of rebellion. Most high school girls have phones, wear makeup, and have used alcohol but these girls do it to the extreme. This is what defines their subculture.

How is it connected to the other artifacts you’ve collected?

All of these are connected because they involve partying, rebellion, and friends.

Think about the values this artifact reflects for this subculture. What are they?

These reflect that these girls value what they look like, who they are with and their social lives a lot. Basically they like to have a good time and don’t care what others thing about.

How is this object used in the subculture? What does that tell you about its significance and the value it has for the group?

I think that the better the phone, the better you look the more parties you go to and the more friends you have in the group the better. They want the new things and to be liked by everyone.

What research might you do on the object's history? uses?

I think I could research the significance of makeup and stereotypes about it and what it says about people.

Phones are very social devices. I could research their impact on people. Maybe for the interview I could ask the girls how many texts the use a month and so forth.

Then, in the space below, finish the following sentence for each of the three artifacts you

have chosen:

The three (or more) most important things this artifact tells me about this

subculture are they are social, they are rebels, they care about what they look like because the other girls in the group do that too, they follow one another and what the media says is ‘in’.

One Last Strike from A Long Way Gone

“He looked at me and I could see in his eyes that he had given up hope. I begged him not to leave us. His lips were about to utter something, but they stopped shaking, and he was gone. …I still held my uncle in my arms, tears running down my face. My entire body had gone numb. I couldn’t move from where I sat. Mohamed and Allie came in and took Uncle away from me and put him on the bed. After a few minutes, I was able to get up. I went behind the house and punched the mango tree until Mohamed took me away from it. I was always losing everything that meant something to me.

            My cousins cried, asking, Who is going to take care of us now? Why did this happen to us in these difficult times?

            Down in the city, the gunmen fired off their guns.”

(Page 208)

                                    

This scene just ripped my heart out. His uncle, his only blood relative left in his life, was taken from him. He has already lost so much!  He is angry that he lost the important things in his life. Just as things were getting better again, the war caught up with him and he lost his uncle. He just can’t seem to get away from tragedy. This made me mad because I felt he deserved the good things that were happening to him after all that he had been through in the last few years.

I found this moment memorable also because he finally reacted to death in a ‘normal’ way since being rehabilitated. He use to except death as easy as breathing as a soldier. Now he is crying, punching things, and worrying. He is grieving for the death.

I have never experienced much loss during my life let alone witness it. I can’t imagine what that felt like. I have had my heartbroken by my dog before but that’s about as close to his experience I can relate. That’s not close. I am not saying I want to relate to him though. That’d be so scary and sad. I don’t know how he is so strong.

Parents from A Long Way Gone

"In particular, I remember a final match that my team, which consisted of Junior and some friends, won. Both my parents were at the game, and at the end, my mother applauded and smiled widely, her face glowing with pride. My father walked up to me and rubbed my head before he held my right hand and raised it up, as he declared me his champion. He did the same to Junior. My mother brought us a cup of water, and as we drank she fanned us with her head cloth. The excitement caused my heart to pound faster and I was sweating profusely. I could taste the salty sweat that ran from my forehead to my lips. Standing there with my family, I felt light, as if I were getting ready to fly. I wanted to hold the moment longer, not only to celebrate our victory, but because the smile on my parents’ faces that evening made me so happy that I felt every nerve in my body had awoken and swayed to the gentlest wind that sailed within me.” Page 210

I choose this because it reminds me of all kids. At a young age we live to impress our moms and dad with the things we do. But even now I, at age 17, try to do that with my parents. Our parents find pride in all we do too. Ishmael is just like any other kid in that manner. He feels so much pride and excitement that he brought joy to his parents. We all know the feeling of happiness that can overwhelm us as a child when our parents tell us “good job!” or “that was amazing!”

I also choose this because he used great descriptions in this paragraph. “I felt light, as if I were getting ready to fly.” and “…swayed to the gentlest wind that sailed within me.” are my favorite lines in the paragraph. They really capture how he is feeling in unique ways.

One particular occasion when I felt this was when I was 12. I had to give my first speech at church. My page long speech took me all night Saturday to write, trying to get it all right. My dad helped me out and gave my pointers, and words of encouragement. When you’re twelve you haven’t had much public speaking training yet so the next day when I was a kid with a mission and simply read my speech, not looking up once and reading straight through my writing. I was so nervous, I felt sick but at least it was over. Afterwards I remember my Mom having the biggest smile on her face “so proud of her baby girl.” I looked for my dad who I found with arms stretched out. He gave me a big hug and said I did an amazing job. I was so happy that day and they kept bragging about me. I felt like a million bucks.

Just A Dream from A Long Way Gone

"We arrived in Mattru Jong late that night. Junior and Talloi explained to our friends what we had seen, while I stayed quiet, still trying to decide whether what I had seen was real. That night, when I finally managed to drift off, I dreamt that I was shot in my side and people ran past me without helping, as they were all running for their lives. I tried to crawl to safety in the bushes, but from out of nowhere there was someone standing on top of me with a gun. I couldn’t make out his face as the sun was against it. That person pointed the gun at the place where I had been shot and pulled the trigger. I woke up and hesitantly touched my side. I became afraid, since I could no longer tell the difference between dream and reality." page 14-15

I choose this passage because I can relate to it somewhat. Also, this passage was very vivid. I could feel his anxiety and stress through his style of writing. Everyone has those dreams where they can’t run fast enough or can’t scream loud enough for people to hear of help. His dream seems more in content with what is going on his life though. It could actually be real. That must be terrifying that he has to live in his nightmares. “…I could no longer tell the difference between dream and reality.” How does he deal with that at the age of 12?

After visiting my Uncle Joe’s ranch one year I kept having this dream:
A bunch of animals are stampeding. Horses, deer, rhinos and every type of animal imaginable are coming straight for me in an open field. I run as fast as I can and try to avoid them in any way. I look to my side and see some brush that I could hide in. But my mind won’t let me turn off into the brush that could offer shelter. My gut yearns to be able to go that way and I just can’t. My mind can’t control my feet and I keep running in the path of the animals. It’s frustrating to the point I want to cry. Then, the moment comes when I can feel the vibration of the animals on my heels. They hooves sound like a thousand booms of thunder going off as they hit the ground. I trip, slamming hard on the ground. I wake up after this moment, feeling anxious and frazzled. I hate not being able to control the dream but at least I knew it was just a dream.

Also, I have had dreams where I’m running through the halls of my school and I hear the bell ring. I wake up because of that and find my alarm going off. It’s weird how that works. This is kind of like him waking up to the gunshot.

Rough Draft of First Two Pages

Obesity
Go to a mall and look around. You should see an overweight or obese teen or child effortlessly. If a person has a BMI higher than 30 they are considered obese. (cdc) “In the last 30 years the number of children who are overweight has tripled to 15%. When you add the overweight and obese statistics together, the problem becomes crystal clear. One-third of the nation's children are carrying too much weight.”(hcco) But what caused these huge numbers of obese children and teens in our population in the richest and most successful nation on earth? Doctors claim that the main reasons for it are poor diets and lack of exercise (hcco). Our mothers and fathers have the most influence on our lives. And one of the best ways to teach is by example. Parents should act as a role model for their children in the things they eat and the ways they exercise.

With peer pressures all around, teens and children are always worried about their image. They make choices with what the crowd does. Sometimes these pressures lead to anorexia or on the opposite spectrum obesity. But, the best diet a child or teen can be on is the non-fad diet. “The no-fad diet is one that relies on good food choices that provide the nutrients needed to accommodate changing bodies”(hcco) Diet doesn’t necessarily mean not eating, it means eating the healthy food, in correct proportions.

If parents teach their children to have a well-balanced diet, all these pressures will subside. With healthy bodies, children and teens won’t be sent in the direction of not eating of overeating. Avoiding fatty, high sugared, greasy food is simple. The parents, by not buying these unhealthy products, can teach their children to eat healthy food like fruits and vegetables instead. Always having grapes or nuts or jello available to snack on in the pantry is very important.

Fast food restaurants have begun to offer healthy alternatives on their menus. Their advertisements target young children and teens to come to their restaurants. Those thousands of dollars and millions of man hours put into commercials and advertisements are no match for children. Parents should make it clear that it is okay to go to them sometimes though. When they do go out to eat get a small drink and fries and not the biggest size. Or even better, milk should be suggested instead of pop, and apples or carrots instead of fries. These simple choices can have a huge impact. Parents, order the salad and take out the mayo dressing to set an example too.

Technology has taken over today’s world. ”People don’t have to walk a mile to see their closest neighbor. They can just sit on their couch and text them burning about 10 calories.”(nick) TV, computers and video games make for much more sedentary lifestyles in most children’s lives now a day.

Schools have also contributed to increased childhood obesity. ” Daily participation in school physical education among adolescents dropped 14 percentage points over the last 13 years, from 42% in 1991 to 28% in 2003.” Sitting in school for seven hours a day is not teaching children healthy habits.