Day 319 of 365 - Social Conscience
Today I watched a great documentary called Living On One Dollar. I shared it on Facebook, so you might see it in my feed there. It's about a couple of college students of international studies who decided to spend their summer in a village in Guatemala to see first hand what living in poverty with inconsistent income is like. They provide themselves with random sums of money per day, for their group of four, from 0 to 9 dollars for realism.
As they made efforts to get to know more about the villagers, mutual benefit ensued. Their new friends showed them how to cook more nutritious but still low cost meals, and how to bargain in the market for example. The young men already knew from their studies that massive international aid funding seldom trickled down to people like the villagers. They were eager to learn how they lived, earned their income and how they accessed financial help when needed.
Some of the community members had organized themselves into a savings club, whereby each contributed a fixed amount per month, but a lump sum would be paid out to those most in need. It was their own little cooperative bank. They would never have been able to borrow money from a regular bank as they would not be able to meet all the loan criteria.
The young Americans investigated different financial options for locals, learning about micro-financing options, which had much simpler criteria and repayment terms. They actually took out a loan themselves to be able to get a small place to live and grow a small crop while they lived their summer in Guatemala. The film shows a couple of examples of residents bettering their lives by using micro-loans to improve their earning capability using existing skills, as well as allowing them to further themselves through education.
Watching this film brought back memories of the multiple visits we made to the same small resort in Cuba, year after year. Most of the staff lived in the town just down the hill from the resort and we got to know them, along with some of the musicians who came to entertain in the evenings. While their economic situation was not as dire as the residents in the Guatemalan village of the film, they still had a fairly limited standard of living.
We used to take an entire large suitcase of donations like clothing, toiletries, stationary supplies and some over the counter medications each vacation there. Then, while there, I would try to fairly distribute them. This, of course, was a mere drop in the bucket of need, but it made me feel like I was helping. Usually, when you go on vacation to a resort, you don't pay much mind to the needs of the local people. But, when you get to know them personally, it's a different matter. On more than one occasion, we were invited into homes, which were very simple structures of only a few rooms, curtain dividers and sketchy wiring.
Our Cuban friends took great pride in their homes, their families and their community. Because they usually made the best of their situation and were smiling and friendly, it could be easy to assume that they were content in their circumstances. One of the cameramen in the documentary film made this assumption about the Guatemalan villagers, commenting that they 'seemed happy'. The protagonists of the film reminded him that when parents worry every day about being able to feed their growing children, they are not content with how they are living.
The American students making the film asked what message the representative of the villagers wanted conveyed. He implored that they not forget about the survival struggles of the people there. That was powerful to me, because it highlighted that it is never enough just to drop in with superficial aid from time to time. First world countries need to be reminded on a regular basis of the disparity that exists and that the best form of humanitarian aid is to support our fellow global citizens in being self-sufficient.
If you would like to learn more about options for being a micro-finance lender, or just what reputable organizations already exist to provide these kinds of loans both nationally and internationally, do an internet search for microfinance organizations. Grameen Bank was the one featured in the documentary.
As they made efforts to get to know more about the villagers, mutual benefit ensued. Their new friends showed them how to cook more nutritious but still low cost meals, and how to bargain in the market for example. The young men already knew from their studies that massive international aid funding seldom trickled down to people like the villagers. They were eager to learn how they lived, earned their income and how they accessed financial help when needed.
Some of the community members had organized themselves into a savings club, whereby each contributed a fixed amount per month, but a lump sum would be paid out to those most in need. It was their own little cooperative bank. They would never have been able to borrow money from a regular bank as they would not be able to meet all the loan criteria.
The young Americans investigated different financial options for locals, learning about micro-financing options, which had much simpler criteria and repayment terms. They actually took out a loan themselves to be able to get a small place to live and grow a small crop while they lived their summer in Guatemala. The film shows a couple of examples of residents bettering their lives by using micro-loans to improve their earning capability using existing skills, as well as allowing them to further themselves through education.
Watching this film brought back memories of the multiple visits we made to the same small resort in Cuba, year after year. Most of the staff lived in the town just down the hill from the resort and we got to know them, along with some of the musicians who came to entertain in the evenings. While their economic situation was not as dire as the residents in the Guatemalan village of the film, they still had a fairly limited standard of living.
We used to take an entire large suitcase of donations like clothing, toiletries, stationary supplies and some over the counter medications each vacation there. Then, while there, I would try to fairly distribute them. This, of course, was a mere drop in the bucket of need, but it made me feel like I was helping. Usually, when you go on vacation to a resort, you don't pay much mind to the needs of the local people. But, when you get to know them personally, it's a different matter. On more than one occasion, we were invited into homes, which were very simple structures of only a few rooms, curtain dividers and sketchy wiring.
Our Cuban friends took great pride in their homes, their families and their community. Because they usually made the best of their situation and were smiling and friendly, it could be easy to assume that they were content in their circumstances. One of the cameramen in the documentary film made this assumption about the Guatemalan villagers, commenting that they 'seemed happy'. The protagonists of the film reminded him that when parents worry every day about being able to feed their growing children, they are not content with how they are living.
The American students making the film asked what message the representative of the villagers wanted conveyed. He implored that they not forget about the survival struggles of the people there. That was powerful to me, because it highlighted that it is never enough just to drop in with superficial aid from time to time. First world countries need to be reminded on a regular basis of the disparity that exists and that the best form of humanitarian aid is to support our fellow global citizens in being self-sufficient.
If you would like to learn more about options for being a micro-finance lender, or just what reputable organizations already exist to provide these kinds of loans both nationally and internationally, do an internet search for microfinance organizations. Grameen Bank was the one featured in the documentary.
Beautiful post Joan!
ReplyDeleteThank you Jocelyn!
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