August 5, 2008

******

 

Thirty-four Peace Fellows are volunteering this summer in 21 countries or territories with community-based partners of The Advocacy Project (AP). AP issues a weekly digest of their blogs.

 

Highlights:

 

 

Excerpts:

 

Colby Pacheco (UC San Diego) is working with the Dzeno Association in Prague, the Czech Republic

."The Czech National Party is unveiling a 150-page document, detailing their plan to buy land in India and forcibly relocate Romani. The title of the plan is: 'The Final Solution to the Gypsy Issue in the Czech Lands,' evoking Nazi Germany's 'Final Solution to the Jewish Issue.' Though the Nationalists claim that they do not want to kill Roma, but merely move them... It is not believed that the Czech National Party will win the 2010 election, but anything less than a multi-national rebuke of this development will enable such extremists to gain footing little by little."

 

Hannah Wright (Bristol University) is working with the Women's Affairs Technical Committee in Ramallah, Palestine.

"While Ahmad's body was being buried, film crews hovered at the entrance to the village where soldiers were waiting for the crowds to return from the funeral. One camera man commented to his colleague, 'We'll just get a few shots of the clashes and then we can go home.' For the children of Ni'lin, this is home, and the perceived inevitability of the violence doesn't make it any less devastating. Ahmad Musa and his peers did not ask for this life. Will they ever know anything else?"

 

Mackenzie Berg (University of Denver) is working with informal waste recyclers at the Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group in Delhi, India.

"The landfill seemed to exist within a cloud of grey-brown dust that surrounded the acreage like a grimy bubble. Everything and everyone was covered with a layer of this grime, reminding me of a painting badly in need of restoration, as if you could swipe your fingers across the scene and reveal a clearer, brighter layer of color underneath. To my right and left were groups of people gathering trash into small bags that hung over their shoulders, tying up large sacks to take home for segregating, or resting under the shade of a battered umbrella to escape the blaring heat. In front of us, more wastepickers scavenged amidst the rumbling green MCD trucks, avoiding cows, stepping over mangy dogs, and ignoring storming flies as they searched for anything that might be valuable enough to sell."

 

Krystal Sirman (George Washington University) is working with the Landmine Survivors Network-Jordan (LSN-JO) in Amman, Jordan.

"Suraya comes from a traditional Muslim family, and she and her sisters are not allowed to engage in certain activities outside of the house, such as working, without their father's permission. However, because of the work that LSN-JO has done with Suraya and her family, her father has come to trust the organization and allows Suraya to participate in LSN-JO activities and events on a regular basis, even those that would place her in the company of members of the opposite sex."

 

Chi Vu (Coloumbia University) is working alongside survivors of landmine injuries with Landmine Survivors' Network-Vietnam in the Quang Binh province of Vietnam.

"The village is built on land that was cleared [of landmines]... The new houses were sold at very low prices, and now families are rebuilding their lives and earning their livelihoods again on this land. We visited a kindergarten, located at the center of the village, where children who were there for summer school chased each other around the school garden and happily posed for photos with the visitors."

 

Juliet Hutchings (American University) is working to raise awareness of the plight of pygmies with the World Peasants and Indigenous Organization in Central Africa.

"Freddy and I had a very necessary and somewhat painful conversation this morning, wherein I first scolded him for his lack of punctuality, blamed him for my inability to do the tasks I am set to do and then, finally, succumbed to the reality that I am just in the first stages of the mourning process for my impending departure in three weeks. I felt the tears welling, totally uninvited, and then trickling down my cheek. As soon as I let them come, unabated, I realized how much I am going to miss this place. I have been bottling that feeling up and trying to place it somewhere deep down so that I could just get on with things and go home."

 

Heidi McKinnon (University of New Mexico) is working with the Association for the Integral Development of the Victims of Violence in the Verapaces, Maya Achi (ADIVIMA) in Rabinal, Guatemala.

"Every town has its quirks and eccentricities, too. Twice a day I pass the mortuary on my street that sells caskets, perfume, after shave and shampoo. Makes sense. When you have the typhoid bacteria in your municipal water supply, it adds an edge to the bathing experience. All local transportation, as anywhere, seems to advertise that it is in the service of the Lord. I have never seen more hair gel usage in my life. And this truly is the epicenter of all commerce regarding frozen, chocolate dipped fruit on a stick. That includes coconuts. I would bet ten quetzales that the ancestors of any of my Mayan friends here would have flipped over a good chocomango on a stick."

 

Paul Colombini (American University) is working with informal waste recyclers at the Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group in Delhi, India.

"Rajumathur, a Delhi cycle kabari, shows off his new Chintan ID card. Chintan views the cards as the first step towards helping the wastepickers attain professional recognition. According to wastepickers I have spoken to, the main advantage of having an ID card is that Delhi police are less likely to harass wastepickers with IDs. Chintan charges each wastepicker 40 rupees ($1) per year for an ID card, the cost of producing them. This fee also gives the wastepickers a sense of ownership and pride in their ID cards. Every time I have seen Chintan staff handing out the cards the wastepickers receiving them have been very happy."

 

Antigona Kukaj (Columbia University) is working alongside conflict survivors with Landmine Survivors Network-Bosnia Herzegovina in Tuzla, Bosnia.

"This is her first time at the Balkana Art Colony, which has been organized by Survivor Corps. Nermina also affirmed how happy she was to be a participant at the colony. She remarked that it gave her an opportunity to show other people how important painting and art is in her life. This is Nermina's way of portraying her survivorship to others."

 

Jes Therkelsen (American University) is advocating for Dalit rights with the Jagaran Media Center (JMC) in Kathmandu, Nepal.

"When Devin came last summer, the woman was hammering rocks by the shore of the Seti River. She made 15 rupees a day, almost 7 dollars a month. Today, she hauls bags of sand more than two kilometers along the river from 6 in the morning until 7 at night. She's not sure what the sand will be used for, she says with a shrug. Maybe buildings, maybe a bridge. She does make almost 100 rupees a day now, though her knees and back hurt more."