Friday, July 6, 2012

day 24: excited about an extra egg

Today I caught myself really excited about the extra egg I have allotted in my rationing plan. It makes a huge difference in the way I feel, with that additional protein really carrying me further. I thought, wow, this is a glimpse into what it's like to live from meal to meal. That I would be sitting at my refrigerator this morning (which, granted, slum dwellers do not have refrigerators, nor electricity in many cases), and realize it's "double egg day" and get really excited about that.

That may sound foreign to you, but let me tell you, it's a beautiful thing to have that extra protein in your diet when you're really hungry. The price of one egg? 11 cents. Daily wage in the slums of South Asia? About $1. Assuming a 10 hour workday, my extra egg represents about 10% of their daily income. I'm just trying to put things into perspective for you, from the vantage point of where I stand and from where I've walked.

I'm dedicating day 24 to this young girl I met in the slums of Hyderabad, India. I press on for her sake, and for the countless others like her who now sleep under makeshift tents in the slums, during the rainy season. The mosquitoes are bad right now, and rain leaks through her roof in the middle of the night. For the chance that I might change even one of their realities, to improve their lives, makes it worth it for me. To make a difference. You can be a part of this, too. Read on.


Would you join me in being a part of the solution to extreme poverty? Would you make the choice today to reject indifference, to say no to apathy? If we all decide to do a little something, we can create a radical life-changing difference in their lives. But, if we just sit around and wait for governments and the rich to take care of her problems, it's never going to happen. This has to be a popular uprising of individuals who want to make a difference in these children's lives, a grassroots effort all of us will need to embark upon together.

I'm really regretting not setting my initial goal higher. I started out with a goal of 10 scholarships (total of $5,000). I thought that was an ambitious goal and really was not sure we'd make it.

Now, since we reached my original goal, we've stalled out at $5,100. The excitement everyone felt in trying to rally friends to reach the goal has now passed because, well, the goal was reached, and everyone felt great, including myself.

But I'm determined to make up for my lack of faith by appealing to you to reach out again to friends, and share the link (30d.ch). I'm appealing to you to consider how you might chip in personally, in order that we might reach more children, to enroll them at The Children's Hope Center. Would you be willing to chip in a little toward one of their scholarships? We just need $400 more to bring in another child.

For just $500 (a little over $1/day) we're able to a provide a well-rounded education including a computer lab, hot meals, hygiene supplies and medical care for the new students brought in! Thank you for considering how you might be a part of the solution, for considering how to overcome indifference, to really make a difference!

On to what I was able to cook up today with just $1.

Breakfast. Oatmeal with raisins and season-all, can't go wrong here. I'm really into the tostada thing. Here's one with re-fried beans, brown rice and one scrambled egg on top. See previous posts for instructions on how to bake a corn tortilla. It becomes one huge corn chip, and amazingly, it doesn't crumbled to pieces when you bight into it. Delicious, and a huge boost to the variety factor.


Lunch. Went a little lighter on lunch today since I had the extra egg, to make a decent portion of egg fried rice with carrots and cabbage. I've been a little conservative on my carrot rationing lately, so today I had 1/3 of a pretty big carrot to work with. It made a substantial difference.


Dinner. Since I skipped using a corn tortilla at lunch, I had an extra one to work with at dinner. Hey, it's the little things when you're living on $1 of food per day! So I had enough to make two tostadas with re-fried beans, brown rice and boiled potato cubes, and a small serving of pasta with a two teaspoons of pasta sauce. It felt like a lot of food, all things considered.


Take Action!

1) Please consider giving toward my goal of 10 scholarships for children of the Indian slums. We surpassed our initial goal of $5,000 to cover 10 scholarships, but I want to keep going to see how many more scholarships we can come up with! Every little bit helps!

2) Please visit my unofficial sponsor, Amazon.com through this link. 7% of your purchases made through the link are given to Peace Gospel. If you're in the UK, use this link.


3) If you're compelled by my effort here, please share it with friends. One of the main goals is awareness. So if you can help with that, huge.

4) Leave me feedback. Please comment on this post, especially if you have any ideas about what I should try to cook with these ingredients I have available. I love hearing from you! It really helps!

No comments:

Post a Comment