Making changes: I need your help

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Comment by Laura on January 13, 2009 at 2:35pm

I think I stopped doing homework once I earned my MA degree. ;-) But if I have time in the future, I'll oblige. In the meantime, I'm too busy living it to write about it.

But I'm enjoying reading everyone else's comments. Keep up the great work, guys! :-)

Comment by Kaysar Ridha on January 12, 2009 at 5:37pm

I"m glad everyone is writing about their experiences in great length on here but I would like you to start new blog entries for each thought. So that we can catalogue these experiences and learn from them. I'm working on a section that will help clarity what I mean.

Comment by Kalila on January 11, 2009 at 10:17am

Ok, well... I'll start documenting my service by pictures. I'll comment at the bottom of each and every picture I post. I'll do a blog about my community service with Hands on Miami/Miami Children's hospital and the Metro Zoo.

For now, I have my corporate run picture posted.Yenni, Mossie, Shelly and Laura GREAT posts... you too Kaysar!

Comment by Laura on January 10, 2009 at 5:24am

Yeah, thanks Moosie. I realized that but at this point in life I don't have the time to write all of that. Maybe in February.

Comment by yenni on January 9, 2009 at 9:57pm

Great idea! No pictures but lots of emotion. For the last 6 months I’ve been part of a special project at the bank where I work. We have been helping customers who are in unfavorable loans to get refinanced into more traditional loan products…..AND at NO cost and WELL below market rates!!
I’ve found that there are many different reasons why customers have gotten into trouble with their finances. In one case, a gentleman was having a hard time making ends meet because he had refinanced his home to turn the equity into cash so that he could help his son open his own business. The son was doing well with the new business, but was also living large….buying many toys such as new trucks and motorcycles. He was also paying his dads expenses but one day got into a motorcycle accident and did not survive. This had now left the dad with all of these expenses that he could not afford, as well as a business that he knows nothing about…and on the verge of foreclosure. It was an extremely sad story and probably the hardest one I had to deal with. I have to say it was the first time I had ever heard a grown man cry and I hope it’s the last. It tore my heart in two. Just knowing that I was helping him save his home and put him back into a loan that he could afford was worth a years salary.
I have hundred of stories like this and could probably go on and on and on. For the sake of space and time I’ll keep it to a few examples. For a while I thought that our group working on this project would need counseling. I met so many people who are in desperate situations that it made me realize how fortunate I was to even have a job. Many people were having problems covering their bills because of emergency medical issues that came up unexpectedly. Or they lost a job that they had held for 30 years and the only job they could find was a job where they had to commute and hour and a half each way every day. Some had to take jobs in other states, forcing them to turn their family home into an investment property…IF they were even lucky enough to find someone who was willing to pay rent close to their monthly payment. I’ve listened to woman cry because she had dreams of fixing up her basement for her grandchildren; another woman accused me of working for the devil and a 90 year old woman who said she collects cans and bottles to help pay her mortgage. It was probably the most challenging but also the most rewarding thing I’ve had to do in my 12 year career as a mortgage loan officer. An even though we were not able to help all of these clients it really made me feel like we are making a difference when customers thanked us for trying to save their homes. I now look at my job in a whole new light and what use to be a job that had a potential to make a great living….now I look at it as a job that can actually change a life.

Comment by Moosie on January 9, 2009 at 8:53pm

Hey laura.. you can still share what each experience meant for you and how it changed the way you go through your day.... I know going to Guatemala in January really did a number on many things.. just hard to really put into words just yet. Soon :)

Comment by Laura on January 9, 2009 at 5:03pm

Oh. Well nevermind then. Sorry. :-)

Comment by Shelley on January 9, 2009 at 2:36pm

I don't know how to document what I do in pictures :( I was just named United Way's campaign coordinator of the year for the city I work in... do you want me to go to all of the United Way sponsored groups and take pictures of how the money raised is helping the community? :|

Comment by Moosie on January 9, 2009 at 4:45am

Good idea Kaysar.. am up at 4:30 a.m to go get out the door to help with volunteer work on ABC's Extreme Home Makeover. They picked a house in our town of a woman born without any legs and a deformed arm.. and has 4 kids (I believe they are foster kids.. not sure) .. but as the Houseing Authority helped get her home.. she went back to them so to help out other low income families achieve their dream of owning a house. She is also an Ambassador for our local Easter Seal program too.

Well there were so many volunteers the builders on this project have relayed names to help out at other groups in the next week.. and for those showing up at the site they ask that everyone bring some canned goods as our local food bank is empty. Usually feeding hundreds a day.. it has been bare for months now.. So hoping the several thousands of visitors to watch the rebuild will bring in food and awareness to this need.'

Through that process will try to get photos of the people adding in what they can.. while watching others assist someone in need. The one thing I have noticed is the energy that IS reviving a very depressed area.. and for as much as I have trouble with some of the attitudes in this area.. for this time period.. people seem to have opened up their hearts and lifted up their arms to help out. I will be able to start picking up photos as late as Sunday as yesterday we never had time to even stop to 'breathe' let alone break out cameras..

Also right now the group that I went with to Guatelmala last January are there now with some of the repeat students and doctors.. and some new. I truly wanted to go this trip but it didn't work out. However what I did do.. was to give up the one tapestry that I brought back (purchased there for $20) and sold it on eBay for $160 adding in $40 so to send medical supplies to the group for their next 2 week trip in June (I'll be going to that one). This group also help those in Ecuador and the lessser medically underserved in South Florida too. There was another auction for KatesClub.org that raised $100 and I hope to raise more for that non-profit group too. I don't know what I would do if I lost those that meant the most to me.. and this group really is doing a great thing for kids and teens who have lost a sibling or a parent.. and that kind of support or thought is a constant need.. without groups like Kates Club.. these kids would not have the "psycho-social" support needed to move on. This is something those passed on would want for their loved ones.. I'm sure.

Hard economic times hit the smaller groups with no mercy
so I'm making 2009 of .. bringing giving back.
:)

Comment by Kaysar Ridha on January 8, 2009 at 7:01pm

Thanks Laura. Nice stuff you're doing. But if you're asking me if what you just work counts as documenting your work then NO it does not. Hahaha. I understand that you can't take pictures of these things so write about them. Break them up into specific events / experiences. And tell us about how you started and where it took you. How did does it effect you as a person and what sort of impact does it have on the recipient.

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