-0...9-
Help Someone Else; Help Yourself
Steff at Last Ditch has a good idea :
Being charitable a pretty selfish thing. You feel great when you're doing it. If that contributes to making the world a better place, then there's a big, big bonus.I've wanted to adopt a kid through World Vision for years, actually, specifically AIDS orphans in Africa. I've been thinking a lot about it this weekend, and it strikes me as the right thing to do to set the tone for my year to come. I think my biological clock is ticking but instead of it making me want to have a kid, it's making me want to help kids. Weird. :)
I'm adopting a girl, when I do go ahead with it, though.
And the other one, doing a small biz loan through Kiva.org, is something I've just heard about and blows my mind. I can't remember his name, but there was that economics dude in the last year or so who won a Nobel or something for his plan to radically affect global poverty by doing ridiculous little loans of $20 or more that people not only used to change their lives (and those around them), but also repaid in full as a matter of pride.
Apparently 99.7% of the loans given by Kiva get repaid, and you can either take your money back or use it as "Kiva credit" to help someone else. You can read their stories, email them, and watch how their lives change as they use this one brilliant shot at achieving their life dreams.
Awesome. Both, adopting AIDS orphans and changing poverty one small loan at a time, are things that I've believed in for a while and consider myself pretty blessed to finally be in the position where I think I can afford to give away $40 or 50 a month if it means making someone's life better.
I could use the self-satisfaction that comes from knowing I'm making a bigger ripple in my little pond. I think I'll give a $25 Kiva loan today and see what happens. :)
I shall chronicle my recipient's successes, too.
How fun! (OOh! FIVE minutes later and I have gotten the ball rolling, doing just a $25 loan to a woman in Nigeria trying to get her soft drink-selling company off the ground. How cool! I'm her first lender. :) Let's see what happens. Awesome. And so easy to do! What a great way to get my day started. Small change = big change potential!
Click on her name below this and help me to change her life! It's so easy.
(You know you want to!!!)
Go to her website Steff has the woman's business loan graph posted and you can click on it to see how she is doing. The graph does not show up at the permanent page link (I am telling Steff about this) but if you click to get to the blog page and scroll down to this entry, you will see the woman's chart. Also see: Kiva.org
Dear Kiva Lenders:
Just one year ago the Kiva staff (there were fewer of us then!) were gathered in our one-room office in an old warehouse-turned-office-space in the Mission District of San Francisco.
Some of us were in Halloween costumes, all of us were excited for a big day in Kiva history.One year ago today Frontline/WORLD first aired the program "Uganda: A Little Goes A Long Way" on PBS. The first airing was at 9pm Eastern / 6pm Pacific, and we all stood around our engineers who watched for our traffic numbers to increase.
Our total loan portfolio at that time was approximately $400k, and we were excited to see it grow.
Minutes into the broadcast, the Kiva.org website crashed as thousands of people simultaneously typed "www.kiva.org" into their browsers. As the broadcast repeated across each US timezone we had no chance of handling the response we received from this documentary following Kiva Loans from the US, to Uganda, and back again.
Over the next four days Silicon Valley rallied and with the help of many engineers who believed in Kiva's mission, we were back up and running.
Viewers came back to the website, and were excited that we had received such an amazing response. They told their friends, and they bought gift certificates for their families. By Thanksgiving we had passed $1m in total loan volume, we passed $2m just weeks later, and we've not slowed since.
Kiva Lenders recruited new lenders, and one year later there are over 130,000 Kiva Lenders around the globe. Word of mouth spread until finally it reached President Clinton, who has been continuing spreading the word - just like each of you.
Eventually we reached the ears of Oprah Winfrey and appeared on her show less than a year from the Frontline/WORLD broadcast.
We'd like to thank You, Kiva Lenders, for creating a grassroots movement which has truly swept across America and spread across the globe. You've proven that together, $25 at a time, we can make a real difference in the lives of the poor.
To date, you've made a difference of over $13 million, believing in more than 20,000 entrepreneurs who wanted a chance to support themselves through a small business. You've also made a difference in the lives of their families and children, who are enjoying the benefits of additional income to provide for their needs.
It's mind-blowing to think how far we've come in just 12 months. You have all really proven that together we can make a real difference, $25 at a time.Sincerely,The Kiva Team
Being charitable a pretty selfish thing. You feel great when you're doing it. If that contributes to making the world a better place, then there's a big, big bonus.I've wanted to adopt a kid through World Vision for years, actually, specifically AIDS orphans in Africa. I've been thinking a lot about it this weekend, and it strikes me as the right thing to do to set the tone for my year to come. I think my biological clock is ticking but instead of it making me want to have a kid, it's making me want to help kids. Weird. :)
I'm adopting a girl, when I do go ahead with it, though.
And the other one, doing a small biz loan through Kiva.org, is something I've just heard about and blows my mind. I can't remember his name, but there was that economics dude in the last year or so who won a Nobel or something for his plan to radically affect global poverty by doing ridiculous little loans of $20 or more that people not only used to change their lives (and those around them), but also repaid in full as a matter of pride.
Apparently 99.7% of the loans given by Kiva get repaid, and you can either take your money back or use it as "Kiva credit" to help someone else. You can read their stories, email them, and watch how their lives change as they use this one brilliant shot at achieving their life dreams.
Awesome. Both, adopting AIDS orphans and changing poverty one small loan at a time, are things that I've believed in for a while and consider myself pretty blessed to finally be in the position where I think I can afford to give away $40 or 50 a month if it means making someone's life better.
I could use the self-satisfaction that comes from knowing I'm making a bigger ripple in my little pond. I think I'll give a $25 Kiva loan today and see what happens. :)
I shall chronicle my recipient's successes, too.
How fun! (OOh! FIVE minutes later and I have gotten the ball rolling, doing just a $25 loan to a woman in Nigeria trying to get her soft drink-selling company off the ground. How cool! I'm her first lender. :) Let's see what happens. Awesome. And so easy to do! What a great way to get my day started. Small change = big change potential!
Click on her name below this and help me to change her life! It's so easy.
(You know you want to!!!)
Go to her website Steff has the woman's business loan graph posted and you can click on it to see how she is doing. The graph does not show up at the permanent page link (I am telling Steff about this) but if you click to get to the blog page and scroll down to this entry, you will see the woman's chart. Also see: Kiva.org
Dear Kiva Lenders:
Just one year ago the Kiva staff (there were fewer of us then!) were gathered in our one-room office in an old warehouse-turned-office-space in the Mission District of San Francisco.
Some of us were in Halloween costumes, all of us were excited for a big day in Kiva history.One year ago today Frontline/WORLD first aired the program "Uganda: A Little Goes A Long Way" on PBS. The first airing was at 9pm Eastern / 6pm Pacific, and we all stood around our engineers who watched for our traffic numbers to increase.
Our total loan portfolio at that time was approximately $400k, and we were excited to see it grow.
Minutes into the broadcast, the Kiva.org website crashed as thousands of people simultaneously typed "www.kiva.org" into their browsers. As the broadcast repeated across each US timezone we had no chance of handling the response we received from this documentary following Kiva Loans from the US, to Uganda, and back again.
Over the next four days Silicon Valley rallied and with the help of many engineers who believed in Kiva's mission, we were back up and running.
Viewers came back to the website, and were excited that we had received such an amazing response. They told their friends, and they bought gift certificates for their families. By Thanksgiving we had passed $1m in total loan volume, we passed $2m just weeks later, and we've not slowed since.
Kiva Lenders recruited new lenders, and one year later there are over 130,000 Kiva Lenders around the globe. Word of mouth spread until finally it reached President Clinton, who has been continuing spreading the word - just like each of you.
Eventually we reached the ears of Oprah Winfrey and appeared on her show less than a year from the Frontline/WORLD broadcast.
We'd like to thank You, Kiva Lenders, for creating a grassroots movement which has truly swept across America and spread across the globe. You've proven that together, $25 at a time, we can make a real difference in the lives of the poor.
To date, you've made a difference of over $13 million, believing in more than 20,000 entrepreneurs who wanted a chance to support themselves through a small business. You've also made a difference in the lives of their families and children, who are enjoying the benefits of additional income to provide for their needs.
It's mind-blowing to think how far we've come in just 12 months. You have all really proven that together we can make a real difference, $25 at a time.Sincerely,The Kiva Team
posted by Greenconsciousness
at 8:01 AM - Link
0 Comments:
Post a Comment