OT, but important (and hey, it's MY blog)

On Monday, my son and I went to my friend Siobhan's house for our usual weekly French class. (Note: to save me time and typing, when you see my friend Siobhan mentioned anywhere, please mentally plug in one or more of the following descriptives: classy, gorgeous, politically active, environmentally sound, elegant, funny, brilliant, artistic, sophisticated, down-to-earth, modest, well-read, kind. If you have any questions {as I do} as to why she's slumming with a slob like me, kindly keep them to yourself.)

Anyway: when we got to her place, she apologized for not being completely ready to receive us. Her sister lives in Myanmar, and Siobhan had been lucky enough to manage to get in email contact with her and learn that she was all right, and then of course had to contact the rest of the family to let them know.

Siobhan is on my local homeschooling loop, and posted this today. I know it has nothing to do with homeschooling or magazine editing, but I really wanted to pass it along. I hope you'll do the same.

In case anybody else's kids are also raising money to help the Burmese people recover from cyclone Nargis I thought I would forward this from my sister who has lived in Burma for the last dozen years working for MSN (Doctors Without Borders), ICRC (International Red Cross), and translating for Aung San Suu Kyi. My extended family is also sending money directly to my sister as she has a lot of contacts for getting supplies to people.
..Siobhan
 
...I am recommending four groups, which you will see in the signature of this message, with url links. Some groups are soliciting for aid, which are not really working in the country right now! Of course they need money to start projects, but I don't think this is the time for that. The ones I recommend below are already working, and have high capacity for relief.
 
I am afraid that the govt way typically does not turn out well.  Typically with all the chaos it is easy to think "Well, my family is suffering too..." or to give money first to their favoured groups. In a study of aid for cyclone relief in Bangladesh in the late 90s, it was found that only 3% of such aid reached the disaster victims...
 
For those who want to contribute to Nargis relief funds, here are the organisations which I think can use the money most:
 
For a local NGO which you can donate to online, I recommend Gitameit, whose people are already at work in disaster relief (instead of the usual music). You can also donate to Foundation for the People of Burma at this site, who will do development and reconstruction later, as well as relief:

http://www.gitameit.com/wp/page/4/

For international NGOs with the highest capacity for working in the delta, I recommend:
 
MSF - Holland
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news/article.cfm?id=2656

and CARE
http://my.care.org/05/myanmar/?qp_source=170860490000
 
and Merlin
http://www.merlin.org.uk/Lists/News-Detail.aspx?id=687