in resonse to Davis' post - by Emily

I was going to just write a comment to Davis' post, but I don't know if people actually read those so I'm just writing a separate post.

I was a little bit surprised by your post. To me, Penny did not come across as uneducated at all. She works as a nurse, and she obviously cared very much for the woman who she is currently working for. She also talked about her plans to return to school for sociology. I am not very the south (Florida may be in the south of the US, but it's definitely not "the south"), so I come from a different background. I actually did not even realize that she had a very strong accent at all.

However, on that note, I was watching a rerun of America's Next Top Model yesterday, and one of the contestants was a black girl from rural Arkansas. She was told that the only reason she may not win the competition was that she had a strong accent and needed to learn how to speak eloquently to be a Cover Girl model. Maybe your feelings that accents are seen as an identifying socioeconomic feature of people are more wide spread than I thought.

Also, I was interested in your comments about how/when/where we should talk about race relations. While I think it is very important that those conversations occur, I think it is just as important to have fun, more light hearted conversations in order to build community. Going to the pool, watching movies, and just hanging out help to create a closer community. That can help create trust which will lead to better conversations. We have structured time to discuss important issues like race relations, and I agree that we should not completely isolate those conversations to those structured times. But I also appreciate the importance of having more fun conversations and activities.

-Emily

Personally Blogging, by Davis

I am curious about the state of race relations in my own mind. - For those of you in tier 2, we tier folks had a discussion on racial relations and just visited Moore's Ford. So race, specifically racism, has been a prominent topic of discussion recently. - Katie brought up a good reference in our discussion Thursday night: "Everyone's A Little Bit Racist" from Avenue Q. (for lyrics go to - http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/avenueq/everyonesalittlebitracist.htm). This song speaks on the little bit of racism that exists in all of us, and as Vialla told us about her experience about having to deal with the racism cultivated in her during her youth, I catch myself wondering what parts of me are racist.

I was raised in the South, and have some racist friends and some racist family. My mother and father did their best to stop it from actually taking any form of a strong hold on me, and I think they actually did a very good job. But I am still am sure that I am racist in some ways. I laugh at the occasional race joke, but then again I laugh at the religious jokes that make fun of my religion. So, I guess I find offensive things somewhat funny, and I may be wrong in this sentiment, but I find them comments with the most truth behind them tend to be the most offensive. If something is true, shouldn't we want to talk about it? Maybe that is idealistic.

For example, the lady who spoke to us during the Moore's Ford Trip, Penny - daughter of the wife of Roger Malcom who was murdered, spoke with a deep accent that made her sound incredibly uneducated. It was actually a somewhat humorous accent. But I have learned much from her and her story. She has sparked thoughts that I would never have had before. Now her accent is still incredible, but it is not a reflection of her inherent worth. It is simply an observation. It is a racist observation? Is it a racist observation if I comment that there are many other African Americans, especially where I grew up, who speak with similar accents to hers?

Part of the reason that I think it is so hard to have dialogues confronting racism is that the boundary line between what is racist and what is simply observation is thin enough that observations and comments can be misconstrued as judgmental. Also, the comment may be judgmental rather than objective. Where is the line? Where/when/how do we talk? Why is it so hard to confront truth? Why would we rather stay silent and lazy and play pong or go to the pool or watch a movie than have discussions that actually bring about personal and communal development? Because it's easier. and more convenient. and we wont feel uncomfortable.

well. I hope you enjoyed my rant. If you ever believe that my blogs are a slight bit too personal, please let me know. But I figure, what the hell? It's why I signed up for this program.

oh and the URL for the International Rescue Committee is www.theirc.org Enjoy!!

If you finish Fire in a Canebrake...

...I recommend picking up a copy of Gig: Americans Talk About Their Jobs, the book I am currently reading. I picked it up randomly at a bookstore here because it was a "Staff Pick," and because I have been in about a 3-year period of confusion for what I want my own job to be, so I thought this might help. But this book has done a lot more than that, it is completely absorbing and an awesome read.

The reason I am posting about this book on the SAS blog is that I just finished the section on Lawyers and the Law, and I came across a quote that reminded me of my experience in SAS. This is from a social worker whose job it is to try to get accused criminals treatment instead of jail time, or otherwise improve their situation:

"I know this sounds nutty, but I'm learning to look at things in what I think is a more real way, you know? Just the different way the world is for different people. So I'm not always having these huge triumphs with my cases or anything, but I'm dealing with reality. Which, you know, as painful as that may be, once you start dealing with it, it's very hard to stop."

Reading this really rang true for me and the maturing process that happened to me as a result of SAS: the breaking of the bubble (to be cliche about it), Emory or otherwise that a lot of people (or at least, me) grow up in. Doing my Tier 1 internship (which was being a camp counselor at the Nicholas House, a homeless shelter) and hearing about everyone else's internships helped to shake me out of my own little world, and this quote helped me realize what I have liked about that. You just can't go back to your sheltered world, really, in the same way. I think we do go back somewhat, I go back into the Emory bubble all the time, but something about that reality I faced during SAS pulls me out of it every so often. Sorry for the philosophizing, but I just liked this quote a lot and thought it might be relevant to some of your placement experiences as well.

As far as my current placement, I love it. What I really love about it is that I feel like there is always more to do than we could possibly do, so my presence there always feels very important to Public Citizen's work, which I think is important for Texas, which can be really influential to the U.S., which could be really influential globally. And this kind of Texas-->U.S.-->world thinking is something everyone talks about all the time at the office, because our overall focus right now is abetting global warming, which is (obviously) a global problem, and that kind of attitude makes me feel the weight of everything I do--from making a phone call to drafting educational material or writing reports. And so I stay extra time, and I am going into work this Monday and I don't work Mondays. I just really like my placement.

And to tie this back into the beginning of this post, I first thought of energy efficiency as kind of a problem for the affluent portions of society, like can you really worry about your carbon footprint when you are struggling to feed your family? But actually, thinking about energy is dealing with reality in a way I haven't before as well. All of us use energy all the time. I am using it to write this blog. But before this summer I spent verrrrrry little time thinking about how any of that energy got to me. I only ever really gave it consideration when the power went out or a fuse blew in my house. So studying and working on the energy issue is really a way of me dealing with a part of my own reality, and has opened a Pandora's box of thoughts--so now I know how my electricity gets to me (sort of), but where does my food come from? my clothes? my car? this computer? Once you start dealing with reality, its hard to stop. Its kind of ridiculous in a way, that I haven't given a lot of thought to these sort of obvious questions before, but there you go.

Anyway, I have yammered enough. Go off and enjoy your summertime! And go find the book Gig, and read it.

- Natalie

Sarah's 3rd Week

“God gives but doesn’t share.”
-Mountains Beyond Mountains

After trying to garner support and funds for Darfur for the past couple of weeks I’m beginning to feel like a used car salesman, but in a good way. I have my short shpiel, which took some time to perfect actually. It seems like the average person has an attention span of approx. 30seconds, which isn’t much time to explain my project and how they can help. You can’t force people to care but I’m getting better at nudging them in that direction. $250+ raised so far, all of which is going to Stop Genocide Now (SGN, http://www.stopgenocidenow.org/) a nonprofit that is supporting primary and secondary school education the refugee camps. Through Tents of Hope and SGN, All Saints’ money will be going specifically to the Kounoungo camp, which currently has over 18,000 people living there.

Working at All Saints has been great; it seems like a huge family instead of an office. Congratulations and celebration of good works is a regular part of every staff meeting, it starts them off with a really great positive atmosphere. With all that they do I am amazed that they are able to keep it all organized and function, I think the closeness of the people working here is one the reasons. I hope that wherever I end up working in my future career it has the kind of great mood that All Saints has.

Its great to read the blog and hear what everyone is doing/learning from their organizations, I’d love it if you guys could post any links you have so I can go learn more about them. Also, how have the weekly dinners been going? I remember those interesting conversations being one the highlights of my experience last summer.

Anyone interested in doing more visit:
- http://www.democracyinaction.org/
- www.stopgenocidenow.org/petition
- http://www.africaaction.org/

Gender Roles of Dying

Working at Hospice Atlanta has been an amazing experience so far! Not only am I getting to learn about the elements required to run a non-profit organization, but I am also being exposed to an area of life that I have not had much experience with in the past.
Sitting at the front desk today, signing 600 letters with two signatures that were not my own, I was thinking about the things I had seen at Hospice during the past three weeks. As a sociologist wannabe, I cannot help but try to connect people's behavior to the bigger picture and the structure of our society at large. The thing that has really stuck out to me is something that many sociologists seem to be obsessed with-the way in which men and women approach various situations (in this case, the issue of death). Interestingly, my experience with Hospice as of now has shown that the coping methods of men and women with regard to death are very similar. The family members involved are either extremely reserved and silent or they are overactive and demanding, regardless of gender. Also interesting is that there seems to be no correlation in the gender of the caretakers of the patients in the center. Both sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, mothers and fathers are involved in seeing that the sick loved one is well taken care of. To me, it seems that death is a topic and experience that causes people to forget the expectations and norms of society-perhaps because death is so abnormal (in that it is often unfamiliar and not a part of a person's everyday life). This is just an observation of a mere three weeks. My opinion may change-we will see....

On a completely unrelated topic, I have really enjoyed the book Fire in a Canebrake. It is set in Walton and Oconee counties. I grew up in Newton County, which makes up part of Walton's southern border-so this story hits close to home (so to speak). It was odd to me reading the names of families and churches that sound familiar and to learn that they may be connected to this historical horror. I think that I actually feel relieved that attention is still being paid to the lynching of Moores Ford, and I love the work that Andrew Sheldon and his colleagues have been working on in the last few years. Many people will argue that the past should remain in the past, but I find something wrong with that idea. It seems that often people tend to believe that the passage of time makes things disappear and that somehow, with time, wrong becomes less wrong and less important. By reopening cases from the Civil Rights era, these lawyers are voicing the opinion that a crime is a crime whether the criminal is caught 2 hours or 50 years afterward. I would agree; to ignore these murders is worse than forgetting them.

Okay, now that I have sufficiently shared these random thoughts, I want to say that I am really enjoying living in this house with my wonderful housemates and hope that Tier 2 is doing well!

-Richelle

Tiredly Blogging, by Davis

Hello again,

i am staring at the page experiencing difficulty forming words.

It is actually not that late for college students, but I am still a wee bit tired. I work with High School refugee students through the International Rescue Committee and it seems that once they learn to speak English they learn to have a typical rebellious high schooler attitude. It is quite fun trying to get a good size group to perform a project when they would much rather play on the computers and we cannot make them do anything because the state requires 90% attendance rates to provide the funding that makes the camp possible. It is a fun balancing act.

Try this. Do this. Ok, this may be a little corny but it's actually really fun.
In return- blank stare blank stare blank stare possible nod blank stare

Anyway, I am learning a lot more about my company as I work more and it's pretty cool. It was started by Einstein, who was a pretty smart guy and a refugee. He said there should be in existence a group that helps refugees resettle. He really was pretty smart. He allows for the brain drain that has pushed the US high above other countries. (not sure this is actually a good thing as far as sustainability goes or as far as furthering our global identity goes, but it sure does help the US academic system and also allows us to train refugees to go back to there home country and educate their fellows). I was amazed to find out that in foreign countries only 2 % of IRC workers are expatriates and 98% are native. That is awesome and outstanding.

However this still does not describe exactly what I am doing. Tomorrow I am going on a field trip!!! YAY!! I am going to the airport with 20 kids who speak no to very little English where we are going to attempt to meet an incoming refugee family. Challenging yes. An experience yes. An amazing experience. Yes.

We also just found out that a subcontractor doing work with younger child refugee populations has had some background check problems - no criminals or sex offenders (the biggest worry of people working with child groups) were found to be working so dont get a wrong idea, the wrong background check company was used - and lost almost all of their staff. Therefore, the IRC is going to see if we can go in and contain the problem until the new checks go through. So I can now also put on my job resume description, crisis management. It was a very fun day.

Well I believe that I am about to start writing nonsense if I dont go to sleep.

until our next chat - farewell!

Living in the Community

Visiting Buzz's house was so amazing. I can't believe two solar panels could power his whole house. The fact that he was able to build the whole house is even more astonishing. I also think its cool how he said he could have built a system which would constantly keep the house cool so it would not need air conditioning. I definitely learned more about living a sustainable life.

I also really enjoy living in the house with everyone. Before this experience, I have never really felt the responsibilities of living in a house with others. It's such a new feeling to wash my dishes and clean up after myself--even during school when I lived in an apartment with three other guys, our standard of cleanliness was mostly nonexistent.

I really enjoy the activities we do together. We go out, watch movies, and have a grand time. One of the movies we watched is JUNO, arguably the best film ever made aside from CITIZEN KANE. It inspired us so much that Helen and I decided to reenact the emotional and unforgivable song.

Ending Your Suspense

I know you've probably all been anticipating my post--what gems of wisdom would I offer the group? When would this text appear?  Would it even appear at all?  Well, friends, wait no longer, as I am simultaneously ending your suspense and alleviating my guilt for being only a bloggee and not a blogger.  (Bloggee--someone to whom bloggers post?  I can't resist using words that make it nearly impossible to take myself seriously.)  Either way, I'm now expressing my earlier frustrations in written form--slightly less satisfying than my more dramatic narrative tendencies--but cathartic nonetheless. 

For those of you who haven't heard about the saga with my first placement (warning: spoiler ahead), here you have it in cliff notes version.  Back in January I contacted the Women's Resource Center to End Domestic Violence.  I wanted to start speaking with places early--even before I knew if I was accepted into the program--just to make sure that I'd have a great internship set up for the summer if it worked out.  I tried to be detailed and explicit without being demanding or entitled, and it seemed for months heading into the summer that my supervisor was eager to provide me with the type of experience I sought.  Even by my first couple days of work, I could tell something wasn't right.  I was essentially a glorified babysitter--watching the children while the staff did the real work in the other room.  I spoke to my supervisor, referencing what we had initially agreed upon, and she said she would get back to me.  And she did, but only to tell me that if I couldn't perform those duties asked of me then I should find a different place to work.  So much for all my preemptive efforts.  Luckily I was able to secure another placement that I'm just beginning work at, so I'll post again soon about how that is going.  Based on my meeting with my new supervisor, it looks like it may be an excellent place for me.

But back to the issue at hand.  The only aspect of this that was able to curb my fury with the organization for completely backing out on me...pity.  I saw how this organization functioned.  They were understaffed and overworked, underpaid and overwhelmed.  Those kids were also irresistibly adorable, and my heart broke for them every time I'd look at them and imagine the kinds of horrors they've seen in their short lives.  They deserved someone who wanted to be there with them 100%.  The Dalai Lama tells me--as well as the other millions who read his books, but I like to think that it's his personal advice to me--that compassion is a much more admirable quality than pity, because compassion implies a type of empathy.  Not just "feeling bad" for someone else, but truly caring for them because of the interconnected nature of everyone and everything.  If I ran a nonprofit organization, if it were MY responsibility to look after these struggling women and their children, help them get back on their feet, and provide them with every type of service I could, I'm fairly certain that I would be able to justify sacrificing some intern's preferences over the needs of my greater cause.   In a perfect world, my supervisor should have been honest with me about the work that she was lining up for me, but then again, in a perfect world, we wouldn't need domestic abuse shelters.  I know what it's like to be driven, and I understand that you can not expect to accommodate everybody perfectly in the pursuit of your goal.  This whole "compassion" deal certainly takes the fun out of being bitter, doesn't it? 

Rebecca

Pictures!

This past Saturday, a few of us managed to drag ourselves out of bed to help with two of the Community Gardens: Rollins and the Depot. I personally had a great time and had thought several times during the past year that I would like to be involved with them-- now I am! Perhaps the experience seemed particularly satisfying since all we really had to do was a little weeding and harvest the food; no waiting involved. It was also a fitting experience to follow our day with Buzz, who probably grows more food by himself than all of the gardens at Emory combined.

Thanks Katie!

I remember being very curious about the life his daughter must lead too--how many people grow up in a yurt? I think it takes brave parents to raise a child like that too, since I would imagine that the reason many adults who are concerned about the same environmental causes that Buzz is would give for living a more conventional, energy-consuming life is the well-being of their children. But Buzz and Mrs. Buzz let their daughter go out and find her own food in the forest! (They talked about this last year, I don't know if they mentioned it this year, but they said she could just go out and know which plants were edible and bring back a basket full of food at age, I dont know 7 or something ridiculous.) They remind me in a way of Paul Farmer--an extreme example of living the cause, so that all of us realize the extent that we could be committing ourselves, and hopefully push us to do a little more.

Since Natalie requested...

...I think I'll talk about our trip to the Chattooga Conservancy since no one else has yet.

Yes, Buzz's composting toilet, solar panels, and Native American-inspired former home (how did he live there for so long?) impressed me. However, what impressed me most was his down-to-earth nature (I really didn't mean those puns). I've worked at a nature conservancy before, and one often meets truly angry people who, while well-intentioned, often isolate their audience with vitriol. I mostly saw Buzz as a man who does want environmental change to occur, but he's also a hunter who majored in forestry. As he said, in order to actually change a community from within, one has to work with them, not above them.

I also found myself thinking about his daughter and the life she must lead. What an interesting background she'll have as she goes through school! Riding horses bareback, getting a knife for her birthday (I would be scared to handle that thing, let alone give it to an eight-year-old), going down to a nearby creek to pick up artifacts. And all while living in Georgia without air conditioning. While I thought Buzz did go a bit overboard when talking about our "apathetic generation," I do agree that his daughter's generation will be growing in a world quite different from the one we did. I enjoyed his positivity and also remain hopeful, although a little apprehensive, for the future.

Grudgingly Blogging, by Davis

First blog ever. Exciting.

The bar has been set high.

Creativity, insightfulness, inspiration, explanation, narrative.

But... where is the humor? I wish I was one adept at causing laughter. Albeit, I am not! I hope that you can enjoy my blog in spite of this fact.

Work Work. File File. Sleep. Eat. What is it exactly we do here? We learn!! Living and learning communities. We field trip - can that be used as a verb? yes - to many fanciful places in Atlanta and Georgia - or if we want to refer to it as the Place name, Piedmont. (for tier 2, I believe that one of the initiatives we are focusing on here in tier 1 is "Emory is Place." It is one of the initiatives that Bobbi Patterson has been working with and Vialla is now teaching us about. I believe it can be found in certain Wheel articles.)

Did you know that the Piedmont has its own traditional style of music? Yes it does. The piedmont blues.
Also, if only we were living in the central piedmont, then tobacco and not cotton would be our primary crop- what a wonderful crop. I believe it was called the "Great Civilizer" once by an Englishman - but I have absolutely no reference, so you probably shouldn't quote me. In the North we could diverse with orchards and dairy and such, but what is civilized about milk cows?
Now my favorite, in the piedmont we have a traditional style of dance known as the cakewalk which is an old African American slave dance that parodies the style of old European ballroom dancing. I think in fact that all tier 1 folks should learn the cakewalk and when tier 2 returns, we will teach it to you! (I attribute all of this to Wikipedia - academics will hate me - but it is so marvelous)

Obviously, I kinda enjoy the Emory is Place initiative.

Well, I believe that it is actually time for me to go; I have a project to finish before work tomorrow and I am kinda getting a late start. If you're curious about where I work, then I guess you will have to wait til the next time I must share myself with my digital interface to the internet!

Have a good week all you tier 2 folks!

Out of the Office

My second week on the job I felt like I barely saw my desk. This week we had a staff planning retreat because the Chief Operating Officer of the DC Office was in town so we were out of the office for two days to talk about management and long-term strategic planning. We are trying to move Public Citizen into the 21st century and get the young people of the world interested in what we are doing, so in that respect the other interns and I were able to help out the whole organization with our "youth" perspective.

That was nice because for the rest of the two days it was a little bit difficult to figure out what my place was at these meetings. I had only been a part of Public Citizen for a week and a half and then suddenly I'm sitting in a meeting about where Public Citizen is going and all sorts of other big-time topics. It was hard to decide if any input or thoughts I had would be helpful or naive and useless given my relative inexperience, but I tried to find a good middle-ground for participation. I think that's one of the difficult things about being an intern in general--you are given responsibility and you want that responsibility, but you are also very young and new, so how much independence do you let yourself have? Should you make suggestions to the regular staff?

The good news of the week is that I sat down with my direct supervisor and talked about my specific project for the summer, which is going to be to work on an energy efficiency campaign for electric co-ops. I am going to do a survey/report of Texas cooperatives, come up with educational materials, attend annual meetings when I can, etc. Its exciting to have a tangible end goal to work toward--now that I have that I can be more self-directed.

This week I also made another trip to San Antonio--this time for a City Council B Session where the city unveiled their sustainability plan. It was really encouraging to see the city so on-board with efficiency, green jobs, and greener transportation and it was exciting to see a city council in action. San Antonio's municipal utility CPS has set a relatively high goal for energy savings through efficiency plans and their president made a very clear commitment to efficiency at this session. So the meeting was great, and hopefully one of these times I will actually get to see some of San Antonio outside an office.

So that's my week--Tier 1 you should post about your weekly outings! I think you went to see Buzz this weekend, whose lifestyle makes him pretty much the poster boy for energy efficiency. Thinking back on that trip I am especially impressed/appreciative of people like Buzz after all the reading I've done for this job.

Anyway, good wishes from Austin to the SAE house!

Sarah's 2nd Week

One can never work overtime for the poor. We're only scrambling to make up for our deficiencies.

-Mountains Beyond Mountains

While I realize Tier 2 is all about autonomy, its extent is a bit unnerving. I now have my own cubicle, phone number, voicemail, and email address at All Saints, and they all treat me like I’m a permanent part of the staff. Its great to be entrusted with so much responsibility and to be completely involved and in charge of every aspect of the Tents of Hope project, at the same time I almost feel overwhelmed at the amount I have to do. Its almost like there isn’t enough time for all that I need to do, hopefully that feeling will pass. My supervisor has already told me to be careful about working too much; she knows from experience that “this place will steal all of your time if you let it.” Considering all the projects that just the Peace and Justice Department I can see what she means.

No matter how hard I work though, I feel like it won’t be enough. Even the fundraising I am able to do will only be able to help the approx. 400,000 refugees that have been able to escape. 2.5-3 million are still essentially homeless within Sudan, trapped in their own country in constant terror. In Not On Our Watch Don Cheadle asserted that, “... indifference and ignorance can kill,” the more statistics and stories the more I realize the truth of that statement. Apathy and selfishness can prove just as harmful as hatred, because they allow horrors to continue. From the beginning of this project I have been realizing how simple it is to alleviate someone else’s suffering, even a miniscule amount. It just makes me sad that everyone doesn’t, but grateful that so many do.

Being new to the somewhat complicated infrastructure of the church I sometimes feel incompetent because I have to ask so many question all the time about how to get things done. All the same everyone has been incredibly welcoming and helpful with my project. I still can’t get rid of the nagging fears about my plan falling through or that I’m not knowledgeable enough about the topic or that I’m not doing enough. What is enough? All of us will be working with a partner for 8 weeks, then what? Do we just walk away?

Tents of Hope is really only a one year project, culminating in a gathering of the tents decorated by communities around the country in Washington, DC in November. In addition to raising funds to support primary and secondary school education in the Kounoungo refugee camp I am trying to use our tent to inspire people to political advocacy. This is especially exciting for me because I've never been politically active in my life (I only registered to vote a few months ago) and now I am heading a letter writing campaign to President Bush and Senators Boxer and Feinstein.

One of my main struggles in my project is trying to find ways to make people care. The fact is most everyone knows about the Darfur genocide, they don't necessarily know exactly where Darfur is or who is killing who or why (if there really is a why), until a few weeks ago neither did I. Even so, when the word "genocide" is used, do any of those details really matter? Perhaps everyone, somewhere deep in their subconscious, does care but not enough to drive people to action, that’s how I was. I'm just worried that I won't be convincing enough, after my first attempt at fundraising I realize how naive I was to think this was going to be easy. The current state of our economy makes money a difficult thing to part with especially when the church is already involved in so much (and yesterday I paid $4.80/gallong for gas).

Working at a church is helping me to regain my faith in faith. Being Catholic when I was younger meant my faith was largely dependent upon a lot of rituals. Other than my personal negative experience, I began loosing faith because I thought that it required all the bowing and bells and stained glass windows and repetitions and what seemed like endless memorization. While I understand and respect that some find that part of their respective faiths comforting and necessary, for me it just always seemed superfluous, especially when I didn’t feel like it was helping me or anyone else. All Saints seems different. Aside from being the most inclusive church I’ve ever seen, it seems like their faith is not so centered on “how” you practice (though church services are an important part), or even what you specifically believe in, they place more emphasis on what positive effects you allow your faith to lead you to. Even their church seal symbol shows this, spirituality is only one of pieces of their faith. My supervisor said she once spoke to an atheist who became a member of the church. He told her he didn’t believe in God, but if he did it would be like the one All Saints believes in. I completely understand what he means.

For more info about Darfur:
- http://www.ourpledge.org/
- http://www.standnow.org/
- http://www.jewishworldwatch.org/

Moving Up

Today I graduated from my first posts and got to actually interact with clients today! Crossroads Community Ministries is best known for two things: a soup kitchen and helping people obtain identification. Both services are meant to be utilized by homeless people only. Therefore, each day begins with an orientation where new clients have to fill out intake paperwork and a verification of homelessness form. Someone can be classified as homeless if they're sleeping in a shelter, with friends or relatives, if they're facing eviction, in an abandoned building, or simply on the street.

The first week I spent my days familiarizing myself with the organization by working in the soup kitchen and the mailroom. Since homeless people generally do not have reliable mailing addresses where they can receive things such as food stamps, social security/disability checks, and other important documents, the mailroom is very important, but working there consists primarily of putting mail in folders alphabetically then finding people's mail for them.

Today, however, was my most interesting day at work. No soup kitchen, no mail room...real people. After orientation, a recent theology school graduate who is getting practical experience in Urban Ministries and I sat down to work with a few of the new clients. There were two victims of domestic violence. One had a place in a shelter but is an illegal immigrant with no job. She is homeless because her husband recently tried to kill her and is now in prison. The other came with her two children. She has a job, but cannot find housing because she has been evicted previously. Other services include verifying employment and helping people to receive MARTA assistance, navigating the bureaucratic jungle of obtaining birth certificates and state IDs (which are often necessary for work and housing), and helping people with disabilities and addictions get help.

The people at Crossroads realize that they cannot simply feed people, and also that they cannot do everything, so I have learned a lot about other social service agencies in Atlanta because Crossroads works closely with many of them. I've also learned about fundamental problems with Atlanta that make people particularly prone to homelessness. I now am acutely aware that an Emory Student's Atlanta and a Homeless Person's Atlanta are two very different cities in the same geographical location.

The first weeks! (Joy)

Hey everyone!

Let me share a bit about my experience so far. I’m in a little bit of a different situation; I started my internship three weeks ago, almost as soon as school ended. So today was the start of my fourth week. However, let me start off by telling a bit about the place I’m working, and my initial reaction to it all.

I’m working at the Laguna Relief and Resource Center (LRRC) in California. The center specializes in three different areas – homeless help/prevention, low-income family outreach, and disaster preparedness/relief. It sounds like an odd combo of things (at least that was one of my initial responses), but it all fits together in an interesting way. The center was started in response to a huge landslide that devastated the community and surrounding areas. A huge number of families lost everything they had; they were effectively left homeless and/or within the low-income family category. Instead of just raising money and dealing with the situation at hand, the founding members of the LRRC decided to make it a long-term project to prevent another catastrophe, help the families devastated by the landslide, and aid other homeless/low-income families then and in the future. The center has since grown into a much larger organization, and the emphasis is now mostly on the homeless and low-income family outreach programs, with a smaller program designed to prepare the community for potential disasters.

Initially I was planning on working solely with the low income families, especially since that way I could use my Spanish skills. As it turns out, I’ve had the chance to work with both the homeless and the low-income families. Both programs are coordinated within the same (small!) building, so it’s hard to be around and not somehow end up engaged in both. Occasionally it causes a little bit of strife when the homeless and low-income unexpectedly are forced to interact, but more on that later.

The staff at the center is one hundred percent volunteer, meaning that it’s hugely understaffed and incredibly chaotic at times. The upside is that there’s always a ton to do, and there’s NEVER a dull moment. Given my experience in Tier 1, I was a little worried about not having enough to do, but that is definitely not a problem here. Another huge plus is that I get to engage in a mixture of hands-on client interaction and more removed organizational/managerial work.

It’s been an amazingly eye-opening and interesting experience so far. That’s it for a general overview and I’ll provide more specifics next time!

Joy

Helen- First Week

Hey everyone,

Helen here (Tier 1), and I guess I'll just share a little bit about my work at Hospice Atlanta this past week. Everyone working there is extremely nice and open to helping learn what the Hospice does and how it works, and having Richelle work with me is really awesome.
At first, (and I guess now still) I have lots of paperwork, stamping, and filing to do, but also very necessary things to help the hospice running. I feel like the hospice is a really good learning experience because of its private environment. I am interested in going to medicine, so one-on-one time dealing with doctors and nurses is really nice. We even get to participate in interdisciplinary in-patient meetings with doctors, nurses, social workers, and bereavement counselor, which gives such a different view of taking care of patients.

Sitting on those meetings and leading teas and coffees with bereavement counselors really made me think about the mindset at the hospice. How did these people continue through their job, caring about patients who have been diagnosed to die in the very near future? They have to treat people with the mindset of comfort rather than survival. Some workers have to try and detach themselves from the patients while others find some faith or belief to carry on their work with. I have yet to really figure it out what I think about when it comes to these patients, but I guess I'll have to figure that out later.

Natalie's First Week in Tier 2

Hey Atlanta!

My first week at my placement has been very eventful and interesting. I am working in Austin at Public Citizen’s Texas Office, which advocates for consumer rights and environmental issues (www.citizen.org). There are 7 other interns and we are all assigned to a staff member to work on their specific issue area—mine is energy efficiency. Having 8 interns is part of a big growing period for this office; not long ago they only have 3 staff people, now they have 6, so we are a little cramped in our office space, which is the 3^rd floor of an old house. It's nice and cozy though.

This week I started out by learning about energy efficiency—I had no idea how much I didn’t know! It’s a little bit difficult to get a grasp on the technical aspects like megawatts and demand savings, but I am working on it. I have also been researching electric co-ops, which are member-owned utility companies, to see how we can get them to improve their energy efficiency programs. I think I will also be working on some media outreach, but I haven’t started that yet.

On Thursday, I went down to San Antonio for a meeting of the anti-nuclear coalition there. The coalition is trying to prevent the city from building a nuclear plant and to improve their energy efficiency programs instead. They can save as much power as the plant would supply, without spending about $10 billion and without producing radioactive waste and all.

Yesterday I went to the Capitol building to pass out information on the economic benefits of reducing the effects of global warming, and to the Texas Democratic Convention to pass out more information to the delegates there. We also had a staff meeting yesterday, so it was a very long day.

I won’t be working as much every week, but I wanted to get as much as possible out of the first week, and I think I did. Anyway, everyone turn off your lights when you leave a room and I hope everything is well in Georgia!

P.S. Sorry about this blog being a day late—I left my laptop in the office overnight. =(

Sarah's 1st Week in Tier 2

“If you do the right thing well, you avoid futility.”
-Mountains Beyond Mountains

When my original Tier 2 placement fell through I didn’t have high hopes for finding one that I would be passionate about. I took the placement at All Saints Church (http://www.allsaints-pas.org/) because I didn’t think I would be able to find anything else. Even after only being here for a few days, I am so glad that my original plans didn’t work out, working at All Saints has already opened my eyes in so many ways.

Those who know me well would be incredibly surprised that I am working at a church; as a result of a negative experience with the Catholic Church I lost my faith in organized religion long ago. As time has passed my hatred cooled to dislike and has recently simmered to a nagging distrust. Now working at a church (of which my mother is a member) I see the positives of religion that I had denied or ignored for so long. It helps that All Saints is also one of the most liberal and politically active churches in the country (http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=8297, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Saints_Episcopal_Church_(Pasadena,_California), http://www.allsaints-pas.org/site/PageServer?pagename=news_splash).

People in large groups, whether they share a creed, race, ethnicity, or nothing at all, have the power to commit terrible atrocities, but they also have the power to enact positive change. I feel very privileged to have the opportunity to participate in that mission of the Peace and Justice Department at All Saints, however short my time here is.

My main project will be coordinating the All Saints “Tents of Hope” project (http://www.tentsofhope.org/), which is all about raising awareness of and funds for the victims of the current genocide in Darfur. These past few days at the church I have been dedicating all my time to learning as much about the genocide as possible by looking stuff up the web as well as reading Not on Our Watch: The Mission to end Genocide in Darfur and Beyond (http://www.notonourwatchbook.com/). While reading I began to feel more and more guilty about having done nothing up to this point.

I have to admit that I had avoided learning about the genocide so that I wouldn’t have to care enough to try to make a difference. I’m too busy studying, what could I possible do to help people thousands of miles away? I now realize how much of a “cop-out” that is. The answer is (or should be)…anything I can.

So whose watch is it? Who stands on deck aboard this world-ship, assuming responsibility for the actions that occur during the shift? To us, the answer is clear: the responsibility of the "watch" lies with those who take it up...we know that there are thousands, maybe millions, like us who desire to tell their children and grandchildren that at a time when there was a terrible thing called genocide, to which those in power turned a deaf ear and a blind eye, people like us spoke so loudly, in numbers so great, that we could not be ignored.
- Not on Our Watch: The Mission to end Genocide in Darfur and Beyond

I have heard it said that Americans have a ridiculous habit of sticking out heads in the sand when it comes to international issues. As Don Cheadle and John Prendergast said in their book, “"...this is the usual response to horrific crimes against humanity -- disbelief in the totality of the horror and genuine hope that the problem will go away.” Despite my cynicism sometimes I think that, considering the many injustices occurring in current society, maybe we didn’t actually have to stick our heads in the sand…perhaps we’ve been buried. That’s how I’ve felt at times, so much wrong I don’t know what to do so I (ridiculously) chose to do nothing. I am glad that working at All Saints will give me the chance to make up for it.

For those of you that want to know more:
· http://www.savedarfur.org/
· http://www.enoughproject.org/
· http://www.ushmm.org/conscience/?gclid=CIzwkfPS0ZMCFSMYagoddAjqjA