Epiphany in the night

You know when you have those nights when you can't sleep, when there is something you are suppose to realize or remember but your brain is too sluggish to get there before ruining some sleep first? I don't have many nights a year like that, I mostly sleep pretty well, though I do dream about the craziest things. But when I do have them I end up doing stuff, like watch Die Hard or read a book or write something. Die Hard numbs my brain and can help me sleep again, a book makes my eyes lazy, which makes me sleepy, but the writing is the best way, because then I can sneak out whatever it is that I'm suppose to realize out of my head and go to sleep a little bit happier

See, I tend to have the best ideas in those few nights. Its a shame I don't have more of them. These are the nights I realize that if only I could find a really rich person to set it up we could solve the unemployment crisis. Yeah, its true. AND we can save millions at the same time. Put up a factory, have people making water purifying straws (yes they do exist, here's the website: http://www.vestergaard-frandsen.com/lifestraw-introduction.htm) and then loads would have work and even more would have clean water. Brilliant yes? After a while we can switch to other really cheap, simple solutions, like insecticide bed nets or little solar water pumps. 

I'm sure there are loads of issues with this plan, and please feel free to let me know, but the thing is I feel that for some reason it seems like people can't help complicate things. If you have a huge population without work why not put them to good use? In England it can be things like mentioned above, in poor countries there is urgent need for infrastructure, so get people doing that. I can't seem to fully understand the issue with that, after all someone in power could with a bit of creativity and thinking out of the box find the resources to start such a project, and then the rest will follow, opportunity creating new ones.

This might seem like a young persons rant about things she doesn't understand. Fact is I have great people backing me up. Jeffrey Sachs, a personal favorite, introduced in his book "End of Poverty" an idea called clinical economics, meaning taking a step back and looking at a situation including every aspect of it. Say if you are looking at a country in trouble you would not just look at the economics to help them economically, but you would take into account the geographical positions and resources, religious and cultural traditions, political connections and history. This for me seems like such a simple but brilliant idea, and I kept thinking- why has no one done this before??? I don't know much about financial advice, but looking at all the aspects and the nitty gritty of it surely must make sense to anyone? That's what I would do...

So here's to really simple ideas in the middle of the night. I hope people with a bit more power than me has the same thing once in a while, and if not then just give me some time and I'll take care of it ;)

I wish you all awesome dreams, or epiphany waking hours :)

Why, oh why

The question I get the most often about this project is why- Why bother? Why not be something else and let others do the work. What do I get out of it? I also get that smile, you know the one, the smile that says "poor ambitious girl, sacrificing her future like that". And then of course the look "I wish I could do something like that"

Well, here's the answers, and I've been running them around in my own head for years.

Why bother? Because the solutions are so simple, so easy to get your head around and and it takes a lot less effort to do something creative and helpful than make up excuses not to.

Why not be something else? There seems to be this idea around that aid work, event management and fundraising is only for nannies with nothing else to do, or women who have no families or other commitments. Or worse- girls with ambition but who give them up, or "grow out of it". Well, I'm not planning on being any of those.I love planning events, getting a team together and pull off a great event, I love finding new ways to solve big problems, I love meeting new people, traveling, spending time understanding situation I've never been in, and I love learning new things. It gives me a buzz, it gets me out of the bed in the morning and it makes me excited about the future. 

And since I love this line of work I'm really good at it

But that's the only real difference between me and other people, I love this kind of stuff and some people don't. I have no agenda getting everyone to go down to Africa to build wells or give up half their house for a charity. But I want to encourage a better way of looking at it- what do you have to spare? Some companies have boxes in storage, with t-shirts, school uniforms, books, toys and so on. I have connections to redistribute almost anything. And as a family maybe you have something in the attic to sell on ebay and give that money to a charity you like? Everything helps. 

And if anyone needs advice about charities, what they do, what they are like to work with, or just a good cause to support with guaranteed good results then let me know,I'm sure I can help you out :)

No guilt, no pity, just really good ideas, now thats worth being a fan of