Sunday, April 7, 2013

Hunger Banquet

My great and wonderful friend Chambrey hosted a hunger banquet a couple weeks ago in order to raise funds for a school building project in India.  She will be leaving in a couple months along with her siblings.  She is a great example of someone with a passion and drive to help others in need and has an adventurous personality to go along with it!
70% of people sitting on the ground to illustrate the vast majority of poverty stricken people in the world.
The hunger banquet was a great success!  She had 3 guest speakers and I was lucky enough to be able to share my stories with disaster relief service.  The hunger banquet was geared toward highlighting global hunger, with a majority of people living in poverty.  Most of the guests sat on the ground and had rice and beans to eat, while others sat at nice linen tables with a gourmet meal.  The hunger banquet also highlighted how to get involved in service and what service can do for you!
Hosts and speakers at the Hunger Banquet. Ali (second on the left) talked about international service, Josh Braizer, founder of Kaiizen (second on the right) talked about his organization Kaiizen.org, I talked about disaster relief service, and the other three hosted the event.

I am so proud of the work Chambrey is doing and I hope that you will take a minute to watch this video about the hunger banquet!  Also, if you get a chance please check out her website http://www.humanitariantraveltips.com/  There are a lot of great tips on how to get involved and plan humanitarian trips!

Keep on serving!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CydiyQb2NCM

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Sub For Santa

This year we are helping a family undergoing a tough year.  The mother of the family was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis; due to this she has been unable to work.  She has been staying at home caring for 4 young children.  In October, the dad unexpectedly passed away in his sleep from unknown causes.  Unfortunately, he passed away the day before his life insurance policy went through.  His passing left the family devastated and with no income.  We would like to help out with giving this family a good Christmas.  Below is a list of items the family needs and wants for Christmas.  Please pick out an item you think you could help with!  Let's show this family a lot of love this Christmas!  If you can help please e-mail me what you are getting so I can take it off the list.  You can also donate money to get these items as well!  Thanks for all the help and support!  MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Vanessa- age 11
Skinny style jeans (girls size 12)
T-shirts (young women small)
Women's socks (size 4-10)
Boots (women's size 7)
Girly things like nail polish, hair products, bright hair dye, etc
Hats
PJ's

Chloee-age 7
Monster High anything (fashion doll)
Jeans/pants (size 8)
T-shirts (size 8)
Books (7-8 year old reading)
PJ's

Ella-age 4
Art stuff (paints, markers, paper)
Barbie doll (a new one on the market)
Clothes, loves dresses!  (size 7)
Shoes (11-12 size shoes)
Loves Disney Princess stuff
Leap Pad II games
hats/gloves/scarf for winter

Jaxson-age 2 years
Diapers (size 4)
Onesie (24 month)
Picture books (loves Mickey Mouse!)
Musical toys
Legos
Clothing for the winter or spring (2T and up)
Snow boots (size 5-6)
Hat/gloves

Tonia-Mom
Large Sweats
Hoodies/T-shirts (women size large)
PJ's
Body works stuff



Wednesday, January 18, 2012


Thank you thank you to all those that helped out with the addiction rehabilitation center holiday project! We were able to collect 17 letters for each guy there, along with a tie and a journal! A special thank you to Braden Whiting for getting all 11 ties needed. The holiday packages were delievered two days before Christmas and were greatly appreciated. The impact the letters made on these men may not be known right now, but I do know the outpouring of love shown will resignate with them. I feel very appreciative for everyone that so willingly helped out. This project had personal meaning to me, and I found it had personal meaning to many others involved. I think it is important to show everyone how much they are cared for, that their lives have meaning, and that they are just as important as everyone else regardless of their past. I believe that goal was accomplished.


"Be the Change You Want to See in the World"
-Gandhi

Friday, December 2, 2011

The Goal is 110!


Christmas is fast approaching and everyone is feeling the spirit of giving. I know that times are rough right now and most people barely have enough to get presents for their loved ones, so I've come up with a way to give on a budget! Many already know that someone very close to me suffers from problems with addiction. I have got to meet a lot of amazing, humbling people along the journey with him. There is a rehab that is run by former addicts and is a non-profit. They do this to make it affordable to those that don't have the means to go to an expensive rehab. There are no doctors or therapists there, but yet the relapse rate is lower than most places. I believe this is because the people at the rehab are driven by their will to get better and the love and support given by fellow addicts and family. Holidays are a rough time for those in rehab and I thought it would be amazing to write them notes/letters of encouragement
and hope. Unfortunately, addiction has become so prevalent that most people know someone close to them suffering from some type of addiction or are/have suffered from addiction
themselves. I challenge you to write a letter to these great guys. If you have kids, get them involved in drawing them a Christmas picture too. It doesn't take long and doesn't cost a penny! I KNOW that these letters will touch their hearts immensely. I can't stress how much it means to them to know others care about them! There are 11 guys at the rehab and my goal is to provide them with 10 letters each. I need the letters by no later than December 22nd, so they can be delivered by Christmas eve. You can hand write them and I can pick them up or you can email them to tracymarikobarnes@gmail.com and I will print them out.

As I stated previously, these guys don'
t have a lot of money and in my experience with them I learned that most don't own nice clothes. It is difficult for them once they get out of rehab to go to job interviews because they don't have the proper clothing. I am planning on getting 11 ties to go with the letters and make a Christmas package. If you want to help out with the ties as well that would be great!

Let's remember to keep in mind those that are having a difficult time! I have seen amazing things happen and people transform when they know there are people out there that love and support them. Lets reach the goal of 110 notes/letters to lift their spirits! Thank you so much everyone, I have been amazed at the amount of people always willing to help out!

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

The Gift Is In The Giving

I wanted to give a proper introduction to this article. I asked my good friend and fellow trip mate on the Haiti mission, Jack, to write an article about how he got started with service and some of his experiences. When he sent me this article, I have to admit I teared up. There is so much this man has accomplished that I wasn't even aware of. Jack is one of the most humble, fun-loving, great guys I know. His story is amazing and absolutely inspiring. My life has been touched by Jack's great work in this world and I know many others have been as well. This is a story of how gripping service is on the human soul and how you can use your talents to make a substantial difference to the lives of so many others less fortunate. Jack thank you for taking the time to write your story down!

Through a series of unusual persuasions created by some old friends in 2003 I was suddenly on an airplane on my way to Ethiopia to embark on my first humanitarian effort. After an initial one-day stop-over in Ethiopia's capital city Addis Abba I was loaded onto a bus with thirty other people heading south about one hundred sixty-five miles to a region of twenty one villages in the Arsi Negelle District of Central Ethiopia. It was a grueling hot ride in the old bus with only one pit stop along the way ending on a dusty hillside where thousands of villagers had assembled to greet us and celebrate our coming. I was with a humanitarian company that was newly established in East Africa, Engage Now Foundation, that also had projects at that time in Mexico, Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia. That was the beginning that changed my life forever.

I remained in Ethiopia for a little over two weeks that first trip, but I was hooked and immediately planned to return again on the December 2003 Expedition sponsored by that same company. While I was there I realized, much to my surprise the large impact the group made on the villagers. It was a wakeup call to my otherwise skeptical view of what could be done in developing countries in a short period of time. I found out that little efforts by someone invested in making a difference can improve the lives of the poorest of the poor in ways that would astound most skeptics. I had previously spent much time in Zambia and Algeria years before, but not on humanitarian ventures. On those visits I was working on large transfer of technology projects. I had experienced in those places that introducing costly, highly technical systems to the non-technical populations of developing countries was a long and arduous process. What I learned in that first week in Ethiopia, however, was that simple technologies, properly presented and made sustainable was the answer to immediate and long-term change, and that it could be done with little cost and minimal effort if directed by someone with the skills and desire to make simple things work efficiently.

By the time I left Ethiopia after that first trip, I had decided that since I was already pretty much retired anyway, that I would turn over my life to humanitarian work. So between my first and second trip to Ethiopia I set about to develop a few simple technology instruction manuals that would make my work a little easier and would be something that could be translated into the local languages of the host countries of Engage Now Foundation. My plan was to use these manuals to train locals who would then pass on that information to their respective villagers insuring that the new technologies we were introducing and the methods to use and maintain them would be sustainable. When I left the U.S. in December of that year for my second humanitarian visit to East Africa, I carried with me manuals on how to assemble a simple water purification system for families built from buckets and sand, how to build pit latrines, how to make an indoor smokeless stove and the manner in which drip irrigation projects for small family farms could be implemented. Those I put to work on my return. By the time I left Ethiopia forty-five days later with help from dozens of community workers I had trained on the use of the manuals, there were over fifty new stoves that had been built in five of the twenty one target villages and over on hundred pit latrines finished and in use. In addition, dozens of families were now using drip irrigation systems on small gardens that saved them from carrying large amounts water to irrigate their gardens and also give them the possibility for year-around gardening. The dozens of water purification units we built during that time were also in use in family homes providing as much as ten liters of clean water for domestic use, with the possibility of totally eliminating the lecherous pathogens that were entering people’s bodies from the fetid water that was available to them from rivers…their only available water source.





Family Pit Latrine Indoor Smokeless Stove

Bucket Sand Filter Water Purification

The key to our success in Ethiopia was finding and employing committed community workers who could take the simple technologies we were introducing and carry them out to their respective villages and then teach the villagers how to implement them. In Ethiopia at this same time we also initiated a program of community education that involved women for the most part. We knew women were the key to making things change in their communities, so we began assembling these village women in what we called, Women’s Committees that met twice weekly and were trained by our community workers in simple technology use, hygiene, family income, small business, and functional literacy. When I left Ethiopia after my forth and longest visit there with Engage Now Foundation (I hadremained thirteen months on the last visit in 2005-2006) there were over four thousand women meeting regularly, over two hundred community workers were functioning in twenty villages, thousands of stoves and latrines had been built and were in use by families, several hundred bucket sand filter water purification systems were in use, many water projects involving roofwater collection and storage had been initiated and many other projects had been started that involved new small businesses that the women created. Involvements on community projects like these were unheard of before. Overall health had been improved significantly by use of purified water and new hygiene methods started by families and women, because they were spending less time gathering wood and fetching water were able to spend quality time with their children, tend to their gardens, thus improving family nutrition and were more committed to improving overall health of their families.










Women's Committee Involved in Functional

Literacy Training By Community Worker


Community Workers Teaching Homeowners

How to Construct a Smokeless Stove Using Adobe Brick


By 2006 Engage Now Fo

undation, while still operating under that name in Ethiopia, had formed an alliance with another company out

of South America and had changed its name to Ascend, A Humanitarian Alliance. I continued my work with the company developing more and more simple technology manuals and training modules associated with those and other simple technologies such as blacksmithing, water collection and distribution by pumps, greenhouse construction and management, beekeeping, building and using brick baking ovens, making and u

sing adobe bricks, sewing and using sewing machines and others. In all over twenty-one manuals finally ended up in the archives of the company. Most had been translated into the Ethiopian language Amharic and several had been translated into Spanish.

During that time, and until early 2010, I continued my work with Ascend, traveling and living in places like Mozambique, Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia. In each instance, I l

ived in those countries from two to six months each spending a total to over sixteen months doing the types of humanitarian work I had come to love in Ethiopia. It was always a gratification to know that so little effort could mean so much to people who were considered the poorest of the poor. I found that in most places people were highly committed to change and improvement of their living conditions, but in most cases either didn’t have the means to make those changes or tradition and culture had held them back from even challenging their conditions. This meant for me, careful assimilation into their activities, so as not to upset those traditions and cultures while introducing new systems that would ultimately force them to challenge their old ways. In some cases, mostly because of religious imperatives, people resisted change, especially those that affected the lives of women. But when those people saw the benefit of taking on new ways of living, they took it upon themselves to make those changes, regardless of the pressures from their religious leaders, and in some cases with women, from their husbands.

Some of the most remarkable things that I observed as a result of mine and my colleagues’ humanitarian efforts were the rate at which villagers who had lived in primitive conditions all their lives, quickly changed and adapted to those new technologies we were introducing. The changes were not only rapid, but were sustainable, and after they were implemented, people were looking at ways they could make them last. Many other seeing the benefits their neighbors were having from adopting those new simple technologies took the initiative to create them themselves. The major key to that success was the use of easy to find, locally available, inexpensive materials, and training of users on how to maintain those simple devices we introduced. In Mozambique’s Beira region where we pioneered the use of simple technology rope and washer pumps to lift water from shallow wells for domestic and irrigation use, we used all locally obtained materials to build the pumps. For the pulley, we used the sidewalls of used automobile tires, cement was locally available for making concrete for the splash pad and to hold the pump in place, plastic pipe used for gutters and potable water lines was locally available and cheap, wood for the pump frame, though rough was locally available and inexpensive. In most cases we built the pumps for under two hundred dollars each. The well was hand drilled with an auger…the only imported item. Since in the six months that I was in Mozambique I trained several entrepreneurs to build these pumps and drill the wells, hundreds of new wells now exist where in most instances people draw water out of open dangerous hand-dug wells with simple devices that lifted about one or two liters of water each time the device was brought out of the well by a stick with a rope attached to the bucket.

Boys Pumping Water From a Single Technology

Rope and Washer Pump at a Mozambican Orphanage


The new rope and washer pumps were capable of lifting water from wells at a rate of up to fifteen to twenty liters per minute. This made it possible with little effort on the part of the child or adult pumping to irrigate gardens as large as one half hectare (about 1 acre) and have those gardens be productive year around. To this date, I still remain as Ascend’s Technical Advisor on matter dealing with their humanitarian work in South America, and India.

In 2009 in addition to my continuing work with Ascend I was invited to become involved with a newly formed humanitarian organization, Machara, A Miracle Network, founded by two of the Lost Boys of Sudan. This project, now focusing on five villages in the Apuk Padoc region of the new country of South Sudan, has at its goal of improving the conditions of five villages that were decimated by the civil war that ravaged over twenty years between the north and south Sudanese. For this region, with a population of over seventy thousand people, we have developed a Five Year Community Development Plan that focuses on developing water resources, improving health and hygiene, building schools, installing pit latrines, assembling stoves for homes and generally improving the economic status of the community by creating entrepreneurs for small businesses with loans. The entire plan is based on our successful development work in Ethiopia. Work has only begun in Sudan as funding for the over two million dollar project is still underway, but this small organization is active, and much is anticipated by the communities that will become the beneficiaries of this program.

When the earthquake occurred in Port-au-Prince Haiti in February of 2010 I was asked by a humanitarian organization, Foundation for Children in Need, to assist with the logistics of rebuilding the wall surrounding a small orphanage that had been destroyed by the quake. The children were without security with their downed wall, and also lacked sleeping areas damaged by the earthquake. I went there in March of that year spending two months with the project finding and purchasing the materials that could be used to rebuild some seven hundred feet of eight foot high block wall to secure the facility. Nine masons from Utah went there to do the work, and in just two weeks completed the project and cleaned up the debris from the broken wall and downed buildings. With conditions as they were shortly after the quake, building materials and general logistics of obtaining and delivering the materials to the site was a nightmare. But we accomplished the task to the surprise and gratification of the orphanage management. At present work with the orphanage continues through regular expeditions sponsored by the Foundation and its dedicated staff.

In summary, humanitarian work is an effort that cannot be described adequately. It can only be experienced to know its value. Many companies and dedicated people embark in these efforts both locally and internationally, and almost all know after their experience that their lives will never be the same. It is an effort that takes time and sometimes large amounts of money, but in some instances, there are possibilities for high school and college students to become involved by serving as Interns with these established humanitarian organizations. The challenge awaits anyone interested in having a new and enlightening experience in their lives. I for one have become a strong advocate through my own experiences, and will forever be grateful that I took the initiative to become involved.

Friday, November 25, 2011

Experiences of Others

The Road Home Homeless Shelter has bookclub night every Monday from 7:00pm to 8:00pm. Bookclub was established to teach the children staying at the homeless shelter, how to read. I believe education is the cornerstone to make a difference in society. "When you know better, you do better." Bookclub gives an opportunity for the community to give back and strengthen the reading skills of these children. We like to reward the children for their hard work reading! A friend of mine, Kyle called me and informed me that he had a bunch of pizzas donated by Little Caezers and wanted them to go to good use. I told him about the Bookclub night at the homeless shelter and he was all in. We read with the kids for the first half and then had a pizza party! It was great watching the kids grab for slices and sharing pepperoni's! My friends wrote about their experience with Bookclub and this is what they had to say about it!

Last week I was provided to be of service at the homeless shelter in Salt Lake City. I arrived just before seven o’ clock and was welcomed by those in charge. They were very kind and helpful as they directed me to where the children would be. When the time came the children were eager to enter the room, though some were disappointed that reading would have to come first, knowing that there was pizza that had been donated by Little Caesars afterward. As the children began to pick out their favorite books I was able to help Nathan, a 5 year old boy, read each one. I soon came to realize that many of the books were created by the children at the shelter. They had stories of people, animals, and buildings that were in Salt Lake City.
It was humbling reading those books; but was uplifting in the fact that the characters in the stories were always positive and happy. At the end of the reading period we were able to serve pizza to each child. They really seemed to enjoy the pizza as they fought over who got which slice. It was a good opportunity to serve and always realize that no matter what situation we are in we can still be happy and positive as we strive to overcome challenges that we are faced with.

-Kyle Tanner

Literacy Night with the 9-12 year old residents at the Road Home Shelter was one of my favorite volunteer experiences yet! I wasn't expecting to find such a large group of kids that wanted to read! In fact, Justice, the young resident that asked me to read with him, kept asking to read more books. We switched off reading pages and Justice kept trying to sound out words that were hard for him. Justice is a unique child that wants to learn, but just needs someone to spend a little time helping him with the harder words. Literacy Night is the perfect program for kids like Justice. You could tell that all of the kids were happy to be there, and happy to have someone to spend time with them.

-Mark Rogers

Saturday, November 5, 2011

It's That Time Of Year!

My mom is a social worker for DSPD (Division of Services for People With Disabilities). Each year around the holiday season, she picks a family or two that is in great need for my friends and I to help out. For Thanksgiving we gather all the food in a traditional Thanksgiving meal and deliever it a couple nights before. In the past the families have been very appreciative and look forward to cooking a big feast together! Those selected are in great need and are amazing people!

The family we have selected for the Thanksgiving meal this year have a very unique story. They are a family of five from Tonga. Their son had a brain tumor that needed immediate attention. Due to the lack of health care in Tonga they came to the U.S. for treatment. Unfortunately, during treatment the surgery went amiss and resulted in permanent brain damage. The family can not go back to Tonga because they need to continue to to receive proper health care. Since they are not legal residents they can not gain employement. The father sells homemade wood carvings and will do yard work for neighbors to try and obtain an income. They are currently trying to gain citizenship, but it is $8,000.00 per person and they don't have the money for it. I have worked with this family in the past and they are truly amazing people. They are very humble and would greatly appreciate a hearty meal to share with the family!

I am asking for help from anyone that wants to get involved in the holiday spirit. The more people that can help, the more families we can bring a bit of joy too! Below is a list of items needed. If you would rather donate money for the items that is fine too. We need to gather the items by no later than November 22nd to ensure that they can prepare the meal in time! Please contact me via e-mail tracymarikobarnes@gmail.com or by phone 801-205-4541 if you can help out. Thanks again!



  • Turkey

  • Potatoes/instant works too

  • Gravy mix

  • Cranberry sauce

  • Yams

  • Green beans

  • Stuffing

  • Pumpkin pie

  • Rolls

  • Drinks