Sunday, June 5, 2011

Fundraiser for Japan!

On March 11, 2011 a huge earthquake hit the coast of Japan, followed by a tsunami that destroyed towns completly. Soon after, Fukushima was strucked with a nuclear disaster as the nuclearplants got damages by the earthquake.


3 months later, Japan is still trying to recover from all the lost and damages caused on that day and they still have many more months/years to fully recover.

I was pretty shocked when I heard the news (at 6am from a text message from my sister).
Being a poor student, I felt powerless to help a country that I love.
Having lived and traveled in Japan, I came to make it as my second home country. I wanted to give, but all i could do was donate 5$ to the Red cross...which is not enough.

My sister came up to me with a great idea : A fundraiser!
She came up with the idea of selling "Tsuru" origami paper cranes for 1$.
In Japan, the tsuru represent Hope and dreams.
When you fold 1000 tsuru, your wish will come true.

I remember when I visited the Children Peace memorial in Hiroshima the summer before. All those garlands of tsuru made and given by children from around the world wishing for Peace, Better health, Hope ect...

I thought it was a great idea. So i approached the coordinator of my program to ask if I could do the fundraiser at school. He then approached the person in charge of money for the school and I got the green light.

With the help of a couple of friends, every day for 2 weeks, I sat in the hallways of my college folding tsuru that people would buy.
All the money would be later on donated to Red Cross society and all the Tsuru would be sent to the Memorial park on Hiroshima.

So for every dollar that people gave me, I folded a tsuru.
In the end, We ended up making 500$ / 500 tsuru!

Just a few days before school ended, my 2 teachers and I went to the office and gave the money to the school who then wrote us a check accordingly. We then proceeded to go to the Red Cross's main office in Sudbury and donated the 500$ check on behalf of all the students and teachers of College Boreal.

I got to hold on to one of those giant check and get my picture taken with it. We also got a frame with the Red cross logo and saying we donated to the Japan Tsunami relief fund (which i decided to let the school hold on to it, since It was everyone from the school who participated and not just I).

Right now I have all the tsuru in a shoe box ready to go to Hiroshima. Next year I am planning on going to Japan, so I will wait until then to send them. (It will be cheaper to mail them from within the country).

Thanks for everyone who donated!

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