What's New Today June 19, 2010?

Legal Stuff

We are looking for a state other than California to set up our non-profit corporation, perhaps Texas.  The reason for this is California has an $800 minimum income tax.  That can be waived if the corporation is granted tax exempt status, but I have no faith in the California government right now to deliver the needed documents in a timely manner.  I suspect that we would end up paying the tax.  Eight hundred dollars would help a lot of kids.

Ideas and Action

Speaking of kids, I went out and bought a bunch of small size (all the way down to baby jumpers) clothing at a thrift store.  I got a lot of nice stuff, but I realized that this will not be a sustainable way to operate.  I have put out a call to family members to contact their friends and business associates to donate children's apparel that we can ship to Peru.  This will be a first step that we hope to use to demonstrate that we are a serious organization dedicated to helping the children of the northern provinces.

We had a couple of ideas that we were considering.  One of these ideas is a kind of radical idea to pay children to attend school.  The premise is quite simple.  Attend school on a regular basis, every day, you get a certain amount of money.  At midterm and the end of the school year, good grades are rewarded.  Now we realize that the money will probably not be used by the children, that it will go for the general welfare of the family unit.  This is okay.  Why is it okay?  Our purpose is to keep the child in school, to prevent them from being yanked out of class to work, beg or sell things to support the family.  This idea will have to be funded by a major donor or a grant. 

The other idea was to provide hearing aids for those who need them.  These would be rebuilt, donated aids from major hearing aid companies such as Starkey.  Starkey has a wonderful foundation for this kind of work and they have, in fact, donated many hearing aids to the children of Peru.  Here is the problem:

Please take a minute to watch this video.  You will see that, to many people, Cuzco and Machu Picchu ARE Peru.  The northern provinces are more or less forgotten:  http://www.starkeyhearingfoundation.org/hearing-angel.php.

While we think their program is wonderful and it is obvious that a lot of needy children were served, we hope to redirect some efforts toward the northern provinces.

Other Stuff

Tom and Maribel are our people on the ground in Chiclayo.  Tom is the infamous Chiclayo Gringo and you can google (http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=chiclayo+gringo) that to find more about him.  They are busy right now assessing need and trying to get cooperation from local government officials and NGOs to see how we can best provide help.  They have already made trips at their own expense to outlying areas of Lambayeque Province to talk with folks and see where we can help.  Without them, we would be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.  Thanks, Tom and Maribel.

On the US side, I am researching a number of things, the main thing right now being grant writing.  I am actually hoping to locate a non-profit that needs a grant proposal written on a volunteer basis so I can practice for when we have our tax exempt status.

Here is a link to help you get an idea of the area we will be serving:  Lambayeque Province

Rose's Mom as a Little Girl

Rose read my most recent blog entry about her, and she said, "It's not about ME.  It's about my Mom!"  Well, this is the story of Mom.  Her name is Noemi.  She was born in the town of Olmos, Lambayeque Province.  Her mother become pregnant with Noemi at the tender age of fourteen, an event not that uncommon in Peru.  A while after she was born, her father, who never married the mother, basically just snatched her up one day and took her to live with his mother.  Noemi's mother never made much of an effort to get her back.

Among the poor people in Peru, it is almost customary that those who can not afford to feed another child, rather than preventing the birth, will give the child to a foster family.  There is no formal adoption or anything like that.  A few are raised as a son or daughter, but many more are raised to be the family servant, or worse yet, a slave.  Only when they feel they are old enough to strike out on their own do they leave.  Many of the young girls get pregnant at an early age and perpetuate the cycle of poverty.

That is pretty much exactly what happened to Noemi.  She met her future husband and became embarazada about the same age as her mother did with her.  Jose, her someday husband to be, took her away from the family that was using her as a maid and brought her to live with his father who was first generation Chinese.  He took her in as a daughter and watched over her while Jose drove trucks all over Peru.  Jose would drop in from time to time, for a birth or long enough to get her pregnant again.  The Chinese father taught her to cook and generally gave her a better life than she had in the past.  Jose finally did the right thing and married her. 

Noemi tells the story of when she first started school. She didn't have enough money to buy pencils, so she made a batch of candy to sell so she could buy a few pencils and other things she needed for school. PENCILS! Let that soak in for a second. Anyway, she wanted to test the hardness of the candy and she pushed her finger down into the gooey stuff. It was so hot, and it was so thick, it stuck to her finger, burning her so badly that the skin came off. Just so she could buy a few pencils to do her school work. She made it through the third grade.


The family got by but they were never well-to-do. Noemi instilled in her kids a sense of self-worth.  I can tell you from personal experience that none of them suffers from a lack of self esteem.  Rose's father would often tell his daughters to never depend on a man for your livelihood.  Always have a way to provide your own income.  That advice, and a desire to never be poor again caused Rose to seek a professional education and she quite literally pulled herself up from the depths of poverty by her own bootstraps.  She found that a lot easier to do in the United States.  We are not called the Land of Opportunity for no reason.  You've heard me say it before: Hardly anyone can swing getting a legal visa to enter the US. Those who are held by the chains of poverty in Peru are not going to be coming here.  For one thing, it is not like Mexico where one can take a short trip to the border and hop across the fence.  Peru is way down the west side of South America.  The trip is expensive and extremely arduous.

One could make the argument that these people got themselves into this mess.  Let them get themselves out.  It is easy to feel that way until you consider the children.  They are blameless.  They did nothing to get themselves into the misery they find themselves in.  We hope to break that cycle of poverty by education. 

To wrap this post up, let me say that Rose wants to ensure that other Peruvian children do not face the same fate as her mother did as a young girl, simply because the parents or the single mother has too many mouths to feed.  Promesa Peru (Promise Peru) is the organization that is going to do the job. 

Vaso de Leche

Vaso de Leche is a program that provides, literally "a glass of milk" daily.  The program is set up to  provide ladles of milk to mothers who bring their own container to the distribution point early in the morning.  Families are predetermined to be needy and the milk is distributed according to their allotment, so many ladles per child.

While Vaso de Leche is not affiliated in any way with Promesa Peru,  we hope they will be able to help us identify those families with the greatest need.  Tom and Maribel (Maribel is Promesa Peru's executive director) recently visited the office where the program is administered in the town of Patapo, Lambayeque Province.  They met Betty Bustamante who is the district manager for the program.  She administers the Vaso de Leche program for the surrounding areas which includes the city itself and 11 outlying communities   

Maribel talking with Betty in the Vaso de Leche office.

Meet Rose

Rose cooking on a primitive stove at her uncle's chacra.

It is time you met Rose. She was the visionary for this operation and it was her promise that led her to want to help the children and families of Peru.  Her roots are in this area as her mother was born in Olmos.  This picture was taken at a small farm, or chacra, in Olmos.  Note the fuel rods feeding the stove.  We call those "sticks."  That's right, this stove runs on good old wooden sticks.  As they burn down, you simply push them a little further into the stove.  I have to admit that this is the only home I have visited in Olmos, so I can't tell you if this is typical or not, but from the way many of the homes looked, I would guess that Rose's uncle was actually one of the more affluent members of this small community.  If Olmos has an upscale section, I must have somehow missed it.

Electricity to the house was provided by a car battery that the uncle would have to take by bicycle to get charged every couple of days. He even had a tiny propane powered refrigerator, a real luxury in this area.  As many families do, the uncle operated a tiny store by his front door selling sodas and other items.  When he offered us a tepid soda, I felt badly about taking it, but he would have felt badly if we paid for it.  I would have asked for water but I know better. 

Some of the other residents at the chacra.

Rose came to the United States with her family when she was eight years old.  Her parents and all of the children became US citizens and very productive ones, at that.  Her parents can brag that they have a medical doctor, a doctor of pharmacy and a teacher and a sociologist among the siblings.  The others either operate their own businesses or they are nearing retirement age.  Naturally, the ability to immigrate to the United States is not within the grasp of most, and that is why Rose wants to do something to help these families.  Promesa Peru is the vehicle that we will use to direct aid to the families and children of the Lambayeque Province.

Beachfront property in Santa Rosa, Lambayeque Province

Web Site is UP

Well, it is yet another humble beginning as we don't have a lot to put on the pages just yet.  I am using a new web page editor program so it was a fairly tough learning curve, but I have it working right now.  YEA!

If you want to take a look it is http://www.promesaperu.org/

Is There REALLY Poverty in Peru?

Village of Cura Mori in Piura in northern Peru

I did a little on line research on different organizations that do work with poor children in Peru.  What I discovered was this:

• There is a need and it is greater than you or I can imagine.
• There are a lot of folks making efforts to help in varying degrees.
• Most of the relief efforts seem to be concentrated in the Sacred Valley region, which I already knew.
• We are directing our efforts in the right direction, the northern province of Lambayeque.

This link should take you to a list of videos on YouTube that will show the need that exists:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=poor+peruvian+children&aq=f

Be sure to watch the one about feeding at the garbage dump.  No one who had a choice would hang out there.  These people obviously have no choice.

Humble Beginnings for our Non-Profit

Promesa Peru is a start up non-profit. My name is Ray and you will meet my wife, Rose, and two of our other board members later. She is a native of Peru and now a US citizen. Her life as a young girl in Peru is what convinced us that we should start this organization to help the poorest of the poor children in Peru. Our goal is quite simple: We want to help the children of Peru and help their families to develop a better standard of living. Depending on many factors, we can grow as needed. While we are excited and optimistic, we don't want to go overboard. Our plan is to concentrate for the time being on the areas of the northern province of Lambayeque (lahm bayh YEH kay) which is an under served area due to its out-of-the-way location. It is not on the way to Machu Picchu like Cuzco is, nor is it the capital of Peru like Lima. It does have some great tourist attractions but most people bypass it in favor of the biggie, Machu Picchu. This also makes the area a less-than-desirable venue for charitable giving and volunteering.



WHERE WE ARE NOW

The idea has been rattling around in Rose's head for years. She knew that she wanted to do something for the children of Peru. She just didn't know exactly what. She is an extremely generous person as I discovered by her contributions to local charities such as homeless shelters and soup kitchens. Oh, and tipping. She always makes sure I leave a good tip wherever we go.

We decided that we needed to redirect the charitable giving to Peru where we can control the distribution of goods and funds. After much thought, we determined that a non-profit was the way to go since it will allow us to help many more children than just us by ourselves. Will it take a lot of work? Yes. Will it use up her valuable vacation time doing Promesa Peru work instead of lounging on the beach? Yes, again. Will it be worth it to see children grow into healthy, productive citizens of Peru? Oh, yes!

Establishing a non-profit is not an easy thing to do, as I have discovered. I have a Dummies book that is guiding me through the process in a very professional manner. Thus far I have:

• Written the Articles of Incorporation


• Written the bylaws


• Made temporary (and maybe permanent) appointments to our Board of Directors)


• Created our web site


• Started this blog (Thank you for reading, by the way!)


• Contacted an airline that services Peru regarding charitable shipping

WHAT WE NEED TO DO

• Get the Articles of Incorporation and the IRS forms submitted for tax exemption


• Obtain start up funding


• Find volunteers in Peru


• Find a reliable and inexpensive source for shoes and clothing and other necessities


• When IRS exempt status is a reality, apply to California for state exemption


• Begin grant writing efforts (most sources require tax exempt status)

WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT FROM US

You can expect us to be forthright and honest. If we fall on our collective butts, you will know. If we receive a huge grant (or a tiny one) we will let you know. We plan to keep you advised on every aspect of our operation through this blog and our web site (http://www.promesaperu.org/). You can expect us to not be compensated for our efforts. All the funds need to go to the children. You can expect us to be diligent in our efforts.

WHAT CAN YOU DO RIGHT NOW?

Until we are approved for tax exempt status there is not a heck of a lot you can do except plan. Plan to volunteer or plan to help with financial support. We have great hopes and expectations for the future. Until our Articles of Incorporation are approved and we are a tax exempt organization, we can't even open a bank account. We can't even say that your donations are tax deductible until we are approved. If you think this is a worthy cause and you feel you just have to make a donation now, we'll find a way. We'll also do our best to make sure that we are approved by the end of this tax year (2010). For right now, the best thing you can do is keep reading and grow with us.