"Would you contribute to a Disaster Fund?" asked Robert of USJ 23 in another thread. He was moved beyond words what he has been reading in the news that he felt he has to do something and thus suggested that we start some sort of SJ/USJ Tsunami Disaster Fund collection. He is not suggesting that we start another fund to compete against those that have already been started by the major newspapers. He suggested that the amount that has been collected be hand over to some aid organisation. In this context, I believe Mackzuklifi, our active forumer and who incidently has a web blog (www.brandmalaysia.com) will be making a statement on starting a fund whereby the SJ/USJ community will make an active effort to collect donations for the disaster victims to be channeled through the Red Crescent Society.

In his blog, Mack who has started the ball rolling by pledging RM 5,000 said "I will be contacting the Red Crescent Society in a short while to finalise the arrangements and will keep you informed. I am thinking of forwarding their methods of payment so donations may flow directly, without the hitch of a third party accumulating the funds and extending it to them later. I was told they severely need funds, espescially as an expected outbreak of disease is close on the heels of the natural disaster.

Last night a handful of us were with Mack brain storming on how to go about it as collecting cash donation is a very sensitive issue. The cheques are easier to handled. We are opened to further suggestion the best way to go about it.

i think thru RCS is much better as all other funds will be channelled to the national disaster fund which, as usual, will be bogged down due to red tape. so, pc, who do i make the cheque to?

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What you have to do and the way you have to do it is incredibly simple.
Whether you are willing to do it, that's another matter.
- Peter F. Drucker

Until we finalised the mechanism, hold on to your horses .... I mean money first. Others have started to call me how they can make their contribution. The following are their suggestions

1. One even suggested that we assign leaders of the various neighbourhood watches to do house to house collection.

2. Another suggestion is do a Mother of all recycling campaign at various location to kill one stone with two birds .... or is it two birds with one stone. For your information, every 8.5in thick of old newspaper will contribute RM 3.50 to the fund. How much is 8.25 inch? Your A4 paper dimension is 8.25in x 11.75in or rule of thumb, the length of the tip of your thumb and your smallest fingers fully stretch.

3. Ask forumers to pledge here first (without amount stated as this is a personal thing) and get Ah Loong go after them to collect their pledges. We call this cyberpledge. I have read that some people have the cheek to go public with a mockup cheque for RM 20,000, get their photo published in the papers and then let their cheque bounced!! Say that is a very cheap RM 100.00 publicity stunt. Hope that won't happen here.

4. Enlist volunteers and go after the commercial outlets in SJ/USJ area.

5. Lastly, arrange with retail outlets such as the Subang eGrocer and place a donation box there. In other public areas like the hypermarkets, we station people there with the box.

Do you have other suggestion?

Hi all,

The Brickfields Buddhist Vihara has set up the Buddhist Maha Vihara Tsunami Relief to mobilize resources to assist victims of the Tsunami disaster.

It is appealing to the public to donate any aids, e.g. old clothes, medicine, dry or canned food, toiletries and fund for victims in the countries hit. You may channel your donation/pledge to the Vihara.

The 1st container will be leaving the temple premise on 31 Dec.

For more info, pls call the Vihara at 227 41141 or at 123, Jalan Berhala, Brickfields.

May the blessings of the Noble Triple Gem be with you and your family.

PC, the way I see it, there's many things that can be done to raise funds. Can we do something different? Like maybe a food carnival at 3K or something...its easier to get people to buy things so they don't feel that much. From personal experience, asking for "donations" is the hardest things to do but a carnival is different. I have been toying with a community sort of fund-raiser for a while now. There are people who's willing to sponsors prizes, set up booth etc just need the mechanism...

Ok guys, here is what has been going on.

Our MPs and ADUNs are all in favour of a SJ/USJ Tsunami Disaster Fund. The following YBs have pledged their full support (and soon to come donations)
__________________________________________________ _______

MP for Kota Raja – YB S Vigneswaran a/l M. Sanasee
Mobile Phone: 019-3832281

ADUN for Sri Muda – YB Amzah bin Umar
Mobile Phone: 019-2151405

MP for Puchong – YB Lau Yeng Peng
Mobile Phone: 012-2778808
(MP YB Lau confirmed his participation even though he is overseas)

ADUN for Kinrara – YB Dr Kow Cheong Wei
Mobile Phone: 012-2972198
__________________________________________________ _______

I am sure that YB MP Loh Seng Kok and ADUN YB Dato’ Lee Hwa Beng will also give their support in due course.

Whilst we understand that we do not want to be bogged down by red tape in our efforts to help. There is also no need to rush into this as the Corporate guys are way ahead of us with their donations. We can take our time with our smaller amounts for after all, we want this to be our Community effort to help.

Yes, a Community effort by the Residents of Subang Jaya and UEP Subang Jaya. We must make sure everyone in SJ/USJ has a chance to help even with small amounts.

We must also be accountable for the amounts collected and at the end of the day, we should be channelling the fund through the right parties.

In this instance, it looks like the best way would be to hand the funds collected over to the National Disaster Management and Relief Committee headed by Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

I have an idea of how to collect the funds, will let you all know once they are finalised.

If anyone has any better ideas just voice them here.
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Live long and prosper - Tuvok
Live in USJ23 - Robert
And that's the bottom line cause Stone Cold said so!

Due to time constraint, we do not have the luxury of time. Organising a food carnival is a brilliant idea which we can target for later part of the year. I am also thinking of a Treasure Hunt around the vicinity of SJ/USJ. Hopefully it is not for another disaster. But for this donation drive, we are looking at a 2 week time frame. Sometimes, I wonder why must people give donation with string attached. This type of donation must be done with trust. Worst still, there are others who don't give even a sen but provide a million ringgit worth of criticisms like pouring icy water on our back.

PC,let me know if you guys decide to have the carnival thingy later next year as I have some airlines company that is willing to sponsor prizes etc....It is a publicity for them as well.....Treasure hunt's a good idea....Let me know too.

For the donation, it shouldn't be too difficult. I think a donation box can also be placed at more popular outlets like Starbucks Summit & Taipan. The traffic is good there as well , otherwise, set up a temporary counter somewhere during weekends to collect. Lots of people are careful about who they donate to these days, even people close to us, whatever it is, just let me know how I can help. Financially might not be able to assist alot but energy & time I still can cope.

I was in touch with my ADUN for Subang Jaya YB Dato Lee Hwa Beng via SMS/email and spoke to MP for Kelana Jaya YB Loh Seng Kok and both of them expressed their willingness to support us fully in this great cause. If we can get the 6 YBs to work together, it will be great and let us just focuss to get the things going and done. I believe we will have to cease all donation drive on 15th January 2005 if we give ourselves 2 weeks. We will have to call for another meeting to plan out the mechanism and issue a Khidmat Komuniti decree to enlist your help. But please bear in mind that this is a community effort and is done not along political boundaries. We just want each and everyone of us to bring out the caring attitude in us.

Looking at the situation at hand, I feel that the collective participation of all community leaders would heighten the influence of the fund. The aim is to collect more money for the victims and their participation would in no small way achieve that. Of course, I would be honoured if they were to help out my little effort here. I pledged the money, thankful that my own family and property in Penang was unharmed, yet felt bad to those who were. Any help I get in this is very much appreciated, more than me, by the victims. I am in full agreement of what Robert has plannned and thank him for allowing the fund to be collected via his neighbourhood community. I guess accountability is important and Robert's gesture lightened my load tremendously. I think we can go ahead and start on the implementation, I already have a a few pledges coming in, including some corporatee ones and a board member of a bank. Let's talk soon guys.

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Something more.

Those who are interested to join us bloggers in our rally to assist the victims of the Tsunami may go to these web pages for information on what has been happening and how bloggers have helped bring the message out globally, helped in no small means by our own Jeff Ooi.

Jeff Ooi's Screenshots
Mack's Brand New Malaysian Post Index
Ping Board of Malaysian Bloggers writing on the Tsunami
Brand New Malaysian Latest Index

Click on the trackback links to see how bloggers network to set the newswire networking globally.

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Something more.

I now have confirmation from all our MPs and ADUNs of their full support for this initiative
__________________________________________________ _____

MP for Kota Raja – YB S Vigneswaran a/l M. Sanasee
Mobile Phone: 019-3832281

ADUN for Sri Muda – YB Amzah bin Umar
Mobile Phone: 019-2151405

MP for Puchong – YB Lau Yeng Peng
Mobile Phone: 012-2778808
(MP YB Lau confirmed his participation even though he is overseas)

ADUN for Kinrara – YB Dr Kow Cheong Wei
Mobile Phone: 012-2972198

MP for Kelana Jaya – YB Loh Seng Kok
Mobile Phone: 012-2231121

ADUN for Subang Jaya – YB Dato’ Lee Hwa Beng
Mobile Phone: 012-2203600
(ADUN YB Dato’ Lee has confirmed his participation even though he is overseas)
__________________________________________________ ______

Now to contact all the

1) Neighbourhood Watch Communities
2) Jawatankuasa Penduduks
3) Rukun Tetanggas
3) Residents' Associations

and get their support too.

Yes, Mack let's meet up tonight to finalise this.
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__________________
Live long and prosper - Tuvok
Live in USJ23 - Robert
And that's the bottom line cause Stone Cold said so!

Err...internationally massive scale of relief efforts are NO Easy Task or Feats...ahem...so guys just leave to the experts themselves to handle those situations....n every willing donors should contribute to these causes in kind...meaning CASH!

Ahem...it is easy said than done...even if somebody manages to send 10 containers of foodstuffs to SriLankan ports...err...chances are the aids would be left neglected or unattended by chaotic situations in those affected areas....

Err...work smart n donate smartly in CASH!...to the local RedCross...Red Cresent or St John societies or the both of them...which has got creditable exposures n experiences in handling such issues both within or outside of Malaysia...n just get them reliefs to the victims...ahem...ASAP!

Ahem...so quick timing n effective measures are of critical importance here...err...there is absolutely no necessities to brain storm about any events or functions....period

Err...quickly over to you PCYeoh...Robert...n Mack...all of us are behind you guys 100%!

Tuesday, December 28, 2004

Biggest relief effort underway

Humanitarian relief operation beginning Tuesday would become the biggest relief effort the world has ever seen along Asia's monster earthquaked shores as the death toll was predicted to hit 45,000 and thousands were missing and millons homeless. With many billions of dollars of damage, the disaster could be the costliest in history as well. More than 12,000 people died in Sri Lanka, nearly 5,000 in Indonesia, and 4,000 in India.

The International Red Cross said it was concerned that waterborne diseases like malaria and cholera could add to the toll and as hopes faded for many thousands more still missing and fears grew that disease could unleash more tragedy. In Thailand, the government offered free flights for thousands of foreign tourists desperate to leave the southern areas ravaged by the tsunami.

Hundreds of rescue ships, helicopters and planes were mobilised to evacuate tourists from wrecked resorts and airlift stricken victims to hospitals already overflowing with the injured and corpses.--The Nation

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.as...stre&sec=latest

Err...Robert...Tan_R...KH Ee...n fellow forumers....Orchi just spoken to Mack n PCYeoh over the phone...CONFIRMED!...we see each other tonight at Stadium 2...USJ16...its the same place where we have our regular TT sessions...TONITE at 9:30pm!

Ahem...our initial target is to collect n donate to the cause as much as possible by the 7th of January 2005(being our first Friday TT session for the month of January New Year 2005)...following by another collection n donation of as much as possible for the same cause...by the 14th of January 2005(2nd Friday of the January)...

Err...the initial goal is to handover all the donations to either one of our ADUN or MP on the same schedules mentioned above...