Last week Tara wrote her own update on our progress with the Books for Burma Campaign. As she said we really didn't know what to expect when we began, but the response has been very inspiring. I have roughly 200 books here in Charleston, over 100 of those come from the Charleston Tibetan Society alone, and expect more packages which are now starting to drift in. Tara reports to have at least 100 books in Portland which include a large donation from a local bookstore.
As Tara stated, other than the 5 organizations listed here, which will be getting your donations,
We've also had a few more groups that have expressed interest in receiving books, which extends our potential outreach to include Arakanese, Chin, and Rohingya groups in Bangladesh and India, as well as those already in Thailand and Malaysia. U Sang at the Chin Refugee Committee in Malaysia tells me they are currently renting 5 flats in and around Kuala Lumpur to accommodate the 300 children currently attending classes. Just a year ago there were only 100 children.
It certainly looks like we are going to have a sizable amount of Children's books to ship, so much so that we have stoped asking for Children's books. We are focusing now on adult educational and nonfiction, which by the way I got a box just yesterday of some wonderful nonfiction books. Those were sent anonymously, but we would like to know who you are so please drop us a email.
If there is any question to the value of our campaign we can learn a lot from this article on the American Center in Rangoon, run by the U.S. Embassy. The center provides books, movies and magazines and even seeks out requested books. Membership over the last year jumped from 8,000 to over 15,000, even with junta watchdogs around every corner. Locals are absorbing everything on the shelves at the American Center from books on the Universal Declaration on Human Rights (not an easy subject in print to come by in Burma) to overcrowded viewings of Brokeback Mountain.
While the American Center offers everything from Vogue to books on starting online businesses, we are certainly a much smaller organization and have to consider priority on our very limited budget. Plus, our books our going to organization libraries. We have to take into consideration what each location needs now, what will be most useful and the overall quality of the books we are shipping over there. We also have to think of money. Many have donated $15 or $20 but so far we only have around $100 for shipping books. $100 can go very fast at the post office so I do hope that you remember our cause over this Christmas season. Every dollar goes a long way to insuring that all our books get where they need to. PayPal is the easiest way to donate.
Thank You to everyone who has contributed to the Books for Burma Campaign. We will continue our campaign well in to the new year, so it's never too late to make your contribution. Thanks again, we've really created something good.
