Generosity in the face of disaster

I have been working on a blogging unit with some of my high school students, and we spent a lot of time going through sites on MSNBC's Resources on Asia's deadly tsunami. There was some very powerful stuff there, and it overwhelmed all of us to see the photos of the destruction. We were also impressed by how much of the information was from personal blogs, rather than media networks. To me, that is a reflection on the generosity of the human spirit... I can't weigh in on the criticism over whether President Bush was a slacker in getting out aid from America, and I haven't been able to keep up with what types of fund-raising and benefits are going on in other countries, but I can certainly see a huge desire to provide grass-roots help here in America.

Both of my two schools have less than 100 students, and yet each student body mounted their own fund-raisers... I am sure that is going on in schools throughout the country. Our local coffee shop owner (North Fork Coffee Company in Downieville) picked a day to donate all her sales, and so did one of the shops in Nevada City (Asylum Down, actually, she committed to three days' worth of sales, over $7000). I live in a pretty narrow world, but am seeing that it is a reflection of the greater culture, where lots of big-scale fund-raisers are taking place.

I found another knitter who developed and was selling a sock pattern through her blog, and donated $421 so far to the Red Cross, and also located Bloggers Without Borders, a forum for bloggers to get involved and collect funds. To me, this is a reflection of the fact that most people want to do good, and will if presented with ways they can be of help. I am sure there are tons more similar stories out there... share yours with me.