Small Sacrifices for Somalia

Anderson Cooper totally got to me the other night. His coverage of the famine in Somalia made me cry. There are a lot of sad things in the world but people going hungry, to me, is one of the worst. And let me just give a quick shout out to Anderson Cooper, who I think is an incredible journalist. See, AC doesn't treat reporting like a job. It's clearly his passion. He's so sincere when he covers these tragedies. You can tell it really affects him. No wonder he turned prematurely grey.

He talked about a family in Somalia who had lost all their children to the famine. Their last one had just died and they still had his body because they couldn't afford to bury him. Anderson paid for it because, he said, "It was the humane thing to do."

So I started thinking about what I could do to help Somalia. First, I went to the website that AC told me about: www.cnn.com/impact and gave money to Save the Children. And then I started thinking like Oprah: how could I make my donation go further?

Here's my idea: I'm going to encourage people to make "small sacrifices for Somalia." Just think of some little luxuries you could give up for a month so that these people in Somalia could have the simplest necessity. When I told Frank about this he said, "Oh, so you could give up the housekeeper for a month?"

Now that's just silly. No reason for the housekeeper to suffer too!

Instead, I reasoned that if our family could give up going out to eat three times in a month, I could save $100. (I'm talking about restaurants with a waiter, not Chick Fil-a). So I was able to give $100 to Save the Children.

And $100 feeds a child for 100 days!

Here are some other ideas:

Skip the movies for two people one time and you could give $20. If you usually get candy and drinks, you could give $30.

Give up a Starbucks froo-froo coffee (the kind that costs $3+) @ twice a week for a month and you could give $25

Usually buy wine at the grocery store? Sacrifice two bottles at $9 each (you don't spend more than $10 usually do you?) and you've got $18 to give (although you could probably round that up to $20, don't ya think?)

Instead of buying ten shirts at $20 each for your fall wardrobe, buy eight. Then you've got $40 for the famine.

The point is that these are little things that you probably wouldn't even miss anyway. Now, the housekeeper, that I would miss. But going out to eat, that's a small sacrifice. You could also look at it this way: would you really miss a dollar a day for the next 100 days?

And yes, it's true that insecurity in this part of the world sometimes makes it difficult for aid to reach the victims. However, organizations like UNICEF, the World Food Program and Save the Children are constantly on top of this and they do manage to get in. So don't think that your donation won't go where it needs to go.

So make a small sacrifice. Feed these hungry kids. Don't let Anderson Cooper's hair get any more grey than it already is.

Please comment on this blog if you give and then we can really see how much my "campaign" generated!