Tag Archives: Clean Water For All Campaign

Day 153

Isolation is the beginning of oppression – that’s what I learned today.

It’s 11: 11 PM on day 153 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself mangoes for breakfast, meditate for two hours – we had a power outage so it’s not like I had anything better to do but still it was nice 🙂 – feed myself barbecued chicken for lunch, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – Emma from Cambridge – who by the way had donated TWICE before – sacrificed her Starbucks/Dunkin Donuts for a week and donated $5 – I LOVE people like her who sacrifice what they want to give others what they need 🙂 – formulate a questionnaire for the book I’m writing – I’ve always wanted to know how woman lived in different parts of the world so about two days ago I came up with this idea to find woman from different countries all over the world on Twitter and ask them to fill out a questionnaire consisting of 20+ questions ranging from their skin-care regimes to their religious beliefs – and send it to my friend Amy of the PennDragonArt Studios for her to fill out.

Today as I was doing research to find out if Twitter was available in all 209 countries of the world I discovered that China – one of the world’s largest economies – blocks Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and BlogSpot and I thought to myself what’s the use of living in a country with a 8% GDP if you cannot communicate in the way you want and I realize that all forms of abuse – human rights, domestic, bullying etc – begins with cutting the person/people off from the rest of the world with that said I am calling on China and all the other countries who have placed bans on all forms of media to lift those bans and allow the voices of their people to be heard. Are you unwittingly facilitating an environment that lends yourself to being abused?

Day 152

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I am a woman in process. I’m just trying like everybody else. I try to take every conflict, every experience, and learn from it. Life is never dull. – Oprah Winfrey

It’s 11: 25 PM on day 152 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself a banana for breakfast, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today – feed myself rice and curry for lunch, go visit my cousin, feed myself a KFC Twister for dinner and watch the movie Eat Pray Love – it was SO relatable I could see Elizabeth in every woman I had ever met – I would recommend this movie to the entire female population 🙂

All my life I had been under the misconception that once I had the house, the car and the money my life would be perfect but after watching Eat Pray Love – the movie based on Elizabeth Gilbert’s best-selling autobiography of the same name – I realize that perfection is not a destination but rather a journey. Are you a woman in process or do you believe that you know everything that you need to know about yourself? 🙂

Day 151

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You can be friends with someone regardless of their age – that’s what I learned today 🙂

It’s 10: 02 PM on day 151 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, sent thank you to Clare – the Facebook friend of mine who I sent a donation request to yesterday – for the $21 that she had made – tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today – feed myself rice and curry for lunch, went to physiotherapy – did you know… your muscle tone changes according to your emotional state – you learn something new every day 🙂 – feed myself Chapati – an unleavened flatbread – and chicken curry for dinner and finish reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle – it was a nice book but towards the end I felt like Kathleen was dragging the story on just to fill the pages.

A few week ago I was at my physiotherapist’s office and she was beggaring me about enrolling for college classes and I said something along the lines of why are you always on my case and she looked me in the eyes and said something that I never expected to hear from another human being in my lifetime you have a brilliant mind I just don’t want to see you waste it and looking back on it today I realized that I was withholding from her the love and affection I felt towards her because she didn’t fit my description of a friend. Do you have a strict criteria that needs to be met before people can start calling themselves your friend? 🙂

Day 150

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Seek not the favour of the multitude; it is seldom got by honest and lawful means. But seek the testimony of few; and number not voices, but weigh them. – Immanuel Kant

It’s 9: 48 PM on day 150 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself a toasted-cheese sandwich for breakfast while watching TV, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today – feed myself rice and curry for lunch, exercise for 30 minutes, feed myself pizza for dinner, update my Facebook friends about my campaign and asked one of them for a donation – it occurred to me that I was putting too much emphasis on the Twitter users and not enough on the Facebook users.

Today as I was lying on bed tweeting, updating my Facebook status and doing everything that needed to be done I remembered something our old reverend once said in one of his sermons one who is popular with everyone is not popular with God and as I remembered that I thought you know what I do not care if people walk in the opposite direction or change the subject for fear that I might ask for a donation because I know that God is proud of me. Do you measure your success by the extent of your popularity? 🙂

Day 149

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Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough. – Oprah Winfrey

It’s 9: 20 PM on day 149 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself a chicken polony and lattice sandwich for brunch while watching TV, exercise for 10 minutes, feed myself rice and curry for dinner and tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today

As you may know I preach gratitude to EVERYONE I meet but today as I laid in bed remembering how guilty I felt for asking my mother to take me to the bathroom I thought to myself with tears in my eyes who feels apologetic about needing to go the bathroom God I hate this: I hate having to check if a place has stairs before I go anywhere, I hate needing to be bathed, clothed and pushed around everywhere and in that moment I said to myself tomorrow the dawn will break and you’ll feel better once again and with that I realized that gratitude gave me the foresight to know that anguish and disillusionment doesn’t last forever. Are you thankful for what you have even in the ‘bad’ times? 🙂

Day 148

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Unless you choose to do great things with it, it makes no difference how much you are rewarded, or how much power you have. – Oprah Winfrey

It’s 8: 45 PM on day 148 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – two donations were made to my campaign – the first one was a $20 donation from Andrea of the Brite2Briter Kids Foundation –and the second one was a $16.15 donation from Abdullah – I am SO grateful to both of them 🙂 – feed myself rice and curry for lunch, exercise for 10 minutes while watching TV, feed myself grilled chicken for dinner and continue reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle – I read for a few hours before it occurred to me that my mom had to turn off the lights and go to bed – there’s just something about reading that I LOVE so much when I read it’s almost like I forget the people who stare at me my mall, my father who prefers that I go to the other room when people come to visit, my mother who somehow manages to minimize everything I do and my sister who I could never quite live up to.

Today lying on my bed trying to concentrate on the words I was reading I couldn’t help thinking I wish I was Justin Bieber for a day and in that moment I was so overwhelmed with frustration because most celebrities – Oprah and Alyssa Milano excluded – write a cheque and think that that is all there is to giving but having donated money to various different charities myself I can tell you that donating money pales in comparison to giving someone else an opportunity to give and showing them that they can live a fulfilled life without being caught up in the vicious cycle of consumerism. Are you doing great things with your power? 🙂

Day 147

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To effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others. – Tony Robbins

It’s 10: 01 PM on day 147 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, feed myself a bread and lattice sandwich – my mother had originally put something made of chicken in it luckily for me I remembered my meat-free Mondays resolution before I took a single bite – for breakfast while watching TV, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – today I woke up to find that the person who had promised to make a donation the previous day had in fact done so – I was REALLY surprised not because I thought he wasn’t a man of his word but because I hadn’t met prior to him telling me that he would make a donation – nice to know that there are people out there who give for the sake of giving 🙂 – feed myself rice and curry vegetarian-style – it taste quite as bad as I thought it would 🙂 – and exercise for 10 minutes.

As you may or may not know I am not big on getting or giving material possessions – there’s just something about going to a store and buying a gift-wrapped present that seems so impersonal to me – and because of that every time I saw a guy giving a girl a present on TV or in a movie I thought to myself why don’t you write her a letter or something and looking back on it now I realize that not everybody will express their feelings exactly the way I do with that said if you’re planning to buy your significant other diamonds this Valentine’s Day I urge to visit Charity Diamonds – 50% of the profits are donated to charity (Note: estimated shipping time is 2-4 days). Is your inability to communicate effectively causing you to judge other people harshly?

Day 146

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There comes a time in everybody’s life where you have to decide that people are going to treat you with dignity and respect or not at all – that’s what I learned today 🙂

It’s 9: 38 PM on day 146 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to continue reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle, brush my teeth, feed bun and baked beans for breakfast, played host to our family members who came for the prayer in memory of my grandfather – it is annually event that takes place usually of the anniversary of my grandfather’s death but this year we postponed it for two days because everybody’s had prior commitments on the actual day – we are Jacobites [pronounced yacobites] – one of three denominations of Christianity in Kerala – our place of origin – and as such we believe that it is necessary for us to pray for the souls of the deceased in order for them to be accepted through the gates of Heaven – tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – somebody – you know you are – promised to make a donation – I am SO happy 🙂 – feed myself rice and curry for dinner and exercise for 10 minutes.

Today I was lying on the bed minding my own business when my mother waltzes in and announces that we – all five of us – might be going to India in June or December and in that moment I suddenly had a flashback to a few months ago when I BEGGED my father with tears eyes to take me to my cousin’s wedding in India and when I finally snapped out of it I realized that my father was my father so long as he didn’t have to be seen with me and I knew I deserved more than that so I decided to sever my relationship with him before it eroded my whole heart. Do you put up with disrespect from those you love because you want them to be a part of your life? 🙂

Day 145

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Every birthday, you decide whether to mark it the end of your greatest days or the beginning of your finest hour. – Oprah Winfrey

It’s 11: 30 PM on day 145 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to watch Inception on DVD – it was MIND-BLOWING – there was so many layers to the story I would recommend it to anyone who likes a movie that makes them think because it was written in such a way that you – the audience – felt compelled to connect the dots – brush my teeth, feed myself Chapati – an unleavened flatbread – and beef curry for breakfast, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – no luck today – feed myself bun and baked beans for dinner, exercise for 10 minutes and continue reading The Last True Cowboy by Kathleen Eagle – I couldn’t finish reading it last year because my sister had to return it to the library when her school term ended but on the plus side I’m only a hundred or so pages from finishing it 🙂

As you may or may not I’m turning 20 on March 25^th and although I don’t usually make a huge fuss about turning a year older this year I wanted to do something truly global to commemorate the occasion so with that in mind I asked my Twitter and Facebook friends to do something nice for someone else in the next 48 days leading up to my birthday and it is my greatest hope that you will do the same. Do you embrace your birthday or resist it? 🙂

Day 144

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An idle youth becomes in age a beggar. – Latin Proverb

It’s 9: 04 PM on day 144 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to brush my teeth, tweet about my Clean Water For All Campaign for a few hours – two donations were made today – the first one was a $53.85 donation from Wayne of the Jindalee Foundation who by the way has donated to my campaign not once, but THREE times – thanks Wayne 🙂 – and the second one was a $5 donation I made on behalf of the person who made a donation via PayPal – which brings the grand total to $58.85 – I know I don’t get any of the money and yet I am SO happy 🙂 – exercise for 10 minutes while watching TV, hung out with my little sister – she actually turning into quite a woman I wonder if she knows how proud I am of her 🙂 – and feed myself pizza for dinner.

I’ve always wondered why some kids, like my sister, were straight-A students while others of the same age were drug-addicts and as I watched her sitting on the bed singing along to One Way by Hillsong United (see below) I finally figured it out – everybody wants to belong to something – chess club, debating, church, etc – and when they don’t they fall into the ‘bad crowd’ simply by default. Are you setting your kids up to be beggars in the future by not giving them enough to do in the present? 🙂