In Reply to: While your intentions posted by PhilandRhonda on Saturday, 21. January 2006 at 12:34 Bali Time:
I remember a few years ago, a volcano erupting on an island. News stories were flashed acroos the world and showed bare-footed people trying to walk over the hot lava. Thr reporter said these people were so poor the couldnt afford shoes. So that was it, people sent shoes from all over the world to these people. So many shoes were sent, in fact, that people didnt buy the localy made ones, and the factory had to close down, putting many people out of work.Point in fact, the Indonesian Government does not want huge amounts of used clothing to go to Bali, because they want locals to buy Indonesian made clothes. They are protecting their own clothing industry. What Ted,Jean,Smudge,Linda, Chris and myself do is try and get enough clothes over to look after a few very small, very poor remote villages. Some of these people are so poor that they cant even afford to buy the local clothes. We endevour to transport the clothes as "personal" items, in small quatities, store them and then every few months make a trip up to these villages. Not only do we distribute clothing but we have a look at the health of the people, especialy the kids. But thats another story. What we need is for people to help transport a few kilos of clothes, end of story.