Our Voices 1st Workshop from Our Voices Project on Vimeo.

This is a quick look at the first Our Voices Project which took place the week of May 18th-24th, 2009. Photographer Hunter Barnes and artist Jason Rosenstock took cameras, printers, scanners and computers to the town of Lapwai, Idaho on the Nez Perce reservation and conducted a ten day workshop with teens there. Black and white 35mm photography, scanning, printing were taught as well as digital video shooting and editing. The students were asked to tell stories of their daily lives on the reservation through these mediums. All the equipment was left for the students to use and they have produced amazing work, which will be posted soon!

Dame Silvia Cartwright

Dame Silvia Cartwright. Patron of Rose Charities New Zealand, visits the Rose Charities Cambodia Eye Clinic. Please click to read the article from Stratford Press

Left to right: Mike Webber IRose Charities NZ), Dr Hang Vra (Rose Charities Cambodia) Dame Silvia, Mrs Natalia Hang, Mr Bun (Rose Charities Cambodia)

Rose Charities NZ Trustee, Mike Webber, hosted a visit by Dame Silvia Cartwright to Rose Charities Eye Clinic in Cambodia.

The New Zealand judge and former Governor-General Dame Silvia is one of five trial judges for the Cambodia War Crimes Tribunal and has been based in Phnom Penh since last July. She is also a Patron of Rose Charities NZ along with Lady June Hillary.

Mike said that Dame Silvia spent 40 minutes at the clinic on Anzac Day aftershe had attended Anzac day events at the Australian Embassy.

“She was most impressed with what we are doing for the people of Cambodia. Dame Silvia is a charming and friendly person, who put all at ease very quickly, and was able to ask the staff all manner of questions regarding their work. As a non-medical person she was fascinated by the pre-op preparations for cataract surgery that took place whilst she was there. She was given a tour of the tour complex, with explanation of what was done in each area,” he said.

Mike spent seven days in Cambodia. In the past the trips have been up to two weeks long, but he said the visits are now shorter because they are fine tuning the operation at Rose Clinic and spending more time planning for the future.
Whilst there he took the opportunity to visit the school where the second intake
of refractionist nurses is in training. Cambodian National Refraction Training
Project has been established by the ICEE and Mike was one of the people instrumental in having this set-up.

“This group I saw in training was at Ang Doung Hospital in Phnom Penh. ICEE have had a huge input into this project, and have set up new offices in Phnom Penh where examinations and optometrical services will be carried out. There is input also from the Fred Hollows Foundation, and their person on the ground, Horm Piseth, is the Cambodian Overseer of selection and training for this course. Main input form ICEE Sydney comes from Gerd Schlenther,
Research and Programs Manager, Asia-Pacific, and Dr May Ho, Project Manager, South East Asia who supervises the design and implementation of the training programme.

“There are seven nurses in the intake and they come from all over Cambodia. Once trained they return to their provinces and undertake the work they are trained for and refer people to the clinic when necessary.”

The 2007 Durban Declaration on Refractive Error and Service Development recognises that the greatest contribution to a severe worldwide shortage of refractive error services is the limited number of trained personnel, a need that is most pronounced in poor and marginalized communities in Cambodia.

The establishment of a National Refraction Training Centre in Phnom Penh and the delivery of refraction training by local personnel have been identified as the most effective means to address the shortage of refraction personnel in Cambodia.

The ophthalmic community in Cambodia is new and emerging. For example, in 2007, optometric services were provided by only 19 refractionists with no national refraction training available in the country.

RANZCO has also been successful in setting up a training course for Cambodian Ophthalmology, which requires four years of internship, and there are currently nine interns on this course. Visiting lecturers are supplied by RANZCO, and some other occasional lecturers brought in from Europe, Thailand, and the U.S.A per courtesy of PBL and the Health Ministry.

In December last year Rose Charities celebrated its 10th year in existence.

International Secretary for Rose Charities said the organization is about people helping people.

^{“10 years has seen a huge amount happening. Wonderfully it has happened in ways which really follow the Rose principals of ground level, person to person, 'human scale' initiatives. Everyone - organiser, donor, and recipient all benefit. Rose Charities is coming of age, but not, I am pleased to say, by adding layers of bureaucracy and rigid administration. Rose Charities remains what it always has been, and must always be; simply people helping people,” he said.}

^{Mike said the eye clinic in Phnom Penh is well on its way to be self-sustaining but he’ll continue to visit from time to time to help fine-tune its activities. Over the past five years other kiwis have been involved in supporting this project. David Sabiston, now retired as a Trustee,
has made four visits. Christchurch optometrist and Rose Charities Trustee John
Veale has made three visits, and Ken and Penny Adams visited last year.}

Walking to Santiago for Rose Charities...
www.justgiving.com/denis-dronjic
The never ending road! By: Denis Dronjic

I’m not speaking of the Road to Santiago I am so anxiously waiting to begin on May 13th, I am speaking of the road we choose for ourselves; the road that brings us to our destination, only to realize, once we arrive at our destination, that the destination has always been within us during the journey.

Here I am, once again, counting down the hours before the start to the new expedition. I must say, it’s a mighty coincidence that I am starting on my Santiago expedition on the same day I set off on my ‘Pedal for the Medal’ expedition I did two years before, in ‘07. It was on May 13th, 2007 I set off from Nanaimo, British Columbia, to cycle my road bike 3,000 km to San Diego, California, to help raise money for Rose Charities. It was during this expedition when I was first introduced to my never ending road.

So here it goes…. On May 13th, 2009, I’ll be starting my walk on the Road to Santiago. I had originally learned of this 860 km road through Northern Spain , from one of Paulo Coelho’s books. Paulo Coelho is a Brazilian author whom is recognized throughout the world for some of the most amazing mystical stories written. He completed this road himself and praised it a number of times in his books; that is how I came to learn of this Christian walk.

The 30+ days it took me to cycle the west coast is nowhere near the 45 - 60+ days I am predicting will take me to complete the walk to Santiago . I know, I know! I should be able to walk more the 30 km per day and get this done in less than a month. If you are rushing to get things done, sure, a person could complete it faster, if that’s what they desire. But even if I wanted to rush - which I don’t - I can’t!! I am starting the walk on my one year anniversary from the day I almost lost my legs and my life.

On May 13th, 2008, I was crushed by a car! I was riding my motorcycle when I lost control of my rear tire – due to rain and inexperience-- and since I was not able to regain balance I had to dislodge my motorcycle, only to hit the pavement and slide underneath an approaching vehicle.

The collision with the vehicle was so severe that I was thought to be dead by all the bystanders since they literally had to lift the car off my body with their bare hands. After I was revived back to life, I was rushed to hospital in critical condition. A dislocated hip like I was dancing salsa on a deserted island hanging of the coast of Spain; broken right femur; broken right head of tibia, connecting into my right knee; broken right and left fibula; broken left tibia (open fracture with more the 3 cm of bone missing); broken left ankle; broken scapula; and last but not least, like all of this wasn’t enough-- internal bleeding and swelling in the frontal lobe of my brain. Besides the road rash, I think that is the complete list of the injuries I sustained in this horrific accident.

Now don’t be shocked, it sounds worse than it really is. If you were to see me today, you wouldn’t even know I went through this. Besides a few hidden scars and limping when I walk, I function like this was nothing more than a bad dream. I mean, physically I am not what I use to be, and I might never be again, but this hasn’t stopped me from chasing my dreams on this never ending road. And that’s what this walk is: a journey, a journey to the destination called Santiago. A journey for all the children and families that don't have a chance to dream like you and I do. A journey for this world to wake up and take care of its people. A journey for all the wonderful work that ROSE CHARITIES has done and is continuing to do. A journey for you!!

Please donate, even if a dollar is all you can afford, trust me it will make a big difference. It is people like you that make the difference in this beutiful yet unfair world. I will be doing something that doctors DO NOT think is possible, and I hope you will do something I know is possible.

Thank you for taking the time to read my fundraising page. If you are interested in following my journey I am taking with my father, you may add me to facebook. Search for Denis Dronjic. I’ll be posting pictures and stories periodically when I arrive at a village that has internet. It is said that a person walking the Road to Santiago has a spiritual awakening during his/her journey, so I am sure my blogs will be an interesting read :-)

Thank you and may God bless you
Denis
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Donating through Justgiving is quick, easy and totally secure. It’s also the most efficient way to sponsor me: Rose Rehabilitation Trust gets your money faster and, if you’re a taxpayer, Justgiving makes sure 25% in Gift Aid, plus a 3% supplement, are added to your donation.

So please sponsor me now!

CAMBODIA: The high price of jealous. Acid violence in Cambodia

Photo: William Grut/Rose Charities

Many children also suffer when some of the acid thrown towards an adult accidently drops on them

PHNOM PENH, 26 March 2009 (IRIN) - Sreygao is house-bound, her life destroyed after a jealous wife doused her face and neck with acid. It burned into her skin and blinded her.

“Everything has been taken from me because someone was very jealous,” she told IRIN.

Before the attack, Sreygao worked as a hostess at a karaoke parlor. Every night over beer, she flirted with and sometimes solicited sex to wealthy men, prompting an angry wife to take revenge on the 19-year-old.

“I have no face, no job, and I will suffer forever,” she said.

Deeper than scars

Acid throwing is a common form of retribution in Cambodia, usually perpetrated by jealous lovers, said William Grut, a physician at Rose Charities which provides free treatment.

“Whether male or female, jealousy is jealousy,” he told IRIN. “It's not a question so much for gender discussions but rather why it's so prevalent and how it can be reduced.”

Cambodia's pattern of gender blindness marks it out from Pakistan, India, and Malaysia, where it is usually the men who use acid on women for punishment or reasons of honour.

Between 1999 and 2002, the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO) documented 44 cases in local newspapers – the most thorough research to date, as no government body or NGO compiles data on acid attacks.

An attack occurs every 25 days, the group said in its report. But Jason Barber, a human rights consultant for LICADHO, told a radio station that the real number of attacks remained unknown since many went unreported.

Grut said the numbers available correlated with more populated areas, such as the capital, Phnom Penh, and smaller cities in Kandal and Kampong Cham.

Manifestation

I have no face, no job, and I will suffer forever.

The widespread availability of acid to replenish old batteries, weak law enforcement mechanisms, and what Grut calls “tertiary conflict injury”, have all popularised acid-throwing.

Tertiary conflict injury is a mindset in war-torn countries that problems can only be solved with violence, with beatings and acid attacks commonplace.

For decades, Cambodia has experienced coups, civil wars and a genocide in 1975-1979 that killed two million people.

“Cambodian history has regularly been very stressful for the [ordinary] person,” he told IRIN.

“This is not the same as PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder], though arguably it may be a sort of long-term manifestation of it,” he said.

Repairing the damage

Corrective surgery is out of reach for most Cambodians, with 35 percent of the population living on less than US$1 a day, according to government statistics, so most sufferers must rely on emergency services from NGOs.

“Clearly in Cambodia, facilities are far more limited than in western countries, where one would have a long series of repetitive operations gradually working things back, reconstructing, and grafting,” Grut explained. “It would all be accompanied by very close counselling and peer assistance.”

But first, more attention needs to be paid to acid attacks as they are usually not a priority for local NGOs and government agencies, he added.

“There's not enough recognition at the NGO level, but at the street level there is,” he said. “People tend to know about acid attacks as the word goes around.”

Geoffrey Cain