thanks, nivv

Anyone who is interested in giving support for psychological trauma to the affectees, I think that is one area that is not being addressed at all....

Starling, dear, no offense was taken. You were urging against going to extremes, which is always good advice, and I reminded everyone of the importance of treating others, even unknown others, the way we wish to be treated. I think we've both contributed something well worth reading.

nakia- i respect and agree w/ your comments. my comments weren't meant as an attack. what i meant was that often times we don't know that so-and-so chemical in a medication or other medical devide has been derived from an animal. they are required to list certain things, but not required to list others. i was just making a point for the general edification of all. perhaps it would have been better left unsaid. hopefully no hard feelings. peace.

Well, I agree that absolute avoidance is impossible, but I wouldn't make that decision for anyone else. I plan to try to avoid the obviously animal derived ingredients and hope that anyone who has more personally strigent screening for meds will forgive my shortcomings, and perhaps appreciate the efforts I have made. I wouldn't give food or clothing too shabby for me to wear, and I take the same approach with med screening.

here is info that might be relevant to ppl collecting medications. a previous comment was made about halal-ness of meds. what most ppl outside of the med world don't realize is that *many* meds and other materials used in medicine are made partially from cows and/or pigs. be cautious, but if you want to get modern medical care pretty much anywhere, chances are you'll come in contact w/ some minute extract of an animal at some point along your journey. some hard-liners would say not to get medical care. i disagree. regardless, here's another way to help if you can...


Asalaam Alaikum and Greetings,

We are writing this email to gain your support for Dr. Nawaz Haq from Griffin Hospital in Connecticut who is leaving with a team of 8 doctors for Islamabad and then to Muzaffarabad and other effected areas on Saturday, October 22, 2005. Dr. Nawaz, who is a native of Islamabad/Rawalpindi area is very familiar with these kinds of operations as he also volunteered his time and efforts in the Tsunami affected areas in South Asia.

He and his team are currently busy packing medical supplies and making travel arrangements with local organizations in Pakistan so that they can hit the ground running. Reports are that medical supplies are running low in all of Pakistan, so while other avenues for securing medical supplies are being researched, Dr. Haq is purchasing and collecting as many donated supplies as he can here.

His brother Ehsan-ul-Haq who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area is supporting these efforts by collecting donations and/or commitments/pledges of money so that Dr. Haq can purchase as many supplies as possible prior to his departure. The goal is to communicate to Dr. Haq by Thursday, October 18, 2005 how much money he can spend on supplies. Additional funds collected after Thursday will be used in securing shipments of medical supplies to support Dr. Haq's team once they have started working in Pakistan.

A family friend of the Haq's, Asif Siddique also from the Bay Area, has setup a quick link to also collect donations on a merchant website that he operates.

You may donate one of three ways:

1. Fastest way is to contact Br. Ehsan directly via phone call/e-mail pledge and then send check to:

Ehsan-ul-Haq
190 Trestle Cove
Hercules, CA 94547.
[email protected]
415-370-1712

2. Via Paypal at the following website: www.gifts2east.com

3. Slowest, but tax deductible method via Dr. Haq's hospital website (designate Earthquake Relief in the drop down box): www.griffinhealth.org

---

To provide an added level of confidence in this effort, we want to share with you the following:

The local TV news station in Connecticut did an interview of Dr. Haq's efforts at: fox61.trb.com track=homelink
click on DERBY DOCTORS to view the video interview.

At the end of the video interview the following website is mentioned: fox61.com

Then you can click "Links mentioned on Fox 61 News at Ten": fox61.trb.com
Click on Pakistan Doctors (This will take you to the Griffin Health Donation website mentioned above).

Dr. Haq's team is planning to purchase instruments, medicine and other required supplies from here and take it with them and we are requesting your support of him and his team. While your contributions will be used to support the needy with no admin fees involved, they would not be tax deductible using options 1 or 2 above. As you may have seen, individual efforts and contributions have been very important in helping the survivors during this crisis.

While using option 3 would be tax-deductible, the processing time from the hospital will not be quick enough for Dr. Haq to purchase supplies prior to the trip.

Please give what you can using whatever method you feel most comfortable and please forward this message to others that may help.

Thank you for your consideration in this matter.

Ehsan Ulhaq [email protected] or 415-370-1712
Asif Siddique [email protected]

Same here- Filza, if you can give me more specific information about where pick up/drop offs are, I can probably take stuff but my car is pretty small. Sunday is the best day for me and I live in Boston so if they need items by Monday, maybe i can get stuff before (Friday) and then take it myself on Sunday. Does that make sense?!

I will be needing help packing the clothes we gather in Billerica. I plan to do them Fri night or Sat morning. I need to get them to Boston by Sat. Sunday is my son's 1st Birthday party so I will be busy all day. Monday the items are being taken to NYC. Let me know if anyone can help in Billerica. Also, if someone wants to help drive the boxes to Boston, that would be appreciated as well. I only have a Honda CRV so I would be limited in space...but I dont mind taking multiple trips. But I might need help with the boxes so whoever can help, can ride with me as well. Let me know.
Thanks!

i'm on a few diff email lists and there are groups collecting medications. if i find the info, i'll pass it along.

I'd like to announce that Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Dental Medicine now have collection sites for winter clothing and blankets, and it has been publicized to all the students, faculty, and staff. we will need help packaging the items this sunday. if anyone is interested, please get in touch with me.

I'm also focusing on clothing and blankets.
I was wondering about the medicine as well.
If people drop any off, I will send them. I will try to send whatever I can.
Resale of these items could be a problem, but what else can we do? We can do our best with our best intentions and hope for the best, right?
This will definitely need to be an ongoing effort. We should arrange fundraisers periodically for this. They said it could take up to 10 years to rebuild that area.

BBC news is still covering. I heard this morning on NPR UN rep in Pakistan saying that there are not enough TENTS in this world to cover 3 million homeless people. No ordinary tents will work, they need winter / water proof material for which Pakistan is number 1 in the world. They are mobilizing every company in Pakistan to work day and night. I also heard that food and other stuff is in access and is lying on the roads. One big problem is logistic and the weather. You all must have heard about the MI17 helicopter crash 2 days ago in which 6 soldiers died.

I'm working at a college, and we'll have to focus on clothing and blankets- no one has a tent, and medications get complicated with the halal/haram issue- let alone the diet restrictions on Hindus and Buddhists. I'd hate to get boxes of Tylenol gelcaps and Nyquil, only to have to return them or throw them away.

Hi all,
The media has virtually stopped headline coverage of the earthquake and this means donations will drop drastically. This same amount of time after the tsunami, relief orgs. had raised over ten times what they've raised for Pakistan, and that is largely due to continual frontpage media coverage. As some of you may know, I and a few others have established a web site devoted to getting people involved in grassroots campaigning including writing letters to the media...It can be an op-ed, or it can be a simple e-mail asking journalists to continue covering the story of the earthquake because you, a reader, are very interested and concerned. That said, I will be posting a sample letter/e-mail with names of reporters and you all can just copy the letter word for word and send it to press reporters to continue frontpage coverage. These people respond to volume more than anything else. I am also asking my non-Muslim friends to do the same. You can cut and paste the letter by going to forum.kaash.org and clicking on the campaign, "Earthquake in Pakistan". I should have something written tomorrow (Monday) after work. I'm hoping to do it asap!

Nakia u should go ahead and plan the eid fundraiser, they are still going to need money, the rehabilitation is going to take a while...in fact that might be a good time frame to do it b/c the earthquake has already been forgotten on us news etc...so it would be helpful to give reminders to the community every couple mos...
on another note the feedback i'm hearing from NWFP is to NOT send clothing but concentrate on tents and medicines/medical supplies instead, and when sending stuff don't just drop it at a PIA office but try to make arrangements w/local ngos on the ground there for distribution b/c there is a lot of theft and resale of aid prevalent...

I also think that we should keep sending money back home on regular basis because this recovery will take some time. Redevelopment will start in couple of months and then they will need a lot of financial aid.

I have been put in charge of delivery the clothes/blankets etc from Billerica area to Boston for the pickup on Oct 24. I plan to take the items there on Sat Oct 22 so I need them by Oct 21. The drop off place is Ajab Complex
246 Rangeway Road
Billerica, MA 01862

Or you can call me. You can drop it off at my place, my work place (Lexington), or I can come pick it up.
You can email me at filza_shaikh at yahoo and I can give you my numbers. I don't want to post them here.

Thank you.

The islamic center of burlington is collecting warm clothes, blankets etc. Donating money is best to satisfy immediate needs. However, its going to be a long term recovery and anything we send will impact someone later on.

130 lexington street,
Burlington, MA 01803, USA
781-229-0336
[email protected] www.icburlington.org (site was down when i tried)

It looks like at least one collection site in MA is being established, but the deadline is next week. I think a second shipment should be arranged. Any ideas? Even better, does anyone have a truck/van and is willing to take a trip to NYC on Eid weekend?

We can establish a collection site in MA. Go to this site to find out how: reliefefforts.us
And Filza, I am definitely interested.

I was going to organize a clothes drive since I have been hearing they desperately need clothes and blankets. However the Pakistani embassy says money would be best since it can get there quickly and the people over there can buy the things and provide.
I heard PIA is shipping free cargo so if we do get some things together, we would have to coordinate with PIA in NY to take the items. I can work on that if people are interested. That was my idea.