5th Update October 22nd 2008

Yangon, October 22, 2008

Dear Friends,

It has been almost six months since Cyclone Nargis blew through Burma’s remote delta shores, the storm wreaking a path of destruction that resulted in the worst natural disaster in the country’s recorded history. We have been living with delta village women for most of October, helping them restart their pre-cyclone small businesses and create new ones. I write this while waiting for a boat to take us back to the main delta town, Labutta.

As of June 24 of this year, the United Nations reports indicate that the official death toll from the Cyclone stood at 84,537, with over 50,000 people still missing and almost 20,000 injured. The unofficial death toll is probably closer to150,000. Of the area’s 7.35 million population, 2.4 million people were severely affected by the cyclone. More women and children died than men, resulting in a disproportionate gender population. Over 800,000 people were displaced, with 200,000 of those living in camps. Most of the fishing and rice-farming livelihoods were destroyed.

Nargis’s survivors are bravely grieving their losses. They now face the grim reality that their once reliable fresh water sources are salt contaminated. The summer monsoon rains that fill their ponds and cisterns have stopped early, and their wells are salty. As in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”: water, water everywhere, and yet there is not a drop to drink. Neither is there a whisper of wind, and the ink is frying on the paper. How will all these people find enough water to drink until the monsoon rains of next June? It was difficult for the women working with us to focus on learning new job skills while they worried about their children drinking salty well water at home. We gave the mothers a safe drinking water and water conservation workshop, and left a good supply of chloride tablets and rain catchment tarps, but their worries will continue.

Summary and follow up of our immediate relief initiated in May and June

$12,500 - Rebuild /repair 6 village primary schoolsI visited 5 of the schools. Two had further funding from other donors enabling them to lay cement floors. With our help, the schools were able to build sub-ceilings for heat reduction, as well as salt-resistant fruit tree planting in four of the schools. All five schools were filled with healthy children happy to be learning in safe schools.

$10,000 - Repair 5 monastery primary schoolsI visited all 5 monastery primary schools. Four were fully functional once all repairs were completed. One, however, was still under repair. Unfortunately, this school could not reconvene after Nargis because there were no teachers.

$5,000 - Mother-Child health (tetanus vaccinations, prenatal care) to 20 villages
Completed.

$4,000 - Rebuild 3 Baptist Churches
All three completed

$2,300 - Fund 3 mobile medical clinics for three weeks
Completed. Over 5,000 patient visits during this time.

$5,000 - Fresh water pond recovery for 40 one-acre ponds All but 5 ponds were immediately recovered and filled with rain water. Unfortunately, many of the ponds are now contaminated with salt water.

$3,500 - Rice Farm recovery to 2 small villages
Completed, with rice crops currently growing.

$800 - School health clinics
Completed, with 1500 child health screening examinations.

$600 - 15 School Action Learning BoxesI visited 5 of the schools using the boxes, and found them in use by both teachers and students, who were excited about receiving replacements and new teaching devices.


$350 - Teacher salary support
To be continued through December.

$260 - Widow support for 6 months
To be continued through December.

$150 - Support for 3 blind children to attend Baptist Blind School in Yangon
To be continued for three years.

Summary of our longer term recovery support initiated in July and August

$12,000 - Start-up for nonprofit social business GoodSleep. GoodSleep is completing its third month of operation. Of our seven production employees, three are healthy women living with HIV/AIDS. Of the 935 bed nets made to date, we have sold 630 and maintained an inventory of 275. Half of these bed nets were bought by NGOs to distribute to cyclone victims. We are ready to scale up production and sales now that our operation is fully functional by buying long-lasting impregnated-insecticide net in bulk from China, and by purchasing a small truck to enable us to sell directly to customers. I will be sending a separate report about BusinessKind’s progress in attaining 501c3 status and GoodSleep’s plans for 2009.

$1000 - Cyclone affected Women’s Livelihood recovery and creationI was asked by the French NGO Acted to create and implement a $50,000 grant for women’s livelihood regeneration in a severely cyclone affected area. I contributed $1000 of our funds to salary a local Myanmar field manager of the program. Acted is familiar with GoodSleep’s rapid success in employing women to produce and sell useful products. Having open access to ACTED’s infrastructure (helicopter, speed boat, computers, field house, mechanics, agronomists, logisticians, and accountants) allows us to use the money 100% on direct women services. I feel that our contribution of $1000 is magnified 50 times! Please e-mail me if you are interested in reading the program proposal and reports.

Special thank you to Tom Philips, Patrick Babinski, and Dan Deaver for helping me file 501c3 status for BusinessKind, and to Su Moon, Stan Sze, Don Taicher for good business advise. I will be in San Francisco for November and December then back to Burma in January.
Please e-mail me, helengunthorpe@gmail.com, or call 415-713-4728, with any comments, new contacts, ideas, or advise. Have a special Thanksgiving, celebrating all your generous caring and giving.


All my best, Helen


GoodSleep Production Office

Selling GoodSleep bed nets GoodSleep office garden















Post -Cyclone Nargis Women’s Livelihood Regeneration Program















Village women’s meeting Cyclone widows

4th Update July 10th 2008

Yangon, July 10, 2008
Dear Friends,

It is Post-Cyclone Week Ten. I am just back from another trip to the delta. The villages I am visiting are recovering quickly. The farmers now have seeds, plows and diesel and are in the paddies racing time to get their winter rice planted. In fact, they had little time to talk!

My focus on this trip was to follow up on our support to the villages’ primary schools and health clinics. Most of my talking was with teachers, community health workers, mothers and children. The children that survived the water surge and storm shrapnel need no more life drama. They seemed relieved by the boredom of memorizing their textbooks. The teachers were amazed that their pre-cyclone shabby schools are now in better condition with new roofs, cement floors, new black boards and partitions. The community health workers are confident in their new skills in diagnosing and treating basic medical conditions. And the mothers… they are happy just to see their children alive and their husbands working in the paddies.

Below is a summary of our direct and immediate support given to cyclone survivors.

$12,500 - Rebuild /repair 6 village primary schools

$10,000 - Repair 5 monastery primary schools

$5,000 - Mother-Child health (tetanus vaccinations, prenatal care) to 20 villages

$4,000 - Rebuild 3 Baptist Churches

$2,300 - Fund 3 mobile medical clinics for three weeks

$5,000 - Fresh water pond recovery for 40 one-acre ponds

$3,500 - Rice Farm recovery to 2 small villages

$800 - School health clinics

$600 - 15 School Action Learning Boxes - metal boxes filled with innovative learning devices. Thank you to friends and family who helped me buy, cut, paste, copy, laminate and pack up these learning widgets.

$350 - Teacher salary support

$260 - Widow support for 6 months

$150 - Support for 3 blind children to attend Baptist Blind School in Yangon (3 years) And many more small in money large in meaning contributions.

Below is summary of long-term recovery support

$12,000 - Support in start-up costs for Good Sleep

We are what Muhammad Yunus, Noble Peace Price winner 2006, calls SBEs- social business entrepreneurs. I know little about starting a traditional for-profit business, but during the many years of learning how poor women struggle to raise families on one dollar a day, I feel I have earned my honorary MBA at the University of Poverty this season in Myanmar.

At UOP I learned that poor people better utilize precious living resources than rich people, and therefore if they are given a charitable living resource that is not useful to them, it will be reshaped into something that is!

Most of the poorly-designed, expensive bed nets that I have given away have been used has fishing nets, pillows, water and gasoline filters, food covers, and decorative clothing. A Swiss company donated 80,000 bed nets to cyclone victims. I predict most of these nets will be used for something other than sleeping under, probably stuffing holes in their thatch roofs.

Of the 50,000 kitchen sets donated by an international NGO that I spearheaded to get airlifted into Yangon, no more than half had handles that remained intact (and there are no pot holders in Myanmar). We have all passed on a gift that we might not fancy, which is fine in the recycled world of the rich. But when a gift goes directly from the rich to the poor….it loses much in its trickle-down functional value.

So with little else aside my MBA from UOP, I went straight to the poor women and listened to what kind of a net they want and how much they can and will pay for it. That was easy and fun. The struggle was designing and producing their dream net without losing money! The Good Sleep team is now producing the first thatched hut economy family bed net…blue moon. We have also designed a wooden house ( middle class - rich) net …full moon and a privacy top of the line net….honey moon. We call these our Robin Hood Nets! Please, anyone who has a real MBA from a real university… I need help.

It is cyclone week eight for me…time for me to take a week break with my family and friends. I leave on Sunday evening for a short holiday in Maui and will be back in San Francisco July 21st. My bags are stuffed with Thank You’s from people whose lives are touched by your kind donations. I hope to be able to meet with many of you before I head back to Burma in mid-August.

A special thank you to Chenda Fry Haw, without whom as my Compass Rose, I would be a cork on an ebb tide.

Best regards, Helen

Good Sleep team setting out for hut bed net interviews

Zin Zin invited into a hut for interview

A Good Sleep customer

Good Sleep production team with the blue moon

Blue moon wrapped and ready to be sold

3rd Update June 19th 2008

Yangon June 19th 2008

Dear Friends,

I have just returned from a four day trip to the delta area. I met with six rice farming villages, population of 4800 thousand people. I was very fortunate to be granted a permit which was facilitated by a business friend of David Chee’s. It is now seven weeks post cyclone. The greatest concern of the rice farmers is getting their winter rice seeds planted. Time is running thin. It must be planted by the end of July, if not, there will be compounding months of hardship with food dependency. These hard working people have never been in debt and are not asking for any more free food. They want to do what they have done for 100’s of years, plant their winter rice.

The cyclone’s rain and water surge destroyed their seeds and surplus rice ( which they use as money) . They need seeds and diesel to plow and plant their paddies quickly. Most of our funds have now been used to fund immediate recovery efforts.
I am looking to the local business community to fund a micro credit plan to help these six villages get their rice seeds planted before the end of July. Any one who is interested in reviewing the complete proposal and my trip report, please email Dave and he will get it to you.

Good Sleep is progressing. We have an office -production site and two dynamite young women managers, one for production the other for office/marketing and sales.
We are making our first prototype bed nets and will be market testing them over the next few weeks. Sam, our son , arrived yesterday and is already making a science out of designing an effective bed net. Our tag line;

Good Sleep
We are a small community non-profit business
that makes the coolest and safest bed nets
Wishing You Sweet Dreams

I forgot to tell Dave to send my camera downloader cord, so sorry no pictures.

Special thanks to Holly and her 5th grade class, Linda and her church support,

And everyone for your support............All my best Helen

2nd Update June 6th 2008

June 6, 2008

Dear Friends,

After over 72 hours of pouring rain, large areas of Yangon are left sitting under two feet of water. The 2008 Myanmar monsoons have begun, which means that by next week all will be tinged with the hint of mold. We are probably swamped into our little office for the night—so with the smell of left-over samosas and the sounds of the electric generator drowning out the rain, this is a good time to write an update on what we have been up to.

I am still attending the UN cluster meetings, but each time I am learning less and yawning more. It takes a minimum of four meetings to get a consensus on whether or not there should be a meeting at all. It is amazing to see how much of the world’s money can be wasted by people with such good intentions.

You have probably been reading much on the cyclone’s destruction of life, land and communities, as well as the sub-par response of international relief efforts—and it is all true and worse. It takes all my scheming skills to get our funds directly to the ones who need it most.

I have written up four more proposals for small local organizations looking for funds to continue their relief work. I funded with our money two of these groups because they had realistic proposals and budgets, direct delivery, follow up, accounting records, and they work in close partnership with under-served villagers.

Fresh water pond recovery : $5000

• 40 more one-acre ponds; more pumps; gasoline; lime; water-quality testing. Included will be an educational course for villagers on fresh water pond quality maintenance.

Livelihood: $3500

• Salt-resistant rice seeds and hand plows for 2 small villages given directly to small rice farmers.

Education: $500

• School readers and school supplies for 3 schools serving a total of 325 children.

To date a total of $30,000 of our money directly funded cyclone-affected people and communities in need. This week I will be going into the delta and will fund direct medical services targeted to 3 village tracts, whose population post-cyclone is 90,000.

Many of the NGOs are giving away poor quality, nonfunctional bed netting. I would like to take a portion of our funds and start a “social business” in a cyclone-affected area producing functional, affordable insecticide-impregnated bed netting. Waiting for the Gates Global Malaria Fund nets to float down from the sky for free is like waiting to win the California lotto.

The product’s name is “Good Sleep.” It will be a community-based business, producing, marketing and selling the nets locally. All employees will be from the community. I have already bought ten trettle sewing machines (at half-price from a local donor) and good-quality Japanese netting to make the first 1000 nets, and have worked out a functional design for a family bed net based on consumer feedback. I will be interviewing for a country manager over the next few days. Malaria prevention will be integrated at the sales site. I am hoping by next year that “Good Sleep” will cover its running costs; thereafter, any profits will be reinvested into the business. I will write in more detail about “Good Sleep” in my next update.

If anyone is interested in developing “Good Sleep” into a successful, small community-based social business, I need your help.

Dave tells me that your generous donations are still coming in. Sam, our son, will be coming on June 16th, and will hand carry the second load. Many thanks to all of you. I would like to particularly thank Jill Hanna for accounting help, Kathleen Jordan for doing double duty, Susan Comstock at the Foundation for processing your checks, friends who are taking care of Dave, and, of course, Dave, Charlie and Sam who are doing all the things at home that I should be doing!

All my best, Helen

1st Update May 27th 2008

Yangon May 27, 2008

Dear Friends,

Yangon is slowly recovering but everything south and to the west of Yangon is either washed away or battered to bits. The gentle rhythm of delta life was forever changed by the fury of Nagris and now the survivors must adapt to the powerful international aid machine.

I have been in Yangon for 5 days and feel plugged into the relief effort’s three fronts.

• Small community based non official NGOs
• Official national and international NGOs
• Government/local business

Tremendous amounts of emergency relief supplies are being distributed but open access to the delta area for international aid workers is restricted and dangerous for nationals facilitating their passage. I have been patient (happens with age) to wait for a safe, secure and effective way to work in the delta area. I leave tomorrow morning with the Yangon business man who is in charge of rebuilding the Pyapon township. Many thank yous to David Chee for his support and trust to make this important connection.


What have I been doing?

I immediately gave $5000 to a trusted colleague who is working in the field to ensure pregnant women health in 20 villages. I gave $10,000 to a small community organization to repair their 5 schools so the children can return to school in 2 weeks. I gave $4000 to a Baptist village to repair three churches. I gave $2000 to two doctor colleagues to supply a field clinic and gave them half of my antibiotic supply.

I have been attending the UN emergency relief coordination meetings. The amount of money that has been pledged and is flowing in is beyond my math skills. Most of it must be spent within 3-4 months. I have decided to tuck our money away until this cyclone of cash evaporates. In 4 months our money can be used with a focus on gaps of support.

I have written two proposals for small community based organizations totaling 800,000 euros. I am sure they will receive every euro and more.

I am sitting on the UN shelter task force. I will spear head receiving “orphaned” survival kits sitting in BKG, storing them and distributing them to small community based organizations.

I am delighted to be asked to join up with three dynamo Myanmar women to start a new program for Relief International in Myanmar. We have a small office. One table, 4 lap tops, 4 cell phones., no printer and lots of energy.

Thank you for your good wishes…things change everyday..so this is today's news

All my best to you Helen