Help buy food for Rohingya children
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Thank you,
Rachna Bocsi*******
My name is Rachna Bocsi and I'm a Denver-based mom trying to raise urgently needed funds to feed malnourished Rohingya children living as refugees in Bangladesh. The cost to feed a child one high-nutrient meal each day is $1.
I am working with a local Bangladeshi non-profit, Moonlight Development Society, to raise funds to feed these children. Within their area of operation (Chakmarkul camp), Moonlight has identified 2,414 children who are underweight and in need of high nutrient meals. Moonlight has prioritized 200 of these children (between the ages of 6 – 12) to receive meals. They are enrolled in Moonlight’s Temporary Education Center (TEC). Forty percent of these children are orphans--their parents were slaughtered in the recent genocide in Myanmar.
While one high-nutrient meal a day would help to improve a child’s nutritional status, children currently receive only a combination of milk, a banana, or bread in the morning as a part of the TEC program. These 200 children rely on Moonlight to provide that one meal a day. At home, children only receive cooked rice and some kind of grain, depending on UNHCR rations.
Moonlight recently completed the construction of a hot food kitchen, built in response to a dire need for nutritious meals for the malnourished Rohingya children. Moonlight needs to secure a modest amount of funding to start providing high-nutrient meals. At this time, there is only enough funding to support the hot food kitchen for two weeks. $5,000 will enable them to feed 200 children for approximately one month, after which funding from other sources is expected to follow.
100% of the funds raised through this campaign will be dedicated toward cooking costs and delivering meals to the children. Examples of food supplies that will be purchased with funds raised are milk, oatmeal, chicken, fish, chick peas, lentils, vegetables, seasonal fruit, and multivitamins. The more funds raised, the more children we can feed for a sustained amount of time. I know that every dollar raised through this campaign will go towards feeding these children. For $30 you'll help feed one child for a month, but any amount you donate will make a difference.
View a 15 second video of a TEC snack distrubtion here:
https://www.facebook.com/205181346507792/videos/525673307791926/
“I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.” – Edward Everett Hale
About Moonlight Development Society
Moonlight Development Society is a local Bangladeshi non-profit working to help Rohingya refugees since the exodus began in August 2017. This organization already has programs in place for refugees and vulnerable populations within Bangladesh in the areas of healthcare, education, and humanitarian aid. Located in Cox’s Bazaar, the epicenter of the refugee crisis, Moonlight has several programs in place to help Rohingya refugees. The Temporary Education Center (TEC), through which the high-nutrient meals will be delivered to the children, is a vital program in the refugee camp. The camps can be particularly dangerous for young children and the TEC provides a safe space for children to learn. In addition to a standard education curriculum, the children also learn about issues directly affecting them—e.g. disease prevention, hygiene, defense against rape, sexual violence, and abduction. Please visit Moonlight’s website (linked above) for more information.
About the Fundraising Team
We are a team of three women who are passionate about helping Rohingya refugees. We live in three different countries—Australia, Bangladesh, and the United States and we communicate at odd hours across time zones to strategize about different programs. Here is some information about us:
Rachna Bocsi is a Denver-based mom to two little girls. She has a background in global development with a focus on health. Rachna started helping refugees about four years ago. She supports local refugee families and refugee initiatives in the Denver area, raises awareness of refugee crises around the world, advocates for refugees, and implements a variety of donation drives (financial and material) for refugees locally and in hot spots around the world. Although her heart keeps tugging at her to volunteer in Bangladesh, for now, she strives to help from a distance as much as possible.
Zannat Haque is one of the founders of the Moonlight Development Society. She established this non-profit in response to the 2013 devastating floods in Bangladesh. She grew up in Bangladesh and moved to Canada at the age of 19. Now, she splits her time between the two countries. She is passionate about Moonlight's work and has received a lot of positive press coverage and accolades in Bangladesh. She diligently keeps us appraised on Moonlight’s projects and progress.
Deborah Rays is an Australian nurse with a big heart and strong spirit. She has volunteered multiple times in different refugee camps in Greece, Jordan, Serbia and Bangladesh. She has led teams of doctors, nurses, and nutritionists and placed them in projects all over Greece. She has also hosted refugees in her home, including a Rohingyan since 2012. During her most recent trip to Bangladesh in November 2017, she volunteered as a nurse with MedGlobal (a medical NGO working to provide care to the refugees).
Thank you for your kind support!
Rachna, Zannat, and Deborah
________________________________________________________
About the Rohingya refugee crisis
The mass exodus of the Rohingya from Myanmar began in August 2017. Rohingyas that managed to escape the brutal massacre of their people by the Burmese military share accounts of sheer horror and inconceivable violence and atrocities. The Burmese military systematically ANNHILATED entire villages of people, sparing NO ONE, not even babies. Although the international community continues to skirt around the issue by calling it "ethnic cleansing", in reality this is genocide against the Rohingya. Recent reports describe the gruesome discovery of at least five mass graves of Rohingyas massacred by the Burmese military, and their subsequent use of acid to dissolve the bodies.
Although safe from the terror of being slaughtered, the Rohingya are living in miserable and dangerous conditions in the camps along the border. An estimated 700,000 - 800,000 Rohingya have fled to neighboring Bangladesh, and the genocide has resulted in an estimated 37,000 orphans, at last count. To protect the health and economic interests of its people, the Bangladeshi government prohibits Rohingyas from seeking formal employment and from venturing outside the camps in order to prevent the transmission of communicable diseases.
A large majority of Rohingya children arrived in Bangladesh malnourished and in poor health. The ordeal of the escape and treacherous journey, coupled with the difficult, low-resource setting of the camps has exacerbated their nutritional status. While living in Myanmar, the Rohingya have been marginalized for decades, being treated as "vermin" and illegal migrants. They have had little to no access to health services and education. As a result, a large majority of Rohingya children have never even been vaccinated against preventable diseases!
The Rohingya refugees, including little children, have witnessed degrees of violence that none of us will ever experience in an entire lifetime. From brutal beheadings of babies to systematic gang rapes of young women and girls, to throwing live infants into raging fires, to execution style killings of entire villages-- these people are haunted. Most recount their horrific stories of loss and escape in a stoic, monotonous tone, including the children, so as not to inject any emotion into their painful memories. Despite experiencing immense loss and pain, the Rohingya have a strong spirit, and exhibit incredible strength, resilience, and patience even in such dire circumstances.
The nation of Bangladesh and the Rohingya need our help. The people of Bangladesh have been extremely generous and opened their hearts to shelter these survivors of genocide, but they cannot sustain a humanitarian crisis of this magnitude without significant assistance from the rest of the world
Thank you,
Rachna Bocsi*******
My name is Rachna Bocsi and I'm a Denver-based mom trying to raise urgently needed funds to feed malnourished Rohingya children living as refugees in Bangladesh. The cost to feed a child one high-nutrient meal each day is $1.
I am working with a local Bangladeshi non-profit, Moonlight Development Society, to raise funds to feed these children. Within their area of operation (Chakmarkul camp), Moonlight has identified 2,414 children who are underweight and in need of high nutrient meals. Moonlight has prioritized 200 of these children (between the ages of 6 – 12) to receive meals. They are enrolled in Moonlight’s Temporary Education Center (TEC). Forty percent of these children are orphans--their parents were slaughtered in the recent genocide in Myanmar.
While one high-nutrient meal a day would help to improve a child’s nutritional status, children currently receive only a combination of milk, a banana, or bread in the morning as a part of the TEC program. These 200 children rely on Moonlight to provide that one meal a day. At home, children only receive cooked rice and some kind of grain, depending on UNHCR rations.
Moonlight recently completed the construction of a hot food kitchen, built in response to a dire need for nutritious meals for the malnourished Rohingya children. Moonlight needs to secure a modest amount of funding to start providing high-nutrient meals. At this time, there is only enough funding to support the hot food kitchen for two weeks. $5,000 will enable them to feed 200 children for approximately one month, after which funding from other sources is expected to follow.
100% of the funds raised through this campaign will be dedicated toward cooking costs and delivering meals to the children. Examples of food supplies that will be purchased with funds raised are milk, oatmeal, chicken, fish, chick peas, lentils, vegetables, seasonal fruit, and multivitamins. The more funds raised, the more children we can feed for a sustained amount of time. I know that every dollar raised through this campaign will go towards feeding these children. For $30 you'll help feed one child for a month, but any amount you donate will make a difference.
View a 15 second video of a TEC snack distrubtion here:
https://www.facebook.com/205181346507792/videos/525673307791926/
“I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.” – Edward Everett Hale
About Moonlight Development Society
Moonlight Development Society is a local Bangladeshi non-profit working to help Rohingya refugees since the exodus began in August 2017. This organization already has programs in place for refugees and vulnerable populations within Bangladesh in the areas of healthcare, education, and humanitarian aid. Located in Cox’s Bazaar, the epicenter of the refugee crisis, Moonlight has several programs in place to help Rohingya refugees. The Temporary Education Center (TEC), through which the high-nutrient meals will be delivered to the children, is a vital program in the refugee camp. The camps can be particularly dangerous for young children and the TEC provides a safe space for children to learn. In addition to a standard education curriculum, the children also learn about issues directly affecting them—e.g. disease prevention, hygiene, defense against rape, sexual violence, and abduction. Please visit Moonlight’s website (linked above) for more information.
About the Fundraising Team
We are a team of three women who are passionate about helping Rohingya refugees. We live in three different countries—Australia, Bangladesh, and the United States and we communicate at odd hours across time zones to strategize about different programs. Here is some information about us:
Rachna Bocsi is a Denver-based mom to two little girls. She has a background in global development with a focus on health. Rachna started helping refugees about four years ago. She supports local refugee families and refugee initiatives in the Denver area, raises awareness of refugee crises around the world, advocates for refugees, and implements a variety of donation drives (financial and material) for refugees locally and in hot spots around the world. Although her heart keeps tugging at her to volunteer in Bangladesh, for now, she strives to help from a distance as much as possible.
Zannat Haque is one of the founders of the Moonlight Development Society. She established this non-profit in response to the 2013 devastating floods in Bangladesh. She grew up in Bangladesh and moved to Canada at the age of 19. Now, she splits her time between the two countries. She is passionate about Moonlight's work and has received a lot of positive press coverage and accolades in Bangladesh. She diligently keeps us appraised on Moonlight’s projects and progress.
Deborah Rays is an Australian nurse with a big heart and strong spirit. She has volunteered multiple times in different refugee camps in Greece, Jordan, Serbia and Bangladesh. She has led teams of doctors, nurses, and nutritionists and placed them in projects all over Greece. She has also hosted refugees in her home, including a Rohingyan since 2012. During her most recent trip to Bangladesh in November 2017, she volunteered as a nurse with MedGlobal (a medical NGO working to provide care to the refugees).
Thank you for your kind support!
Rachna, Zannat, and Deborah
________________________________________________________
About the Rohingya refugee crisis
The mass exodus of the Rohingya from Myanmar began in August 2017. Rohingyas that managed to escape the brutal massacre of their people by the Burmese military share accounts of sheer horror and inconceivable violence and atrocities. The Burmese military systematically ANNHILATED entire villages of people, sparing NO ONE, not even babies. Although the international community continues to skirt around the issue by calling it "ethnic cleansing", in reality this is genocide against the Rohingya. Recent reports describe the gruesome discovery of at least five mass graves of Rohingyas massacred by the Burmese military, and their subsequent use of acid to dissolve the bodies.
Although safe from the terror of being slaughtered, the Rohingya are living in miserable and dangerous conditions in the camps along the border. An estimated 700,000 - 800,000 Rohingya have fled to neighboring Bangladesh, and the genocide has resulted in an estimated 37,000 orphans, at last count. To protect the health and economic interests of its people, the Bangladeshi government prohibits Rohingyas from seeking formal employment and from venturing outside the camps in order to prevent the transmission of communicable diseases.
A large majority of Rohingya children arrived in Bangladesh malnourished and in poor health. The ordeal of the escape and treacherous journey, coupled with the difficult, low-resource setting of the camps has exacerbated their nutritional status. While living in Myanmar, the Rohingya have been marginalized for decades, being treated as "vermin" and illegal migrants. They have had little to no access to health services and education. As a result, a large majority of Rohingya children have never even been vaccinated against preventable diseases!
The Rohingya refugees, including little children, have witnessed degrees of violence that none of us will ever experience in an entire lifetime. From brutal beheadings of babies to systematic gang rapes of young women and girls, to throwing live infants into raging fires, to execution style killings of entire villages-- these people are haunted. Most recount their horrific stories of loss and escape in a stoic, monotonous tone, including the children, so as not to inject any emotion into their painful memories. Despite experiencing immense loss and pain, the Rohingya have a strong spirit, and exhibit incredible strength, resilience, and patience even in such dire circumstances.
The nation of Bangladesh and the Rohingya need our help. The people of Bangladesh have been extremely generous and opened their hearts to shelter these survivors of genocide, but they cannot sustain a humanitarian crisis of this magnitude without significant assistance from the rest of the world
Organizer
Rachna Nangalia Bocsi
Organizer
Denver, CO
