Is there a ghost in my house?

A little life lately:

Last weekend we went to the gymnastics meet

To which we brought our little camera. At which point we noticed the LCD screen was inexplicably cracked. And were saddened. We still took a picture of ourselves though, to prove we were there. It still takes pictures...we just can't see what they look like until we put them on the computer. Hence why we're making goony faces...

And then we came home and had graham canyon ice cream. MMMMM!

Saturday we did lots: went to the temple, went running, did homework, and watched a movie with some married friends of mine, Christine and David. Whoo for married friends! We don't have many of those (although we love the ones we do!) and we're always looking to make more. This was indeed a successful venture! Also something we've learned about married life is that it's great to have each other but sometimes it's easy to get holed up in our apartment instead of going out and doing something. So it was good to get out and be with people!

Also this week, we went to the Hunger Banquet. You are placed randomly at either a nice round table, in a row of chairs, or packed in on the floor. 10% of people sit at the nice table and gets a really nice meal, 20% sit in the chairs and gets a hot dog and vegetables, and the other 70% sits on the floor and eats rice and beans and a tortilla. Jesse and I, as you can imagine, ended up on the floor. This whole thing was representative of the world. 70% of the world lives like we did that evening, often in crowded, uncomfortable situations without enough to eat. But this wasn't the whole point. The focus of the evening was Human Dignity. Just because much of the world is poor doesn't mean they're entirely miserable, and they still deserve our respect. They talked a lot about not just donating money to people who are in need, but donating money to causes that educate those in need. This way you don't just give them money and then think they're fine, when in a few months when the money runs out they'll be back to where they were before. Instead, teach them that when you buy too many chickens, they actually lay less eggs, not more, give them a good sense of business and important health information, and they can begin to lead better lives.

The whole experience was awesome. And afterward, there were a lot of non-profit organizations that had booths set up, telling us how we can get involved. It was so great. We're thinking seriously now of doing, at the very least, Habitat for Humanity, and at the most, joining with Help International to go overseas and teach English and HIV education for a few weeks.

We both feel really blessed and a little guilty that we live in one of the most prosperous nations in the world and that there are so many people that live without so much of what we have. We want to give back. And now we've found some ways to do so.

In case you're interested, here are some of the other organizations that were there that also give opportunities to volunteer or donate:

Oulessebougou Utah Alliance

Unicef's tap project

Healing Hands for Haiti

Vittana

Sowers of Hope

peace, love, charity,

Catherine