To Live Poor
A great pain, it is.
Too great, they don't dare to scream.
They try to fly, but are wingless.
Then, they face mountains.
Knowing the impossible, but yet they try.
Again and again they try,
Again and again they fail.
The world is too big and careless about the small, incapable dwarfs.
It only allows the best of the best.
Dwarfs try to run away from their dark, heavy shadows;
To the land of the sun.
They run and run,
try and try
to live a proper life.
But, they are always
Denied, Rejected, and Kicked.
The downtrodden like to dream, too.
They have always dreamed of the day
when they would fly over the mountains.
But this is a useless effeort without warmth from the world.
Okay, so. This is my poem. And please, if you would like, comment on it... The photos of this poem will not be posted as it takes up so much space and all that, so mr. r just told us to bring it to school so that he can send it to you guys. haha.
-SARAH
Derek's Message:
Hi. Sorry I'm a little late in writing my opinion on the wiki. Right now in the ITL Project, I'm trying to find music that goes along with this video. I found this really great artist/band called "Apatride?". I thought that some of their acoustic style of songs really suited our topic. Here are some instructions to check out some of their songs:
- Go to THIS WEBSITE.
- After you have done that, there should be a search bar on the top right corner.
- Type in "Apatride?" (without quotation marks) and you should have a group of songs by that artist/band.
Some songs that I thought were good were So Tired, Quatier Rouge, and Roots. You may want to check out the other songs, just in case you like those, too. If you like any other songs and want to put them into mp3s, just CLICK HERE and you should find the list of songs and their links as mp3s (I really hope I said that right). Anyways, the only thing that worries me about these songs is that they have lyrics. All though we can just turn the music down when someone is talking, it may not sound as good as it possibly could be.
What should I do with the video? I can think of many ways to organize the video, but I'm not sure which is the right way. If you have an idea of what the video should be like, please feel free to send me and email.
Opinion on Sarah's Poem
I really enjoyed your poem. I think that using Dwarfs as a metaphore for people living in poverty was great (well, that's what I got from the poem, email if I got the message of the poem wrong). I think that you made a great poem and I don't think that anything really needs to be changed to it.
Opinion on Adrian's Poem
I really liked your poem. I liked how you fit in some facts about poverty in your poem. What I meant by look at the second part of your poem was to just look at it and see if you can change some of the words. Now that I think about it, the second part of your poem is good the way it is. Your poem was very well done and I don't think it needs any changes.
I'm wondering if you guys are going to put some pictures on the wiki (e.g. like the teen smoking page). It's okay if you aren't, I was just wondering if you guys were.
For you guys in Cartegena, I think you guys have the right idea about how to do the documentary. A few days ago, Mr.Fisher told me that you guys actually interviewed somebody in SPANISH and that you guys translated it in english, so that it would be easier for me to put in subtitles. First of all, THANK YOU! Secondly, that should be a bundle of work, but it'll be fun and make our project even better.
Well, I think that's it. I apologize if I put in my message too late and I hope you get to see it in time. Please email me if you like/dislike the music, have any idea on how to organize the video, or if you have any questions. Good luck to everybody in our project and I hope everything goes well!
Hey Derek. In reply to your question on whether or not Sarah and I were going to add pictures like the teen smoking page, the answer is yes. Our teacher Mr. R wants everyone to give the images to him. From there he'll email it to the other schools since he doesn't want to overload the wiki page. At least that was the last I heard.
-Adrian
Poem
Hey, guys. I finished writing the poem about poverty. I know it might sound weird, but I think it will be okay once you guys edit this poem. Also, I will try to take a photograph that reflects this poem soon. Please, Please, Please! Feel free to edit/comment/question.
So, here is my poem:
Dwarfs
A great pain, it is.
Too great, they don't dare to scream.
They try to fly, but are wingless.
Then, they face the mountains.
Knowing the impossible, but yet they try.
Again and again they try;
Again and again they fail.
The world is too big and careless about the dwarfs;
It only allows the bests of the bests.
Dwarfs try to run away;
To the land of of the sun.
They run and run and run.
They try and try and try:
to live a proper life.
But, they are always.
Denied, Rejected, and Kicked.
The downtrodden like to dream.
They have always dreamed of the day
when they would fly,
Over the mountains.
But this is a useless effort without encouragement and support.
By, Sarah- MKIS
Adrian - Hey Sarah, I liked how you used the connection between dwarfs and people who are in poverty. This is because you could think of dwarfs as disadvanted people like those who are in poverty. In your second line, you wrote "cream", but I think it's meant to be "dream". Great job though.
Hi, I've also finished my poem about poverty. As Sarah said, just go ahead and add your feelings and edits. Hopefully, it'll turn out better and like Sarah I'll get an image posted soon. If you have any ideas for a creative title just put them down in your comments. Thanks.
Our own people, killed each day
25,000 die of hunger and lack a place to lay
Most, children who deserve better
What would help would be to send money in a letter
We can stop poverty
If we work together
As a multiparty
We can strive for better
Many die from diseases
We can hear their sneezes
And their pleads of assistance
We can hear it round the world even at a distance
Most of mankind doesn’t make it
Yet we still cannot admit
Poverty is a virus killing millions
Beyond our control and treacherous to civilians
Some so affected by this disease
They cannot sleep with ease
They have no medicine or food
Living on the boundary with time to brood
Faint trickling of tears barely contact your mind
Reaching deep within our kind
Exposing your true feelings
The need to shelter these people with a ceiling
If we could lend a hand
If we helped they could have land
A place to live on
And poverty would be gone
We can stop it
But we choose to let it permit
Only we can stop this
Instead we forget them and insure ourselves bliss
By Adrian
SARAH- Hi. Your poem is really nicely done. you have all that cool rhyming words and you used facts to tell people what is happening in the world in the first paragraph.. e.g. 25000 people die of hunger and lack a place to lay. You clearly stated what we can do to help those poor people. It is also very cool how you critisized (sorry if i spelled that wrong.) how people are just letting the problem go out of control. I really really love your poem. GREAT JOB. (oh.. in my poem, it is supposed to be scream not cream.. haha. I changed it:)
Introduction
Wow. SO MUCH research…
Okay. Well. I agree with your first paragraph. There are way too many people in this world who can’t even afford their food and everything, while on the other hand, there are people complaining about the sandwich they just ate. And yes, our goal is to give people lessons about what ‘poverty’ means to people and the world about how serious it is, how it affects the world, things we can do to prevent and/or improve the situation, etc.
The video, interview, image and everything you mentioned is a good idea to interview some of the poor villages. I don’t think here, in Malaysia, we will be able to do that. It is quite dangerous to go around in this country.
What I and Adrian are trying to do is to make a poem on Poverty that kind of wraps up the video, something that talks about all the things I have mentioned up there. Its seriousness, impact, things to do to improve, etc. That way, we can do our ‘poetry stuff’ that we are doing in English class AND do this project. I think it will gather people’s attention effectively as most people don’t like to read long, boring essays on these things. They would be more interested by getting to read people’s poems because: one, they don’t have to read boring 1000 word essays and two, they picture the image while they read.
But before we get started on this poem, we first have to do enough research so that we can bring that information to make poems.
What do you think? Also great information!
-Sarah/ MKIS
The Message
Our message for our documentary is that poverty is something that we really need to be concerned about; we really need to find a solution. I have seen that there are some people that while others are asking them for help, they are just ignoring them; these people do need to change. This is just an example, but there are some people that start crying because they got Adidas and they really wanted Nike. This is happening while other people are not even crying while they haven't eaten ANYTHING during the day or night.
In order to present our message, we are going to use images, videos, opinions and interviews. We will try to interview specialized people so they can tell our audience what poverty is, how poverty is affecting the world, and how it can be cured. We also want to visit poor villages and film what poverty is like. We can also film orphanages that help poor people so you can get to feel what they are feeling.
First Part of our Documentary: What is Poverty? Show some images that show poor people.
Second Part: Causes and effects of poverty. Interviews
Third Part: Poverty in developing and developed countries.
Fourth Part: Poverty in children and show the videos of the poor villages or the videos about the orphanages.
Right now, in order to complete our documentary, we want to first talk with our parents. We want to tell them about the idea of taking us to the poor villages or to the orphanages. Also, talk with them about the interviews with specialized people. Maybe, they will know someone who we can talk to or they can have some useful resources. In the information part, we want to research about poverty in developed countries so we can compare and contrast it to poverty in developing countries.
Poverty in Developing Countries
According to Poverty.com, many people die because of hunger and being homeless. Actually, 25,000 people die each day because of these reasons, this means that every 3 and a half seconds someone dies. However, most of these people are children. Although many people die because of hunger, in reality, there's enough food all over the world, but the problem is that many people have a lack of money, so they aren't able to buy it, because they don't eat, they don't get energy, so they get weaker and weaker each time in the end they die.
However, there are some ways in which these things are solved. There are two programs which help to solve this problem. For adults, there is "food for work." It consists on digging and building things, but instead of getting paid with money, they are paid with food. For children, there's a program called "food for education." This one consists of giving food and education to children. If they get well educated, they can work, and this makes them get out of poverty.
I am especially interested, as I told you before, on poverty on kids, but also in poverty in developing countries. A developing country is a country that has low economy, low way of living etc. Sometimes, the government of the country affects if it is poor or not. A developing government is the government of a developing country. If the government is poor, the country has more probabilities to have poor people. Also, if the country is a developing nation, it has poorer people because there is less advances and less jobs. Developing nations are regularly called "South." This is because most of them are located in the Southern Hemisphere. Often, in developing countries there's 'corruption'. This means that some judges or policemen take off bribes to rich people, so obviously this affects the poor. Also, there's worse corruption. In the government this happens too, but much more badly and with huge amounts of money. Another fact that doesn’t let poor people get out of that problem is the lack of opportunities and jobs.
In developing countries, many people die because of many diseases. Some of these include diarrhea. This disease is mostly caused to poor people in developing countries. It is an infectious disease that works in the intestines and can dehydrate you and can lead you to death. Also, many people die because of eating insecure food. This means that the food or water isn't cleaned in order to be eaten or drunken. Definitely, the disease that kills the most is Aids/HIV. This disease affects most in Africa, which is the poorest continent, so the poorer the place, the most it attacks on. Finally, a very dangerous disease is Malaria. This disease is spread by mosquitoes and it kills millions of people yearly."An absolute poverty defines poverty as the state of living under certain, pre-determined amount of income or consumption. The most common absolute poverty line is the $1-a-day line."
My Opinion
What I think about poverty in developing countries is very simple. Obviously, developing countries are poorer than developed countries, so the have more poor people. Also, that the people aren't wise enough. Some causes are caused by the same people of the affected country. If they know that being corrupt will cause more harm in your city or country, why do they make it? They need to realize that being rich isn't the only thing in the world. Yes, its true, people need to be able to afford some things, but I think that it isn't fair that while some people are starving in one place, others are going shopping in another place.
I could finally research about developing countries. Still, I want to research on poverty in Cartagena. Maybe, this may not be possible because I didn't find enough resources and I could only do it on my observations, but the schools from other countries can't observe this.
JHK Research
Facts About Poverty
Sources
Wikipedia
Google
Dogpile
List of countries by percentage of population living in poverty
What is Poverty?
Poverty is a condition where a person or community lacks the essentials for minimum standards of life. These essentials include things like food, safe drinking water, and shelter. They also include social resources such as education, health care, political power, access to information, and social status.
Causes of Poverty
There are many causes of poverty. They can be put into the four groups of material, economic, political, and social. Most causes of poverty are:
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Material: Climate or Environment, Geographic Factors, Amount of Natural Resources, Bad Nutrition, Disease
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Economic: Bad-paying Job, Unemployment, Globalization (too much or too little)
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Political: Lack of Rules of the Law, Lack of Democracy, Lack of Infrastructure, Lack of Health Care, Lack of Education, Government Corruption, Over Population, Tax Havens, Historical Factors, Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Monarchy, Fascism, Totalitarianism, Lack of Free Trade
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Social: Lack of Freedom, Slavery, Lack of Social Integration, Crime, Substance Abuse, War, Brain Drain, Lack of Social Skills, Exploitation, Cultural Causes, Individual Beliefs, Mental Illness, Discrimination
Effects of Poverty
There are many effects of poverty, some even the cause, which creates a poverty cycle. Some causes of poverty are:
- Depression
- Lack of Sanitation
- Drug Abuse
- Lower Life Expectancy
- Increased Discrimination
- Loss of Population
- Low Literacy
- Social Isolation
- Homelessness
- Increased Risk of Political Violence
- Increased Suicides
- Human Trafficking
- High Crime Rate
- Starvation
- Increased Vulnerability to Natural Disasters
How to Reduce Poverty
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Economic Growth
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Direct Aid
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Improving Social Environment
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Develop Goals
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->Foreign Aid
<!--[if !supportLists]--> <!--[endif]-->And Other Approaches
Organizations and Campaigns Fighting Poverty
- The George Foundation
- Abahlali baseMjondolo - South African Shack dwellers' organization
- The Borgen Project
- Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP)
- The Make Poverty History campaign
- 17 October: UN International Day for the Eradication of Poverty(White Band Day 4)
- Center for Global Development
- Child Poverty Action Group
- Institute for Strategic Clarity Multi-stakeholder Study of Poverty in Guatemala
- Mississippi Teacher Corps
- World Food Day
- Nourish International
- Chronic Poverty Research Center (CPRC)
Other Wikipedia Pages
Other Web Pages
Other Pieces of Information
Poverty (Video)
Poverty Rate by Age (Chart)
Make Poverty History Radio 2005 (Audio)
Girl who Suffers from Severe Protien Malnutrition (Image)
A Homeless Woman with Her Dog in Rome (Image)
A Homeless Man in France (Image)
Understanding of Poverty (Graph)
Poverty in Canada
Sources
The Canadian Encyclopedia:Child Poverty
The Canadian Encyclopedia:Poverty
Child poverty is a real issue in Canada. Here are some facts about child poverty in Canada:
- Slum Dwelling, Toronto (Image)
- Canada has the second highest rate for child poverty in the world.
- Since 1989, the number of children below the poverty line has jumped nearly 45%
- Most of those children have parents that make an income more than $8,000 below that line
- 55% of poor children have two-parent families
- The other 45% of families have it even worse
- And More
"One of the fundamental problems in estimating the number of poor people is agreeing on a definition of poverty. How badly nourished, housed and clothed how much insecurity and stress, and how much withdrawal and powerlessness must people suffer before they are considered or feel poor?"
Toronto, The Ward 1910 (Image)
Links About Poverty
Poverty.com
poverty in developing countries
The Canadian Encyclopedia:Child Poverty
The Canadian Encyclopedia:Poverty
Other Source Links
Google
Wikipedia
Dogpile
List of countries by percentage of population living in poverty
Links to Pictures
Slum Dwelling, Toronto (Image)
Toronto, The Ward 1910 (Image)
Hey, I’m Adrian from Mr. Raisdana’s class. I noticed that the rest of you have done a lot of research on poverty in general, a draft of our final project, and Derek has added information about children poverty in his country, Canada. I found this article on poverty in Malaysia and I thought that it might help give another angle on poverty.
This article talks about poverty in Malaysia and how it has decreased over 34 years. It mainly says that Malaysia is the only country in Asia who has managed to turn good economic growth into jobs and poverty reduction. It also says that from 1970 to 2004, the percentage of people in Malaysia below the poverty line has dropped from 52% to 4%.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007%5C02%5C27%5Cstory_27-2-2007_pg5_26
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
ILO hails Malaysian jobs drive, reduction in poverty
BANGKOK: In Asia, only Malaysia has succeeded in turning impressive economic growth over the past three decades into jobs creation and poverty reduction, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) has said. That was one of the conclusions of a joint report by the UN Development Programme and ILO that looked at eight Asian countries: Cambodia, the Philippines, China, Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Thailand. The study focused on the relationship between Asia's fast economic growth to its generation of jobs as a means of poverty reduction. "Asia-Pacific clearly has reason to be proud of its significant contribution to world economic growth over the past two decades," said Hafiz A Pasha, UN assistant secretary general and regional director of the UN Development Programme Bureau for Asia and the Pacific. "Yet while this has been the case, we also see the region facing a continuing decline in employment growth." The report, unveiled at a meeting of the two UN agencies in Bangkok this week, concluded that with one exception - Malaysia - all the Asian countries studied experienced inadequate employment growth and the problem has become worse in recent years.
Malaysia, which has experienced an average growth in its gross domestic product of 6.8% from 1970 to 2004, has seen the percentage of its people living below the poverty line drop from 52% in 1970 to 4% in 2004.
"In the 34 years between 1970 to 2004, the annual growth of the labour force averaged 3.16%," the report said.
It noted that Malaysia has succeeded in shifting its work force from the agricultural sector to the services and manufacturing sectors and had encouraged immigration, thus expanding its labour force.
Real wages in the manufacturing and services sectors had increased at annual rates of 2.8% and 2.6%, respectively, from 1972 to 2000, it added.
It pointed to Malaysia's economic policy initiated in 1972 that focused on poverty reduction as a major factor in the country's performance on the labour front.
The ILO said other Asian countries had been less successful in making the switch from agriculture to export-oriented industries and services and, without giving examples, said that in some cases, they had harmed jobs growth through government policies.
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