Feast or Famine? Do you know the answer?

We played a bit of a game at this meeting! A game show to be exact... I named it Feast or Famine, because the questions were based on facts about children and life in Ethiopia. A friend of mine told me about someone who would be sending containers of food and goods over to an impoverished village in Ethiopia and asked if our club would like to help. (To get more details on this please visit the website at...

http://www.vertechengineering.com/EthiopiaRelief.html )


So me, being me, can't just tell the kids to bring bags of food, and be done with it! I wanted to make a game of it, and have them learn something in the process. I was surprised at the outcome. I think I learned more than they did!
For example to point out how different our lifestyle is here; I asked the kids how much a house cost here in the U.S, and how much a house cost there in Ethiopia. (keeping in mind their home is made of tin scraps, mud and hay...)
What I learned is that our children think our homes cost 1000.00! So a home over there must be about 50.00.
A chicken on the other hand here in the U.S must be about 50 or 60 dollars... ( do these kids go shopping with you?) It was hysterical! I was going to ask what an average monthly salary was here and there but they were so far removed from reality I moved on to some other questions... (In Ethiopia the average income is 70.00 a month!)
So we discussed some interesting facts like the favorite foods here verses favorite foods there, the rich over there eat less vegetables, where here I think it is the opposite. One sad fact is that 30% of American children are over weight and 40% of children in Ethiopia are underweight. Those numbers have another interesting statistic behind them. Both weight problems carry similar health problems. Diabetes, heart disease etc. Hopefully this is something that will change within our lifetime.
Educating kids about healthy choices and exercise now is one way to help. Here in Chico there are so many out door activities, it is easy to stay busy. Speaking of that...next Saturday, October 25th is National Make a Difference Day!
http://www.nationalserviceresources.org/node/19455
The above website is a link that might get you thinking about what you can do...
Of course I will be doing something with the kids on Tuesday that will be for Saturday.
Until next time
NinjaMom out