Monday, September 16, 2013

Syrian Refugees in Kurdistan in Great Need

So there are more than 2 million Syrian refugees in the world. It is estimated that half of them are children. More than 250,000 of those refugees live in camps throughout the Kurdistan region where I live.

I said something awhile back about how some people I know co-founded an organization called the RISE Foundation. They're amazing. It's volunteer-only. Not a penny goes anywhere except for straight to things that are needed for the refugees.

Just yesterday, Dr. Amer (one of the co-founders) bought 800 small stoves which will be distributed to refugee families living in Qushtapa near Erbil.

I've kind of gone head on into fundraising and donation drives. We've got four locations set up throughout the city where people can donate food and daily necessities. We've got two weekly fundraisers. And yesterday I finally managed to set up an online donation system.

We're having another fundraiser come up soon. The local Oktoberfest celebration has a raffle and all proceeds go to RISE. Then we're having a beer pong championship a week later and all the entry fees go to RISE and we're taking donations throughout the night.

Our next goal is $6,000. We want make food packages to give to each of the families living in one of the nearby camps. We figure with the food donations we're getting plus another $10 family, we should be able to give them a pretty good package.

Please share and donate!