On behalf of the staff and volunteers of Operation Eyesight, I’d like to extend our warmest thanks to you for your support over the past year, and our very best wishes for a merry Christmas and a very happy new year. May you celebrate in good health and surrounded by the ones you love!

 

While we Canadians celebrated our Thanksgiving in October, it’s our American friends’ turn to enjoy turkey this week! On behalf of everyone at Operation Eyesight, we wish you all a happy, healthy Thanksgiving. We hope you are able to be with the ones you love on this special day.

Did you know? Operation Eyesight has a number of committed donors from the US and we are especially grateful for their generous support over the years. We have been registered since 2005 as an American tax-exempt non-profit 501(c) organization. Visit our website to learn more.  

 

When we Canadians gather at our Thanksgiving dinner tables this weekend, many of us will be thankful for our most precious gifts: family, friends, and health. We know we’re fortunate to live in a fully-developed nation where we have universal health care and a good social support system.

As the World Health Organization points out, “Better health is central to human happiness and well-being. It also makes an important contribution to economic progress, as healthy populations live longer, are more productive, and save more.”

But what about developing countries where there may be little or no standardized health care? Where babies are blind because their mothers are too poor to have them treated? Where blind elders must beg for food because there is no medical hope for them and no money to treat them anyhow?

That’s when our donors step into the picture. They want to prevent and treat blindness wherever they can, and their generous gifts to Operation Eyesight make this possible. Together, we are making great inroads into the devastating health issue that is avoidable blindness.

As executive director of Operation Eyesight, I felt very privileged to be a part of Calgary’s celebration of National Philanthropy Day on November 15.

Not only was I able to see our “founding family,” the Jenkyns family, honoured as the Outstanding Philanthropic Family by the Calgary chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals, but I found myself overcome with warmth and gratitude towards the spirit of philanthropy in general.

Sitting in the large banquet room, surrounded by thousands of philanthropists, donors and peers, was humbling for me. There was so much generosity and community spirit in the room; so many people who volunteer their energy, time and money to causes meaningful to their hearts. It was revitalizing!

Over and over, I heard representatives from other worthy not-for-profits, including the food bank, ending homelessness, and cancer research, reinforce that they share with Operation Eyesight the desire to strengthen the community, to give back some of the many gifts we enjoy in our own lives, and to ultimately make the world a healthier, safer, happier place for all.

Our own guiding philosophy – “the best for the poorest” – may not be articulated in every organization, but I think it’s safe to say it is deeply embedded in our collective hearts.

Congratulations once more to the Jenkyns family and to all recipients of the Generosity of Spirit awards! On behalf of all of us at Operation Eyesight, thank you for all you do to make our world a better place.

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I find myself needing inspiration. Those of us in Operation Eyesight’s Calgary headquarters are oceans away from our programs and projects in Africa and India. Thanks to meetings, email and other distractions, some days, it can be easy to lose sight of why we do what we do.

Luckily for us, we have the good fortune of finding inspiration from another source – our donors. Let me tell you about a young lady we met last week who gave us all the inspiration we need.

Kare is a grade four student at Strathcona Tweedsmuir School just outside of Calgary. She and her mom, Lola, visited our office on Halloween to learn more about Operation Eyesight. She was happy to meet costumed staff members, and asked great questions about our work as we feasted on a tasty potluck lunch.
Kare learned about our organization from Mrs. Hendricks, her music teacher, and was especially curious about what happens after we receive a donation.

Why? Because she was wondering how the $420 (yes, you read that right!) that came from her birthday party would be put to work. You see, to celebrate her recent ninth birthday, this generous, thoughtful child asked for donations to Operation Eyesight instead of presents!

“I would feel bad if I was blind and people cared more about presents than me being blind,” Kare explains. Kare’s friends and family responded generously.

When our Philanthropy team explained that her donation could go toward whatever she chose, she was thrilled. Without skipping a beat, Kare said she wanted to help other children.

As you can imagine, her family is very proud. “Kare is learning that it’s not all about self. She’s learning to think about how she can bless and impact the lives of others,” says her mom, Lola.

Not only will her generosity change the lives of children in Africa and India, but she’s filled up the “inspiration tanks” of all of our Calgary employees. Isn’t it incredible to think that philanthropy can start at age nine... or even younger?! Thank you, Kare! Keep up the great work.

Interested in learning how you can use a special occasion to raise support for Operation Eyesight? Take a look at this information.

When Dean Loewen puts his mind to something, he tends to make it happen. So we weren’t surprised to see to his team’s fundraising total climbing toward the $15,000 goal in the weeks before their Run for “Well”ness in June. (Read more about their story here.) Dean and his team of 17 runners all pitched in to fundraise. “The key was reaching out to both business and personal connections,” explains Dean. “And you just never know where the donations will come from!” Case in point: the day after the June 23 run, Dean got a Facebook message from a woman who wanted to chat and make a donation. It wasn’t someone he knew, so he thought it might be a ruse. Nonetheless, they connected by phone and he found out she was the aunt of one of his teammates. After traveling to Africa years before, she understood the need for clean water, but had never found the right organization to support. To Dean’s surprise and delight, she donated $5,000! “We’re still in shock,” laughs Dean. “That put us over our goal and now we’d really like to get to $20,000.” He credits their success to his great team and Rivka Lipsey, the director of Communications and Marketing for the Mechanical Contractors Association of British Columbia (MCABC), who was “the heart, soul and backbone. She kept us all in line!” And the best part of all... Dean and the MCABC team have fundraised enough to drill four wells in Zambia! On behalf of the children, women and men who will have clean water and a brighter future, thank you: To help Dean and his team reach their $20,000 goal, click here. 

Many of our supporters around the world are celebrating Easter this weekend. We would like to take this opportunity to wish you, your family and friends a very happy Easter time and, for those of us in the northern hemisphere, a very welcome Spring!

Canada, the United States, Australia and many other countries celebrate the special mothers in their lives on May 12. We’d like to take this opportunity to wish all moms a very happy Mother’s Day!

This photo shows a heartwarming maternal moment, when one of our favourite mothers and grandmothers, Jerita, saw her baby granddaughter for the first time after cataract surgery. You can learn more about Jerita’s story here.

 

Special thanks to our Assistant Director of Africa, Alice Mwangi, for sharing Ann’s story with us!

Ann Adoyole is 70 years old, and lives in a village in West Pokot County in Kenya. She has two sons and several grandchildren. Since she came to live in this village after her marriage many years ago, she made the trek on a daily basis to fetch water from the Suam River, several kilometers from where she lives.

When it rains, the water gets muddy and dirty – yet Ann and other community members still had to fetch it because there was no other source of water. One rainy season, the villagers found a dead body floating down the stream towards their community, but this did not deter them from collecting the water. What else could they drink?

Whenever the water became extremely dirty, the villagers filtered it using locally-available materials, and purified the water by squeezing juice from sisal leaves, mixing it with the water and leaving it overnight. Ann knew the process didn’t really clean the water because of the reoccurring diarrhea and other stomach ailments from which the villagers suffered.

Given the long distance to the river, Ann and the other women could make only two trips each day for water, fetching 20 liters in a plastic jerrican each trip. Over the years, she developed chronic back pain, which she believes is a result of carrying the heavy jerricans for long distances. In constant pain, she still had to manage the daily trek for water. There was no other option…

Like over 30 percent of Kenya’s population living in trachoma endemic districts, many Pokot people suffer from this terrible eye condition. Transmitted by flies and made worse by both cultural and environmental factors, trachoma infects the eyes and scars the eyelids. Left untreated, trachoma leads to blindness. What is Operation Eyesight doing to help people like Ann? Come back next week to learn more.

As we wrap up the 2013 year, something struck me: we’ve been fortunate to be able to say “thank you” to our wonderful donors for the past 50 years!

Of course, we could not have reached our 50th anniversary milestone without our donors’ continued strong support of our mission to eliminate avoidable blindness. Together, we have been able to provide light, life and hope to people in Africa and India who desperately need help. It’s an amazing accomplishment and one of which we’re very proud.

None of this would have happened without those who have donated selflessly over the past 50 years, and given millions of people in the developing world the gift of sight. For that we say a heartfelt thank you. Your generosity makes our life-changing work possible!

On behalf of all of us at Operation Eyesight, our very best wishes for a healthy and happy 2014.