Friday, January 15, 2010

Celebrities Come Together

As much as people like to complain about Hollywood and their stars they also do some great things for people and places especially when they need it. Right now, the situation at Haiti is bringing so many people together. I just wanted to share with you what some are doing. Who knows maybe it will change your opinion of them, or even donate to what they are doing.

Wyclef Jean is Haitian-American multi-platinum musician, rapper, and record producer. Many of you know him from the song "Sweetest Girl". He also is ambassador to Yele Haiti a global awareness for Haiti while helping to transform the country through programs in education, sports, the arts and environment. You can check out how to donate to Yele Haiti or learn more about it here. http://www.yele.org/. Also Jean and Give On The Go campaign joined forces to encourage people from around the world to send a text message of "Yele" to 501501 on their mobile device which would then charge $5 to the donor's cellular phone bill.

Of course, Hollywood's power couple, Brad and Angelina's foundation, the Jolie-Pitt Foundation has donated $1 Million dollars to Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontiéres. And according to Doctors Without Borders' website"More than 2,000 patients have been treated so far at Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) locations in Port-au-Prince. Teams are now focusing their attention on expanding surgical capacity, as needs are huge."

Ben Stiller, who has been in tons of movies that I love, and an actor known and loved by many, launched a series of viral videos on Stillerstrong.org, his personal website in the hope of raising money for the Save the Children’s Ceverine Community School Project in Haiti. And this is from Save the Children's website about what they are doing in Haiti, "One of our key priorities is protecting children in emergencies around the world. We're on the ground now, in Haiti delivering assistance, often with local staff in advance of a disaster, and we stay on the scene long afterwards." Apparently too, Lance Armstrong poked fun as his charity, StillerStrong, but I am guessing that has to deal with the fact of Armstrong's LiveStrong campaign.

Scarlett Johansson apparently is an Oxfam ambassador. I had no idea about that! In one report from FOX she states, "As an ambassador of Oxfam, I urge those who are able to donate to the organization which currently has over 200 people on the ground and a team of 15 highly-experienced emergency specialists based in the capital that are responding with public health, water and sanitation services to prevent the spread of water borne disease.” And from their website about what Oxfam is doing in Haiti, they write, "Oxfam staff in Haiti are providing shovels and picks for local civil workers to clear rubble to search for trapped victims in the capital, Port-au-Prince, following Tuesday’s massive earthquake in Haiti."


Chris Martin, the singer from Coldplay is also teaming up with Oxfam for people to make donations to Haiti. In a relase from Oxfam, Martin says this, "I visited Haiti with Oxfam a few years ago. It's a country of extreme poverty and brutal living conditions. Most people in Port-au-Prince live in tin shacks. The earthquake that has struck Haiti will have turned the city into an unimaginable hell."



And the beloved talk show host, Oprah on her show mentioned that we as Americans need to come together and help the people of Haiti. She asked viewers to donate to the Red Cross in anyway because “we, as a global nation, should come together and support those in need.” As many of you know you can text Haiti to 90999 and $10 will be charged to your phone bill to help this place. So far, over $5 Million has been donated from people texting. I think everyone should do it. It's really simple. It took less than a minute for me to do, in fact, in my last post, you can see the text that you would get when you donate to Red Cross.

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