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April 6, 2007
Doing a world of good
Teens are on the front line of creating change.
VERONIKA STEWART
Youth are among those with the most potential to affect positive
change on an individual level, according to Danny Siegel.
"If people will use their heads, they will be able to make
such a radical difference," said Siegel – known as "the
Mitzvah Man" – in a speech to students in grades 7-12
at Temple Sholom March 26. Siegel said that despite the fact that
adults are "supposed to be clear-thinking," they can be
more hesitant to adopt new and helpful ideas than younger people.
Siegel's talk centred around showing the 60-odd youth and their
parents that small, innovative approaches to charity can work miracles.
Siegel is the founder and chair of the Ziv Tzedakah Fund –
an organization that focuses on an individual's ability to affect
positive change in the world through work on little-known aid projects.
These mitzvah projects range from a program that distributes fair-trade
kippot hand-made in Guatemala by indigenous women to one that collects
old car seats to redistribute to struggling new parents.
Siegel even offered samples of the colorful Guatemalan-made kippot
(featured in the Independent's last Chanukah Gift Guide).
At $12 a pop, they were popular with the crowd, and sold out within
minutes.
Another one of the projects Siegel has encountered involves biodegradable
kippot, with a texture like that of thick grass, that are embedded
with seeds and can be planted after they've been used.
"The younger generation is much more ecologically friendly
than we are," Siegel said.
This sustainable theme is also carried through in Siegel's promotion
of a Honduran project, which has spread to many other developing
nations, including the Philippines. Local women in cities collect
garbage like potato chip bags and juice boxes, which would otherwise
crowd the streets, and weave them into coin purses and tote bags.
It's a way of recycling the refuse that piles up in highly populated
areas.
These items are now sold in Vancouver stores, and Siegel suggested
using them as gifts for b'nai mitzvahs, instead of T-shirts or underwear,
with the name of the child and date.
Siegel started Ziv in 1981. It operates in Canada, the United States
and Israel and funds both Jewish and non-Jewish programs. Since
its beginnings, Ziv has raised and distributed more than $6 million
to a variety of aid projects.
The initiatives to which Ziv contributes are not solely focused
on sustainability. The organization also promotes giving to the
sick and the elderly. One such project was started by a child in
Long Island, N.Y. Siegel said that the child – a cancer survivor
– noticed how bored other kids got at the hospital, so he collected
donations of old videos. However, there was a catch: the hospital
had to give away the videos to the kids when they left the hospital.
Siegel said this was so that if the kids became attached to the
videos, they could keep them to watch at home.
Siegel cited a leukemia survivor named Jay as one of the greatest
success stories he had heard. Siegel said that after a donor was
tested on a whim and found to be a match for a bone marrow transplant,
Jay decided to devote himself to finding matches for others who
require bone marrow transplants. Siegel said Jay has now matched
more than 1,300 people.
Siegel himself participated in a fly fishing retreat for women with
breast cancer. Siegel said that fly fishing, as well as being a
good excercise for rebuilding muscle tissue, became a full-fledged
hobby for many of the women who took part. He said that, during
the retreat, cancer was mentioned only once, in a doctor's speech.
"I've never been at a weekend as powerful as when I was with
these women," he said.
Veronika Stewart is a Vancouver freelance writer.
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