| Costa Rica:
Calendar Girls |
| By Miss
August |
| As a happy
and blessed expat living in Costa Rica for close to nine years, I have
always believed that International Citizens living in a foreign country
have a civic responsibility to give back to their “Home Away from Home”.
Nothing worse than the image of the ‘Ugly Gringo” living cheaper in paradise
than they could at home and feeling no obligation whatsoever to do anything
for their host community, other than contribute to the economy by
asking for “Otra Cerveza Por Favor”.
There’s also
a silver lining in volunteering abroad. One of the first ways my
husband and I learned to practice our Spanish was volunteering to teach
a weekly cooking class for sexually abused young girls who were watched
over by caring Sisters. No Costa Rican sunset can compare with the beauty
in the smiles that greeted us each week as we taught these girls how to
make pizza and they taught us the meaning of Tasa, Batadora y Cucaharon |
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| Therefore
it was pretty easy to say “yes” when a year ago, I was asked to
“Get Naked and Literally Drop Everything” to embrace SASY!
(Stop Animal Suffering Yes) in Costa Rica and convince my fellow expat
amigas to do the same. Modelled after the original Calendar Girls
project, which has raised funds for Cancer Research in England and the
popular film, which told their empowering story of female volunteerism,
the wild and SASY Calendar Girls of Costa Rica was born over what
else? Lunch with the Girls. We had afterall been asked for help
by 4 legged friends who desperately needed an advocate.
There are numerous
community needs hidden beneath Costa Rica’s tropical oasis and as you might
imagine, help for much needed shelters, spaying and neutering clinics in
low income barrios and reporting and prevention of animal abuse isn’t always
a top priority. So we gathered up a collection of international women who
brought their talents, their beauty, their love for animals and Costa Rica
and their SASY Ways to create the 2007 Wild and SASY Calendar Girls.
There were
guidelines: “Breathtaking, Award Worthy Goddess-Like photography,
women |
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| who would
not only tastefully bare all but commit to the project’s success by sharing
their creativity and special talents. Yes, among the girls you’ll find
a former marine - now a jazz singer who also donated a concert to SASY;
photographers, event specialist, A computer programmer who handles on-line
calendar sales and yours truly, a professional speaker, writer and specialist
in non-profit fundraising and volunteerism.
If you’re reading
this article you might be dreaming of living or volunteering abroad
or you might already be there.
If so, I ask
you to consider volunteering and giving back in some small way to your
chosen international community.
No, you don’t
need to take your clothes off, but maybe dare to step outside of
your comfort zone - out of your gated |
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Offshore Resources Gallery
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of safe and secure expat living and give back in some small way. I think
you’ll find the personal reward and cultural enrichment immense.
I would frankly
be thrilled if countries added to their residency requirements a commitment
to provide either financial or volunteer support to their host community.
What a concept!
Finally, if
this article touched you in some way or if you believe in the words of
Mahatma Gandhi that “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress
can be judged by the way its animals are treated …
That
the more helpless a creature, the more entitled it is to protection by
man from the cruelty of man” then please visit the SASY Web-site
and order your 2007 Wild and SASY Calendar.
On our web-site,
you can meet the girls, and even get a sneak peak of the calendar.
Until then,
be well, be bold, be caring and be a citizen of the world. |
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| Rosemary Rein,
Ph.D,
Author of
“Go Wild,
Survival Skills for Business and Life”
and Most importantly
- Miss August
“Life outside
a person is an extension of life within him. This compels him to
be part of it and accept responsibility for all creatures great and small.
Life becomes harder when we live for others but it also becomes richer
and happier”
Albert Schweitzer
www.sasycostarica.com |
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