Let me take a moment to talk about what a Bat Mitzvah means to me as a Jew. I asked myself, what does a Bat Mitzvah mean to me? I kept telling my friends what I wanted to get and what I planned to buy. I was so excited but I realized that it’s not about the gifts, it’s not about any of that. Becoming a Bat Mitzvah means to grow up, to become more mature, and to be welcomed into the Jewish community as a young adult. I am now expected to take care of things myself, and not to rely on my parents for everything. But, it’s not just that. It is so much more. I have expectations to do mitzvot, give tzedakah, and fulfill the 613 mitzvot of the torah. I will work at fulfilling as many mitzvot as I can, one of which is Tikun Olam, which brings me to this.

On December 24th my family and I had the pleasure of going to see The Sound of Music at The Royal Alexandra Theatre downtown. It was a cold day, snowing a little, and definitely not a great day to be outside. On the sidewalk next to where we parked was a grate. We saw a young man wearing a heavy sweater, without a jacket or mitts, checking the grate for heat so he could warm himself. My dad said that he had a fleece blanket in our car and wondered if we should give it to the man. We all agreed, OF COURSE, and proceeded to get the blanket out of the trunk and we all walked over to him and gave it to the man. He could not believe it. He was so touched, so grateful, so appreciative.

It is something that we all take for granted – covering up whenever we are cold. To this gentleman it was like winning a lottery. He wrapped himself in the blanket, lay down on the grate adorned in his precious garment. The sigh of relief from the man’s mouth said it all!

My purpose is to be responsible not only for myself and for my actions but to be responsible for others – to help others less fortunate than me – and I know how very fortunate I truly am! In trying to make some kind of connection between my Parashat and extract some meaning from it, with the help of my mom, I decided to create my very own tzedakah project.

I call it Project Cover Up. My Mom, the greatest sourcer of merchandise and deals that I know, went out and purchased 125 Queen sized fleece blankets. I partnered up with a fantastic organization called Ve’ahavta to reach the homeless and get these blankets delivered. They believe in the role of Tikun Olam – the act of repairing the world.

On January 21st my mom, dad and me went out in a van (not just any van – it’s called The Mobile Jewish Response to the Homeless) driven and supported by Ve’ahavta and delivered the 125 fleece blankets on the streets of Toronto to the homeless. We worked from 6pm until midnight and it was COLD. Ironically though, it was the most heart warming experience of my life! The people who we gave our blankets to were so grateful, so moved, so touched, and they were so WARM.

In some cases, the thing that they needed most was not food or clothing or a blanket (although they were incredibly grateful to receive any or all of these items) but a friendly face, someone to talk to, a conversation that they really appreciated. I got so much out of this experience. One random act of kindness…well actually 125 random acts of kindness…this is the meaning of Tikun Olam.

On January 21, 2010 I began my mission of Tikun Olam – to repair the world – one blanket at a time. It all stared with that one blanket but in a short time it reached another 125 people in need. With this tzedekah project I was able to reach a significant number of poverty stricken people.

We all have the strength to make a difference in this world we live in, and often take for granted, and I believe that this project has the potential to become bigger and better. I believe that this project not only made a difference in the lives of the homeless people, but it certainly a difference in my life as a new responsible adult.

- Emily F.

The 40′ container that Ve’ahavta packed and sent on November 30, 2009 arrived safely at the Howard Hospital in Zimbabwe. The shipment took three months to arrive.

Thanks to our donors, partners, and volunteers, the Howard Hospital continues to be one of the only fully operational public hospitals in the country, providing medical services for 155,000 patient visits each year.

The container was filled to capacity; it included:

• an ultrasound machine
• an ECG machine
• a fetal monitor
• 3,000+ boxes of medicine and medical supplies
• crutches
• canes
• an electric scooter
• toilet paper
• scrubs
• used clothes
• 700 pairs of shoes

The shipment also included 1,600 Kinder Kits destined for the Kenyamba primary and secondary schools.

Approximately 20,000 Jews live in Chile, more than half in the capital of Santiago. According to reports from the country, Jewish facilities were either lightly damaged or were largely unaffected. Ve’ahavta is accepting donations for Chile. Donations will be distributed through the Jewish Coalition for Disaster Relief (www.jdc.org/jcdr_main.html) to partner agencies which are providing crisis relief in Chile. For more information, please call 416-964-7698.

Please consider donating the following items for the event Marketplace:

• Men’s, women’s, children’s clothing and shoes (good condition only please)
• non-perishable kosher food items (canned/boxed)
• childrens’ toys

Please contact Jackie Stein at jackie@veahavta.org

*please do not drop off supplies without confirmation

Report 1:  Dr. Mark Fenig

Day two has been super-tiring. Despite docs and nurses and volunteers numbering over 70 there seems to be an endless amount of work. I flew here with 3 orthopedic surgeons, 2 anasthesiologists, 2 physiotherapists, and 4 nurses, 1 internist (and I’m and ER Doc). Our team is one of about ten from various States and Countries. Everyone works well together so things are running as efficiently as you could expect in such a resource poor environment.

As soon as I arrived I was assigned to the ER of this compound. The compound is made up of a hospital with a few “operating rooms” and an ICU, an orphanage that has been converted to an emergency department with 3 inpatient wards, and a large tent for post op care.

Most of the patients have sustained some sort of orthopedic injury and have infectious complications of their amputations, inserted pins, crush injuries, etc. the surgeons are working pretty hard. Patients are littered about, sleeping on bare mattresses in hallways and in the open air.

Today I took car of a handful of people: lady with two wound infections, one bad one under her scalp secondary to an injury she sustained when a cinder block fell on her head during the quake.  During my workup she was found to have a kidney infection and possibly malaria. She’s doing well now that she’s been started on medications.

Another lady showed up extremely jaundiced with a fever. We thought she’d have malaria too but instead she has pelvic inflammatory disease and hepatitis versus mono. I found a portable ultrasound machine and was able to work up several pregnant women and discharge them after some reassurance. There’s no Ob/gyn docs here so this week I’m probably among the most qualified to deal with this population. One of my last patients of the day was a very sweet, well appearing 6 year old that was trapped under a collapsed house for two days before she was pulled out. Her mother and sibling were crushed to death and her father is in the US. Her uncle cares for her now. Despite her terrible story I discharged her with just some Motrin for a bruise she sustained during the disaster. She is otherwise in one piece, has no metal pins or rods stuck in her extremities and she’s alive. She might be the luckiest girl I saw in our overcrowded compound today.

Report 2: Dr. Mark Fenig

Day three has been the best day so far. I was asked to be in charge of an extremely cramped ward of about 60 patients laying about an outdoor corridor and five cramped rooms with no ventilation or electricity.  Everyone was laying on bare mattresses and the vast majority had external fixation hardware in their legs and arms. Due to the lack of an x-Ray machine, patients cannot yet have rods put in their broken bones. There is one very old c-arm that had broken prior to our arrival (probably better this way since it looked looked like an old atari that would give the user a tumor after 20 min of use). I rounded on all the patients and began to sort out who still needed surgery, who still needs to be hospitalized and who is stable enough for transfer. Transferring is a huge problem since few hospitals are able to take dozens of sick, illegal Haitians with no home or living family off of our hands. Today we were able to ship out a bus-worth of patients and two helicopters came for two patients that were critically ill and needed more resources. Our hospital leadership spends a lot of time on the phone with US politicians trying to twist arms so that favors are called in from the state dept. These favors usually come in the form of a Dominican military med evac helicopter.

After rounds, we started to get an influx of new patients. Many were Haitians that crossed the border illegally to our border hospital and some Dominicans began looking for medical consultations as well. The town we are in is extremely impoverished and the locals hadn’t seen a doctor in decades. In order to help “decongest” the already overcrowded wards we decided to open an ER/minor med clinic. The hospital’s incident command liked the idea and I was awarded a storage room, three chairs, an interpreter, and an examination table. I signed out the daunting ward I was placed in charged of to a new doc and opened my clinic for business. My interpreter and I moved all the boxes of med supplies out of the way, mopped, put signs up, stocked the room with equipment, and then we began to treat patients. At first the petients flow was just a trickle, but by the afternoon there were always at least 4 patients waiting to be seen. I evaluated and treated patients with simple fungal infections, perforated ear drums, and I incised and drained some abscesses. I also wound up admitting a severely malnourished 13 month old boy who was anemic and had total body swelling. Another woman who had sustained crush injuries to her legs had been literally carried by a cousin for two weeks because she couldn’t walk. I admitted her for multiple fractures that were likely compound (open) fractures. A third women had to be admitted for hyperemesis gravidarum.

I was then notified that I had to return to Santo Domingo for my flight. This was to be the last transport for a while and my return flight is tomorrow. I had no choice but to pack up. Before doing so, I found a great family doc to take over the clinic (Dr. Jim). I spent my last hour training my interpreter to be a medical assistant so he could help run the clinic for the next few weeks. He was a fast learner and by the end of the hour he was doing the patient intakes himself including vital signs, urinalysis etc.

I had come with the agenda to leave something sustainable behind.

Despite my very short stay at the hospital I think I accomplished my mission.

Currently en route to Santo Domingo typing on my iPhone notepad. I hadn’t had a chance to internalize the dozens of horrific stories the patients told me. It’s starting to sink in now. Words can’t describe my team’s overwhelming sense of appreciation for what we have in North America, empathy for the survivors of families who were all crushed to death, and guilt for being on the winning end of the ovarian lottery.

Hannah Damiani celebrated  her 7th birthday on January 9, 2010. She asked all of her friend to make donations to Ve’ahavta, instead of presents, to help the homeless. In January, Hannah and her brother Seth, came into Ve’ahavta’s office to give us the funds they had raised to help the homeless.  What a beautiful and compassionate gesture. We learn much from little people.

Hannah decided to contribute to Ve’ahavta becasuse she says, “she wants to help people” especially those who live on the streets. Here is the thing. Her parents, Sam and Marnie, told me their children strengthen them. What a beautiful thing to hear from parents. What they meant by that was that when Hannah and Seth see people in need, like a homeless fellow living on the street, they insist that their parents stop and help.

There have been times when they were so upset but the fact that someone was so in need, that both children would cry. I know this level of empathy. It runs deeply.

On one occasion, the family was heading down to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Hannah and her father spotted a fellow who needed some change. They were short on it so the next time they went downtown Hannah insisted the famly drive around to find him. They didn’t but saw someone else in need sitting on the edge of the street. They went over and gave him money.

“Early on when Seth was starting to read, he saw a sign that a person did not have a home or money for food; all of a sudden we heard crying in the back seat of the car. It was Seth who was so upset by what he read,” said mother, Marnie Burke.

They are beautiful children with an intuitive sense of empathy and caring. Like so many children they understand the importance of sharing and the true meaning of tzedakah, justice, finding balance in our world. The question is, our Hannah and Seth like this because of their DNA or is it a learned response? Are most or all children like them? Do we as adults have that inside of us?

Sam and  Marnie constantly remind the children how fortunate they are to have so much when so many have so little.  Seth and Hannah would like to personally challenge all children to play their role in tikun olam (repairing the world) by assisting those on the streets of Toronto or around the world through acts of tzedakah in support of Ve’ahavta’s projects.

- Avrum Rosensweig