Quirks and Questions

We, in the USA, are used to being able to handle our financial dealings from wherever we have internet access. I assumed that assisting my sisters around the world would all be done from my desk. I am learning, at the age of 64, first-hand, from my World Pulse sisters, just how horribly out-of-touch I am. I often create more questions than I can come up with answers.

I am a volunteer, choosing to spend my time in service to the wonderful women healing our shared earth, one woman and one innovative initiative at a time. I hear so many needs from so many sisters, and I long to be able to apply what I have seen work so well in my own country and the agencies with whom I’ve worked. Each time I believe there is an easy thing that I can do, no matter how small, it turns out to be less than simple and smooth.

I thought that, since I can see and speak with my sisters around the world, in real time, with the miracle of the internet, all transactions would be as effortless and efficient. This is certainly not so. I am obtaining quite a lesson in world finance and politics through what turns out not to be remotely related to everyday, touch of a button, communications in my own country. Each effort at international assistance has its own set of quirks.

Purchasing purses from a WP sister in Nigeria became an ordeal of how to get the merchandise to me and the money to her, without incurring exorbitant fees in the transaction. Even wiring money from my home computer to her is impossible; I must physically appear at a Western Union office to originate the effort.

A WP sister in the UK has been busy making washable sanitary protection to supply sisters in several countries in their menstrual hygiene education efforts. I had originally wanted to help with the expense of supplies; this was before I realized how prohibitive the costs of international postage can be. Another connection appeared to set up a Facebook page to help our sister in the UK bring in funding for FEMpads’ fabric and postage expenses. I can now simply click a couple of times and postage is paid.

Now that I’m more accustomed to the “ways of the world,” when my Pakistani World Pulse sister’s shelter for her free school was blown to bits in a storm, I didn’t hesitate to use my new cosmopolitan commerce skills to help her procure a replacement.

I long for a way that we World Pulse sisters can create a banking exchange through which we could effortlessly, and cost-effectively, filter our various currencies. Perhaps we could even incorporate a micro-loan aspect and venture capital investment initiative, based on our knowledge of each other. Will a World Pulse sister make this happen?