We would like to thank our amazing performers for volunteering their time and talent to BRIDGES and Viva La Mujer

  Kathy Sohar has been in the local Gainesville bands Commander Foxy Pants, Bound, and The Other Gods.

Cathy DeW: Brought up in a family with a jazz pianist/trumpeter for a dad and a classical piano prodigy for a brother, Cathy’s constant lifelong companion has been music–from church choirs to rhythm & blues bands to coffeehouse folk to jazz groups–but the most important role of music right now is her work with Shands Arts in Medicine, where she shares her eclectic talents in the hospital setting.

John Alvarez, a native of Miami, FL, has been working with Bridges Across Borders (BAB) since it’s initial founding in 2003. He has served in several areas of the organization, starting off as a Student Intern, to his most recent positions as a Technology Consultant and Advisory Board Member. He was also the Layout and Design Editior for the premiere edition of Between the Lines, BAB’s newsmagazine.
John works for Miami Dade College as the Instructional Assistant of The Law Center, where he provides academic advisement and counseling support services to students from all over Miami-Dade and Broward counties.

http://faculty.mdc.edu/jalvare9

CHICAGO ENCUENTRO: COMMUNITIES IN RESISTENCE TO GLOBALIZATION: A Bridges Across Borders USA contingent, along with our Wayuu friend, Debora Barros Fince, participated in the 6th Encuentro on Globalization of Environment, Territory, and Justice, which was organized by the Colombian group Justicia y Paz and hosted by the 8th Day Center for Justice. Groups from all over the Americas and as far away as Spain and Italy sent representatives to work on building a global network of solidarity for the struggles of civil society and people’s movements of the Americas — the indigenous, Afro-Latinos, and the rural poor, in particular. Participants included representatives from the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement (MST), Argentina’s Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign, and activists from the 6 Nations Iroquois Federation, among many others. We came away from this meeting awed and inspired, with many new friends and contacts, and with a trengthened and renewed commitment to help build international networks of cooperation and mutual aid.

Meet Paula

Dear Sponsors,

First of all I hope you are doing well. Second, I want to express all my gratitude for all the support and help. I am finishing high school successfully and I am looking forward to graduating here in Guasca. I have had a lot of new experiences all this year. A lot of challenges have occurred. New events have taken place and I have had to learn new responsibilities. I just can say that it isn’t easy to grow and that it takes time to learn and be able to make a difference. I am learning… and growing. I am planning to visit my town (Chocó) during vacation. I haven’t been able to talk to my mom and that is one of the main reasons I want to go there. I am also planning to spend some time in Cacarica after my graduation. Cararica is also a small town in Chocó [which has declared itself a Peace Community] and I would like to go there to help to teach children. I am very grateful for all your help and support. I have been able to do and reach a lot of goals thanks to your kindness. I want to be a Psychologist and I hope to be able to go to university for this. Paula’s Story

Thank you very much for all your help, support and care.

Most grateful,

Paula Florez (Colombia)

Debora Barros Fince of the indigenous Wayuu has accompanied BRIDGES to several SOA demonstrations. The following is the transcript of one of her speeches.

Demonstration to close the School of Americas, Nov. 20, 2005

Good afternoon to all of you. I am here because my family and my community were the victims of a massacre of the 82 indigenous groups in Colombia. We are the largest group, the Wayuu indigenous community. We are located in the northern part of Colombia.

At 6:30 in the morning 150 paramilitaries came into our community. Now these are paramilitary who work together with the National Army. And they began to kill women and children in my community. They had no mercy. They cut them; they cut their heads off.

As you were marching it was very painful for me to see how many crosses there are. And how much grief and pain there is in each one of us who are victims of all of this. That’s why I ask each one of you to please tell your government and your president to stop the bloodshed in Colombia. The blood not only of indigenous people is being spilled in Colombia. People are being killed constantly. Labor union leaders. Human Rights defenders. These are people who, in one way or another, are helping the indigenous groups to defend ourselves against this huge monster. Tell Bush not to give ANY more money to President Uribe for military in Colombia. And I also want to ask you to continue coming here each year. This action helps to guarantee at least a little bit of peace in Colombia, and not only in Colombia, but also in other parts of the world.

And in the name of the 12 people who were killed in my community, I thank you for this solidarity. Good luck.

At BRIDGES ACROSS BORDERS we set about dissolving the imagined and imposed borders between us. At BRIDGES we:

•   Weave relationships between the US and war torn nations 
• Give slide and video presentations
• Lead workshops and discussion groups on a host of topics
• Teach skills for peaceful conflict resolution
• Seek assistance for communities in need of basic services and sustenance
• Help to initiate projects in Colombia, Panama, Mexico, and the United States
• Working to provide educational opportunities
• Promote Fair Trade cooperatives and localized economies

We ask you to join with us in creating this global tapestry. Please help us to lay the foundation on which to build a more just and compassionate world.

Each adoptive parent will receive an adoption certificate  and a tagua turtle.

The tagua (vegetable ivory) turtles are carved by Waunaan people of Panama.

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT

As an administrative assistant, you will be responsible for various tasks around the office. The administrative assistant will work directly with Carol Mosley, the US director of BRIDGES. Responsibilities may include but are not limited to: checking and responding to emails, filing, answering the telephone, printing and creating BRIDGES literature, and any other unforeseen tasks that may arise.

GRANT WRITING

BRIDGES is seeking a Grant Writing intern as well. During these times of economic hardship it is essential that BRIDGES is able to finance our projects even when private donations are few. If you are interested in learning about grant-writing and working on a variety of grant proposals, BRIDGES would be very happy to work with you.

TECH/COMPUTER PERSON (OR WEBSITE MAINTENANCE)

As our all-around tech person, you would be responsible for the maintenance of our new website. We have many materials and articles that need to be posted to the site, so the bulk of this internship would deal directly with that. The website is edited using wordpress, so any knowledge of that program would be nice. In addition, we would like to have someone with a general knowledge of HTML, but any computer knowledge would be great.

VOLUNTEER, FUNDRAISING, & EVENTS COORDINATOR

If you prefer hands-on experience, perhaps you would enjoy being our volunteer, fundraising, and events coordinator intern. BRIDGES puts on many events and fundraisers throughout the year and is always looking for exciting new ideas to get our name and projects out there. If you are creative, friendly, and organized, then BRIDGES would be happy to have you as our intern in this area!

BRIDGES INTERNET OUTREACH FROM HOME

The intern holding this position would work from home, for the most part. One of BRIDGES’ goals is to create and maintain relationships with other organizations who have missions similar to ours. The Outreach intern would be responsible for organizing “link swaps” with other organization’s websites. Also, perhaps most importantly, we would like to focus on using the full capabilities of the internet to gain awareness about BRIDGES’ projects and programs. We will supply you with PDF files of all relevant BRIDGES literature.

COORDINATION FOR PROJECTS ABROAD – Spanish speaker preferred

If you choose to apply for this internship, it is advised that you have prior knowledge about BRIDGES’ projects. This job would provide you the opportunity to work with any of BRIDGES’ particular projects and make recommendations to improve them or make them run more efficiently. This would require working directly with Carol Mosley, the US director of BRIDGES, and keeping close contact (through email or phone conversations) with the people running our projects on the ground.

Title: New Website Launches!
Location: Everywhere
Date: 2009-04-01