Congratulations 148th A-100

Last night, the 148th A-100 class hosted its fundraiser at Ghana Cafe, and it exceeded all expectations.

Though the numbers are at this point are extremely rough, early estimates were that the event brought in a few thousand dollars, which will be spread evenly between two charities - Doctors without Borders and the Foreign Service National (FSN) Emergency Relief Fund.

(Note: For whatever reason, the FSN fund is even more behind the times than I am when it comes to technology, and it does not have a Web site <gasp!>. So here is is snippet from the Associates of the American Foreign Service Worldwide's facebook page: The Foreign Service National (FSN) Emergency Relief Fund enables the Department of State to respond to crises affecting our FSN employees overseas. To donate to the fund, send a check to the Department’s Gift Fund Coordinator, Donna Bordley, RM/CFO, Rm. 7427, 2201 C Street NW, Washington DC 20520. Make checks payable to the U.S. Department of State, designation for the FSN Emergency Relief Fund.)

Congratulations are especially in order because of how quickly this event came together. Planning began (to the best of my knowledge) as recently as late last week, and in that time, the 148th also managed to get the word out through some of the big players in the Washington media including The Washington Post and the local NBC affiliate.

A thank you also needs to be given to Ghana Cafe, which has agreed to donate 20% of its alcohol sales from the evening to 148th's efforts.

It was a great event that packed the building to near capacity for most of the night. Good job once again, 148th.

ANOTHER UPDATE
This from the 148th A-100 organizers: "I wanted to thank all of you for the tremendous effort that many of you put in to making the Aide Ayiti fundraiser an enormous success. Thanks to all of your efforts, we raised $3667.00 last night for two very worthy causes. We also had around 300 people come through the door, and we increased the profits for, and supported a local small business."

An Open Letter to the U.S. Government

Dear U.S. Government,

I was quite distressed to learn that in addition to the unfortunate passing of Victoria DeLong, three “obviously, they’re not government employees” (according to Assistant Secretary Philip J. Crowley) also died in Haiti.

I don’t know anything about these people, in part because you haven’t released their identities. I hope this is because you still are contacting family members, but when this task is complete—if it isn’t already—then I urge you to let us learn more about the three “dependents” (Crowley again).

I don't know who these people were, but I feel a slight connection. They've been through what I'm going through, and some day, I'll experience what they've experienced as an American expatriate.

You shared the identity of Ms. DeLong, and The Washington Post wrote a wonderful article detailing her life as a foreign service officer.

It would be nice to share with the American public that while the FSOs are doing their jobs representing the United States in foreign countries, many of them do so with their families. Instead, you strung together this beautiful bit of prose: “Yeah, they’re part of the official – they were there in an official status as accompanying family members in Haiti…But they’re not – obviously, they’re not U.S. employees.”

Suddenly EF’M doesn’t seem so tongue-in-cheek. (This is Crowley below, and so far, I don't like him very much.)

Let’s be clear, Crowley, while we do not receive paychecks from the government, we are (or will be, as the case pertains to me) representing the United States as well.

In fact, the day after your impersonal references to the additional paperwork that travels with your FSOs, Hillary Clinton said, “We know that when we send someone to serve in a post overseas, the family serves, whether the family accompanies the officer or stays behind. We know that there is a family that is involved in most cases.”

Let’s up those are not just words, and a good place to start would be to tell the stories of the three Americans who died serving their country in Haiti.

UPDATE
I guess I misread one of Clinton's remarks, and the State Department did identify the three EFMs as Andrew Wyllie's wife Laurence and his two young sons Evan and Baptiste. The way the statement was worded, I thought he was employed with the United Nations, and while tragically losing his family, I worried there still were three more EFMs the government had not identified. Here is an article from The Newport Daily Express and another that shares some about the family. Regardless, I still was upset with Crowley's choice of words, which is why I decided to leave this post up.