Welcome to Gaia! ::

What do you have in mind?

I'm thinking something small, at first. Something fairly basic, such as a recycling program, that could benefit any sort of area. I can't tell for sure, since I (obviously) don't know the areas that other Guild members are from.

The more spread out, the better. Means we can reach into more communities.

I like my restuarant water, but you're right, if I'm drinking coke or something, I'm not going to really touch the water. I do know what you mean though. It's wasteful. Just like fast food places that put sixty napkins in one sack of food. *Nods*

Oh. It's Breast Cancer awareness month. We could do something for that.

It's also GLTB (Gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual) History Month, which y'all better know I'mma be doing something for.

By the way; putting pressure on local businesses (not just restaurants) to stop wasting resources would be a cool thing to do. I'm trying to get the food service that serves my college to stop dumping their food every four hours, and instead refrigerate it and donate it to the local homeless shelter.

How would that bring about awareness of breast cancer? No, if people are going to ask about a man's pink kippah, he should tell the person, "I bought it to contribute to breast cancer research. Here's how you can help, too..."

Another idea: How about ordering ten dozen pink suede kippot with imprinting? Have it imprinted with something like this:

Using My Head To Fight Breast Cancer
For more information, call ###-###-####
Or log on to http://www.whatever-the-URL-is.org
The wife you save may be your own

You can get those for $24 per dozen, or $240 for the whole lot. That works out to two dollars per kippah. Then you take the kippot down to a synagogue, Jewish Community Center, Jewish high school, a hospital... anywhere there are Jews, really. Charge $5 per kippah, and the extra three dollars per kippah goes to breast cancer research. That's $360, right there. The phone number and URL can be adjusted depending on which breast cancer organization you want to support.

I also think one might be able to get one or more companies to custom-embroider scarves/hijabs with a little pink ribbon on one corner, so that women too could have something to wear to contribute to awareness. Plain scarves, patterned scarves, pink ones, other colors... whatever. Just put a little ribbon on it, either embroidered or a sewn-on patch or even a decal. Some of the scarves at http://www.tznius.com and http://www.modestworld.com and http://www.shukronline.com would be perfect for this. If the pink matches your outfit, that's pretty. If it doesn't match, though, maybe it'll make more people ask why you're wearing it, and you can tell them about your efforts for breast cancer.

If research isn't your thing, how about contributing the funds to let lower-income women get a mammogram, or provide hospice care or a cleaning person for a lower-income woman whose breast cancer is so painful that she can't even do her own shopping or laundry anymore? What about providing some meals for a family whose mother, daughter, sister, grandmother, or aunt has just died of breast cancer? There are LOTS of ways to throw money at the cancer problem, and every single way is a beautiful and valid one. Perhaps if we were to work together, we could even find a way to use our connections here on Gaia to raise awareness and money for this horrible thing.

(Oh, and lest anyone go through life without knowing this, men can get breast cancer, too.)

Remember, wearing pink raises awareness. Selling pink raises money for breast cancer research. But raising awareness is a darn fine start.