Award from Association of Pakistani Physicians of New England

This is the first time it has been awarded to a non-Pakistani!

Rachel was the first recipient of the award that is not from Pakistan!

Nice article in the Salem News by Alan Burke

SalemNews.com, Salem, MA

June 25, 2012

Ipswich Rotarian helps Pakistan, one school at a time

BY ALAN BURKE, STAFF WRITER
The Salem News
---- — IPSWICH — Pakistan is one of the hottest of world hot spots, often seen as a swirl of violence and hatred so forbidding that individuals, and even governments, are apt to throw up their hands and walk away.
So it’s surprising that one force willing to persist in the face of the conventional wisdom, to reach out, give aid and educate is Rotary.
Locally, it’s the Ipswich Rotary and Rachel Williams, 58, a one-woman ambassador of Pakistani relief. And she won’t hear all that talk about how dreadful the country is.
“They’re fabulous people,” she said. “It’s just a misunderstood place. They don’t hate us, they love us. I always tell them I’m an American, and they love that.”
Williams, a resident of Groveland, has been traveling to Pakistan since the early 1990s. At first, she had selfish reasons. She lived in Singapore. Her marriage had fallen apart, and she was making a living as a personal trainer. She had also developed a very expensive hobby — polo.
It’s a sport that had its beginnings in the regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan, she said, and Pakistan remains the cheapest spot for indulging in an activity dependent on lots of well-nourished horses.
Pakistan grew to mean more than just polo for Williams after the terrorist attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. The largely Muslim nation was swiftly designated a vital American ally in the war to defeat al-Qaida.
By then, Williams had left Singapore, remarried again and settled on the North Shore, an area that the Seattle native judges “the most civilized in the world.” Still working as a personal trainer, she joined the Ipswich Rotary.
As the conflict in South Asia grew, Williams found she could put names and faces to the people being affected. Wanting somehow to help, she began raising money for Afghan refugees and Pakistani schools.
“I work on schools that are already there,” she said. “If you give them a boost, it will increase their capacity.”
Soon, she linked her efforts to Rotary’s international arm, which offered matching grants.
“Rotarians are people who work to make their communities better,” Williams said, “and their countries better and the world better. ... I come back from Pakistan and tell the story, and people donate.”
Moreover, her efforts get a further boost from the fact that Rotary and Rotarians are plentiful in Pakistan, as well. And they’re willing to help point the aid in the right direction.
Williams goes to Pakistan at least once a year. Most recently, she helped provide solar panels, computers, desks, fans, a drinking fountain and books to Dosti Badezai School #2, a formerly overcrowded school, with three rooms serving 300 girls.
In previous years, thanks to donations, a school was able to expand, creating a college. Elsewhere, a bus was purchased for girls traveling many miles to the schools.
Williams acknowledges the concerns in this country regarding Pakistan. Some there have made common cause with terrorists. It’s the country where American journalist Danny Pearl was kidnapped and beheaded, where the Mumbai massacre was launched, and where Osama bin Laden found years of sanctuary.
Williams notes that violent hate groups exist in many countries. Bin Laden may have found sanctuary, but that doesn’t prove official collusion. Fugitives have been known to go undiscovered for years even in America, she points out.
“To the poorest of the poor,” she said, “none of that matters.” The number of Pakistanis killed in the conflict with terrorists dwarfs the casualties in the West, she said. And the problems in Pakistan, she said, are enormously complex. Thus, her efforts to educate extend to America. “I want to do more to help people understand.”
The region Williams serves is in the north, among Pashtun people. On the fringe of the worrisome, mountainous tribal areas, her friends live on flat plains, good farmland where English is the second language.
“Where we are is not that dangerous,” she said. As a concession to local customs, she dresses as a traditional Pakistani woman when she travels.
The hospitality of the people delights her. “They fight over who I’m going to stay with. ... They would never put you in danger.” The most serious concern, she said, is outright lawlessness having nothing to do with religion or politics. Kidnapping for ransom is a minor industry in the country.

The bad news from Pakistan is belied by the hopes and aspirations of average Pakistanis, Williams said. Their dreams are not so very different from those of people everywhere. They want their children to prosper, thus they want them educated. Girls, too.
“People have always been saying that it’s getting worse,” she said. “You have to do what you can do. I learn so much from the resilience of the Pakistani people.”
Williams recalls being in Pakistan and hearing the terrifying roar of bombers overhead en route to battle the Taliban on the Afghan/Pakistan border. She watched the eyes of the people around her as the noise grew.
“They really should be afraid,” she said, “but they carry on.”
Staff reporter Alan Burke can be reached at 978-338-2524 or by email at aburke@salemnews.com.

"Us" & "Them"

 It seems very popular here is USA to condemn Pakistan.  Yet, do you  know that terrorism has killed 350,000 Pakistani’s since 911?  When will we read history and realize what a huge part our own foreign policy has played in the chaos we now read about?  

The CIA recruited fighters in Afghanistan, Pakistan and throughout the Middle East to fight the “godless” Russians.  An elder gentleman I used to have tea with in Peshawar was a general in the Pakistan army in the ‘70s.  The top US military men in those days asked him what he thought about the idea of creating an army to fight for god.  He said “ It will work, but what do we do when you are done?”  

If any of us bother to look up the tragic truth about what is now called the “Af/Pak  Situation”,  we will be appalled!  Own tax dollars helped develop an education system which uses hatred as a tool to create what is now a third generation of terrorists.  The tables have turned and in the absence of the Russians, we are now the infidels.  

The latest story, now being turned into a political football, is the case of the CIA pay rolling Dr.Shakil Afridi to run a fake clinic in an effort to get the DNA of bin Laden’s relatives.  If the US government really cared about this man, they had many 

opportunities to evacuate him.  His real crime is not treason nor is it conspiring to work with the bad guys.  His crime is that his actions have placed a massive cloud of suspicion over anyone offering medical care to the grassroots poor worldwide.   For the CIA to set these kinds of things up, without considering the repercussions of their actions, is business as usual.   

In war big fish rarely get penalized, and very often get rich.  It is the innocent poor, the female, and the young that suffer the most.  If we really want to help the situation, this is who we need to work with.  Does anybody care that there were 20,000 pregnant women among the wave of displaced people who  fled  the tribal areas when we started bombing with our drones?  Those babies will most likely become terrorists, too, if they don’t get a real education and medical care.

Rotary Grant Approved for girls school near FATA in Pakistan!

This Adopt-a-School Matching Grant is a partnership of Unitown Peshawar & Maumee (Ohio) Rotary Clubs.

 The school is Dosti Badezai School #2, also known as Noorlhadi Girls School.   The grant will supply essential items to bring the school from a struggling, overcrowded 3 rooms, to a vibrant, exciting institution for 300 girls.  They will have their own power source provided by 2 solar panels, computers, student & teacher's desks, fans, drinking fountain and books.

 The school is community supported, assisted by the Dosti Welfare Organization in Peshawar and its funding are in Toledo, Ohio, The Global Education Campaign.  It is located near the tribal area of northern Kyber Pakhtunwa Province of Pakistan.

  I have never met anyone who does not want their children educated, including their girls.  They may not want their girls to go far from home, nor be put at risk in an insecure situation.  They do not want their children indoctrinated with foreign beliefs, but they always want them educated if at all possible!

Educating girls is the key to transforming society.  When you educate a girl, you decrease domestic and local violent, plus decrease infant and maternal morbidity.  An educated mother will have less children and she will make sure her children go to school and get better medical care.    In the Koran it says "heaven is below the soles of your mother's feet".  You can't get to heaven unless you obey your mother!  Yes, of course educate boys, but the key to a civilized society is greater education of girls.

A Message from My Grandmother Alice Franklin Bryant

“Let us realize that we now have only the illusion of defense and that we can secure a more real safety by relying less on the use and threat of arms, and by placing more emphasis on helping people to help themselves.”

Alice Franklin Bryant

More info at : http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=8865

Pakistan's Afghan Refugee Camps now housing Internally Displace People from FATA

Internally Displaced People from the Tribal Areas (FATA)

We ALL can make a difference!

Op-Ed in the Boston Globe:

Shock absorbers for US, Pakistan

Why don’t we try a surge of humanitarian work in Pakistan instead of sending drones & CIA agents?

Ask any Pakistani what the problem is and they will say education & infrastructure. If you ask them what they are doing to help you will be amazed at their philanthropy.

They go on to suggest that we “Educate those around you and make your elected officials accountable for what they do”. I’ve been travelling there frequently for over 20 years and have witnessed this first hand.

With the help of vibrant American/Pakistanis here in the US, we can create a political movement of diplomacy and humanitarian assistance that will truly change the situation.