Christmas Eve

Given the situation my family is in, we will be spending Christmas Eve in a way that we have never experienced before.

Since my sisters work at different hours during the night, my mother and I will be spending Christmas alone. Even though we live together in the same house, our family can't be together on Christmas eve. It's sad... but what can we do? This will seem to be a fact of life for our family for several years to come. I hope no family ever has to face such kind of separation in spirit. The family is so near, yet the bond is so far.

As for the food, seeing advertisements on TV about bountiful Christmas dinners just punish me, so I just turn off the T.V. We'll just be dining on pasta and rice on Christmas eve. It's cheap, so it seems to be the best choice at the moment.

Merry Christmas to everyone! I hope you all have a great time with your family and friends!

How much should I donate?

There have been inquiries asking how much should they donate to help us.

My answer is... any amount will do.

You don't need to donate $1,000 like what Mr. ****** did. That's too much. But of course I won't mind.

The best amount probably would be $5, $10, $20 or $50. Any of those amounts would be enough and would already be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks to those who have donated for our cause and I hope many more blessed people will continually share their blessings. God bless you all!

Nope... I am not lazy

In my attempt to solicit some support from kind-hearted people of the online community, i've been receiving some comments that either i'm a scam or just plain lazy.

I wouldn't blame people from calling me a scammer. There have been a lot of cases already both online and offline about people being swindled- and my mode of sourcing for help may alarm people since I am basically asking people whom I don't know and don't know me for financial aid. Trust over the internet has greatly deteriorated due to scams, and I can't blame a few of my blog's visitors if they suspect me of ripping them off. But, that will be a different topic.

What I cannot accept is when some think that I am lazy.

It's not as if I sit around all day checking on my blog traffic and paypal account balance for any changes. That's crazy! I prioritize my job as a full-time teacher- preparing lessons, teaching (of course), assessing test scores, caring for my students, and many more. At the end of the day when I still have the energy and time for it, that's when I go online to follow-up on my appeal to the online community.

I still take my monthly paycheck as my main source of income and means to help me out of the sinkhole our family is in, combined with contributions of my younger sisters.

The reason why I ask for help from other people still, despite our income, is that it's going to take us A VERY LONG TIME to rise up and live in a non-dehumanizing way. A life free of debt. A life of giving what we have to others in our community. A life without insecurities for the uncertainties of tomorrow.

So there. I reiterate that we are not lazy over here and as a matter of fact, we are working like overworked mules here. However, a little push from you guys will help us go to where our family plans to be in in a much shorter period.

God bless you all!

For those who want to support us

Hi!

For the good-hearted people who empathizes with us who would like to support my family and I towards getting out of our family crisis, you may help us through various ways:

Donations

You may donate via paypal.com, using the button at the right side of the blog. You must have a confirmed paypal account first before you can donate for our cause. Any amount will do. However, the bigger the donation, the faster our family could be delivered into a better life. Seriously, any amount- no matter ow small you may think it is, if you have any extra, we'll surely appreciate it.

Shopping online

If you frequent online shopping services and if donation is not your way of helping people in need, you may also shop through our Amazon shopping site by clicking the link at the side part of our blog. You may also visit the site http://astore.amazon.com/thebailoutpro-20 and shop directly via amazon.com. Amazon will provide our family with some small commission from your purchase. It might not be much, but every dollar counts and will surely be very much appreciated.

Referrals

If in case you don't have any loose change at this time to spare for helping our family, then you may also opt to refer the blog to your family or friends who may be more than able to donate some of their blessings through email or facebook. Simply encourage them to visit our blog to know about our story and from there choose how they would be able to help us.

Many thanks in advance for your support and for giving several people in need of your financial help. God bless you and your family. Take care always!

The business model I envision

Make no mistake. I am neither a business expert nor an authority in economics.

I have seen in this many years of existence that poverty is caused by greed, primarily, which branches into many more other problems. Of course, personal complacency and laziness do contribute to the poor being poor, but I believe that a huge part of the poverty problem is caused by a huge gap in income.

Let us take some big companies and people we hear highlighted by this certain business magazine, ranking institutions and persons in terms of their assets. You will commonly here such entities to own billions of dollars each. Only a few hold a vast majority of resources, leaving crumbs to the majority. This is thus the consequence of capitalism.

Capitalism stresses the maximization of profits, reducing cost and competition for market share. This main priorities help cater to the current situation of business owners hoarding majority of the profits, sacrificing pay for employees in their effort to reduce cost. People are thus reduced to mere economic factors- downgraded from their original status of being human. I am happy to hear though of the emerging social capitalists, where a certain part of profit is given back to communities, but in my opinion, what's given back is still not enough and seems to be mostly publicity ploys.

I am also fascinated by the concept of communism, wherein the people share resources equally, and where class is abolished. Unfortunately, communism will only work if robots were assigned to manage communist institutions. People, who head communist organizations, are bound by their human desires at some point. Greed, power, class and fame are among many of the weaknesses of humanity, in general. Therefore, putting humans, with all these natural tendencies, to lead communist structures are bound to fail since they are the very anti-thesis of each other.

However, communism does work, tough in a very low probability. The model of China indicates that communism can succeed, but it must be managed by very strict controls imposed on the higher ups. China also is not a pure communist, since they infused the capitalistic model in their affairs. And I think the merging of these two economic principles, capitalism and communism, in businesses is a good way to greatly lessen the financial gap between the rich and the poor. let me make it clear at this point that I do not support communism being applied in national management. You might get the wrong impression that I am a communist- I am merely appreciating the idealistic objectives of the philosophy.

With these things said, I dream to build a business wherein a huge chunk of profits (and I mean HUGE, like 30%) to be shared among the low income employees- from the maintenance and staff personnel up to the junior supervisors. In this way, a lot of opportunities would open up to the poor, allowing them the option to better educate their children and providing more money to be pumped into the circulation, further improving the economy. Surely, business profits and stockholder income will be reduced, but the general welfare of the many will be valued through this model- bringing back the humanity that humans deserve.

I may be contradicted by the modern capitalists and the traditional economists, but I stand firm with this perspective of the neo-business model I envision... and I will apply it when the time comes when I am called to the batter's plate. Until I ear a more convincing argument against what I envision, I am going to stick by this model. I may probably be too naive or idealistic about this view, but hey, I'm sure Galileo, Marx, Smith, King, Luther, Gandhi and many more visionaries were faced with skepticism when they presented a radical idea to the world.

Help me bring this business model to reality by donating any amount (the more, the better of course) via paypal. In case you can't spare me some of your blessings, you may also shop through my amazon shopping webpage or spread the blog to your kind-hearted friends who might be able to spare me some change.

I am personally appealing for your financial support. many thanks in advance.

Working out of the country for greener pastures

It is common knowledge in low income countries that working abroad indeed brings about a lot of financial benefits. For relatively the same (or most of the time, less) amount or degree of work, you are actually paid more (from twice to ten times) for labor. Not to mention strong labor rights in developed countries, greater respect for skilled workers and additional security due to the police's and judicial system's relatively high effectiveness.

Most people I know that has a special skill are thinking of leaving the country for greener pastures. I agree, but I resist the bandwagon.

I don't resist just for the sake of it or to be a cool rebel by being "against the flow" of the bandwagon, but simply because of my beliefs. I believe that financial abundance in the third world can be achieved even if faced by the handicaps present in a developing country. At the same time, i think that my working abroad contributes to the damage of both the country I left and the one I transfered to- my country experiencing brain drain, while the foreign land losing a job slot to an immigrant. The only positive aspect of this scenario is a personal financial gain, which is selfish. Of course, this perspective of mine only applies to skilled work and not on domestic labor, and likewise is not an absolute interpolation- just an observation by a non-sociology expert.

Anyway, despite the pressure of people around me telling me to go overseas to have a chance to quickly settle my problems (I could raise the money by working for 5 to 8 months in the U.S.), I chose to remain in the country. Maybe out of being stubborn, or maybe I just believe so much in my perspective about migration.

Unfortunately, given the scale of my liabilities, business capital needs, family financial responsibility, etc., it will take me around... errr... 50 years to finish off all my responsibilities! Fifty freakin' years!!! And that's not even factoring in inflation yet!

And that is exactly the reason why my family needs your help. The only thing I want to do in life is to start-up and manage a business. On the sidelines, I want to give my family a better future by providing my sisters with college education, and to provide an oasis of income for my future employees. And the highest chance I can do all that at the soonest possible time is through your donations. Unfortunately, my huge loan from my previous business attempt is dragging me down, eating up precious capital I could be using to start-up a new business.

Because of this, I personally appeal to any one of you who may read this, in this vast cyber universe, to donate any amount (of course, the more the merrier) you could spare via paypal. I guarantee you that your kindness will go a long way and that I will ensure the most efficient use of your bail out money. Many thanks to all of you in advance.

I really do hope you could bail me out.

Bags up for grabs

Just some of the bags up for grabs on my Amazon online store. Choose from a wide variety of hand-picked items by fashion-conscious women and experts. For more of the products, please visit my online store at http://astore.amazon.com/thebailoutpro-20.

*Profits from your shopping would help me bring my sisters back to college, pay my loan, finally free my head of stress and free my life to finally attempt to set-up my dream business that will employ many jobless people in my country. Many thanks in advance.

Selling online as a way to get my life back

So aside from my request from good Samaritans for donations of any amount, I have decided to open an online shop via Amazon.com. I am gradually widening my product line, which includes bags, shoes, electronic products, books, ebooks, apparels, cars, baby items, cosmetics, mp3's, jewelry, software and many more. Fashion items I sell are actually hand-picked by colleagues and friends of mine who are involved wit the fashion industry and are absolutely aesthetically great. Having tem choosing for me though is going to bust my eardrums one of these days since they shreik upon seing the items they prefer out of excitement. You most definitely will appreciate the product line I have in store. Unfortunately the online store seems to cater only to U.S. residents. I'd still have to check with other countries as to what Amazon-equivalents they have.

So if you live in the U.S. and frequently buy in Amazon, I would like to request your good-hearted souls to shop through my online store so I may earn commission out of the sale. The commission, although minimal, would help me bring my sisters back to college, pay my loan, finally free my head of stress and free my life to finally set-up my dream business that will employ many jobless people in my country, as well.

If you'd like to shop through Amazon, the link is http://astore.amazon.com/thebailoutpro-20.

Thanks in advance and have a wonderful shopping time!

My story

Hi!

My name is Mikaela David and I am on a quest to ascend from the very distressing situation I am in.

I am 28 years old, single, an academician, the daughter of a single mother, eldest of three sisters and a businesswoman at heart. I also am a visionary.

My situation all started when I got into several big loans to start an online business three years ago. I thought of going into business when I was one of the many people who lost their jobs to the recession. Unfortunately I wasn't able to recover from my initial investment, and that's when things got all messed up.

I did my homework in business. I wasn't one of the gals who were impulsive about a business idea and suddenly jumped into it. That is just too risky. I covered all bases- capital, skill, marketing, etc. Being young and excited at my first chance to really prove my self, I got blinded by positive thinking away from being realistic. I soon realized that to pump in more clients to the company, I needed more capital- and that I couldn't afford, even if i was utilizing guerrilla tactics. Like a fish in a tank drained of water, the business soon died and left with it a landscape of debt, unpaid bills, trauma, blame, and so on and so forth.

For several months I was in shock. I lost my will to live and came to a point when I contemplated on suicide. See, the business was like my first child, and it died several moments after birth. It was also supposed to be the ticket of my family to a much more abundant life (not the mega rich kind, but the comfortable kind). I was too depressed to care about life and just didn't see the point in living anymore. Until one day, I got up and decided that it ain't over 'til the fat lady sings, or til i'm six feet under, or whatever. I had to either move, or simply die without a fight. So after much contemplation, i've decided to enter the academic profession.

Teaching is fun and very fulfilling, but the pay is not good- especially if you're in a developing country. My salary just isn't enough to pay for rent, food, other bills, repaying loans, etc. And so every payday, nothing is left for saving as everything goes down the drain. To help me out with the necessities, I had to let my two younger sisters stop their college education to work. Overall, this is not a sustainable lifestyle and is definitely not the way to live. A cloud hangs over me every second of my life, reminding me of the many liabilities I had to neutralize. I could choose to run away from them, but I am a woman of my word! I will fulfill all my obligations, period!

The guilt of not being able to sustain my sisters' education also takes its toll on me. Being in an asian country, the culture usually dictates that the eldest bears the burden of ensuring the well being of the family, in the absence of the father. Although not said, the silent consensus is I am to blame for the degradation of our family's quality of living.

I really do hope that the time will soon come that I may finally get over my loans, send my sisters back to school, and that I may get a second and final shot at establishing the family business. Feel free to join me in my quest to overcome the biggest challenge in my life so far- to raise money for a bail out from life's extreme smack at my face.