Well here's your chance! All you have to do is make one small change the next time you go looking to buy a t-shirt, a new cell phone, an iPod.
All you have to do is go RED... as in (Product) RED. This incredible program was started by U2's Bono and an old friend of his. By buying (RED) items you can directly help women and children suffering from AIDS in Africa.
To hear about it directly from Bono, go to this link:
http://www2.oprah.com/tows/slide/200610/20061013/slide_20061013_350_102.jhtml
Click on the video link in the middle of the page. This will bring you to the video's section on Oprah's website. Click the second video down on the left hand side (With the picture of Bono).
"(RED)™ is a revolutionary program designed to eliminate AIDS in Africa. "Lots of people here in the United States have been trying to deal with the problems of Africa in a very serious way," Bono says. "But not everybody has the time to be an activist or put on their marching boots. So we said, 'How are we going to get the shopping malls involved? How are we going to get to where people live and shop…?'"
By buying a (RED) brand T-shirt, a pair of jeans or even a cell phone, you can help save lives. Part of your purchase will be donated to The Global Fund to help those who need it most. Just the T-shirts that the audience is wearing today will provide enough medication to prevent transmission of HIV from mother to child for over 14,000 pregnant women. (www.oprah.com)"
To learn more about this amazing idea and what items are "RED" go to this link:
http://www.joinred.com/home.asp
I can't express how deeply moved I was. I actually spent most of the show on the couch crying because I was so overwhelmed. Overwhelemed enough to email The Oprah Show. Overwhelemed enough that the next chance I have, there is a very special shirt at The GAP with my name on it... I personally want the one that says "inspi(RED)".
Do this and you too can be "empowe(red)"- there's a t-shirt with that one too!
On that same show Alicia Keys talked about the work she is doing in Africa...
"In 2004, Oprah's Angel Network surprised Alicia with a $250,000 check to help her continue her life-saving work in Africa, and her organization put the grant to good use!
Alicia traveled to South Africa to visit the Ithembalabantu Clinic, which means "people's hope." This clinic provides free, life-saving drugs to parents and children with HIV and AIDS. "So many more patients are getting the medications they need to survive because of Keep A Child Alive and Oprah's Angel Network," Alicia says. Donations from Oprah's viewers also made it possible for the clinic to hire its first pediatrician, Dr. Thompson.
Dr. Thompson says that after a year of treatment at the clinic, most people can't tell an HIV-infected child from a healthy child. "Seeing a child coming in being absolutely a waste, literally a walking skeleton, and then a few months later just seeing the improvement…it's a feeling you can't replace ever," she says.
Alicia thanks Oprah and her viewers for their generosity, and she urges people to continue caring about this global issue. "AIDS is 25 years old. I'm 25 years old. There are 25 million [people] already dead," she says. "There is no reason why we can't join together and realize that this is something we have to do. … On behalf of them, let me be their voice and say that there's so much more to do."
For the first time on the same stage, Alicia and Bono perform their duet, "Don't Give Up (Africa)."
Bono and Alicia Keys's duet can be downloaded at www.keepachildalive.org. The song costs $1.49, and all proceeds go to the Keep A Child Alive organization. (www.oprah.com)"
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"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination."Tommy Lasorda
