Stop and Stare

Wow. It's May already. When did that happen? This year has flown by incredibly fast and I surprisingly have mixed feelings about it...on the one hand, I can't wait to be finished with medical school and actually making money (as opposed to piling up so much debt it's ridiculous). But on the other hand, I don't really want to be an adult just yet and I have the feeling that it's going to creep up on me and bitch slap me in the face. Oh well, I guess I'll wear a helmet and pray that it doesn't leave a bruise.

So even though I have no money (as mentioned above), I've been trying to find out about some non-profit organizations started by people in their twenties and exactly how they got people to take them seriously enough to be successful. Even with the whole "med school" thing, I feel like companies would laugh in my happy, 22 year-old face if I asked them for money to save orphans, puppies, etc. But starting a non-profit has been something I've been thinking about for a while, I just have no idea where to begin...I'm hoping with a smile and a handshake?

Well I've been checking out different projects and came across one called Goods for Good, founded in 2006 by a 26 year-old girl who realized that businesses across the world have excess inventory that sits in boxes in warehouses, destined to be wasted or destroyed and sent to "rejected goods" heaven. She has had donations of clothes, toys, and most importantly, school supplies sent over to Africa to help almost half a million people get their lives back together after the Liberian civil war. I was most impressed by the pharmaceutical companies that have donated pens and pads of paper for school children and orphans to use...especially since those particular drug rep goodies end up stacked up in drawers in hospitals (or in medical students' desks?). It's nice to see that drug companies are making good use of the excessive free schwag they throw at doctors and other hospital staff (and the poor med students who may or may not keep a few things here and there...). Pfizer, Barr Pharmaceuticals, and Bristol-Meyers Squibb are three of the corporate donors that have donated hundreds of thousands of pens, calculators, soap and other school supplies and it's nice to know that these companies who benefit from the plight of the AIDS epidemic in that country have a tiny moral conscious :) Again, not that I don't like free stuff...

Here's the link to the Goods for Good website in case you are interested!
http://www.goodsforgoodinternational.org/">http://www.goodsforgoodinternational.org/