Amherst Club notes. May 24, 2011
Rachel
Mustin presided while our president continues her visit to Great Britain. She reminded
us that on today’s date in 1626, the Dutch purchased Manhattan from the
Carnasie Indians. Since the tribe did not actually live there, the island was
later repurchased from the Lenape Indians who did. Susie Lowenstein added that
the Dutch later traded Manhattan for Surinam. Strange real estate transactions
are nothing new!
Guests:
Karin
Wilburn introduced her mother, Marge Zavada, who was celebrating her 90th
birthday.
Rachel
brought her daughter, Sharon Hare, as her guest.
Tina hosted
her husband Michael.
A new
member, Frances South, has just been elected town moderator in Belchertown,
increasing town moderators in the Amherst Club to two.
Bill Hart
stood up to lead “Happy Birthday” singing to Marge Zavada, Jacquie Price and
Carolyn Holstein. (The latter two did not reveal their ages.) There were no
other announcements.
Phyllis
Lehrer introduced Peter Swift, executive director of the Southeast Asia
Development Program, which seeks to support grass roots efforts to empower
communities in Cambodia that are threatened by government sales of land to
foreign countries. These
companies, mostly Chinese and Vietnamese, threaten human rights nearly every
day as they evict indigenous peoples in order to build hotels, cut down trees
to plant rubber plantations, mine gold and other minerals. Armed force prevents the local people
access to the forests and streams on which they depend for their livelihoods.
Although the government claims these companies offer employment to the citizens
of Cambodia, it is only temporary and any jobs usually go to outsiders.
Working
since 1999 to help the citizens protest their rights and defend their land,
Peter and his dedicated Cambodian co-workers have taught citizens means for
identifying peaceful strategies for organizing communities to file petitions to
the government and to finding safe and effective ways to make it see that its
citizens are not receiving permanent employment, nor bettering their lot. One interesting aspect of this organizational
training has proved the effectiveness of women, who are ignored by a government
who doesn’t take them seriously. The women thus can work meaningfully behind
the scenes without fear of detection, to keep protests non-violent and
meaningful. Efforts to date have
proved slowly successful as various groups work together with assistance from
grants from the McKnight Foundation, Friendship with Cambodia, and
contributions from individuals to help to wield influence on the government. As
scholarships are offered to young people to finish high school and college,
hope is high that the government will change its policies so that a better
educated citizenry can improve their opportunities.
Honore David
