PTBOCanada Feature Post: 7 Great Ways To Help The CMHA Locally
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Peterborough Blogs
Peterborough Man Leaving To Visit Refugee Camp In Jordan, Writes Eloquent Facebook Post
/Peterborough community ambassador Michael VanDerHerberg—who works at the New Canadians Centre and co-owns Silver Bean Café with his wife Andrea—is about to embark on the journey of a lifetime. He leaves for Jordan, an Arab nation on the east bank of the Jordan River, on Sunday (December 27th).
Jordan, which borders Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Israel and Palestine, is now home to more than one million Syrian refugees fleeing their war torn country. VanDerHerberg wants to view firsthand a refugee camp there: the living conditions, meet some of the families, see what can be done as the world deals with these deepening crisis.
VanHerHerberg pictured with one of his two children.
VanDerHerberg, who plans to post dispatches and photos from Jordan on social media, wrote an eloquent Facebook post about what this journey means to him—and how he thinks he has found his calling sotospeak. Here is an excerpt below...
Image via Unhcr.org
"I'll be staying with a friend, Faris Khoury, and he'll be my guide while in the great Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. I intend to visit a refugee camp while I am there, connecting with a UNHCR office, and working through some other connections to refugee-serving organizations in Amman, the capital city.
I have been involved in the refugee industry for about ten years now, and what began as a keen interest has now turned into a career of sorts with the New Canadians Centre (NCC) here in Peterborough. Andrea's [his wife] grandfather, who did the administrative work to sponsor 600+ refugees from around the world to come to Canada, taught me how to do this work before he passed a few years ago.
I began attending conferences and consultations with the Canadian Council for Refugees / Conseil canadien pour les réfugiés (CCR) and learned much more about what the work they and hundreds of other organizations across the country were doing to facilitate more and better private and government sponsorships, inland protection for refugee claimants, and overseas protection for those still in camps. They do incredible work. I encourage you to check out http://ccrweb.ca/ to learn more if you are interested.
I was then hired at the NCC as an Employment Counsellor and I worked my way into the role of Employment Services Coordinator over the years. While I still attended CCR conferences, served refugees through my role at NCC, and was involved in various local sponsorships, my involvement in private sponsorships became less and less leading into 2015.
Image via Unhcr.org
After a year parental leave, a season at the Silver Bean, and with a keen interest in consulting work, I took a position with Jonathan Bennett at Laridae Communications in March of this year serving the non-profit sector with strategy, projects, and business systems. Very engaging work. Great employer.
In late September, I received an email from a Sponsorship Agreement Holder, the larger organization through which I would have submitted private sponsorship applications, that a family whose application we submitted in 2010 was being called in for an interview. The only catch was that we had to submit all of the paperwork over again. All of it. This equates to about 40 pages per person and a family of four. 160. And, we thought their chances of acceptance were low because of some circumstances. To cut to the quick, we did it, they had the interview, and they were accepted. Hallelujah.
It floored me to realize that I was feeling pulled back into the refugee work and quickly. While working at Laridae, I started volunteering with Tamara offering workshops, attending forums, and jumping back in, head first, into the refugee world. I'm not sure if any of you ever feel 'calling', or vocation. I mentioned to Andrea weeks into this that I was feeling pulled back into this work. If you allow me to be a bit foolish and spiritual for a second, I have learned not to resist these feelings.
How does a young man, with all the privilege in the world, come to feel drawn to working with refugees? Yes, it is a desire to serve in a way that I feel that I can be effective; I won't deny it. It has also been born out of relationship, connections with real people, discovering that who we didn't previously know is often just like us with the same hopes and dreams. I may be nobody to you, and that's fine, but if you fear the other, then I would encourage you to make room, with a thousand steps, to receiving others into your life. For this I thank the TISA - Trent International Students' Association, the Trent International Program, the NCC, the local chapter of WUSC, the Rotary clubs here in Peterborough, the thousands of tourists I have met at our cafe, to those that we've hosted for dinner, to those that we have hosted in our home, and to those that have hosted me in their home on the other side of the world.
So, I'm back at the NCC. Laridae was very gracious to give me up for a bit, understanding that I was becoming much too distracted in it all to actually do both. And I've been hired, alongside Tamara Hoogerdyk, to be a Refugee Resettlement Coordinator, working with sponsoring groups that are assisting privately sponsored refugees as well as building good systems to possibly receive government assisted refugees in Peterborough.
If you're the praying sort, please do pray for me while I travel and while I'm there. Godspeed, as it were."
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Three Loonies Have Now Raised $1,200,000 In 15 Years For Kawartha Food Share
/The “Three Loonies on the Street” raised over $100,000 on behalf of Kawartha Food Share this year, bringing their 15 year total to $1,200,000 raised.
101.5 The Wolf, 100.5 Fresh Radio and CHEX- TV hosted again this year, welcoming The Loonies—Peter Blodgett of Darling Insurance, Bob McGillen of McGillen • Keay • Cooper Law Office and Robb Bennett of the Liftlock Group in Peterborough.
Kawartha Food Share assists more than 8,100 men, women and children every month through 37 member agencies. In 2014, their warehouse distributed over $10 million worth of food and emergency care needs.
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This Might Be The Only House In Peterborough With Snow
/It's a balmy Christmas season with zilch snow in Peterborough—except for this one house on Glengarry Avenue.
photo by Neil Morton
Yes, well played with bringing in this snow. This house will not have to dream of a White Christmas.
Photo by Neil Morton
Photo by Neil Morton
Photo by Neil Morton
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Season's Greetings From PTBOCanada.com
/We hope you have a safe and Happy Holiday!
Be sure to head out with friends and family over the holidays and check out the light show. A sampling below...
It Will Not Be A White Christmas In Peterborough
/Unless you have a snow making machine, it's highly probable you will not be seeing snow in Peterborough this Christmas. Indeed, the weather is looking downright balmy for this time of year.
CHEX TV Weather Analyst Mike Judson tells PTBOCanada what the heck is going on...
"The big bad Super El Nino is to blame for what will surely be a very green Christmas around our region—even for some places north of the city that saw a dumping of snow over the weekend. We will once again be experiencing well-above seasonal temperatures leading right up to Christmas Day. On Thursday, we are expecting to be back in the double digits! On Friday, things should cool off a bit but still remain above seasonal and we could even see cooler temperatures and flurries on the weekend—just not on Friday."
So there you have it. But hey, at least it's not this...
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Is Uber Coming To Peterborough?
/There has been buzz in the community lately about the possiblilty of Uber coming to town.
Uber—which connects riders and drivers using their own vehicles through a smartphone app—has been expanding aggressively around the world (it is now available in 68 countries). That expansion includes here in Canada, where it is already available in cities like Toronto, Montreal, Hamilton, Ottawa, Kitchener-Waterloo, London, Calgary, Kingston and more.
The service is not yet available in Peterborough, and when PTBOCanada asked Uber Support whether it will be coming here, they responded: "We're expanding quickly. So stay tuned for any changes! You can keep up to date with our cities on uber.com/cities."
Picture via Uber.com
What do you think of the possibility of the Uber service coming to Peterborough at some point? Tell us on our Facebook page.
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Meet A Miracle Peterborough Baby Named Michael
/A Peterborough baby named Michael John was born November 30th at 24 weeks, weighing 1 pound 8 ounces. At three months premature, he was given a 20 percent chance of surviving. Through great medical attention and the Grace of God, young Michael is alive and fighting at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto.
Edy holding MIchael for the first time
Michael's parents Amanda Johnson and Edy Jones are living in Toronto (away from work) to be at Michael's bedside—and he is expected to be in hospital there for months until it is deemed safe for him to return home to Peterborough.
Michael was born weight just 1 pound, 8 ounces
