Oxfam Asia Blog

Saving for Happiness

Muang, Pattani _ Timah was a lively, talkative, and very funny woman. Her willpower and sunny demeanor shone through her niqab which covered her from top to toe except her eyes. There was so much positive energy I had to go over my notes to check whether this was the same person whose husband and daughter were killed in a drive-by shooting almost two years ago.

My colleague from partner organization, Deep South Coordination Center (DSCC), was also surprised. Timah he met last year always looked depressed, lifeless, and on the verge of tearful breakdown upon hearing anything even remotely about the conflict between Muslim insurgency and authorities in this restive Muslim-dominated South.

The sudden death of her husband and daughter in early 2010 has torn Timah in pieces. Nothing could bring her out of grievances until last year, thanks to strong, unwavering support from family and friends in the community.

I was warned not to ask Timah about them as she was still traumatized so our talk focused on her work and income which has increased since November last year after she had received a 5,000-baht ($161.29) grant from Oxfam through DSCC.

But it was Timah who started talking about them, recounting how they were killed and what they were like, the conversation between her and her husband, their faith in Islam, God, and life. The list went on.

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Shakti — A Feminist Perspective Building and Performance Workshop

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Adapting to Climate Change, One Melon at a Time

A story on Mother Jones website by Kate Sheppard, who visited a Oxfam-supported project in Vietnam as a part of the Sixth International Conference on Community-based Adaptation (CBA6) to see how communities living in different ecosystems have adapted to climate change.  Read the full story here.

Viet Nam is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world to climate change and poor men and women are particularly at risk. The government’s impressive achievements in pulling millions of people out of poverty are seriously jeopardised by the likely increase in extreme weather events such as severe rainfall and drought, and by slow climate changes like sea level rises and warming temperatures.

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Women Leaders from the Philippines Join Int’l Women’s Conference in Istanbul

ISTANBUL, Turkey  - More than 2,000 women’s rights activists and grassroots leaders from across the world have come together for the 12th Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID) International Forum from 19-22 April, 2012. Themed Transforming Economic Power, the AWID Forum seeks to identify ways for women to engage, challenge and change the dominant global economic system which has fallen under greater scrutiny since it unraveled in 2008.

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Oxfam contributes to the birth of a nation

by Sarah Ireland, Regional Director of Oxfam GB, Asia

March 26 is Independence Day in Bangladesh, each year the thousands of Martyrs are remembered and people reflect on their own or family’s experience of the liberation war – everyone I know in Bangladesh has a story to tell.

This year the Independence Day celebration was particularly special for Oxfam in Bangladesh – we are one of 5 organisations and 120 individuals recognised by the state of Bangladesh for our contribution to the liberation war of 1971.

The war of 1971 is long forgotten by most of the world – but it marked the birth of the nation of Bangladesh – a small populous nation which continues to struggle with the many challenges of development but if full of people who are proud to call themselves a Bangladeshi.

I lived in Bangladesh for almost 6 years, I cut my development teeth on the wide variety of development solutions being practiced here and learnt to love the country where language, art, songs and singers are valued as much as doctors and engineers.

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Pakistan Floods 2011: Early recovery, a distant dream

By Sandra Barrows, Communications Coordinator, Oxfam

Six months after the floods of 2011-12 caused severe devastation in Sindh, people are still waiting to put the pieces back together because in many places flood water is still standing. This not only undermines the potential for planting Rabi crops (normally in November and December) but also delays early recovery programmes. Hashim Memon village in Tando Allah Yar district is one such place.

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Pakistan Floods 2011: Food insecurity & impact on livelihood

By Sandra Barrows, Communications Coordinator, Oxfam (Pakistan)

It has been six months since the 2011-12 monsoon rains caused severe flooding in Sindh affecting nearly five million people. The subsequent loss of seed stock, standing crops, livestock and other productive assets in addition to the reduced labour opportunities has severely undermined the way people obtain basic items.  Their way of coping includes reducing the size and frequency of their meals and obtaining food through credit or borrowing. This increases the risk of hunger that flood affected families face.

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LOVE HAS NO PRIDE

Sabarang, Pattani _They say love does not cost a thing. The statement could not be more true to Wasama-aeh Waedeng, if it has any cost, it is still worth fighting for.

That thought has never changed since he married his wife, Yoh Sulong when she was 20 years old. Now married for 23 years, Wasama-aeh still helps her with almost all household chores including cleaning, washing, and cooking around their small, wooden house in the southern Pattani province.

“I know it since the day we met that my wife is different but it’s ok. I was prepared for this and all the hard work that would follow,” said the 45-year-old house painter about his wife’s health as she was born with a weak heart and hearing problem that is getting worse over the years.

But the hard work Wasama-aeh had braced for definitely did not involve being the only man in a roomful of hundreds of women when he was representing his case to get the 5,000-baht ($161) grant from Oxfam for his wife’s small business.
“I was very interested when I heard that Oxfam partner’s Deep South Coordination Center (DSCC) launched the project in 2010. Although I felt strange and awkward that it focused on women who lost their husbands from insurgency killing, I applied for the grant anyway when it expanded the grant conditions to cover poor families,” Wasama-aeh recalled.

Wasama-aeh’s feelings were not uncommon in this part of Thailand as Pattani is one of the country’s three violence-infested Muslim-dominated provinces where bombing and drive-by shooting by insurgencies occur almost on a daily basis. Since the violence resurfaced in 2001, more than 2,000 women were widowed from the killings. More »