Exciting Exciting News! Our tickets to Michigan have been officially purchased!! We will leave DIA at around 9 am on October 25th and arrive in South Bend Indiana at around 5 in the afternoon where we will be picked up and taken to our new home at IICD in Dewagiac Michigan where we will begin our adventure!
When August rolled around I started to realize how close October is and now that our tickets are purchased the whole things is feeling really real! I think about how fast this summer has gone by and I am realizing that it is time to start getting in some serious quality time with our friends and families. This will be the longest either of us have been out of Colorado, away from our families, or out of the country. It is a very new and different experience and it will be like nothing we have ever done before. It is hard to imagine being away from the people that play such an important role in my life while also living in such drastically different living conditions and going through so much both physically as well as emotionally. Its starting to feel so intense but still so exciting. We will truly be thrown out of our comfort zones so many times and in so many different ways throughout the year we will be gone and this can only offer us an incredible number of opportunities to learn more about who we really are and our places in the world around us.
We are still working on fundraising (check out our Fundraising Thermometer on our blog!) and although we have had some hiccups in our plans things are still moving! We are having a family fundraising party in couple of weeks which is very exciting. We were going to send out fundraising letters to our families and then we thought, this is our family! We figured we might as well have an opportunity to get the whole family together and spend quality time with them instead of just sending out a formal letter to the people we love. We are also still working on a wine tasting event and we will have more details coming soon!
Keep checking back for more exciting articles about Belize and more updates about our journey!
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Sunday, August 1, 2010
A Short Biography of George Price
“It has been my dedicated task to lead the movement of Belizean independence from the chains of British colonialism”- George Price
George Cadle Price was born January 15th, 1919 in Belize City. He was Belize’s first Prime Minister and was an anti-colonial activist and a founder of the People’s United Party (PUP), who helped lead the nation to semi-independence from Great Britain. In Belize many call him the Father of the Nation. Below is a very short timeline analysis of his career, from his early activist years till independence.
Activist Years
In 1947 George Price ran for Belize City Council and was elected. This was the beginning of a long successful political career. He ran to address the deplorable living standards of the Belizean peoples.
In 1950 British Honduras (Belize) unemployment was very high and the working class was idle and poverty stricken under the conditions imposed on them by British colonialism. Under these conditions George Price helped form the precursor to the PUP, the Peoples Committee.
Later that year the Peoples Committee would be reconstituted as the PUP and the fight for independence from Britain began. The PUP and the General Workers Union (GWU) organized a national general strike in 1952 to protest the British colonists. The strike was partially successful, but the main victory was awakening the militancy of the Belizean working class.
The year 1954 saw the British colonial government grant the people of Belize the right to vote, this was due to the agitation and organizing of the PUP and GWU. In 1956 George Price became the leader of the PUP after a dispute between PUP party leaders, this gave Price the chance to push for independence with the party under his control.
Under the leadership of Price the PUP was able to create a strong foundation amongst the Belizean people, and local elections started seeing PUP candidates winning campaigns. The PUP used tactics such as mass mobilizations and political agitation to become a force that the British would be forced to acknowledge and deal with.
In 1964 George Price became the premier of Belize and self-government was finally in the hands of a Belizean. The British colonial government kept the reigns on foreign affairs as well as the defense forces.
For fifteen years George Price and the PUP organized the masses for political independence from Britain and in 1981 they were granted it. They were granted Common Wealth status which means the Queen and or King is officially still the head of state but Common Wealth countries still enjoy nearly complete independence.
George Price continued to be a force in Belize and the PUP until he resigned as party leader in 1996.
Awards:
2000- Price was awarded the Order of National Hero (of Belize). This is the highest award granted in Belize and it was the first.
2001- The Caribbean Community (CARICOM-Trade bloc) awarded Price the Order of the Caribbean Community. “George Price remains the patriarch of his nation, birthing its existence as an independent national state and charting its emergence from economic backwardness to a state of development in which it stands as a centripetal and unifying force in Central American/Caribbean relations.”
2005- Fidel Castro awarded Price the highest award a non-national can receive the Jose Marti award.
References
http://www.pup.org.bz/index.php/the-party/history-of-party/item/194-peoples-united-party-1950-2000
http://www.belizenet.com/history/
http://www.mayanbzevideo.com/4.html
http://www.caricom.org/jsp/projects/personalities/rt_hon_george.jsp?menu=projects
George Cadle Price was born January 15th, 1919 in Belize City. He was Belize’s first Prime Minister and was an anti-colonial activist and a founder of the People’s United Party (PUP), who helped lead the nation to semi-independence from Great Britain. In Belize many call him the Father of the Nation. Below is a very short timeline analysis of his career, from his early activist years till independence.
Activist Years
In 1947 George Price ran for Belize City Council and was elected. This was the beginning of a long successful political career. He ran to address the deplorable living standards of the Belizean peoples.
In 1950 British Honduras (Belize) unemployment was very high and the working class was idle and poverty stricken under the conditions imposed on them by British colonialism. Under these conditions George Price helped form the precursor to the PUP, the Peoples Committee.
Later that year the Peoples Committee would be reconstituted as the PUP and the fight for independence from Britain began. The PUP and the General Workers Union (GWU) organized a national general strike in 1952 to protest the British colonists. The strike was partially successful, but the main victory was awakening the militancy of the Belizean working class.
The year 1954 saw the British colonial government grant the people of Belize the right to vote, this was due to the agitation and organizing of the PUP and GWU. In 1956 George Price became the leader of the PUP after a dispute between PUP party leaders, this gave Price the chance to push for independence with the party under his control.
Under the leadership of Price the PUP was able to create a strong foundation amongst the Belizean people, and local elections started seeing PUP candidates winning campaigns. The PUP used tactics such as mass mobilizations and political agitation to become a force that the British would be forced to acknowledge and deal with.
In 1964 George Price became the premier of Belize and self-government was finally in the hands of a Belizean. The British colonial government kept the reigns on foreign affairs as well as the defense forces.
For fifteen years George Price and the PUP organized the masses for political independence from Britain and in 1981 they were granted it. They were granted Common Wealth status which means the Queen and or King is officially still the head of state but Common Wealth countries still enjoy nearly complete independence.
George Price continued to be a force in Belize and the PUP until he resigned as party leader in 1996.
Awards:
2000- Price was awarded the Order of National Hero (of Belize). This is the highest award granted in Belize and it was the first.
2001- The Caribbean Community (CARICOM-Trade bloc) awarded Price the Order of the Caribbean Community. “George Price remains the patriarch of his nation, birthing its existence as an independent national state and charting its emergence from economic backwardness to a state of development in which it stands as a centripetal and unifying force in Central American/Caribbean relations.”
2005- Fidel Castro awarded Price the highest award a non-national can receive the Jose Marti award.
References
http://www.pup.org.bz/index.php/the-party/history-of-party/item/194-peoples-united-party-1950-2000
http://www.belizenet.com/history/
http://www.mayanbzevideo.com/4.html
http://www.caricom.org/jsp/projects/personalities/rt_hon_george.jsp?menu=projects
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