A pig for Christmas

James_N

Today, my colleague's sister suggested he got a pig for Christmas instead of socks or a scarf. The pig is, of course, a charity gift, intended to improve someone's life in a less advantaged part of the world.

He exploded in indignation, and when asked to explain himself, wrote:

I am not convinced that a large proportion of the donation will not be taken up with administration, salaries of the charity, embezzlment etc.
I assume that it is not intended that a British pig is physically going to be air-freighted to Nicaragua. If it is simply that a pig, already located in Nicaragua, be given to the farmer , then that defeats the object of increasing the wealth of this poor country- or will it involve in fact buying a pig from a rich Nicaraguan farmer , in which case I do not want my sister's money to go towards making such a person richer .

I am also unsure who is going to choose the recipients. I understand Nicaragua is a very corrupt, unstable society, repeatedly fought-over over the last two decades by rival warlords, Sandinistaa, Contras, etc.What chance is there of the pig reaching a deserving case?

I would also make it a condition of receiving the pig that the farmer's wife is sterilised if she already has two children, so that secondary poverty through overpopulation is averted . This would probably mean the couple giving up their Catholic faith.

If, on the other hand, it IS intended to air-freight a pig from the UK to Nicaragua, then I would have a number of concerns . Firstly- the carbon footprint involved .Second, animal welfare issues , on the long haul flight. Thirdly, the unsuitability of British, temperate climate breeds of pig for the tropical climate of Nicaragua. The pig would probably succumb to yellow fever within a few weeks .
Fourth, the fact that the British Pig Industry is facing ruin through lack of government support , and unfair trading with Denmark and Poland .
Fifth- I want a present

---

From: xxxx
Sent: Fri 07/12/2007 11:18
To: xxxx
Subject: RE: Pigs

What bit are you not happy about?

Pigs?

Nicaragua?

Poverty-stricken?

Your sister?

P please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to.

---

From: xxxxx
Sent: 07 December 2007 10:51
To: xxxxxx
Subject: Pigs


My sister wants to know if I would like my Christmas present from her to be for her to send a pig to a poverty-stricken Nicaraguan farmer .

I am not really happy about this .

How can I decline without appearing to be a Scrooge ?



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do you think he has any valid points here? It made me think about it hard.

daisychainxo

I can see where he is coming from. I mean, you do want to be sure that the pig is actually helping someone, and that it is going to a good cause, with no money being wasted. However, some of his reasons I think are a bit "out there" - I guess he's just trying to come up with as many reasons as possible to back up his argument! I think if you got it from a respectable charity though, then hopefully most of the money would go to the cause. It seems to me like he just wants a present though, so best just to get him something for him!

moneysavingmumofone

he does make some valid points but it is rather obvious he wants a present i was actually looking at the charity gifts in tesco and on the packets it says how much of the money actually goes to the charity and it was only about half!

NBirdy

Maybe get him some socks with pigs on?

Stephen_Leak

I take it that's a "no" then?

Den1se

we also do this in work rather than give out christmas card to everyone - we all make a donation & we have done ours through Oxfam

floss2

moneysavingmumofone wrote: »

he does make some valid points but it is rather obvious he wants a present i was actually looking at the charity gifts in tesco and on the packets it says how much of the money actually goes to the charity and it was only about half!

If you buy Good Gifts from their own website, you don't get the tambourine or other token, but you get a card & picture of your gift, with your message inside, and all the cost goes to the gift - you can see who gets the money too.

llamedos36

I have also brought bricks to build a school in africa instead of sending christmas cards.

I was surprised at how many of my family complained and said they wanted a christmas card.

I also brought my children's teachers a presnt from save the children which enables a teacher in africa to recieve some valuable training and saves the teachers saying 'ohhh god not another box of chocolates'

this not only helps poorer countries but will also help the environment as i will not be sending out loads of cards just one general email

Bev xx

dawnteabag

I bought charity gifts a couple of years ago and got my fingers burned.

Bought a goat for one family which was very well received.

Bought 10 chickens for an uncle. to be honest, I begrudge spending a fiver on smellies that no-one wants and had no better ideas. In addition, I know that he never buys our gifts but gets my Gran (in her eighties) to do all his shopping, wrapping etc for him and so I couldn't really be bothered to put much effort in on his gift.

On bxing day I got a phone call from him which went something like this

Hello (me)
How much did you spend on my Christmas present? (him)
What? (me)
You hard - how much did you spend on my [EMAIL="bl@@dy"]bl@@dy[/EMAIL] Christmas present (him)
Pardon? (me)
How much?(him)
Thats a very rude question which I'm not going to answer. (me)
Well don't ever buy me a chicken again (him)
OK (me)
And if you're going to buy a chicken for me I'd appreciate it if you got one that I actually saw rather than sending it to some scroungers abroad. (him)
Merry Christmas (me) [put phone down]

Suffice to say I've not spoken to hims ince and have saved myself a lot of trouble by not buying him anything anymore. He gave me £10 that year so I donated it to the Tsunami appeal on his behalf.

Olliebeak

What a charming guy your uncle is!

James_N

dawnteabag wrote: »

I bought charity gifts a couple of years ago and got my fingers burned.

At least I can say that my colleague is a throughly nice guy.