Fwd: Seva/Help Needed Now!

[Medha Joshi]

Dearest Art of Living Family,

Kiki Ciecielski is an Art of Living Teacher whose partner, Alfredo, is in dire need.  Some of us have been helping them since October or November & she is very grateful.  See below for a letter from her and from another friend and teacher, Debra Poneman.  Debra describes the situation and background.  Kiki & Alfredo did speak with Sri Sri when he was here in Chicago. 

As their situation is deteriorating now, we need to move forward together to help -- those who would like to--- 

We have several options:

1) Food:  a) cooking a meal or 2 and delivering it to their home/business   b) ordering food for them through a nearby restaurant (see below) or c) donate for groceries

2) Donate $ via www.Paypal.com  (best) or www.gofundme.com/AlfredoandKiki  (charges several fees).  For paypal enter the e-address deb...@iglide.net and it will take you to the site where you can register.

3) Donate sturdy, working medical equipment:  hospital bed, wheel chair, portable wheel chair, walker,  etc.

4) Do chores such as snow removal, cleaning house, construct wheel chair ramp to house, etc.  Sign up via the Helpinghands website that Kiki's sister has put together and Kiki's friend manages.  https://www.lotsahelpinghands.com/c/724272/?utm_source=system-gen-6&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=engagement&utm_content=www 

Like someone said, "Seva starts at home"  Please help however you can. 

Sonia Arora and Sowmya Kilaru are taking responsibility for the food coordination and you can reach them at:  helpingh...@gmail.com or their phone #'s:  Sonia: (815) 793-3207  or Sowmya:  (312) 238-9531  The meal train website is being personalized by Teacher Barry Rosen and as soon as the dietary guidelines are approved by Kiki, it will go live.  The idea is that if enough people participate, we only need to cook 1x per month.  You can cook a larger portion if you want so they can eat the same meal for Lunch and Dinner.  Whatever you can do is great!!!

If you have equipment, Sonia and Sowmya will connect you with the appropriate person to talk with.

Restaurants where you can order food and have it delivered:

Amitabul  
6207 N. Milwaukee, Chicago, IL 
773-774-0276 
(closed Sunday and Monday)  

Native Foods Cafe  
Lakeview Location: 1023 W Belmont, Chicago, IL 
773-549-4904 
Bucktown Location: 1484 N Milwaukee, Chicago, IL 
773-489-8480 

Blind Faith Cafe 
525 Dempster Street, Evanston, IL 60201 
(847) 328-6875 

Lyfe Kitchen 
413-419 N Clark St, Chicago, IL  
312-836-5933 
1603 Orrington Ave, Evanston, IL 
(847) 563-8242 

Thank you so much for your help!!!!

Lots of love & Jai Guru Dev,

Email from Kiki:

Dear Friends,

I am so grateful that you are taking the time to read this.  We are so grateful for you blessings, prayers donations and thoughts and plans ofhow to help us. 

I know many of you know about Alfredo's diagnosis of ALS, and have donated, brought food, shoveled snow, helped in many other ways.

Thank you

The best way to donate is thru pay pal, as we avoid a large service fee.

Please share in your networks. This would help me immensely .

Everything you send is very helpful to us. This is also in Facebook . I appreciate all that you can share

Blessings,

Alfredo and Kiki

Email from Debra:

Dearest friend of Alfredo and Kiki,

As you probably know by now, Alfredo has been diagnosed with ALS, known by most as Lou Gehrig's disease

and recently portrayed in the Oscar nominated movie about Steven Hawkings, The Theory of Everything.

ALS is a neurodegenerative disease that causes the brain to lose its ability to communicate with the muscles

in the body.  Control over bodily functions and muscle movement becomes less and less until there is no control

whatsoever and the patient loses his or her ability to not only move but to speak, swallow and even breathe.  

Once the total paralysis sets in, death usually comes rather quickly.  The brain however, remains clear and intact 

this entire time.

I'm sorry to report that Alfredo's degeneration is happening very rapidly and he and Kiki

sincerely need our help.

Alfredo can no longer work due to his condition (although he tries to go to work once or twice

a week but it takes Kiki about 2 hours to get him ready) and Kiki works about 6 hours each day after

making his breakfast and lunch and taking care of the house and the dogs and then comes home to

take care of him through the night.  

There is no health insurance and the money coming in through the business (Bumper City) needs

to go to try and keep the business alive and pay the employees.  This leaves little or nothing for day-to-day

needs like food, help with everything including getting Alfredo around, and medical expenses which are 

piling up.  Even the little things like someone to shovel the snow (Alfredo just had a terrible fall because of 

the snow and ice on the walk) is out of their ability to pay for right now.

Alfredo's running buddies have set up a Crowd Funding site that is exclusively for medical expenses but there

are just so many needs like a wheel chair and building accessibility into their house, that it’s hardly putting a

dent into what’s needed.  And right now they need money to live on.

You can make a donation by going to the GoFundMe site we set up here:  

www.gofundme.com/AlfredoandKiki

However, we want you to know that they take 5% and you can only donate via credit card which takes 

another 2.9%.  If you’d like to make a direct donation, all you need to do is go to www.PayPal.com and put in 

the e-address deb...@iglide.net and that will take you to a PayPal account I set up and you can make your 

donation there.  This way, they will get 100%. Please make sure that you check that it is a personal and not 

a business transaction so we don't have to pay a fee to PayPal.

Alfredo and Kiki want you to know that they love and appreciate everything you’ve done already by helping

them in so many ways.  If you can now see it in your heart to help  them with funds to stay above water, this

will alleviate some of the tremendous burden that is so heavy on them at this time.

On behalf of our dear Kiki and Alfredo, sending love and deep gratitude for your help and your prayers,

Debra

PS Please pass this on to anyone who you think might know Kiki or Alfredo (or anyone who doesn’t but might

be in a position to help these two truly good and caring souls).

[Vidyalakshmi Iyer]

Medha,

I already donated through the website. and these are mostly stuff that you all from Chicago are I am sure doing greatly.

I was also thinking, can we all chant regularly for her 108 ONS via conference call, if you are all already doing that, please do let me know the conference line information and I will join when I can.

Thank you

Jai GurDev,

Vidya

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[Mmgarud]

Thanks dear !

You are so generous !

Yes it's a great idea to chant ons ! 

Can you set it up and take resp for it ?

Who else can help vidya ?

Please respond to this email !

Lots of love 

Jgd 

Medha Garud

[Chandini]

Medha Didi

I can help vidya

Sent from my iPhone

[Mmgarud]

Great Chandini!

Jgd

Let us know when this will be set up and start!

Love jgd  

Medha Garud

[Vidyalakshmi Iyer]

Great Medha and chandini 

I have a free conference nbr already 

You can use that or you can use what you have

WhAts a good timing for all of you? 

JGD

Vidya