Summer Activities in the DC Area for Children

A quick post to point to a few interesting activities for children in the DC area.

• Registration is open for German language classes at the Goethe Institut. Info here.
• Acting for Young People's summer program is open for registration. Info here.
• The India International School's language, music and dance classes are continuing. Info here.
• Inf0rmation about children's summer programming at Wolf Trap is available here.

Update (June 15, 2010) - The German lessons at the Goethe Institut are targeted at adults, not children. Thanks.

A 4-year-old needs a bone marrow transplant; the situation is dire

I'm copying here a note circulated by Bloomberg on behalf of their colleague. If you have never registered with the Bone Marrow Registry, please consider doing it. It's a very simple process. This story puts a face to all those people that are waiting for a match. Due to his family ancestry (1/4 South Indian, 3/4 European) Devan's potential match could come from someone who is of mixed Asian and European descent.

Our colleague Indira's only child, Devan, needs your help. He’s four and has relapsed with a rare form of high-risk leukemia. His doctors believe his life depends on a bone marrow transplant that they hope to do after 12 weeks of chemotherapy.

What is difficult is finding a donor match – 1 in 200,000 in his case, we've been told - and we haven't found one yet. You or someone you know might be the person who can save Devan’s life. All you need to do is a simple cheek swab to find out. The organizations below will send you a kit. Donating is easy – these days it’s much like a simple blood draw.

1.PLEASE, REGISTER NOW. The test is easy & free, but processing takes time (10 weeks in the UK), and Devan doesn’t have much. Register below.

2.PLEASE FORWARD THIS ON TO OTHERS. Anyone can be a match, but those who are mixed Indian/Caucasian have an even better chance of helping Devan. Please, please, cut and paste this message to strip out email addresses and forward this to everyone you can. By forwarding this email to at least 10 people now, we can spread the word to 50,000 possible donors within 48 hours.

3. VISIT DEVAN’S SITE - www.matchdevan.com - we will be including details on how to organize your own drive, valuable information on leukemia and FAQ’s on registering and donation.

WHERE TO REGISTER

=> In the US go to Be The Match Bone Marrow Registry, http://www.marrow.org/JOIN/Join_Now/join_now.html (you need to
be 60 or under)
=> In the UK go to the Anthony Nolan Trust, http://bit.ly/cpkxuy
(you’ll need to be 40 or under)
=> In other countries go to Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide, http://bmdw.org/
index.php?id=addresses_members&no_cache=1 Finally, if you’re pregnant, your
cord blood is particularly valuable for helping children like Devan - please
look here to learn more: http://parentsguidecordblood.org/content/usa/banklists/publicbanks_new.shtml?navid=15

Thank you so much for helping.

Update: June 3, 2010