This past Monday, October 20th, I celebrated with tens of thousands of Indonesians in Jakarta to welcome their 7th President, Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, as he’s affectionately called. Jokowi is the first directly-elected Indonesian president who is not tied to the political or military elite dated back to the Suharto era. He rose to success from poor family background by building a furniture export business in his hometown Solo. He had to borrow money (just like a Kiva borrower!) to start his business and failed several times before he found success. He later became the Mayor of Solo in 2005 and... Continue Reading >>
Fellows Blog Posts by Irene Fung
This past Monday, October 20th, I celebrated with tens of thousands of Indonesians in Jakarta to welcome their 7th President, Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, as he’s affectionately called. Jokowi is the first directly-elected Indonesian president who is not tied to the political or military elite dated back to the Suharto era. He rose to success from poor family background by building a furniture export business in his hometown Solo. He had to borrow money (just like a Kiva borrower!) to start his business and failed several times before he found success. He later became the Mayor of Solo in 2005 and... Continue Reading >>
By Irene Fung | KF19 | India
Water and Sanitation may not be the first issue that people associate with Kiva. Entrepreneurs scoop up most of the headlines in micro-finance, but when it comes to alleviating poverty, other less publicized loan products are equally important. In fact, Kiva is committed to increasing peoples’ access to financial services to facilitate the development of water and sanitation, a key development challenge.
India has felt this challenge acutely with 67% of the rural households lacking any access to sanitation facilities. In Odisha, India...
Continue Reading >>By Irene Fung | KF19 | India
Eileen and Irene are both fellows in India. Eileen is living in Imphal, Manipur and Irene is in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. While in conversations with one another, we have been struck by how different the cities are. We’ve compiled these observations to share with you our experiences of the rich and diverse culture of India. In Part I, we start with Irene in Odisha and continue with Eileen in Part 2.
Top 3 things that you always notice while roaming your neighborhood.
1. Inner City Cows. As people familiar with India...
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