Having had no response to this post I prove my point about the Asian community and its lack of involvement in such issues.
I'm determined to spark up a conversation about bone marrow donation so please post your thoughts on the subject and get the ball rolling.

Charmed,

It sucks to hear about your niece, especially since she is SOO young. My heart goes out to you and your family, really it does.

Please do not expect a response from the two bit fudis, they are too caught up with smelling their own farts to give a crap. its a cruel world, no matter how old you are!

But thank you for highlighting this, I shall make sure this gets some coverage!!

Charmed, whilst I really sympathise with your situation, I don't think you should use the lack of responce as an excuse to knock the Asian community.

The fact is, you are wasting your energies as hardly anyone bothers with this site... it's quite redundant.

And even if the Asian community does want to ignore the issue, it doesn't give you the right to judge them, or speak down to them. That won't solve anything.

Thug, your shit stirring ios just immature.

Fuck u!

Go back to smelling your farts Mola!!

Mola its not just this site that gives me an excuse to knock the Asian community, its also the last two months of campaigning and the struggle i've had trying to get people to understand the importance of this.
I don't want you to sympathise with me, I want to see people being proactive. After all, if it happened to my niece it can happen to anyone.
You're right I don't have the right to judge anyone or look down my nose but I do it because I know that if any one of these people needed a donor for someone they loved, they wouldn't turn it down then. They would be just as desperate as me. That, my dear, is desperation not judgement and I think you're actually being a little insensitive.
My niece is going to die if she doesnt get a transplant, I'm not going to pussy foot around the issue, I'm going to tell it how it is.
I know this site isn't bubbling with activity but even if I get through to one person, I haven't wasted my time.
Its not like this is the only route I've taken. We were on the front page of the Birmingham Mail today and tomorrow we're doing an interview with ITV and the Birmingham post. We should have a lot more going on over the next week too. So believe me I'm doing everything in my power.
Negative comments don't actually help my cause so unless you have some practical advice I wouldn't bother replying. Thanks.

Hi Charmed,

My heart goes out to you, I have just visited your facebook site and reading about your beautiful, precious niece broke my heart. As a mother I can't even begin to comprehend how Alishba's parents must be feeling and the pain they must be going through. I will say a prayer for Alishba tonight my love and will send the link to my friends. I do hope you find a match soon Xxx

i empathise and can understand, but dealing with serious illness in the family is something that is still very close to the bone for me...i cant say anymore than that.

Inshallah all goes well..prayers and well wishes are all i can offer. God bless all of you. Keep praying cause it can and does make a difference. :-)

Charmed, you're quite right. It was insensative of me and I apologise.

It fact it is true that the Asian community in particular apathetic towards such issues. Perhaps it stems from our cultural or religious beliefs?

In any case hope all goes well for your niece.

Thug... eat sh*t and die.

Hahaha!!!

I'm a coming for you Mola Ram!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxHuK0QndAY

NLper, Shekhar and Mola, thank you ever so much for responding to me. Your kind words do help and prayers are more than welcome, they've done the job so far!
The babies mum is completely in denial but you can't blame her, she can't bear to think of her child dying and the dad is putting on a brave face but you can tell its killing him inside. It's not a nice time for my family but what makes it harder is having all these obstacles in the way of finding a bone marrow match for my niece. Never have I quite understood the meaning of trying to find a needle in a haystack.
Sheks, I appreciate and totally understand that some people are unable to consider becoming donors but I've truly come to believe that for the majority, it is our moral obligation to become donors.For example, if anyone of us had a car accident, developed organ failure or cancer, our families would never refuse a transplant. They would do anything to save us. My issue is people are ok with taking a life saving gift but not willing to return the favour. Thats pretty selfish in my book but I understand it because I was like that too. Since my niece was diagnosed I've become a blood, bone marrow and organ donor in the hope that I can prevent another family having to go through this.
Mola, thank you for your apology, I didnt mean to have a go at you but that attitude kind of gets to you when its all you've experienced, especially when you're heartbroken. It is becoming clear to me that attitudes towards becoming a donor definitely stem from religion and culture. Yet I've done my research and it is generally allowed, depends on which school of thought you're from. My family is Muslim and they're completely fine with me signing up but I do know a lot of Muslims claim its forbidden to donate organs when you die as the body isn't to be interfered with at all. There is, however, a line in the Quran which says 'to save the life of one human being, is to save all of mankind'. That was good enough for my family. Its all about changing attitudes, that's what I'm hoping anyway.

Here's the link for Alishbas first television appeal, please show everyone, like I said even if only one person comes forward we could find our perfect match

http://www.itvlocal.com/central/news/?player=CEN_News_15&void=218610

For all those living in Birmingham and the surrounding area, there is a bone marrow recruitment drive tomorrow at

Birmingham City University
Perry Barr Campus
Franchise Street
B42

It will be held between 4 and 8pm and people from all ethnic backgrounds are welcome to attend. I hope to see you there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxCMccq-uNs

Its interesting that no one has replied since you posted that well made video about ur niece,which is distrubing. I did hold back from saying anything before, because you totally disregarded my earlier comments in your previous post on: 08:10pm - 1st August, 2008.

But she is gorgeous! i hope you find a donor soon!!

I was trying to keep out of the way of you and Mola arguing with one another but I did appreciate you sticking up for me! and plus, you had already replied, I was having a go at the people who didn't bother to respond at all.
Yeah I noticed no one has posted on this thread, evidently there are people reading the other posts.
To be honest it's not just individuals on here, I'd say the majority of Asian people choose to remain ignorant about this subject. Its nice to be given a choice, isn't it?
We had our bone marrow drive yesterday, after a week of publicity and only 40 people turned up, the majority were white, can't tell you how disappointing it was.
Fact is, people don't realise that I'm not doing this just to help my niece. I'm trying to increase the number of donors on our national register, for everyone. God forbid if any of you should need a donor, you'll be faced with the same apathetic attitude and only then will you understand how excruciatingly painful it is to know that there are people out there who could help but can't be bothered to because they feel its nothing to do with them, not their problem.
Oh well, one can only ask.

hi all,

before i comment, i just want to remind ppl that not posting on a particular thread, doesn't always indicate widespread apathy.

a thread such as this is quite personal and emotive and some ppl may simply choose not to vocalise their message of support or sympathy when they don't know the individual posting.

i'm sure many more reading this (but not posting) have been given food for thought and, hopefully, may just go and do something about becoming a donor - before they're 'forced' to 'see sense' when something happens to one of their own.

when i found myself in chArMeD's situ ten years ago, i simply never thought anything like that would happen to us. and how many times are we gonna hear ppl say that?

i found out the hard way that ppl's motivation to change, to do something that can make a difference to more than their inner circle, usually happens through personal experience - and not before. (altho some simply disagree with becoming a donor full stop, even when they're told they can save their loved one's life.)

keep asking and keep talking about alishba, chArMed.

it's worth more than you realise.

OMG Im so sorry Charmed matey, I only visit this site every few moons, and trust me i think a lot of the guys and gals are like me in that respect (not apathetic, jus lethargic...)

Ok, from what i know, I live practically down the road fromn your village in Pakistan so genetically we should in 'theory' be close , so its worth a shot, Im gonna contact the facebook site and wanna take part in this.

I'll do my best to raise awareness for this as best as I can through my day job too, but please please keep faith and keep bangin on about it, sometimes it works to keep the message out there and Inshallah the right thing will happen...

Our prayers are with you and you're nieces family.....

Hello Charmed.
I was wondering if I could contact you. I'm writing a piece on these issues and would like to get some information from you. Please could you post an e-mail address for me to write to you.

Hey I haven't visited the site for a while so apologies for missing your messages Raja and Journo, thank you for your sweet words and helping to raise awareness about bone marrow donation.
The last few months have been hectic, donor clinics have been held all around the UK and a few of us have been actively campaigning within our local communities. Trying to engage the Asian people about this subject is like pulling teeth with a pair of tweezers!! It frustrates me because I now personally know of three other babies who desperately require BMT's and they are struggling to find matches. That means over the next year I could quite possibly witness the deaths of four children and I can't bear that thought, especially when someone tells me they don't want to sign up because of something stupid like they're scared of needles!!!
Did you know a white person has a 1 in 5 chance of finding a suitable match, for Asian people it's closer to 1 in 250,000!! and no one wants to talk about it or do anything to change this abysmal situation.
I can't tell you how disappointed I am with the response we have had from Asian media professionals in terms of helping us to raise awareness about donating. On the contrary 'white' organisations/individuals have offered us their on-going help and support. I can't help but feel it a bit pointless when you're sending the message to the wrong target audience!
What we need is more people talking about this with their friends and family and acknowledging that something needs to change.
Cosmic, I would love to speak to you about this but I only have a personal email address and don't really want to post it on here, could I have yours instead?