Counting down to Seva Canada’s 30th Anniversary in April 2012, here’s the second in our series of “random acts of seva”.
Seva means service. There’s no better example of this than Susan Erdmann, a Seva Canada board member and über-volunteer. There’s not much that Susan wouldn’t do for Seva and to help blind people see again.
Susan is passionate about Seva’s work and has traveled at her own expense to photograph the eye care programs and camps in remote areas of Tibet and Nepal.
For the past year, Susan has been raising funds for a special surgical eye camp in Nakchu, Tibet. She needed about $2000 more to reach her goal and, for her last fundraising push, she decided that she would conquer her deepest fear — swimming in deep water — in order to raise funds.
Susan approached her friends and family to sponsor her to dive to the bottom of the pool and retrieve a pair of children’s glasses. All those who made a gift to the eye camp would get a special treat — a picture and video of Susan in a bathing suit.
Here’s a magazine cover created by her nephew that provoked a lot of giggles and emails from Susan’s fans.
Cover girl Susan Erdmann
And here’s the lovely Susan with the glasses.
Susan conquers her fear of deep water to raise funds for Seva
We say there’s not much Susan wouldn’t do for Seva… but she did draw the line on posting the video on YouTube!
We salute Susan for her kindness, compassion and tremendous dedication to Seva and to restoring sight to the blind.
Never doubt that a group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. Margaret Mead
Our bathing beauty committing a random act of seva
