Junk Mail Letters: World Vision

Lincoln Trudeau

MY ADDRESS

MY CITY, PROVINCE

MY COUNTRY/POSTAL CODE

MY PHONE NUMBER

Oct. 19, 2000

WORLD VISION

P.O. BOX 1100 STN

STREETSVILLE, ON

L5M 9Z9

Dear Dave Toycen, President:

Thank you for writing me and informing me of some of the troubles in the world that we in the privileged part of the world do not have to face directly. You tell me that in Mozambique, after years of civil war, thousands of people there are starving. I feel terribly about this.

And then you send me a packet of carrot seeds. I'm confused. Here I am, never having to go hungry and you give me carrot seeds after you just told me people are starving to death. Are you for real? That'd be like telling Bill Gates about the homeless and telling him he just won the lottery. How will I plant these seeds in October anyway? I'm not a gardener but unless these are snow carrots I think these aren't going to do me much good.

But it gets worse. You tell me that no, these aren't for me, they are for starving people. But in order for these starving people to get their food, I have to sign the packet of seeds. You're playing with people's lives here for god's sake! What if I had never opened that letter or just said, "Ah junk mail, who needs it?" and tossed it in the dumpster?

You mention the heart-wrenching tale of Alek Thuch, who lost her three children and is now facing death herself. Pretty heavy stuff. And I'd hate to be the guy to have to tell Alek, "Sorry lady, we had food all ready to go. We were gonna send it to you directly and solve all your problems but what fun is that? So to make it interesting, we sent a package to a random stranger in Canada just to see if he'd actually sign it and send it back to us. Y'know, just to ratchet up the suspense and make you wait and give you something to look forward to. Well, he didn't do nothin' so guess you're gonna have to starve and probably die. Hey, life sucks, now stop crying for god's sake! STOP CRYING! Oh, I can't take this, I'm gonna go have me some prime rib and we'll see if we can scrape up some more carrot seeds for you, ya big baby."

Humanitarian organization, are you? Ha! Nonsense! And what's with your 30-hour famine too by the way? I've gone 30 hours without food before without even knowing it when I was hungover or sick. Any feat you can accomplish by accident is not very impressive. I have a better idea for a fund-raising challenge: a 30-day famine. Get a bunch of students or whatever, drop them off in a desert location with a lot of toilet paper and a How To Cook Cactus 17 Different Ways Without Getting Quills In Your Teeth guide. After 30 days, they'd get so skinny their skin would be stretched tight against their bones now that's a famine! I'd pay a guy $10 to do that! In any event, I want my carrot seeds sent to Alek. Now. I've rubber-stamped them, now send 'em out! Chop chop!

Fondest regards,

Lincoln Trudeau

P.S. I don't even like carrots.