Photo: Stewart Chambers
By Sasha Petrova
TWO dollars is hard to stretch over one day.
In fact, it’s almost impossible.
Dandenong’s Geerthana (Gee) Narendren is among the many who have tried.
She is one of the thousands of Australians who took part in Live Below the Line, a campaign that had people feeding themselves with $2 a day for five days, to attempt to understand how the 1.4 billion people living in poverty do it – every day.
“We’ve raised 1.3 million dollars from sponsorship from people who were getting donations from family and friends and corporate sponsorship,” said Gee, who is not just a participant but also the Logistics Officer for the Victorian part of the campaign.
Gee’s diet for the five days consisted of rice and pasta, as well as “pears and apples ‘costhey were cheap. I couldn’t buy bananas because they’re too expensive,” she said.
The World Bank has estimated that the extreme poverty line sits at US$1.25 per day.
The estimate is a global average, worked out by equalising the relative currencies over each country’s purchasing power. In this way, it disproves the argument that the US$1.25 would go further in developing countries than it would here.
The Live Below the Line organisers took into account the changes in Australia since 2005, when the World Bank’s estimate was released, and came up with $2.
This is in fact, not only how much people live on in developing countries, but also in Australia.
“That doesn’t just cover food. It covers everything for the entire day,” Gee said.
Although Gee’s nutritional intake had dropped for only a few days, she found herself unable to concentrate.
“It’s not a great diet and it’s a bit difficult when you’re a uni student and got a lot of assignments.”
Gee studies a double degree in Arts/Law at Monash University.
“I’ve always thought I wanted to be a lawyer, but I’d rather be involved in social justice,” she said.
“I would love to keep working for organisations like this because I think what they do is amazing.”
The campaign’s goal is not only to provide a practical understanding of extreme poverty, but also to create dialogue and raise funds for those in need. In the midst of the campaign, Gee was thinking about poverty a lot more than usual and having conversations about it with her friends.
“I think the second day I was thinking, ‘Wow this is crazy’.
“I can’t imagine having to do this every day.
“If you got sick or something, we recommend that you stop.
“But people don’t get to stop. They do it every day.”
