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| Help Spread the Holiday Spirit through a Soccer Ball Donation |
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 Photo Caption - Former New Castle Soccer Player and mother of two Sgt. Jennifer Zitani has asked for soccer balls to give to Iraqi children in lieu of traditional Christmas presents for her family. Can you help?
The Thanksgiving edition of the New Castle paper, The Courier Times, recently featured a story about a former New Castle resident, Jenny Brown Zitani, who played soccer for the first New Castle soccer team and throughout high school as a goal keeper, and her efforts in Iraq.
Today, Jenny is a Marine Sergeant serving in Iraq who left behind two small boys(under three years old) and a husband in North Carolina (who is also a Marine). Jenny loves to work with the kids in Iraq and with her background in soccer, is asking people to make donations of soccer balls for Iraqi youth in lieu of traditional holiday presents for she and her family. You can read Jenny's touching Christmas letter to her family and friends below.
The Courier Times is serving as a drop off point for balls and monetary donations (for shipping costs to Iraq) in the New Castle area. The local soccer organization has already started colllecting donations.
If your family or soccer organization would be willing to make a donation or help in any way, please contact John at jguglielmi43@gmail.com.
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Family:
In lieu of the upcoming holidays, I want to share with you that Kellen and I have decided to do Christmas differently this year. We, to include Ethan and Bryson, will only be asking for soccer balls. We will not be accepting other gifts. Our decision is based on what we feel is the true light of Christmas: gifts from the heart.
In having the opportunity to work closely with the Iraqi people these past nine months I have found a different appreciation for the things I have. The Marine Corps has provided both Kellen and I stable careers with great benefits. I have a nice house, two good cars, and a little extra in savings. My wonderful children are well dressed, well fed, educated and have more than enough to keep occupied. We take vacations and have the means to buy the extra things that we want.
The Iraqi's are also grateful people, however in a different regard.They are grateful when the village can scrounge enough fuel to run the generators for one hour of electricity. They are grateful to get a bottle of water for their child because even after using their one hour of electricity to boil water, the filth of human waste still
remains getting their children sick. They are grateful when the Coalition Forces holds a medical engagement because their children are suffering from the vomiting, diarrhea, dehydration and worms from drinking the water they don't have sufficient means to sanitize.
They are grateful that Coalition Forces brings medical treatment to them because vehicles, employment and food are as hard to come by as fuel. All of which make providing for your family on your own extremely difficult. They are grateful when they receive anything because they have nothing.
This holiday season each of you will race thru a parking lot to find a space closer to the department store door. You will step out of your warm car and fight the cold wind in your nice, thick coat. You will shake off Jack Frost's touch as you grab a shopping cart. You will push your cart thru the heated store with lights, music and rushing crowds of shoppers with money to spend as you search for that perfect gift.
For me, for my children and husband, the perfect gift can not befound on isle three. It can only be found in your heart. For these reasons we ask that you respect our Christmas wishes by purchasing a soccer ball and sending it to me. Our gift to you will be pictures of the children who receive them. I can promise you that seeing the smiling eyes of a small child, who will never taste the luxuries we take for granted daily, will embrace the true meaning of the holidays and will be the best Christmas present we can conceivably bestow uponyou. Happy Holidays!
Sending my love, Jennifer
Sgt Zitani, J.M.
2MLG Comm Co Data Plt
Unit 73954
FPO, AP 09509-3954
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