passion.

Novelist Isabel Allende writes stories of passion. Her novels and memoirs, including The House of the Spirits and Eva Luna, tell the stories of women and men who live with passionate commitment – to love, to their world, to an ideal. I highly recommend watching her TED talk below.

skateistan.

Asheesh Bhalla, a friend of mine from college, is in Afghanistan working on public health care education and a skateboarding school for kids. Awesome? I think so. He’s an advisor for Skateistan, Afghanistan’s first co-ed skateboarding school. According to their site, “50% of the Afghan population is under age 16, 75% under the age of 25. This age group is a community that is largely untouched by international aid programs seeking to foster civil society development.” The school provides free classes to children ages 5 through 17 and aims to include girls and poor urban children in order to promote understanding among a diverse group in a fun, positive environment. Established in 2007, the program is run by Afghan and international volunteers and relies on donations. Please donate here if you have the means. Enjoy the photos below; they demonstrate the value of this project more than I can articulate. And it’s always lovely to see photos of people helping and children smiling. Most photos are of the skating project, but there are several of Asheesh distributing vitamin supplements with other healthcare education workers. All photos by Asheesh Bhalla & Jacob Simkin. xo-m

twitter = useful?

Calling all twats, here are some smart words from my neighbor Matt. (Are people who use Twitter called ‘twats’? I can’t resist, ever since Stephen Colbert uttered the word on ‘The Today Show.’)

Does anyone know if this tactic will actually create enough noise to, in effect, ‘hide’ real Iranians?

Set your location to Tehran and your time zone to GMT +3.30. Security forces are hunting for bloggers using location/timezone searches. The more people at this location, the more of a logjam it creates for forces trying to shut Iranians’ access to the internet down. The idea is to create a profile that has the claimed location of Tehran to created noise for people searching the profile locations.

Since media are subject to the Iranian government's restrictions, much of what we know is being transmitted via sites like Twitter. This photo was uploaded to the site.

Cut & paste & pass on to your friends who use Twitter. I think the site is inane, but it has played an undeniably interesting role in Iran, where outside media are banned. Here’s a fascinating blog from inside Tehran documenting the events. Thanks, Jose, for posting that. xo-m

direct relief international.

Hi, friends & people on the internets. Direct Relief provides medical assistance to people living in war-torn & developing nations. WordPress has recently developed the brilliant idea of allowing companies to “sponsor” charities through blogs, and I’ve selected Direct Relief for mine. All you have to do is scroll down the right hand column to the link and watch some silly Showtime preview (hint: you don’t have to watch the whole thing; just click “next” after it starts playing). By watching 4 seconds of an ad, you will help support Direct Relief’s effort to get Antiretroviral drugs (for the treatment of infections caused by retroviruses such as HIV) and medical assistance to those who need it most. These medicines are often cheaper than we think.

You can read more about D.R.’s medical assistance program here. Thanks for helping out, and if you feel extra generous, you can donate directly here. Forbes Magazine rated D.R. “100% efficient” in its analysis of D.R.’s spending practices, so you can be assured that your money will be well-spent. Wishing a happy week to all. xo-m

826 seattle.

I went to the Greenwood Space Travel Supply Co. today with my delightful friend Carrie. The store’s profits support 826 Seattle, a free tutoring center that helps struggling children and adolescents, and the store itself is brilliant. The lady at the cash register greeted us by saying (totally deadpan, mind you), “Let me know if you have any questions about our space travel supplies.” (The store stocks everything from mars ‘goo’ and space rocks to books on cold fusion.) Greenwood Space Travel and the 826 non-profit were started in part by Dave Eggers, the famed short-story writer.

To help students develop their writing skills and self-confidence, 826 publishes a number of student-written and created books. I purchased one entitled It’s Supposed To Be About Happiness, a collection of short stories written by students of John Marshall School. J.M.S. has since closed its doors but once provided counseling and education to children with behavioral problems and backgrounds of abuse and neglect. The book is enlightening, well-written, poignant, and often funny. Its stories detail the lives of the contributing adolescents, their struggles, their triumphs, and what happiness means to them. Profits go to a good cause (helping struggling students!), and the book is a joy to read. Available here. xo-m