Cross country pix – part 3 –

After a week + in the desert, we realized how much we love trees.  We headed to Zion NP for some of the most dramatic and comforting of the parks – we realized we had made a good choice moving to the NW, known for its forests.  We were so excited to see trees and lush forest landscape after so many (and really not that many) days in the desert.  We only had a day in Zion but we did the best we could – we walked up the Virgin River in a world famous slot canyon known as the Narrows.  Remember, this was fall and the water was just above freezing.  We were the only brave few to venture into the narrows without a wet suit that day!  We probably walked for about 45 minutes upstream before turning around.  It was well worth it!

The beautiful Virgin river in cold Novembrrrrr.

Good self-timer shot in the Narrows.

Next we stopped by the Hoover dam on our way into Las Vegas. We had to stop in Vegas as it was on the way to anywhere you want to go west from Southern Utah.  We got a deal on a room and decided to try to live it up.  It was a very depressing place and not a place I will ever return.  Check. Done. Gone.

Hoover Dam - lot of concrete in the desert

And then there is more construction at the Hoover dam for a bypass bridge

We have no pictures of Las Vegas because we don’t want remember it exists.  Next we headed to the coast! We arrived in San Fran to a warm welcome from Jake’s close high school friend, Richard and his family.  We got to stay with them for a few days while also visiting my very close friend, Alka Patel, from the ashram who happened to be visiting her family just as we arrived! We also got to see my cousin John Brown, my college friend Colleen, and one of Jake’s college housemates, Connor.  It was a busy visit punctuated by beautiful scenery, an energetic city, and sailing on the bay!

West coast, baby!

A pictures with the city background from Angel Island where we stopped for a little hike during our day of sailing.

Looking back on the Golden Gate on our way out of the city north toward the Redwoods.

We made it to the Redwoods along the scenic Highway 1 which runs along the coast. We made it to a camping spot in the dark that night and woke up beneath giant redwoods. The camping spot was pitch black when we settled in because of the density of the canopy.  We don’t get trees like this back east (cause we cut them down…).  We spent a day and a half hiking and even got to go to the secluded Tall Trees Grove which holds 3 of the world’s top 10 tallest trees.  We felt like dwarfs among the gigantic scenery here. On the Boy Scout trail you literally expected giant animals and fairies to jump out of the grove.  It is really a magical park with an infectious energy that should make anyone a tree-lover (or tree-hugger .

Look how big this leaf is!

Dwarf in a forest. Wait, that's suze!

After the Redwoods we stopped in Eugene to see some great friends and then we arrived in Portland, OR around November 20th, about 5 weeks after we left Virginia.  Next post will update you on how wonderful we are finding Portland, OR to be.

 

Cross country pix – part 2 – Rockies and Utah

We had frozen our butts off in South Dakota and decided that heading south would be a good idea. Then we remembered that south meant the Rockies which were covered in snow.  Fortunately, as we drove into Denver we got in touch with our little angel Amy. Amy and I met in Thailand through our mutual friend Katie Sadowski. We went climbing last year out west and then connected again this cold dark night as she offered us her parents lovely home outside Denver as long as we wanted. They were out of town and she told us how to get in. Turns out that we also were fortunate enough to receive a project from my work buddies, Sustainability Partners.  So for 4 days we both worked morning to late night on a tight project out of a comfortable home!  We paid off most of the trip and then headed out of town to visit Amy herself at her cabin in Leadville, CO.  Oh yea, and we got a hike in at Rocky Mtn National Park before we left.

Signature portrait in the Rocky Mtn National Park

In Leadville we cooked great food and had great company.  And we went on an epic 13 mile hike in snow.

I am perplexed by how I have gotten myself into this snowy situation.

Somehow Jake is not phased by the snow that is up to my knees!

Next we headed to the vast and huge desert landscapes of southern Utah.  This is a playground full of too many national treasures to experience in a lifetime.  We picked a few top ones for this trip knowing that this is one area of the country to which we must return.  Keep in mind, Jake and I met on a spring break service trip to the Grand Canyon so A. We did not feel compelled to go to the Grand Canyon and B. We have a special love for visiting the desert landscapes.

First we visited Moab, UT and went mountain biking, hiked nearly every hike in Arches Natl Park, and stayed in town long enough to watch the election!

This is one of so many spectacular arches.

This is a dinosaur track, one of many on our mountain bike ride on Klondike Bluffs near Moab, UT.

In the middle of our mtn bike ride we could hike into Arches NP and overlook the northern end of the park from Klondike Bluffs.

This was Jake's first mtn bike ride and it was pretty burly. He did an awesome job! Another hobby we can share

The Delicate Arch is the icon of Utah and the National Park system. It is even more beautiful in person than you would expect. It is not any easy walk (uphill though short) to get to it but well worth it at sunset especially.

Then we decided to go backcountry camping in The Needles, part of the Canyonlands National Park just south of Moab. By backcountry I mean we set up a site .5m from the car and subsequenly packed completely inefficiently. It was worth it considering the sub-freezing temperatures every night. Makes for an amusing picture of me. Sherpa Suze.

We hiked over 45 miles in the Needles over 2 days. We did something like 65 miles of trail in the Moab area. But this was a very cold day that included snow!!!

Over our 45 miles of trail we saw very very few people and tons of great vistas and variated landscapes. The Needles have some really unusual and beautiful rock formations.

One of the coolest rock formations was a tunnel like slot in the rocks. Much like a slot canyon but without the creek running through it. This picture has not been modified.

Our base camp in the Needles for a few days. We bought a new tent in Denver at REI, thank goodness!

We finally left the Needles and headed to Bryce Canyon NP in time to catch a glimpse of the hoodoo formations at sunset. These are unique formations to this canyon. If you look at them long enough you start to see figures, families, faces.

 

The rest of the trip in pictures, part 1

So we took an interest in being off of the computer and outside as we crossed the Mississippi.  Therefore, we took way more pictures and spent less time writing.  I will take you down a quick summary of the midwest and Rockies by way of the highlight picture tour.

Not actually as cool as it sounds; in nowhere South Dakota

The murals inside and out change every year.

Jake in the Badlands, SD; We spent a few days here. Interesting formations but windy and depressing...except for...

except for Buffalo! This huge herd came through camp while we ate our oatmeal one morning! They were beautiful and their size shook the ground as they picked up speed and trotted away.

Devil's Tower is truly spectacular, esp on a day like this. It is a sacred native american site.

Can't escape the midwest without some prairie dogs!

We paid the ridiculous parking rate and saw Mt. Rushmore on a stormy and blustery day. It really was spectacular and the ranger led walk was worth our time. Then we took funny pix.

Can't imagine why that little face is not immortalized as such with the others!?

Pretty goats hanging out in the parking lot as they do...

Sadly we do not have pix of the 40mph snowstorm we slept in without a proper tent (missing a pole) or the spectacular depths of Jewel and Wind Caves but we do have my hair after a week without showering and keeping it tamed under my hat until this moment of freedom. No products were used in the making of this hairstyle.

Enough for this post. Next we made it to Colorado for 4 days of work to pay off the trip, hiking, freezing, and continuing west through more parks….

 

State Slogans!

Here are our thoughts on many of the states we passed through in our first half of the cross country road trip.  The pictures are in the second half.

DC – Taxation without Representation OR the American experience
Traffic, expensive transportation, and cars are all the quintessential American Experience.  I had never really had to get around DC during the week with a car- there is NO reason to have a car in DC during the week.  We left DC with a $100 parking ticket.
We also had the Native American experience, sort of.  There is much debate about the Native American Museum.  I found it worth the visit and especially enjoyed the landscaping and dining hall.  Please cast your opinions here about the museum but be sure to say when you visited as it has changed a lot since opening.

Virginia – Virginia is for lovers.
We reentered VA as we moved west toward St. Louis.  “VA is for Lovers” has always perplexed me.  Maybe I should visit the office of tourism and get a good explanation for this slogan or you could help me understand with your perspectives.  Perhaps VA is for lovers of many different things – mountains, the Bay, the Rivah, history, wine, privately out-of-state funded public education (UVA!), history, tobacco, capital of the confederacy, democrats and republicans, the meeting of the north and south, history, seasons, humid summers, history, fertile family farms, hospitality, my home state.  Did I mention “history?”

Maryland – Seize the Day Off
I have no idea.  Maryland drivers suck…they all seem to drive like it’s Sunday, the day off?  Any ideas?

Pennsylvania – State of Independence
Beautiful farms, rolling hills, and coal.  It independently holds the highest gas price of our trip so far at $2.99. We budgeted for $4.00 so we’re not that upset.

West Virginia – Open for Business (not anymore)… Wild and Wonderful
For a period of time, WVA switched their slogan from Wild and Wonderful to Open For Business. Anyone that cares about fresh air (anyone in their prevailing winds to the east, thank you very much) knows that this was despicable and was happy when they reversed it a few months later.
I’ve visited the wild and wonderful area of WVA many times to climb and play in the New River and Gauley River gorges.  I never saw a place on the east coast quite as beautiful as Summersville lake – climbing next to crystal clear blue waters on a hot summer day is blissful.  But this visit was for only 10 miles across the “finger” of WVA.  I found out that I am not as dexterous with my left hand as my right in describing the shape of WVA.  See below that I cannot flick someone off with my left hand…I mean I cannot describe the shape of WVA.

Apparenlty I cannot make the WVA symbol with my left hand.

Ohio – So much to Discover
So much to Discover…..you just have to look really really hard to see it and we did not.  It was the longest state of our day.  We discovered vast expanses of concrete and corn; and contrary to popular belief there were some undulations in the land.

Indiana – The Crossroads of America
And yes there were…many intersections though we only took one to get gas.  Wait, nope, too expensive.  Lots of trucks and lots of roads.

Illinois – got nothing to say here. Obama?

Missouri -  “The Show Me State”
St. Louis certainly had a lot more to show us than we expected.  We were both blown away by the size and beauty of the Arch.  We excitedly bought our National Park Pass ($80 for the year) and got discounts on a ride to the top!  I had no idea you could go all the way to the top of the arch.  We were whisked to the top in a pod the size of the Apollo return modules.  It was a cool experience to look down out the viewing windows and know nothing was below you.

Touching the Mississippi under the Arch

Then we scooted down to the Budweiser brewery were we ended our free tour after the first stops at the Clydesdales (Aren’t all beers brewed the same?  You’ve been on one tour, you’ve been on them all) and went to the tasting room.

Suze and Jake with a Budweiser Clydesdale

Let’s be honest folks, isn’t the tasting room the entire point of a brewery tour?  First, the tasting room had about as much ambiance as my elementary school cafeteria.  And the pretzls came in 100calorie packs – sad.  But we got two free samples; high marks for that much free bear.  Did you know that Budweiser makes a wheat beer called “Shock Top?” We were impressed (and should be since they are now Belgian owned) but that’s where it ended.  The American Ale was moderate but then we decided to branch out.  The Michalobe Ultra Pomegranate Raspberry excuse for a beverage and the Amber Boch where horrible.

Suze and beer

Jake and beer

After a little afternoon brew we were primed to cross town to the City Museum – the reason for our visit to St. Louis.  Many have asked why we decided on St. Louis as our mid-west stop over Chicago.  Well, first off, this trip is about going places we will never go again because I don’t plan to drive cross country anytime soon.  So, I will likely go to Chicago sometime for a visit.  I will not likely visit St. Louis for any reason again.
Thus, the City Museum beckoned us at the suggestion of a few friends who had recently visited.  The City Museum is an enormous playground.  It is a creative wonderland of tunnels, slides, jungle gyms, ball pits, and secret passageways.   It is in a portion of an enormous warehouse which still holds some museum collections and large spaces for weddings or other parties.  I really can’t describe it accurately with words so a few pix will help and you’ll just have to visit.  They even has a fire pit for roasting marshmallows.

Jake in space

and this is just the outside! look for the little people crawling and playing around!

Iowa – “Field of Opportunity” – Yes, field after field.  Still has a pastoral beauty.   We stopped for gas in Iowa afternoon. What’s wrong with this picture?

Apparently this is what ethanol does to the gas pump?

Read carefully

 

Birthday Present – 14 hrs on the road!

We finally packed the last bits on Tuesday, Oct 14th at 5pm and headed north.

Car's packed and ready to go on a beautiful day!

Leaving Monument Ave, sad feelings

Yes, north, not west.  I had to see friends in DC one last time before we left the east coast and it’s only a short 2 hour drive to commence the journey.  Without any traffic (a good omen for the rest of the trip) we made it in time to catch some friends and family, visit the museum of native American Indians and the National Portrait Gallery, watch the debates, and stop by the Botanical Gardens.

Suze and Jake at botanical garden in DC

flower at botanical garden

At 1130 pm on Tuesday night, we decided to go all the way to st louis the next day.  All 835 miles.  So we got up at 6.  Fortunately, I don’t wake up/have awareness until 9am, so the first 3 hours were ‘free’.  Jake’s introduction to driving included mountains, rain, trucks, and flat boring expanses, over 7 hours of driving.

We pushed through 14 hours of driving on the first day, on my birthday of a quarter century, the celebration of which we postponed for obvious reasons.

Day 1 – 14 hours, 8 states

Here's the beautiful start at 6am.

50 states in 50 days says the presidential campaigns at the time? I think we can do better than that!

Next post will include state slogans and comments on our often brief experience driving through many of them.

 

Cross Country – departure

So months ago now, I embarked across the country (yes, traveling once again) to make my new home in Portland, OR.  I actually did keep track of my journey a good bit of the way and have pictures to prove it!  I am now in Portland but about to leave for India so my stories fall far behind on date.

I will post slowly so as not to overwhelm. Pictures are going to be on Picassa soon. I’ll put up a link when I have it

Pre-departure

Packing never seemed to end.  I think we could have stayed in Richmond indefinitely packing more things to ship or fit in the car.  Jake had a good handful of things to take with us but nothing compared to me.  Having grown up in the same house for 25 years, there is a lot of stuff that is mine.  And then there is a lot of stuff that my Dad wants to be mine.  This scene was common in the last few months (you’ll appreciate this if you know my Dad and I and our house):
Dad: “Suzanne, don’t forget to leave your SmartPass.  Oh, are you taking this very old and very fine piece of furniture? What about this one? And this lovely box of tissue? How about these boxes of stuff in the pantry or this jar of jam?”
Me: “Thanks Dad, I will be sure to leave you the SmartPass (when I leave in 2 weeks).  No, I am not taking this very old and very fine piece of furniture that has sat up in the attic for 20 years waiting for me to take it.  You may eat the jam and use the tissue yourself.  I am driving a VW Jetta Wagon, not an 18 wheeler.  But maybe next time…”
One of the things that absolutely had to occur before leaving VA was Jake getting his driver’s license.  Having lived in a place that did not require one (Singapore) to get around as a teenager, he never had one.  Fortunately, while I was in India our dear friend Jonney taught Jake to drive my car on a driver’s permit.  Sadly, since then, he had not then gotten the license.   So on Tuesday morning, Jake passed the in car test at DMV (first in line at 8am and did not leave till 10!) and now has a license to drive me across the country…cough….I mean so we can split the driving

Jake's ID (this is a joke from a movie for all you non Gen Y)

This is actually my car in a ditch and having just hit a telephone poll. This was pre-departure. Ask me for the full story sometime

 

Did anyone notice we hit a proverbial “food iceberg”!?

As a follow-up to my last post about the environmental movement not just being crunchy anymore….

The organic movement is not just for white people anymore. So says yesterday’s article on Grist – my favorite, often satirical, environmental commentary. Please comment/email me on this stuff. We must must must engage in a dialogue in order to get people thinking not just about the environment but their own health, which is no more intimately connected to nature than through food

You may not hug trees, you may not have children’s future to care about, you may breath clean air today and not worry about tomorrow (unless you are in China, sorry Kari), you may not have a car to fuel up, but you eat food. You probably like eating food and noticed all this noise about the food crisis. You also probably think that organic food is ‘good’ or at least ‘less bad’ than traditionally marketed *cough* I mean grown food.

Many of my friends have been asking me about what the big deal is, what can be done about the ‘food crisis’ on a national scale. At times I fear that these questions are somewhat fueled by a lack of commitment to actually feeding ourselves with more effort than the cheapest brown bread and Skippy from Kroger. It sure sounds a lot nicer to endorse a better Farm Bill than to actually take the time to meet a farmer, cook real food on a stove, and *gasp spend more money on food (as a culture we spend less on food per capita than any other in history; that’s a whole separate discussion). Nonetheless, we need to have a national commitment to encourage and increase a responsible food system as opposed to this disastrous ignorance-based agribusiness oligarchy.

There are plenty of excellent books and articles out there on the food crisis and many proposed solutions so I won’t go on. Grist’s article is a pretty quick and digestible one addressing the ignorance I am trying to destroy by sharing with you. If you don’t have time to read the whole thing (and really no one has an excuse because we are talking about the food you put in your one and only body; this is very basic healthcare so think of it as the latest release on a cancer study breakthrough), then here is a section to whet your appetite .

One of the things the organic industry has to do is educate, inform, and provoke. In this country, fewer than 1 percent of us farm. That’s the lowest rate in the world — and surely the lowest rate in the history of agricultural society. Food really does seem to arrive on our plates by magic — it appears, or seems to appear, by the grace of corporate marketers, not through the hard work of people interacting with the soil, animals, and the climate.

And I believe this ignorance — this beautiful, blissful state of unknowing that would be the envy of nearly any society that came before us — has mostly been maintained by the organic movement. Surely it’s maintained by “organic” milk processors that buy from feedlot dairy operations, and then decorate their cartons with happy cows munching grass. Surely it’s maintained by “certified organic” supermarket chains that decorate their produce sections with images of prosperous farmers, and then stock their shelves with produce grown under God knows what conditions in Chile. It’s maintained by large organic farms that quietly rely on exploited immigrant labor to eke out profits. And it’s even maintained at the farmers market, by the farmer who’s too embarrassed to tell his customers that he’s barely scraping by, that his back is killing him, and that he can’t afford health insurance.

If we’re going to move beyond 4 percent organic cropland and really challenge industrial agriculture, we also have to move beyond this acceptance of mass ignorance. One concrete thing we can do is start talking honestly and seriously about soil fertility — Albert Howard’s Law of Return [we must return the nutrients to the soil which we take out to eat]. We all know our food system generates tremendous amounts of waste. Very little of it gets cycled back into soil. Instead, it ends up rotting in landfills.

I know from hard experience that for new organic farms, the No. 1 challenge is coming up with a fertility strategy. Creating the kind of closed-loop, mixed-farming system celebrated by Albert Howard and embodied by Joel Salatin in Virginia takes years. One of our dirty secrets is that a lot of organic farmers rely on manure from confined-animal feedlot operations to fertilize their land. By doing so, we’re depositing all manner of pharmaceuticals and toxins into our best farmland -- the very stuff people try to avoid when they buy organic. An alternative farming system that relies on CAFO waste for fertility is a kind of parasite on a sick animal.

Why not champion a national composting policy, one that compels municipalities to transform food waste into high-quality, crop-grade compost? And why not then give it away to farmers — the ones who grow food for their nearby communities? That’s an agricultural subsidy that makes all kinds of sense.

While we’re at it, let’s reinvest in the infrastructure that makes small-scale, pasture-based meat and dairy production viable. The best and most successful organic farms are the ones that mix diversified crop production with livestock production; they build their soil with their own animals’ composted manure. But as the Tysons, Smithfields, and Cargills of the world gained control of the meat and dairy industries, they shut down processing plants and concentrated production geographically. Who wants to raise chickens if you have to haul them 70 miles to a USDA-approved slaughterhouse, and 70 miles back?

Rather than continue a trend of corporate control and consolidation of organics, the decision makers in this industry should be cajoling the federal government to enforce antitrust laws and break up the monopolies that control the food system. You should conceive of yourselves as the anti-Tysons and anti-Smithfields by investing in appropriate-scale processing plants all across the land.

As our globe lurches into a period of ecological and economic crises — not least, the food crisis — what we need is less ignorance about food and more people with their hands in the dirt producing it. If we can’t achieve that, than the Tysons, Cargills, and Monsantos will retain their grip over food production, and organics really will amount to some “stuff white people like” — a soothing room within a sinking ship.

 

It’s not crunchy anymore (backlog)

(Warning: this was written a few months ago. I am not in BC right now.)

So this one is coming from very far away from the ashram in India…

I have been in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada for a few days now in a different kind of retreat than the ashram. I was flown out here for ‘work’ and arrived in this outdoor playground just in time for my employers to take me to lunch, the grocery store, around town and then leave their lodge for 2 days! I had plenty to do. Andrew, my work associate, and I had tons to do over those two days including putting up a survey for work AND skiing and seeing some sweet live music. blah blah blah it is beautiful here, amazing mountains and social scene

The point of this post is that we got to the meat of this visit tonight. I was sitting at dinner with Brian and Mary, the ‘employers’, and Andrew, ‘the work associate’, who are also like family. I realized that I have brought myself from one great ‘employer’ to the next as Mary started her sentences just like Kevin Tobin with “and so.” But that’s aside….the point is as we scarfed down my well prepared Thai Tofu peanut stir fry, we started to cover the passions and visions of our lives. Not the lightest conversations for a Friday night but they couldn’t have been more on target with my hopes for an intelligent dinner. As we covered the big stuff (plans for the next year, life goals, etc.) the phrase came to me regarding our business: It’s Not Crunchy Anymore.

We have finally hit the tipping point my friends and the world may no longer consider me a crunchy hippie for loving the trees as much as I do. This afternoon I eavesdropped on an interview with the VP of Marketing at our newest client’s headquarters. It was inspiring to hear an exec talking about ‘opportunities’ to do things differently, more sustainably. He talked about how his children were the generation who share with his generation how to do things differently. It is my generation that doesn’t just know how but cares enough to make sustainability the mission of our lives. I am not alone and I feel that I am no longer on the fringe. It is no longer just ‘crunchy’ to be caring so much about the trees and the air that we breath. You Boomers – listen up, the young ones are inheriting the earth and we have some good ideas about surviving.

Saving the earth may just be the meaning of our lives because our lives depend on it.

We cannot escape it. We cannot ignore the fact that we live on the very ground we destroy; the handle of the axe is made of the wood it cuts down.

It sure is nice to sit in this resort town (a pretty sustainable one though) and talk about saving the world. I should get back to it

 

Witty and recovering

I promise I won’t make a habit of reprinting corny little bits like this but it’s short and witty.  This came from the Youth India Blog, which has no strong discernible theme.

One morning the husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap.
Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out.
She motors out a short distance, anchors, and reads her book.
Along comes a Game Warden in his boat.
He pulls up alongside the woman and says, “Good morning, Ma’am.
What are you doing?”
“Reading a book,” she replies, (thinking, Isn’t that obvious?)
“You’re in a Restricted Fishing Area,” he informs her.
“I’m sorry, officer, but I’m not fishing. I’m reading.”
“Yes, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment.  I’ll have to take you in and write you up.”
“If you do that, I’ll have to charge you with sexual assault,” says the woman.
“But I haven’t even touched you,” says the game warden.
“That’s true, but you have all the equipment.
For all I know you could start at any moment.”
“Have a nice day ma’am,” and he left.

MORAL: Never argue with a woman who reads. It’s likely she can also think.

I find this clever but I also wonder about the last line.  Of course we can think! What is this about, Mr Youth India?

Back to more intelligent things tomorrow.  Today I am recovering from my unpleasant morning with the West End (Rodeo Drive for Richmond) consignment shop fashionistas who rejected not just most of my mom’s clothes but my charming attitude despite what I was doing – selling my dead mother’s clothes.  Give a nice girl a break?

These women were NOT reading.  Fortunately, I do.

 

Sister, sister small world

This is a plug, but a selfless plug.

Roughly 6 years ago I got a sister.

She’s close to 19 yrs old.

She is not an “oops baby” little sibling that I have kept hidden from you friends for years. Nor am I actually the adopted sister and she’s the biological one that my brother always wondered about…

Rakshya Dhungel is my adopted little sister thanks to The Little Sisters Fund. She lives in Kathmandu, Nepal and I have sponsored her education since I graduated from high school. My good friend Trevor Patzor helped found the LSF about the time he was coaching me on the crew team at my high school. Long story short, I have corresponded with Rakshya and visited her a few years ago thanks to my own scholarship at UVA.

Having had the best education available to me thanks to a generous father, I have felt lucky to be able to pass on that honor to a girl in such need across the world. If it weren’t for her education, Rakshya and girls like her would be prostituted at a young age and have no hope for a future with any self respect. So for only a few hundred dollars a year, I give Rakshya a future. Actually, I give her a present. It is today, or rather years ago at this point, that she would be sold as a commodity into one of the largest sex trades in south Asia.

But instead Rakshya has received an education at one of the top schools in Kathmandu, Nobel Academy, just down the road from her home. She has had preventative health care, access to computers and a special LSF library, the community of other LSF sisters, and the guidance of wonderful Ramesh, Usha, and Trevor and other leaders who guide the girls through school and beyond.

This is all background to introduce you to an incredible coincidence. (I should pause and admit that I do not believe that coincidences are just coincidences. I strongly believe that they are red flags waving us down, a knock on the head to open our eyes to something important.) The story I just told is just about what I told my aunt which prompted her to adopt her own little sister. Meanwhile, my aunt’s son (my cousin Christopher Friendly) has close friends from his time teaching in Ecuador who make documentaries among other beautiful creations (Scott and Amy of www.newfictionmedia.com). I will quote from Scott’s email from Kathmandu:

Been looking at a fine family album of yours just this morning, in the form of letters and photos your good mother sent to Shanta, the Nepali untouchable girl whose education she sponsors through the Little Sisters Fund. Amy and I are in Kathmandu, making a documentary about the Little Sisters Fund and girls education in general.

Looked on the wall of this little girl’s tiny room (the one she shares with her brother, sister in law, and niece), and saw your picture. And I says to myself, why, that there’s Pie Friendly’s boy. We all had us one hell of a small world moment right then and there, I’ll tell you what.

We think we’re going to be spending a lot of time with Shanta–probably be filming her for at least a couple long days in the next week or two, and taking an interview, and hanging out with her brother, etc. Check out our blog (linked below) to see what we been up to.

My aunt (in white) and uncle (in dark suit) are dancing in the middle of this photo.

Please do check out their blog: http://www.nonfictionmedia.com/blog

(By the way, Rakshya is the girl in black and white stripes at the top left of the banner on the front page of the NonFiction Media blog!) There is a lot in there about creating the documentary from the technical side but recently it is teaming with adventure as a transportation strike has thrown them for a loop. I feel for Scott and Amy as I too have experienced such a strike as I landed in the rain in Kathmandu as a sole 20yr old girl without the ‘pre-arranged’ ride I thought I would have…story for another day.

So if you are not inspired by my words, read the NonFiction Media blog and read about LSF at http://littlesistersfund.org/ .

Then close your eyes and truly imagine what you would be doing today if it were not for your education which was undoubtedly paid for by someone else at some point. You may not have loved your alma maters but you can’t deny that they led you somewhere that was nowhere close to a brothel in Kathmandu. You may have earned your way through higher ed one way or another but none of us paid our way through elementary, junior, or high school. On top of that, we all had lights to read by, food on the table, and doctors to heal us regardless of the education. Oh, and we have people who believe in us. I believe in Rakshya and all her sisters. I have proven that to her and the rest of her society each year with a small portion of my income.