I gained 5 pounds! :)

Posted on January 7, 2008 — by knb

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we got a play station 2 w/ the star wars legos video game, books, drum sticks, sneakers, chocolate...oh wait, that's what the kids got. we got to watch them have a blast!! (it was great.)

Posted on January 8, 2008 — by mama2jbgb

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It all started Sunday with a room full of recording equipment and a fever of 103. When I'm that sick you can usually find me wrapped in flannel sipping hot toddies, but with Consumermas breathing down my neck I had to get to work. Seven hours later seven songs were recorded and I wouldn't be able to speak for two days. Fortunately, there isn't much to say when you spend your holiday with the family in Sacramento. They did the talking and the screaming, I did the gorging and the reading.
It was a good two days.

I went home and my flat was deserted. Santa had kidnapped four of my favorite people and probably has them slaving away morphing manna and gas into plastic crap and surly sentiments, getting ready for next year's delivery. The fat man at least had the decency to leave me a pack of smokes and a condom in my stocking. He is getting pragmatic and twisted in his old age.

The next thing I knew Interstate 5 was swirling around me. My best friend and his best friend and I were all belting out the best 1001 songs of all time as we dodged listing semis and swerving sedans. I remember every yard of pavement, every inch of yellow paint, and every expression of every jerk in every obstructionist car in my way.

The state seemed to ooze by; jellied valleys on the left, molasses mountains on the right. And you a mile closer but no closer at all. (Sometimes as I fall asleep at the wheel I forget all about Cauchy and Lagrange and I know Zeno was right because no matter how fast I go or how far I come I will always be too far from you. In the limit, I can only touch your face.) I remember every wrong turn, all the backtracking, and the house on the hill with a view of the embers of hell.

When we pulled into your driveway I couldn't leave the car. We sang: "I don't need you to worry for me cause I'm alright. I don't want you to tell me it's time to come home." He and I were bosom buddies on the same wavelength, light beams emanating from the same star...

Suddenly and all at once I was in your arms, and you were in my eyes, and I was in your kitchen making all kinds of messes and drinks and friends with the strangers in your house. (Keep in mind that you and I were still strange to one another, even after all our other times.) And that's how it went.

It's not that we lived all that fast for the next five days: Morning coffee on porches, evening concerts with Peaches (who??), and cocky contests 'tween pooches. It's just that the details escape me.

Was the first sip of wine the sweetest, or was the last? Did you laugh once or the whole time? Was that your voice softly singing as I dreamt about April in the car? What little fires ignited when the white toes of our grey converses met while we waited on line? Was your hello as perfectly intimate as your goodbye?

Why do I remember the wrong turns and not the right ones...

These questions are cerebral static when I come to. The sign says we are 199 miles from home. "Neither here nor there" makes me smile. I slide into the passenger seat and prepare to burst. Driving down your street I thought I would turn around and say goodbye one last time. Driving down your highway I was sure I'd turn around and say goodbye one last time. Fleeing down the north slope of the Tehachapis I was sure...and so on. But I made it to this spot where your state ends and mine begins. And I look to the east where the steely storm cloud is meeting the darkness of the night and I know that I will never turn around. And as I tend my garden I'll plant your last goodbye next to the peppers and cardamom. What strange fruit will a goodbye tree bear? I don't yet know. Best of all possible worlds if its flowers are "Hello".

Posted on January 8, 2008 — by le_baron_rogue

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When i came home from my winter vacation, or more likely trip, i was so excited to see this mini GOOD project.
So here's my story

Interested in the environement, i took a three class course fall semester at Stonehill College that focused on the alarming devestaton of the everglades. I took both envirnmental ethics and environemental science class during the fall and from january 3rd to january 13th i particpated in my third seminar class but camping for 10 nights in the everglades. Let me tell you it was an interesting time camping with 23 other classmates, 2 professors, 2 administrators, one TA and one photographer. Although we were in florida, our first night was freezing! thank god i bought a sleeping bag that is good for 0 degrees celsius.
Our first real day there was a challenge; a fifteen mile bike ride through shark valley in big cyprus national park. I was up to the challenge of course, but i was slightly afraid of the dozens of alligators right next to us on the side of the road.
Our adventures didn't stop there, we canoed through the tangle of mangrove swamps during a rainstorm, in metal boats no less. We stomped our way through the calf high mud and the thigh high water of the everglades forests, all the while looking out for alligator holes and great blue herons.

Posted on January 14, 2008 — by nicnac

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I think Angelina Jolie is so cool.

Seriously, perhaps that’s why I spent my winter break in Tanzania, Africa. I wanted to imitate her third world efforts (and maybe snag a Brad Pitt look-a-like along the way). I really wanted to do something good and thought, “Hey, look at me! I’m going to volunteer at an orphanage in Africa for my vacation!” I have to admit, it wasn’t just a selfless volunteer mission; the group I went with practiced yoga twice a day, went on a three-day safari, spent the night in a primitive Masaai village, and hiked part of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Also, being an aspiring photojournalist, I thought I would come back with the most beautiful photographs ever.

How cool.

I signed up for the trip before I realized I needed five vaccination shots and a supply of malaria pills. Had I known about the needles, I may have chickened out of the trip. I guess this is where Angelina and I differ.

I put together 3-ring binders crammed full of World Wide Web information. All that research couldn’t possibly have prepared me for this journey. Is there anywhere on the internet that explains what you are supposed to do when a child looks up at you not begging for money, but simply asking for water? An overwhelming number of people spend hours every day searching for a water source, only to carry back one bucket on their head to their families, if they find this liquid gold at all.

Being a woman in my mid-thirties, the thought did cross my mind to adopt one of these children (now I would really be on a Jolie-path) until I learned it’s not possible in Tanzania unless you live there for at least 6 months and become a dual citizen. Ok, let’s see how the vacation goes first.

Finally the day had arrived during the trip to volunteer at The Tunahaki Centre, a home for former street children. Many in our group brought gifts. I brought cameras, a laptop and an ipod to donate. I taught the kids how to use my big Canon 5d and take self-portraits of each other. I brought pen pal letters with me from 3rd graders in California. I was sure to be the hit bearing suitcases full of goodies, but again I was unprepared; it was the children who taught me.

These children have so little in ways of material goods, yet they smile from ear to ear. They are happy singing, dancing and performing acrobatics. There is an honest sense of community and a bond these children share. I soon found out I was the one lacking, not them.

One of the highlights of the trip had to be walking for hours hand-in-hand with these children up Mt. Kilimanjaro; the tallest, freestanding mountain in the world at 15,100 feet. We brought 15 of the kids from Tunahaki with us to hike to the first base camp on Kili (this is what the locals call it.) The trek lasted approximately 6 hours. Most of the children lacked tennis shoes and walked in sandals and flip-flops. None of the children complained when they got tired, or when it started to get cold. In fact, they offered to carry our bags—wanting nothing in exchange—out of respect for us, their “elders.”

Shivering through the rain while wearing my $200 hiking shoes from REI, I performed my best Lara Croft tough girl impression, and pressed on up the mountain until we reached the Maundi Crater. ALL of the 15 former street orphans made it to the rim. HALF of the people from our group made it this far.

But really, was this a “volunteer” vacation? Sure I felt good about myself for going, and I felt a little less guilty than sitting on a beach somewhere sipping Piña Colada’s for my winter break, but did I really make a difference?

I’m trying. I will talk about the trip to anyone that will listen, and encourage others to visit and donate to http://www.tunahaki.org Most of these kids have been orphaned by AIDS or simply abandoned. I’ve held one fundraiser. I'm looking into how water wells get installed in Africa. But in no way should my efforts be applauded, (but every little bit helps, right?) The real heroes are the original founders of Tunahaki, David Ryatula and his wife Mary. They started taking care of 4 orphans, having next to nothing themselves, and now house close to 30 kids.

Another person to recognize is Scott Fifer, a man from Venice, California who is now the Director of the Tunahaki Foundation. After a volunteer vacation in to Tanzania a couple of years ago, he fell in love with the children of Tunahaki and has since raised over $250,000 to better their living conditions, pay for their education, and put plans in motion for a new “green” home to be built that will house nearly 100 street children and contain a real theatre for them to perform in. He also brought these acrobatic-loving children on a trip to the US to train with Cirque du Soleil. No small feat, as orphans from Tanzania had never before been granted visas to travel to the United States. Wow, what a difference one person can make.

Angelina Jolie I am not, but hopefully after a “volunteer vacation” I am on the path to helping others. I plan to return to Tunahaki for my summer vacation in 2008—more days volunteering at the orphanage—sans safari.

-by Doria Anselmo; personal photos from the winter vacation in December 2007 can be seen at: http://www.AFRICAphotobydoria.com

Posted on March 3, 2008 — by doria

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