Chicago makes cool people do cool things.

Three things have been occupying me lately, in chronological order: 

1. I spent a month over Christmas and the New Year in the Grand Canyon.  The trip was life-changing (I fell in love with whitewater and remembered the magical power of mountains to make me happy) and the people I spent it with were absolutely incredible.  If you want to drool a little, check out my flickr set.  Thanks, Cooper and the rest of the team!  

2. Last week the Yogurt Pedaler re-appeared in public, at a special Valentine's Day edition of the Seasonal Salon. I spoke alongside and with two other inspiring people on the subject of Food and Exchange, and everyone present had a great discussion and shared wonderful tasty treats and heartwarming food stories.  Check out the audio recording here.  Thanks, Ryan! 

3. The date for the fantastic Structures for Inclusion 10+1 conference is fast approaching!  That date is March 25-27, and it's when dozens, hopefully hundreds, of amazing designers, social activists, and policy-makers will come together in Chicago to share ways and means to create and inspire design for social good, equality, and sustainability.  I'm on the steering committee - trust me, it's going to be energetic, inspiring, and diverse.  You should come! 

I should really update this blog a bit better, so I can do more than inadequately link to the things I care about.  

the Yogurt Pedaler, and photo inspiration

Just returned from a great adventure, the Yogurt Pedaler, which has consumed me for some time.  Check it out: yogurtpedaler.com

I've also been awarded Honorable Mention in the Planet° Global Photo Travel Contest for this photo:

And I'm truly honored to be in the company of photographers with work like this: 

See more here: Planet°

a poem - what?!

I've never been one to reach for poetry, but I wanted to share this one.  I won't share why it's perfect, but my love goes out to Mom and Dad for it.  

The Secret of Life

by Ellen Goldsmith

I grabbed the streetcar from Fisherman's Wharf
to the Ferry Building to save my feet for later.
My dollar bill, wrinkled and worn, resisted disappearing
into the slot. I stuffed the transfer
in my pocket without looking.

As the streetcar rounded the Embarcadero,
I called my mother-in-law with mother's day wishes,
imagined the conversation
I'd have with mine, were she alive.
On exiting, I asked the conductor
how long the transfer would last.
I gave you extra time, he said.
Just show it. Hardly anyone looks.
It's good until it's taken away.

i'm still here!

I've been shamefully missing lately, but it's because I'm really busy.  I have a few posts coming up soon, and hopefully new things will settle into place.  

Last night was my gamelan concert - it was so much fun, and I realized how long it has been since I performed in any way besides speaking.  (Keep an eye on that flickr set, more photos are coming from our rehearsals this weekend.)  

Also, my brother and dad are awesome, again, climbing mountains in NC in Jerry's Baddle, a gnarly kayak and bike race, pedaling up a mountain and paddling down.  

I'm so proud of them!  :)  

p.s. check out Dad's sweet Tati jersey.  

If all goes as planned, I'll be inaugurating my yogurt cart next weekend with Cristina in the Chicago May Day Art Parade.  More to come on that front, too - things are actually moving forward!  

slums win the LEED award - an update to "resourcefulness"

Speaking of informal economies bringing life to Turkish cities -- 

I read an article that's been on the top of my to-do "pile" (of browser windows) for at least a week: "How slums can save the planet."  I'd like to be more coherent than I'm likely to be on this subject, but I'm also so eager to get something out about it that I'm going to give it a shot.  

In the article, the author Stewart Brand argues that slums, in essence the densest and most basic urban conglomeration, are the most sustainable and least wasteful communities - the denser we live, the less opportunity we have to waste.  Which certainly is all well and good.  But what I liked was his thoughts on informal economies; he puts into words my thoughts about less developed countries being more resourceful.  

The homeless people who "live" in East Hyde Park occupy their days trying to bum money off of passers-by.  In Turkey, you saw no homeless people, for two reasons that I can tell.  

One, they spent their days being industrious - selling something on a street corner, collecting recycling, or making a home or some other produce to hawk on the sidewalks downtown.  In the US, there are such strict laws about selling things in public that there is no way a homeless person would be given a permit to sell anything on the street.

The second reason you see no homeless people in Turkey is because they make their own homes if they can't rent or buy one.  Gecekondu means "built in the night" and is the word for the structures that result from some loophole in Turkish law that says if at dawn there is a shelter and someone is sleeping in it, then it belongs to them.  Squatting is legal, therefore.  

None of this means squatters and gypsies and "homeless" in Turkey aren't ostracized, but that's a completely different post.  

Back to the article - unfortunately (in my opinion) Brand's arguments about slum-dwellers being the "Greenest" city-dwellers devolves into an argument for more sterile high-class soluntions for how to counteract our "developed" and wasteful lives by building green roofs and urban gardens.  Don't get me wrong - I love all of these probably more than the next person, I was just so excited about street-level entrepreneurship and resourcefulness that getting preachy was disappointing.  

Then, of course, there are the contradictions of crime and wealth - slums hold puzzling combinations of high crime and drug rates, as well as high rates of television and mobile phone ownership.  But again, that's perhaps another post, and one that Jan Chipchase, a thought-provoking inspiration of mine, would likely appreciate.