Ordinary Hero: Padmashree Dr. Anil Joshi

One of the most exciting environmental stories in a long time is this one. A dedicated researcher/activist in rural India, Padmashree Dr. Anil Joshi, using modern and ancient technologies, proved that it is possible to recharge small aquifers and spring catchments. Why is this exciting, you ask? Because water is life. Without it we die. In recharging dormant springs, Dr. Joshi brought life and hope for a better future to one of the poorest regions of India, and just possibly to all of us, as water shortages loom worldwide. Here's the story.

Thousands of years ago, the people who live in India's Himalayas built their villages near natural springs sheltered by dense forests. For eons, annual rains recharged the forest-shrouded springs and the aquifers that fed them. The tree canopy, and the organic offal it sacrificed to the forest floor, preserved moisture and assured the springs continued to bubble year round. The springs nourished the rural agricultural economy of the region, and the villagers were well-fed and content.

Fast forward to the twenty-first century. After almost two hundred years of British colonial rule (pp.3, pdf file), India leapt into the industrialized world as a sovereign state and began its steady march toward becoming the fourth largest economy in the world (4th largest in 2009 GDP PPI). India's rapid growth, industrialization and centralization took their toll on the forests and watersheds of the Himalayas. Deforestation laid so much land bare that the spring catchments no longer held enough water to serve the villages year round. Many dried up altogether.

Without water, the people could not survive. Many abandoned their waterless villages. Others struggled with increasing poverty and hunger as their crops no longer supported them. Families were broken: The men moved to urban centers, often thousands of kilometers away, looking for jobs, leaving the women and children behind to work the land alone, dependent on their husbands and fathers to send money to get them through the drought seasons.

Enter Dr. Joshi and his organization Himalayan Environmental studies & Conservation Organization (HESCO). Himself once a child of the hills. Dr. Joshi believed that science and technology, together with ancient, tested wisdom, were the keys to improving quality of life and to developing the region economically.

Dr. Joshi recruited a team of scientists to locate a number of spring catchments. When they knew where the springs collected water, they built small dams and embankments called green bunds, which is ancient Hindu technology, to capture moisture and recharge the springs during the rainy season. Villagers built and filled storage tanks to provide a year-round water supply. Now the villages grow and harvest crops for food and for markets outside their area. Farms are prospering once again. Young farmers are staying in the region to till the land and turn a profit.

More, the villages are tweaking another ancient technology, water mills, many of which have been operating for centuries, to provide power from their springs and streams. Generating their own electricity takes them off the less reliable, centralized national grid. With plenty of dependable, locally-generated power streaming to their homes and businesses, in some cases for the first time, the people of the Himalayas can start new businesses and cottage industries with confidence, knowing they will not have to work in the dark, or wait for sporadic energy to power their equipment.

That's not all. Most of India's energy is derived through coal-fired plants. By generating their own power using their recharged streams and springs, rural communities are lowering their carbon output.

Not only is this story exciting for the people whose lives it has changed so dramatically in India, it is exciting for the world as we all face more and more severe water shortages in the decades to come. Dr. Joshi's work shows us that a decentralized water supply, using a mixture of new and time-tested technology, can save and sustain lives, spur local economies, and save the planet.

What's more, this is only one of literally dozens of innovative, life-changing, life-enhancing projects Dr. Joshi has initiated to help rural India raise itself from poverty to an ever-improving quality of life. Learn more about the man and his life work at HESCO, whose creed could be a model for any of us.

HESCO Philosophy

• Serve in the spirit of dedicated volunteerism
• Acknowledge and develop the natural talents of the people you serve
• Give freely of your knowledge and time
• Encourage self-sufficient and "simple" solutions to the practical problems of those you serve
• Promote the practice of "shridan": that every village which is helped with development, will in turn, adopt and help another village in their locality
• Promote sustainable development with a priority on environmental protection and economic independence

HESCO

For choosing to return to his homelands and utilize his training and knowledge to help his people lift themselves from poverty to prosperity, for honoring the wisdom of millenia and melding it with the science and technology of today, for committing to utilizing local materials and resources to solve local problems, for decentralizing energy and water sources while improving their reliability and availability, and for living among and listening to the people he serves, the Ordinary Heroes Award is offered to Padmashree Dr. Anil Joshi with respect and gratitude.



With gratitude to Tweet timlawler who introduced me to Dr. Joshi in his 6/28 tweet: "The Mountain Man The Better India: A bright student, he did well through school and college and after completi.. http://bit.ly/196JgG".

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace, all rights reserved.

Ordinary Hero: Denise Cerreta

Denise Cerreta wants to eliminate world hunger. She started in her own neighborhood, Salt Lake City, Utah, in 2003, when she opened One World Cafe, serving delicious, in-season organic food. Her vision was to provide a living wage to each of her employees, turn no one away for lack of money, and care for the planet by minimizing waste.

One more thing. Patrons would pay what they felt their meal was worth--in cash or in a work exchange.

• We are dedicated to eliminating world hunger.
• We are dedicated to serving organic unprocessed food.
• We are dedicated to feeding and including all members of our community.
• We are dedicated to eliminating waste in the food industry.
• We believe that we can trust our customers to be inspired, honest and fair in their exchange of money and/or work for the fresh, gourmet, organic food we prepare both mindfully and in a heartfelt way each day.
• We will keep believing.

One World Everybody Eats vision statement

One of Cerreta's chief concerns in opening One World Cafe was the tremendous food waste from commercial kitchens. American restaurants are particularly notorious for serving enormous portions. How many times does your order arrive at the table piled high enough to serve a family of four? Do you ask for a box and bag to take the leftovers home? How often do you (or your dog) actually eat them? Or do they languish in the refrigerator, pushed ever further back, until one day you open them to find something that looks like a science experiment gone awry?

Patrons would pay what they felt their meal was worth--in cash or in a work exchange.

When Cerreta's guests choose their prices and their portions, she says they tend to take only what they will eat, eliminating much of the food waste we see so often in traditional establishments.

Serving those less fortunate, and helping them retain their dignity, is another of Cerreta's objectives. One hour's work in the restaurant earns a voucher for one meal. Out of work parent? If your children are under eight, they eat free on the same one-meal voucher. If you have neither money nor time, there is always at least one staple dish, such as rice and lentils or rice and dahl, available to the hungry with no strings attached.

In 2006, spurred by requests from all over the country for help establishing similar ventures, Cerreta filed for non-profit 501(3)c status and founded the One World Everybody Eats Foundation. Since then, she has referred to the cafe as a community kitchen. The foundation explains the change this way.

Since our beginning, we have recognized the spontaneous community building that happens as a result of our venue, which we now call a "community kitchen" rather than a "cafe". We also believe that nothing will further our vision better than having the strength of community behind us.

Denise Cerreta in "Message from Founder Denise Cerreta"

Eventually, Cerreta established gardens to support another of their founding principles: To serve wholesome, nutritious, organically grown foods. Much of the organic produce used in the kitchen comes from the garden in this image. Some also comes from kindly gardeners who produce far more than they can eat, preserve and give away.

These values and principles are among those that make Denise Cerreta a fine candidate for the Ordinary Heroes Award.

The reason our heroes are so important to us is because they do extraordinary things. They take risks, venturing into untraveled territory, often with inadequate preparation. High risk almost guarantees some failure. Mistakes will be made.

It's not easy launching a restaurant which expects its patrons to set the price they're willing to pay for their food. Keeping the cafe going for six years borders on the miraculous. There have been less-than miraculous bumps along the way. Cerreta herself has said more than once that she was ill-prepared for the venture.

In October 2008, she and the foundation's board reportedly fired its "long-time" manager, which in turn spurred the entire staff to walk out, alleging bounced paychecks and disrespectful treatment.

The One World Everybody Eats web site does not address the staff allegations directly, though you will find mention of it in some of the articles posted on their newsroom page. While I hope Cerreta will confront the allegations head on at some point, her initial vision to serve the hungry as well as the affluent, and expect each to pay as they are able for the bounty they receive, along with the courage and stamina she has shown in keeping faith with her vision, are heroic acts at a time in which we hear so much of rampant greed and outright swindling (Bernie Madoff, anyone?).

Despite the near loss of the One World venue, as Cerreta calls it, she and One World Everybody Eats are back on track in 2009 and continue to inspire others. There are now five similar kitchens in the United States, in Denver, CO, Spokane, WA, Charleston, SC, Durham, NC, and a brand new one in Arlington, TX.

Cerreta plans to focus more and more on helping others found community kitchens with no menu and no prices. "Our goal is to continue to move the One World Everybody Eats vision to larger audiences," she says in a personal message. She continues:

We see that mentoring and networking fledgling efforts around the country is where our energy can be best spent. And we are working to connect those people and efforts. Because by letting everyone who is striving to establish their own effort in their own community see they are not alone, we think it may help the establishment of successful endeavors nationwide even faster. And we relish the role and opportunity to help the no-menu, no-prices community building model to fruition everywhere.

To that end, Cerreta travels wherever she is needed to assist in establishing a new community kitchen. She has volunteered as much as a month of her time, working the counter in new kitchens. She and the foundation provide a free online how-to, "Spirit in Business: A Guide for Starting a Community Kitchen," (pdf format) which they are planning to expand to a full book.



For visioning a world free of hunger, for trusting her patrons to pay a fair price for the food she serves, for assuring no one who enters her doors leaves hungry whatever their circumstances, for setting the standard of serving wholesome, organically grown, nutritious foods, for encouraging other food purveyors to consider the no menu-no price model, for working diligently to eliminate food waste and for making a commitment to pay employees a living wage, this week's Ordinary Hero Award is humbly and gratefully offered to Denise Cerreta.

Images of the One World community kitchen and garden courtesy One World Everybody Eats newsroom.

Related articles

• Ordinary Heroes Award (realordinarygraceonline.blogspot.com)

Ordinary Hero: Iranian Woman

Image by misterarasmus via Flickr

After its recent election, and in the face of hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of protesters demanding an investigation into what they suspected was a fraudulent result, the Iranian government silenced foreign reporters. The government also attempted to silence individual Iranians by restricting their access to the Internet.

Many brave Iranians have found ways to get news of their protest rallies, and the violent government response, out of the country. Yesterday may have been the bloodiest day yet. Some have dubbed it Iran's Tienanmen Square. Others call it a massacre. Many Iranians posted horrific images on Twitter, YouTube and FaceBook. Reportedly, whenever they post, they risk discovery, arrest, beatings and perhaps death.

One woman somehow managed to call CNN directly and spoke live to reporter Ivan Watson. We do not learn her name, presumably because of the danger to her and her family, and it is difficult to verify her story. In the video, though, Watson indicates to her that they have received similar reports from other sources inside the country, and I have watched a slew of video clips tonight that support her allegations as well.

Here is her story, in her own words, as reported by CNN. Warning: It is a deeply disturbing account.

Update 6/25/09: Apparently the video above has been removed or disabled, at least temporarily. Another user has posted the same video here. Please let me know in the comments below if this one disappears as well. Meanwhile, I will try to learn why the video is no longer working on the original site and will update when and if I learn anything.

Anonymous, traumatized, terrified, the caller nevertheless risked her life to share what she had witnessed and to plea for help.

For refusing to be silent in the face of injustice, for standing with courage and doing what she can to help those suffering around her, for working with the resources at her disposal to bring the world a little further from the chaos of reprisal and bloodshed and a little closer to cooperation and peace, the Ordinary Heroes Award is gently offered to this unnamed Iranian woman with hope and prayers that she and the people of her country soon may live in peace and harmony.

It is also given with a desire to answer her call for help.

Because this woman, and so many other Iranians, are successful in broadcasting their stories to the world, we who read, listen and watch in horror are forced to accept once again that unmitigated cruelty exists in the world. To stand by and do nothing would be to collude with the perpetrators.

I take only one side, that of compassionate peace, and that leaves me with no clear, direct path to be of use to the caller and to the people suffering. I am mindful, though, of the powerful message of Sharon Mehdi's book, The Great Silent Grandmother Gathering. I have witnessed the miraculous results that can be found in focus and prayer, particularly when more than one person is engaged, and so I call on the grandmothers, and any who would stand with us, to stand for peace.

Stand in your churches, your homes your places of work, on your street corners and buses and playgrounds. Stand for peace. Stand with the intent that this woman's anguish be healed, her country be healed, and that the leaders of the country be healed. Now is the time.

Ordinary Hero: Katie McKenna

The visiting nurse told Peace Corps volunteer Katie McKenna that her Guatemalan village of Chuisac had one of the highest rates of childhood diarrhea in the region. The cause: Inadequate sanitation facilities. As many as fourteen people in the village of 140 families shared a single latrine. Lacking proper toilets, children frequently defecated in their yards and patios. Desperate to save their children and improve overall health, the villagers planned to build a latrine for every household that did not have one--about one hundred. Cost per latrine was $150, and the villagers could provide half that in labor and materials.

Water Charity, a non-profit organization with a mission to provide clean water and sanitation to people who don't have it, learned about Katie's work with the village and offered to provide the additional funding.

While Katie and the villagers worked to dig and begin building the latrines, Water Charity raised the remaining funds, one small donation at a time. Katie pulled a substantial portion of the funds herself, hitting up family and friends back in the States.

Water Charity credits Katie's determination and perseverance for the success of the program.

In many cases, we have 13 people currently using 1 latrine, and the picture of the men building the latrine is in a house where there is NO latrine. They had the hole dug, but they didn't have the money to buy the little house around it and the seat.

These families worked day and night to get the holes and latrines done, digging holes 23 to 50 feet deep! It is scary work in a hole that deep and narrow. For the latrine you see being built, the family went down 120 feet!!

Water Charity Progress Report
on Katie M's Latrines

All told, Katie and the villagers built 91 latrines. They also educated the children on safety and hygiene practices.






The faces of one family, shown here standing in front of their new toilet, tell us exactly how important this asset is to their lives.







It is easy in our land of plenty, where many of us enjoy multiple bathrooms in our homes, complete with hot and cold running water, to forget the enormity of sanitary waste disposal. We flush, wash and go. For billions of people elsewhere, a simple toilet can be the difference between life and death.

According to the United Nations World Health Organization, every year there are 1.6 million diarrheal deaths related to unsafe water, sanitation, and hygiene—the vast majority among children under 5.

Water Charity

For giving selflessly of her time, energy, skills and talents as a volunteer in the United States Peace Corps; for working respectfully with the villagers of Chuisac in their quest to improve the health of their children; for building cooperation through partnership with local Guatemalan organizations as well as international organizations such as Water Charity; for providing a perfect example of a conscious and conscientious member of our world village, and thereby bringing the Village of Ordinary a little closer to reality, the Ordinary Heroes Award is kindly offered to Katie McKenna with humble gratitude.


Image credits: Images of Katie and the villagers courtesy Water Charity. Used with permission.

Ordinary Hero: Christine Nielson

Watch this.



Who knew that a simple act, such as choosing organic cotton over conventionally grown cotton, could save lives? Christine Nielson knew--and did something about it. A former school teacher who had helped indigenous women in Mexico use traditional skills to raise their standard of living, Nielson developed the entrepreneurial "fire in the belly" when she visited the cotton fields of her friend Sally Fox. Fox is a hero in her own right. She revolutionized the cotton industry when she developed plants that grew long-fiber colored cotton, reducing the need for bleach.

Nielson saw Fox's beautiful, cotton in earthy, natural colors as an environmentally sound and humane alternative and founded Coyuchi. Its mission, according to Coyuchi's Joanne Sims, in Hope & Luxury: To stop the production of conventionally grown cotton.

From the beginning our mission was to work with sustainable agriculture. Organic and fair trade means these farmers are paid an extra amount and it gives them a meaningful improvement in the quality of life.

Christine Nielson in Marin Independent Journal

Cotton is the most heavily sprayed crop on the planet. Doing an organic cotton bedding line is a way of offering people a quality product, as well as--since sheets are big and heavy and use a lot of fiber--making a substantial contribution to pollution reduction.

Christine Nielson, as quoted in
SF Gate/Organic Materials

Frequently cited as the first company to manufacture organic cotton fabric for commercial use, Coyuchi launched a line of luxurious organic bedding and bath products and placed them strategically in upscale boutiques and shops, where trendy patrons couldn't get enough. Leveraging the growing demand for her products, Nielson forged exclusive relationships with mills and growers in India. Demand continued to grow, enough that prices came down to within reach of ordinary people like you and me.

In its December 2007, issue, Ode Magazine asked Nielson: What can make growing organic cotton sustainable for the farmers? Her reply was simple:

Only with the added benefit and support of fair-trade certification can organic cotton farming work over the long haul. The higher price for organic cotton in addition to the premium for fair-trade certification assures more returns. Half of the fair-trade premium goes to farmers’ committees and will be utilized for projects that benefit the community, such as setting up schools and providing drinking water.

In providing Westerners with gorgeous comforters and sheets, pesticide-free crib bedding on which to lay our baby's heads, and luxuriously soft towels in the bath, Nielson gave nearly destitute cotton farmers in India, many of whom were already sickened from exposure to insecticides they used on their conventional cotton crops, a hand up and hope for a much brighter future. How did she do it? By giving them a market for cotton fibers grown in the traditional--and organic--way, as they had grown them for thousands of years.

If you watched the The Conventional Trap at the beginning of this post, you'll be heartened to learn what Coyuchi and its partners have achieved in Growing Back to Organic, here.



Not only did Nielson pay more for organic cotton than GMO prices (Note: Due to lower yields in early years, returns are about even with GMO returns, but expected to increase as the soil is replenished.), but in partnership with Solidaridad and the Chetna Organic Farmers Association, she helped bring fair trade practices to the farms, insuring that workers are treated humanely and compensated fairly.

Also with the Chetna Organic Farmers Association, she helped initiate the Livestock & Field Infrastructure Development Project, which she dubbed "The Cow Project," according to OrganicStyle, which explains the project here.

It Takes Six Villages/The Cow Project

Although Chetna trains and supports its members in organic growing practices, the farmers are missing some essentials - most importantly, livestock. Cows and bullocks provide the manure for making compost; their urine is collected, fermented, and applied to cotton plants as a concentrated soure [sic] of nitrogen and natural pesticide. Meanwhile, the cows' milk supplements family diets and provides an additional source of income. On average, the calves born each year contribute more than 3,000 rupees, or $75, to the the groups of farmers and their families.

Together, Chetna and Coyuchi have developed a pilot program with the aim of acquiring 91 cows and constructing 10 cowsheds for six villages as well as building shelters to help lengthen their life expectancy.

Nielson did not stop with the farmers, however. She partnered with fair-trade mills to ensure their workers were also compensated fairly, without discrimination, and that dyes and finishes are safe. Your baby, sleeping on a Coyuchi crib sheet, will never inhale residual formaldehyde, for example, which is used in most conventional cotton products.

This year, Nielson sold Coyuchi to Organic Style, Ltd. "I didn't have the fire in the belly anymore to want to keep investing tremendous amounts of energy into commerce," Nielson told Organic Bouquet's Clark Merrefield.

The work Nielson began will continue under the leadership of Organic Style's founder and CEO, Gerald Prolman. Says Prolman, "You've got six thousand growers in India that are counting on us to sell their goods. I'm going to scream the Coyuchi message as long as I'm running this company."


For changing the way we think about organic products, for providing us with beautiful bed and bath linens made of sustainably grown, harvested, milled and shipped fibers, for saving lives, for improving the quality of life for textile laborers from field to packaged goods, for helping farmers to earn a better living, safely, while replenishing the soil upon which we all depend, for going beyond her company's needs and working with local organizations to provide safe drinking water and livestock for food and crop management, for caring about the earth and the generations to come at home and abroad, and for bringng the vision of the Village of Ordinary a little closer to reality, the Ordinary Heroes award is kindly offered to Christine Nielson with deep gratitude.


For more about organic cotton, including links to numerous organic cotton products and suppliers, ranging from baby toys and crib blankets to high fashion white shirts for men and yummy fashions for women, visit my Squidoo lens, Why Buy Organic Cotton. For more on the effects of conventional cotton growing on the lives of growers, see the PBS documentary, The Dying Fields, on the cotton farmer suicide epidemic in India.

Ordinary Hero: Alice Waters

She's been called revolutionary.

She made a name for herself doing what she loved--cooking delicious, gorgeous food.

She introduced picked-same-day, locally grown fruits and vegetables in her dishes, because they taste best and have the most vibrant color, and started a fresh new cuisine that changed the way millions of us eat.

She used her earned fame to help launch a movement for slow food.

She takes a lot of flack for being outspoken as the link referenced here shows, but she led the campaign for an organic garden on the White House lawn, and First Lady Michelle Obama dug one.

She's been teaching children how to garden and cook since 1996, beginning with The Edible Schoolyard. Now she's lobbying the White House and Congress to plant an edible garden at every public school in the land. More, she's lobbying to get organic, locally grown, healthy food into free breakfast and lunch programs at every school.

You're gonna pay. You're either gonna pay up-front, or you're gonna pay out back. Do you know that one in two kids is gonna have diabetes? Let us subsidize real food instead of fast food. Let's feed every single child in school breakfast, lunch, and an afternoon snack, for free, and feed them real food.

As quoted by Eat Me Daily

Sparks flew at the Connecticut Forum's Food for Thought program May 14, where Alice Waters appeared with celebrity foodies Anthony Bourdain and Duff Goldman. Bourdain made a good point that people who cannot afford to pay seven dollars plus for a gallon of milk are unlikely to care where their milk comes from, so long as they can afford to give their children milk at all. Alice got that, and her response was equally provocative and, more importantly, a marvelous solution to a big chunk of the problem. Chef Duff Goldman made a keen point as well. It's all captured in this video. Take a look.

CAUTION: Two of the chefs speaking on this panel use profanity. Do not watch if four letter words offend you.



Who do you think is right?

Waters may be equally well-known for her political activism as for the delicious meals served up at her Berkeley Restaurant, Chez Panisse, which is almost as much a Bay Area tourist attraction as the Golden Gate bridge. (Among a slew of salivating visitors, @nguyenthuyviet tweeted on May 27 that she was planning "chez panisse reservations, renting bikes at gg park, a's vs o's tailgating, & ghost hunting" on an upcoming trip to the Bay Area.) But there's another aspect to Waters' work that is of vital importance to our collective future.

Sustainability has been a hallmark at Chez Panisse from the beginning. So important is this aspect, the restaurant posts their Commitment to Sustainability. Here's part of it.

We seek farmers who know their seeds and soil, ranchers who care about the food their livestock eats, winemakers who know what their grapes have known, fish merchants who are concerned about the health of the seas. To them we add kitchen and wait staff who care about the material of their work, knowing they will enjoy and take pride in the technical expertise they add to it. We reaffirm our commitment to all this, knowing that it is central to both the deepest and the most joyous of human activities: generosity, companionship, nourishment, growth.

For doing what she loves, for building on what she loves, for using her best talents and skills to help others, and for creating positive change through action, persuasion and deed, the Ordinary Heroes award is kindly offered to Chef Alice Waters with deep gratitude for deepening the vision and widening the path to the Village of Ordinary.

Ordinary Hero: Marion Nestle

If The Personal is Political,* there is little more personal than the food we eat. Yet Americans entrust our food supply almost entirely to big (really big) business. Wholesome, bucolic images of rosy-cheeked farmers jauntily pitching hay while black and white cows graze amiably in green pastures blaze from our television screens, magazines, newspapers and yes, on our blogs and web pages, but the truth about the food we eat is seldom close to these pastoral images.

Marion Nestle (pronounced Ness-ul) has been working to pluck the wool from our collective eyes since 1976. Food is political, she says, and if we are to protect our own health and the health of future generations, we need to get this and vote with our dollars every time we push a cart through the aisles of our local supermarket.

Her three books, Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition, and Health,Safe Food: Bacteria, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorismand What to Eatare more than enough to win her the Ordinary Hero award, but it's something she did last week that brought her to focus today.

She had been nominated to the Smart Choices board of directors. Smart Choices is going to put a zippy little green check mark on the packages of food that meet its criteria for healthy, wholesome food. They'll also tell us how many calories are in a serving of that food and how many servings are in the package. Sounds cool, huh? This might seem a prestigious and appropriate post for a woman whose entire adult life has been in the service of working to assure our food supply is safe and as healthy as possible.

Marion Nestle declined the nomination. She declined the nomination because Smart Choices "is a food industry-initiated plan to put a check mark--a stamp of approval--on processed food products that meet certain nutritional criteria," criteria that, upon scrutiny, she felt, did not provide the reassurance promised in that little green check mark.

The studies that food producers support tend to minimize health concerns associated with their products.

U.S. News and World in interview with
Marion Nestle and David Ludwig

To understand better why Marion Nestle doesn't trust that green check mark, check out 10 Things the Food Industry Doesn't Want You to Know, including item 2: "The studies that food producers support tend to minimize health concerns associated with their products."

Dr. Nestle places the blame for America's obesity epidemic squarely on the shoulders of Wall Street and its demand that corporations show ever increasing quarterly returns. She makes a fair and lively case for it in this video titled Food Politics filmed at the Alworth Center for Peace and Justice. Dr. Nestle doesn't take the podium until around four minutes in, and the visual is fairly monotonous, so I recommend that you grab a cuppa and a biscuit and sit down with a jigsaw puzzle or your favorite mindless computer game while you listen. She's definitely worth your time and I guarantee you'll come away with something interesting for the water cooler tomorrow.



For a lifetime of watching out for the quality and safety of our food, for standing up to the corporate giants again and again and again, and for teaching us how to find safe, healthy food (see How to Find Green Fish, How to Buy Organic Milk, How to Buy Green Produce), and in doing so, helping us all get a little closer to the world of the Village of Ordinary, the Ordinary Heroes award is kindly offered to Marion Nestle.

Learn more about Marion Nestle on her web site and keep up to date on the latest at the intersection of food and politics on her blog.


Thanks to Tweep @AmiraElgan for introducing me to Marion Nestle through her May 12 tweet "HERO ALERT: Nutrition professor tells why she declined nutrition society's nomination to head a prestigious program. http://bit.ly/Mo7NM."

*With a bow and a nod to Carol Hanisch, Shulie Firestone, Anne Koedt and Kathie Sarachild.

Ordinary Hero: Seth Godin

They call him a marketing guru. Sit with his bio for two minutes, and you'll see why. He markets himself pretty well, don't you think? But that's not why he's an Ordinary Hero.

This is why.



For challenging us to be leaders, for teaching us how to lead, for giving us tools with which to lead, and for showing us that we are already part of a tribe, Seth Godin is this week's Ordinary Hero. Thank you, Seth.

In the next 24 hours, create a movement. Something that matters. Start. Do it. We need it.

Seth Godin

Get out there.

Ordinary Hero: Sharon Mehdi

Image copyright 2009
L. Kathryn Grace
All rights reserved

She wrote a story for her granddaughter, not yet born, about two grandmothers who stood for peace. She shared the story with some friends. They shared the story with their friends. The story begins like this.

On a buffety, blustery early summer day, when the news was bad and the sky turned yellow, a strange thing happened in the town where I live.

The Great Silent Grandmother Gathering: A Story for Anyone Who Thinks She Can't Save the World

Tomorrow, as we did last year and as thousands did the year before, women from all over the world will do a strange thing. For five short minutes, we will stand silently in parks, in churches, on public streets, on courthouse steps and statehouse steps, on mountaintops, at the seashore, next to rivers and in our own gardens. Like the grandmothers in the story, we will stand for peace.

For visioning a world of peace; for visioning that two silent women, dressed in comfortable shoes and their Sunday best could stand unmoving with one thought in mind; for visioning that women all over the world would understand the silence and the standing and the vision and join them, each in their village, town, city; and for visioning that sons and daughters everywhere in the world, in response to their mothers and grandmothers and sisters and aunties and cousins standing silently for peace would drop their weapons and choose peace; for making the vision of the Village of Ordinary a little more real, the Ordinary Heroes Award is offered with deepest gratitude to Sharon Mehdi. (Updated 5/10 with link to Mehdi's web page.)



Find out who is standing for peace in your area and join us.

Ordinary Hero: Michelle O'Neil

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

She's funny, poignant, involved, deep, light and a just plain good read. She's a registered nurse, a former radio reporter, a political activist, a writer. She's totally in love with her fella, whom she refers to as Hot Toddy.

A big shout out to my technical guy Todd O'Neil. Not only does he do all my computer stuff, but he's good smelling, warm, and doesn't hog all the covers.

My Technical Guy

Like so many of us, she resists disappearing into mommydom.

The pendent felt like a big blinking neon sign that read, MOTHER, NOTHING ELSE. Wasn’t the screaming baby attached to my body advertisment enough?

The Necklace

She writes a lot about her two children, Riley and Seth. Both are intelligent, funny, eager, loving, brave. With autism, Riley, the oldest, has a few more challenges than her little brother. O'Neil shares many of these with us, heartbreakingly so at times, and also the precious moments. On packing day, Mom is at her limits and sends Seth to his room for a time out, then sits back on the floor to calm herself. Riley climbs onto mom's lap, straddling her hips, and gives her mom softies.

The feel of my fingernails up and down her arms has always soothed her. It almost puts her in a trance. Now, she's trying to comfort me with them.

Softies

A shy friend, perhaps a bit reclusive, in an effort to expand her world has attended a Zumba dance class--that yummy, fast-paced, sexy workout. Zapped with the spirit of the moment, another student shouts exuberantly, "Charo-like". On the way home, in the car, exulting in her new freedom, the friend lets loose, Charo-like, over and over. O'Neil celebrates.

When we free ourselves, we give others permission to do the same.

Work it girl!

Taking the kids in for shots can be a hassle at best any time, right? Try it with a child with autism. Then get a clinic who understands how to work with children, who prearranges for you to take your children past the registration desk, avoiding the wait, and greets the children with smiles, music headphones, dancing, joking. Both children are at ease when the shots come.

Special needs parents have so much gratitude for the kindness of strangers.

People are good

She shares the things she learns that help her cope, gain insights, make peace, if only for ten minutes.

I want to tell you about a meditation I sometimes do. ... You start where you are, and go back chronologically in age. ...

Fade to black

She celebrates her daughter's wisdom far beyond her years, beyond many adults of any age.

"It's okay little guy. It's okay if you die, 'cause you just go straight back to God. Don't worry, okay? Everybody dies."

Riley, speaking to a sick baby squirrel in Everybody dies

She uses what she learns from her past, with regret at behavior born of ignorance and perhaps a certain unconsciousness, to educate those in her community with a receptive bent and, just possibly, win a few playdates for her daughter.

I just keep thinking about Besty. Wishing I had handled it differently. Wishing I had known more. Wishing I had been a better person. I am ashamed I didn't allow myself the gift her friendship would have been.

It would also be a shame for the little girls in our neighborhood to miss out on the opportunity to know Riley.

The more we know, the better we do.

Playdates and regret

For these reasons and so many more, Michelle O'Neil of Full Soul Ahead is the Ordinary Hero of the week. Thank you, Michelle, for sharing so much of your life, for giving so fully and intelligently, for being exactly who you are, an ordinary woman living an extraordinary life.

I encourage any one reading this to immerse yourself in Full Soul Ahead. Learn. Laugh. Love more. Michelle shows us all a bit more of the vision of Ordinary.

Ordinary Hero: Van Jones

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

Seven months ago, when I first wrote about him, Van Jones was promoting green jobs and a green economy for the blue collar worker.

We need a green economy that honors the earth ... but not a green economy only for the eco-chic. ... The people who are struggling for bus fare--they have a place too.

Van Jones, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights

That alone is enough to warrant the Ordinary Heroes award. There's so much more. If it's green, if it's the economy, if it's jobs, Jones is there, showing us how we can lift ourselves and help others lift themselves from poverty to prosperity, slow human-caused climate change and protect our environment in the bargain. In fact, he's shown up twice more here, on Realizing Ordinary, in I'm ready for the green economy--Are you? and in Pinning our hopes on youth.

Hear what he has to say.

We are just now at the beginning of this green wave of new technologies that are environmentally friendly, and that green wave now has to be designed to lift all boats.

Van Jones

A 1993 Yale graduate, "serially successful social entrepreneur", and author of the New York Times best seller The Green Collar Economy:to cite just a few of his accomplishments, Jones is now President Obama's green-jobs czar at the White House, a decision that marks the level of the president's commitment to building a greener economy.

That's exciting. Even more exciting, though, is the hand Jones gives to the most impoverished of our nation and how hard he is working especially to help youth of color to a piece of the American dream.

We can't just keep sending our children away to funeral homes and prisons.

A Tennessee native with keen entrepreneurial savvy, Jones could have done anything with his life. He chose to devote his incredible talent, energy, charisma and intelligence to stopping violence and near-rite-of-passage imprisonment for our nation's youth of color. Three years out of college, he co-founded, with Diana Frappier, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in 1996. In direct disproportion to society, our overcrowded prisons are stuffed with blacks and Latinos. That fact alone makes crime and the prosecution of crime in this country a matter of human rights. Jones sought to change those statistics by changing the lives of the people behind them.

He is perhaps the first to articulate on the national level that more than schooling and jobs are required to change a community from one filled with drive-by shootings, funerals and revolving prison doors to one filled with picket fences, school books and cookies in the oven. Because the poorest of us grow up in the most marginalized communities, often built over landfills and toxic waste dumps, children develop asthma and other chemically-induced diseases in greater proportion than children of affluent neighborhoods. It's not enough to give people a hand up; we need to help clean up.

Jones is committed to cleaning up the toxic mess we made in the last two centuries, and preventing its occurrence in the future--a matter of life and death for poor children.

The next big play in the economy is going to be greening the economy, turning away from the suicide economy to a sustainable economy. Let's make sure those communities that were locked out of the last century's pollution-based economy are gonna be locked in to this new clean and green economy.

For his commitment to ending poverty and endemic racism through the development of environmentally safe industry and for using his passion, energy, intelligence and love to help the poorest of us build prosperous lives while reclaiming the fresh, wholesome beauty of our Earth and preserving our soil, water, air and natural world for generations to come, this week's Ordinary Heroes award is offered to Van Jones with deepest gratitude.

Ordinary Hero: Paul Gillespie

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

Drivers of hybrid fuel taxis in San Francisco are pocketing $9,000 a year in fuel savings, thanks to Paul Gillespie, says Hybrid Cars. If you've wondered how long a hybrid battery would last in real road conditions, they don't get much more of a beating than they'll find on the hilly streets of San Francisco where all but two of the hybrid fleet have logged nearly 300,000 miles without a battery issue since they hit the road in 2003.

"Ford never really intended this vehicle to be used as a taxi," Gillespie said as he tooled around the city's hilly Pacific Heights neighborhood in the silent hybrid. "We adopted it because I was desperate to find a vehicle that would save drivers fuel costs and save greenhouse gas emissions."

Los Angeles Times

According to the Los Angeles Times in San Francisco's hybrid taxis prove their worth, fourteen percent, or approximately 200 of San Francisco's 1,438 taxis are hybrids. They're saving drivers money, helping keep San Francisco's skies blue, lessening the amount of traffic-caused pollution that blows to the East Bay, and giving us all a quieter ride.

For his persistence in advocating the adoption of hybrids into the San Francisco taxi fleet; for proving their value; and for starting where he lives and works to improve one relatively small, but potentially globally significant, fossil-fuel sucking, climate-changing problem, the Ordinary Heroes award this week is kindly offered to Paul Gillespie.

Ordinary Hero: Barbara E.

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

"We have a new member who needs a ride to meetings. Can you take her?" That's how I met Barbara. I was shy, socially awkward and did not make friends quickly. She was educated, well-read, savvy, artistic, a tad eccentric. I was hooked. The first few months, we didn't talk much in the forty-five minute drive to and from our political action meetings. I, self-conscious, felt intimidated. Later, she wouldn't be able to shut me up.

In the meantime, she would volunteer to do the layout for the organization's newsletter, the editing of which was a safe task for me--very little public exposure or public speaking required. She was good at layout. She was good at anything leadership asked her to do. If you've ever worked with volunteers, you know we can be a sketchy bunch. Barbara was always on time, always reliable, and frequently did more than expected without being asked. She saw a need and filled it quietly. She was the volunteer every organizer dreams.

She was passionate about women's rights, human rights, environmental action, art--and she was humble. Unlike so many in the political realm, she never sought the spotlight. Invaluable to the organizations whose work she championed, she gave generously of her skills and experience, her energy and time, and especially her artistic wisdom.

When one after the other our marriages failed, we were there for each other, she more than I, truth be told. Though her life crumbled about her, she was steadfast in her loyalty, comforting me while I floundered in an emotional sea of self-doubt, raw pain and loss. Through her own suffering, she listened quietly to my rants and self-centered caterwauling for hours on end. She always gave me a hug and an "I love you" as we parted.

The last evening I spent with her, we chatted as old friends do through a sumptuous dinner at an indoor/outdoor cafe--new in our town, then sipped vinegary wine at a fundraiser for one of our favorite charities. We capped it with a spontaneous buggy ride through a delicious May evening. Yes, clip-clop, clip-clop. Cerulean blue sky burning golden and cherise, then fading to deep blue, spangled with stars. It was a gorgeous hour of shared contentment with a friend so beloved, words were superfluous in the cool night breeze. Do I remember correctly? Did the heady scent of cottonwoods in bloom fill the balmy air? Or was it a steamy August night, shirts sticking to our skin? Memory, supreme trickster.

How did I lose her? Did I become so self-absorbed I stopped calling her, stopped sending notes? Perhaps she reached a point where her own suffering was such that she could no longer stomach my bellyaching and kvetching when we got together.

A couple of times we made contact again but somehow let it slip, and a few years ago she found me through my family, each of us long since moved to far-flung states. We had out-of-town company the day she called, my birthday it was, and though I wrote down her telephone number and e-mail address, somehow the handy junk-mail envelope I used was lost by the time the company left and I settled down to call her back.

Every word she spoke was true.

Still, despite my incompetent friendship, I think of Barbara fondly and with gladness and gratitude. Every word she spoke was true. Of how many people can you say that? Now, searching the Internet, I find images of her with her grandchild, images of her daughter, easily recognizable after twenty-five years. Perhaps I can reach Barbara through her children and get permission to use her full name here, for she is one of the heroes of my life, and certainly an Ordinary Hero.

Whatever transpired in the thirty-some years since we met and the quarter century since we last saw one another, Barbara exemplifies the love, generosity, compassion and friendship that are typical of the villagers of Ordinary.

For being true to herself, to her friends, to her family, to her country and to people who may never know the love she devoted to their well-being and safety, and for the joy her friendship has been to me over the years, despite our separation, I offer to Barbara E. the Ordinary Heroes Award.

May all who read this know the joy of such a friendship.

Namaste, Barbara.

Ordinary Hero: Amy Krouse-Rosenthal

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

Amy Krouse-Rosenthal is a person who likes to make things.

That's the first line on the home page of her web site, Who is Amy, where you can link to articles that describe her as a best-selling children's book author and tell a delightful ongoing love story.

I've been married to Jason for over 17 years. Which means I've woken up beside him something like 46,225 times.

Redbook

She writes adult books, too, one of which is titled Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, but that's not the reason she is an Ordinary Hero. The reason Amy Krouse-Rosenthal is a recipient of the Ordinary Heroes Award is because she made the video, The Beckoning of Lovely. Watch and be glad.



Thank you, Amy. Your vision, love, artistry, passion and belief in your work and your self make the Village of Ordinary less a vision and ever more real today.

[Edit 4/3/09: Belated thanks and acknowledgement to Wanda of What Would Wanda Do? and to chookooloonks, who introduced the video to Wanda.]

Ordinary Hero: Helena Norberg-Hodge

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

In 1975, a young linguist, Helena Norberg-Hodge, traveled to the tiny Indian state of Ladakh, so far north, and so Buddhist in culture, it is known as Little Tibet. She has returned to Ladakh for six months every year since, living with her friends and teachers, learning their language and assuring it continues to live in both written and spoken form. What she has witnessed in nearly thirty-five years is the near destruction of a self-sustaining, peaceful culture where crime was almost unheard of and the people were so efficient in providing for themselves that they partied during most of the harshest winter months.

To what does Norberg-Hodge attribute this change after more than 500 years of contentment and plenty? Western encroachment. The following film, in three video segments, nicely contrasts the genteel, traditional lifestyle of the Ladakhi with the noise, crime and dirt that symbolize the new, progressive lifestyle imported, along with gasoline and monoculture crops, from the west.







You can learn more of the story in Norberg-Hodge's book, Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh, which is the inspiration for The Village of Ordinary. Ancient Futures shows us that Ordinary is not merely a vision, but a reality in one of the harshest climes in the world.

Founder of the International Society for Ecology and Culture (ISEC), Norberg-Hodge spends much of her time away from Ladakh promoting ecological, economic and political strategies to save the earth. That last phrase, Strategies to Save the Earth, is also the name of a short videotaped conversation with Doug Tomkins, founder of NorthFace and Esprit. In the film, Norberg-Hodge says:

For about 35 years I've been trying to raise awareness about the way in which the economy--economic development, globalization--lies behind almost all the social and environmental crises we face. ... A lot of issues converge in the same root causes. ... It would be a lot better if we could focus on the need for change and look upon the key levers that could bring the economy in a direction that would support life, support our water systems, the land, and help to rebuild the fabric of society.

That means looking at the way in which deregulating global trade and finance is responsible for most of the social and ecological destruction we see. So we need to be looking at re-regulating finance and trade, and one of the things we can do is start already at the local level to create protected local markets where producers and consumers collaborate to create a new economy that really supports diversity.

Sound familiar? But Norberg-Hodge is hopeful for a better future:

The most important idea is to realize is that we're dealing with a man-made economic system. It's not evolutionary. It's not happening at its own natural progression, that things just get bigger and bigger. In Nature, everything that waxes, also wanes. We're not talking about evolution. We're not talking about something natural. It's very unnatural, made by people, and we can change it. We just need to have the courage to look at the bigger picture, and the courage to realize that we are capable of changing a man-made system.

For her love of the Ladakhi people and their culture,
For her ability to recognize the economic and social genius of the Ladakhi,
For her resolve to work with her Ladakhi friends to preserve their way of life,
For her efforts to bring westerners to Ladakh to work and learn,
For her active promotion and training in shortening the distance from farm to fork through her Local Food Toolkit,
For continuing to speak, write, publish and travel to encourage all of us to make more sustainable, life-enhancing choices,
For her faith in humanity to do the right thing, eventually,
For her perseverance and refusal to give up despite the setbacks life throws at her,
For making the story of the Ladakhi available to us all,

the Ordinary Heroes award is offered with deepest gratitude to Helena Norberg-Hodge.

[Edited for typographical errors on 3/28/09]

Ordinary Heroes: Amelia and Michael Howard of Eden Place

Image copyright L. Kathryn Grace, 2009
All rights reserved

They had the money to live almost anywhere. They chose to return and raise their children in the Southside Chicago neighborhood in which Amelia Howard grew up, a place now riffed with gang violence and fear. She became a teacher in a local school. He started a construction business. Together, they cleared a neighborhood vacant lot that had become a toxic waste dumping ground. It took them five years. In its place, they grew a (mostly) native plant garden, built a wetland and a prairie, and taught parents and their children how to grow their own food. They called it Eden Place.

Now city kids who know little or nothing of prairies, flowers and fruit trees can run barefoot through thick, mown grass, pick tomatoes from the vine, watch beans climb poles through the summer heat, and learn about the native plants that grew in Chicago long before buildings and concrete covered the landscape. Chicago Wilderness Magazine tells the story in Secret Garden, and you can learn more about the project at Eden Place Nature Center: An Urban Oasis. What you won't find on the latter page is any information about the Howards and their role in rescuing the land, how they dealt with fire-bombing gangs who tried to stop them, or their struggle to keep the center going. They don't appear to be the horn-tooting type, unless the horn is to draw attention to the need for more volunteers and cash to keep the center and its programs running.

With an eye on the present, the center actively promotes getting down and dirty in the garden. Children of all ages and their parents and teachers participate in nature classes and hands-on gardening, including picking and eating fruits and vegetables as they ripen. The center's eye is firmly fixed on the future as well. In addition to environmental and gardening classes for students of all ages, the center provides unpaid Environmental Management/Stewardship internships to undergraduate and graduate students.

This garden has helped families heal. It's helped them learn how to be healthy physically and socially. It's improved our quality of life.

Michael Howard as quoted on
Gardener's Supply Company's
2005 Garden Crusader Awards

For their courage, determination and perseverance to turn an illegal toxic waste dumping ground into a body, mind and soul-nourishing haven, this third Ordinary Heroes award is humbly offered to Amelia and Michael Howard, with gratitude. May they be blessed one-thousand fold.

My thanks to Twitterer @urbangarden for pointing me to this story.