Grassroot Resilience

On Aug. 20, season-three Survivor winner Ethan Zohn began an epic journey called Dribble 2008. 

After playing professional soccer in Africa and seeing some close friends die from the AIDS epidemic consuming the continent, Ethan began Grassroots Soccer, an initiative that hosts soccer camps for the African youth to raise awareness of AIDS.

"To put it in a frame of reference, I lived and played soccer in Zimbabwe and witnessed what was happening firsthand with HIV/AIDS, had friends who got sick and died. I didn't know what to do at that time, so I came back to the States and got on Survivor and had a similar experience while I was playing Survivor in Kenya. So I used [the $1 million Survivor: Africa prize] to create Grassroot Soccer," Zohn said.

To help promote the initiative, the 35-year-old began a 550 mile, 100 day journey from Boston to Washington D.C. in which he would dribble a soccer ball from start to finish.

During the trek, Zohn hosts camps and interacts with the local communities to help spread the word.

"I really want to engage everyone in a fun, cool project where they can really feel they have a part in helping fight this horrible disease."

Everything was going swimmingly until Zohn tore his ACL and meniscus last week during a fundraising soccer match.

“Trust me, I’m upset. But I’ll be there every step of the way,” Zohn says. “Well, not every step. I’ll be in a car for part of it.”

His supporters have rallied behind him and are finishing the campaign.

"In Africa, we teach our kids about resilience, community, support and asking others for help. That's what Grassroot Soccer UNITED Dribble 2008 is all about—becoming one with the soccer community," explains Ethan Zohn, in his blog on the Grassroot Soccer UNITED Website. "And while I am certainly proud of making it 55 days and 279 miles, I'll be even more proud knowing and understanding that, when I cross that finish line in Washington D.C., it was our supporters who helped get me there. This is the moment to come together and use the power of soccer in the fight against AIDS."

Defying doctors orders, Zohn continues to dribble a little, but still needs everyone's support.

Join One Tribe Creative in showing your support for this survivor by visiting his site.

Girls Just Want to Have Social Change

Talk about telling a story well. This video was shared by Paul at One Tribe Creative's weekly meeting:

This amazing video is from The Girl Effect, an effort rooted in the Nike Foundation which strives to start the economic and social change brought about when girls have the opportunity to participate  in their society.

Why girls?  Because girls in the developing world have the largest opportunity to be agents of change, invest more in families than their counterparts, and as of now, do not have a voice in their regions.

Let's take a look at the facts:

• Today, more than 600 million girls live in the developing world. 
• More than one-quarter of the population in Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa are girls and young women ages 10 to 24.
• The total global population of girls 10 to 24 - already the largest in history - is expected to peak in the next decade.

By placing a girl in the middle of the story of what's wrong with the world, we can see the story of poverty, disease, and violence in a personal way.  We can then write a new story by giving the girl a voice and start impacting the world.  We have one planet and one chance.  Let's start the focus on one girl.

Gravitas at Gaviotas

In the mid-60s, a man named Paolo Lugari walked across the baron planes of the East Andes.  It was here, in the los llanos of Colombia, where Paolo expressed his vision of a sustainable community to a team of scientists, agronomists , engineers, and doctors.  

"They always put social experiments in the easiest, most fertile places. We wanted the hardest place. We figured if we could do it here, we could do it anywhere," Lugari said.

What Lugari set forth is now considered one of the most innovative and sustainable communities in the world, Gaviotas.

Gaviotas is at the center stage of the sustainability movement because of the revolutionary technological work the engineers have done.

Windmill Power that Works

After seeing the need for a mechanical device to pump water from the subterranean lakes below the ground to the dry landscape where Gaviotas is located, engineers went through a staggering 58 models of windmills to power the pumps to bring clean water up to the community before settling with a light-weight, efficient model.

"Civilization has been a permanent dialogue between human beings and water," Lugari said.

Thousands of these windmill-powered pumps have been installed around Colombia; with some even being called Gaviotas in the surrounding communities.

Revolutionary Inventions

Along with the windmills, Gaviotas has made groundbreaking strides in inventions.
 

The village has turned to the fermentation of their livestock's dung for the powering of their hospital.

Their cattle dung is placed in fermentation tanks that turn cow-pies into
methane power. This power is used to keep Gaviotas' 16-bed hospital powered. A Japanese architectural journal has named Gaviotas' hospital one of the 40 most important buildings in the world. 

Another crucial element that Gaviotas has implemented is their water dispersion program.  All water that is brought forth through their ingenious pumps is clean and safe to drink.  The community has used their ingenuity to come up with water-bottles that lock together much like Legos.  These water bottles link up and make for better stacking and reduce the waste of space.  They work so well that the community is filling the used bottles with dirt and are using them as actual building blocks

Forestation of los llanos

The soil that surrounds Gaviotas is extremely acidic and harsh on all plant life.  The community searched for a plant that could help their sustainability efforts, and they found it in tropical pine seedlings from Honduras.

These pine trees have sheltered indigenous plants from the harsh aspects of soil and is allowing them to flourish.

"Elsewhere they're tearing down the rain forest," Lugari says. "In los llanos, we're putting it back."

Gaviotas is continuing its pursuit to be an inspiration to other third-world communities and their effort to be self-sufficient and sustainable.  Something One Tribe Creative sees as one of the most important issues facing the world today

Be Unique. Be Homegrown. Be Local.

It seems that the biggest stories these days have to do with the sinking economy.   With Wall St. on the ropes and non-stop bickering taking place in Washington, Main St. seems to be in the back seat during these hard times.  However, there is one way that people can help the economy - staying local.

That is why Fort Collin's very own Be Local Coupon Book is this year's must-have booklet.  

Started three years ago by the Local Living Economy Project, the Be Local Coupon Book offers over $5,000 in savings (at a cost of only ten bucks) to the unique, sustainable, and homegrown organizations around Fort Collins.

The Local Living Economy Project realizes that the depths of human creativity and compassion start at a local level, and would like to see that human element grow.  They know that independent businesses are crucial for the local economy to flourish and would like to tell their stories.

The Be Local Coupon Book is part of Fort Collin's effort to reinvent commerce as a system of honorable, enlivening and equitable relationships within the community.  Numerous businesses in the booklet help Fort Collin's effort in sustainability and environmentally responsible practices. 

You can get yours at 40 outlets around the community, so be sure to get yours and help change the nation's economic story from the ground up!

If your city does not have a booklet dedicated to helping the local economy flourish and is looking for a similar voice, check out this demo site.