My sister recently overhauled the way she writes her website, Six Twists. I’m taking a cue from her and am going to do the same. In the same vein as her weekly links and inspirations, I’m posting what I’m seeing, feeling, reading, and wondering, right now, from the Dominican Republic:
- My heart is breaking as I look through this gallery of photos by Vlad Sokhin covering what modern slavery looks like in Haiti. I never knew the name restavak, but see this same concept reflected in the Dominican Republic with Haitian children. This led me to discover the Restavak Freedom Project’s website.
- I’ve developed a friendship with a former Peace Corps volunteer also living and working in the DR, and in the last month she has visited La Descubierta and Los Pinos twice to introduce the method and model of her organization. Her team at Community Enterprise Solutions works to train and empower women and youth to sell products like water filters, mosquito nets and solar lamps within their communities. In this way they introduce products with specific benefits and provide opportunities to earn income.
- I have major love for everything that Amber Rae posts on her blog, and spent a quiet moment at the apartment in Santo Domingo doing what she calls The Deathbed Exercise. My top 5 feel sort of universal, but it feels good to put how you want your life to look on paper.
- Along the same lines, I’m reading Martha Beck’s Finding Your Own North Star. The only unfortunate part is that I downloaded it onto my computer, and so need to be connected to this device in order to read it. Its the type of self-discovery, self-reflection I need as I’m about to start a huge transition, moving back to San Francisco, very, very soon.
i will arise and go now 