Documentary Films: Witness of the Real
We were driving to Yellowstone and were diverted to Billings, MT because of the Elk Fire, which started September 27.
We met Donna and her team at the U.S. Forest Service. She and her colleague, Daniel Clausson, were kind enough to give us an update on the fire.
To learn more about the Elk Fire, please visit U.S. Forest Service, Bighorn National Forest for updates.
After the 9/11 attacks, we were given by our employer, Scudder Investments, now Deutsche Bank, a personal evacuation kit.
The months after the attack, many of us working in NYC office buildings thought another attack was imminent. I felt a bit safer with my personal evacuation kit. With my trusty kit under my arm, I would get out of a burning building unscathed.
Twenty three years later, I still keep my kit next to my desk at work. Fortunately, I have never needed it.
Yesterday I finally opened it.
It’s funny what we think will keep us safe.
New York Diary presents one New Yorker’s personal take on September 11 and its aftermath. How was the immediate, unintelligible horror of the attacks digested and domesticated in the days and weeks that followed?
Before I dashed to work one morning I was astonished at the beauty I almost missed, had I not slowed down and looked and listened to the awe of now.
In a time when anti-immigration rhetoric is scaling new heights in the US and the EU, there is a bright spot in the U.S. migration story. A New York City pilot program teaches first-generation high school students financial literacy and entrepreneurship. It is a win for all communities involved.
More than 40 ski and snowboard instructors braved the frigid New England evening temperatures to participate in the 60th anniversary celebration of Ski Butternut, Great Barrington, MA.
As one of the many part-time ski instructors, waiting for nightfall was a bit of a heavy lift after teaching all day on one of the coldest weekends of the year. But once we lit the torches and started skiing down the mountain together, it was a thrilling reminder on how great it is to be part of such a dynamic community doing what we all love to do: ski.
Aileen Lee, Founder, Infinite Goods, explains the difference between fast and sustainable fashion. Lee’s love for retail, the planet and humanity started at an early age growing up in North Carolina at her high school part-time retail job.
Full disclosure: My cousin Tom is married to Monique Bonnet, the founder of Chateau Suau.
Monique is one of the few successful woman leaders working in wine in Bordeaux. She has been running the family vineyard since the 1980’s.
Around 2007, she noticed her workers were developing rashes, runny eyes, and other symptoms. After a few conversations she learned they were impacted by the pesticides that treat the grapes. Most vineyards still use toxic pesticides today. She said, “That’s it. We are going organic.” At a huge cost, they lost almost three years of production to convert their more than 150 acres into an organic vineyard.
Continue reading “Spotlight: Chateau Suau Leads Bordeaux’s Organic Reign”We were traveling in Iran, 2014. We were in the designated world heritage’s Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Esfahan. I met a group of young travelers. As you can see from this short video, it was a robust and ebullient group. Suddenly a woman shrouded in black, with her four male colleagues, tapped on one of the woman’s shoulder instructing her to correct her headscarf. She had too much hair exposed. In less than three seconds the woman shut down from an urbane cosmopolitan to a mix of shame, frustration, rage, resignation and protective humor.
Continue reading “Is The Women’s Hijab Iran’s Berlin Wall?”Writers, Orhan Pamuk, Margaret Atwood and Salman Rushdie taking selfies, pre-iPhone with Pamuk’s new camera. PEN World Voices, Cooper Union, New York City, 2007.