Hi everybody in CI class!
I hope you're all staying dry! This rain just seems to be nonstop!
It was great seeing you last Thursday. I was especially happy after last class because I had been able to hear every single person's voice: some during the presentations, some during the discussions, and some while chatting with me during the break and after class! Thank you everyone for contributing so much! It was really a great class and I was so happy after I got home!
Thank you to all of you who presented last Thursday: you offered a really interesting mix of people and subjects, and I loved all of your presentations!!
Thank you also to Jonas, who has created a great blog page for us on facebook, and a cool logo too.
On Thursday 10/6 we're going to listen to the remaining presentations about People Who Have Made a Difference. If there are any of you who didn't get to present about Someone Who's Made the World a Better Place last week, and would like to do so this week, please feel free!
And then in the second hour this Thursday,10/6, we will finally get to hear Karen share about what she was up to in Mongolia!
I think it's going to be an exciting class, so I hope you all can make it, even if it's still "raining dogs and cats"...!
In the meantime, if you're looking for some reading material, I'd like to introduce another person who is making a difference in this world: Julia Butterfly Hill.
She is known for her act of civil disobedience trying to save a 50 m tall ancient (more than 1000 years old!) redwood tree in California.
She lived in that tree for two years (Dec. 1997 - Dec. 1999), so that the loggers couldn't cut it down. She was trespassing, so it was illegal for her to be there. If they had cut the tree down while she was in it, she would have fallen with the tree and died, so the loggers couldn't do anything. And of course they were really mad and tried many ways to make her get out of the tree, including scaring her with helicopters flying really close, and trying to cut off her food supplies...!!
After Julia came down from the tree, she continued trying to change the world... According to Wikipedia, she was arrested in Ecuador in 2002 for protesting a proposed oil pipeline that was going to cut through a "virgin Andean cloud forest." (I mention this detail since we've been talking about oil pipelines! :D )
Here's the Wikipedia article about her!
Here's an article about what she has to say now, written quite recently (July 2011). Many protesters are full of anger, but in this article, Julia talks about how love is stronger than anger, and how every choice we make has an impact.
And here's the google images page for Julia Butterfly Hill: some of the photos there are from when she was living in the tree!
If we have time on 10/6, we'll discuss Julia too! I love to hear what you think about her!
But we might have more than enough to talk about with the presentations and Karen's special sharing about Mongolia... !!
We'll just see what happens and take things as they come!
See you all in a few days!
Sincerely, Abbie
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