Friday Photo: Waiting
It was a warm spring day, the kind when parents have a difficult time keeping their children close by and even well behaved dogs just want to sprint into oblivion. I on the other hand just wanted to take it all in, and sat at one of my favorite downtown cafes. Iced coffee in hand, it was the perfect people watching position, allowing me to observe all the ins and outs of one of the first true days of spring. The kind of day that reassures you that, no, winter isn’t going to last forever.
Benches lined the sidewalk in front of the cafe, and a fashionable and smartly dressed woman sat down to take a break, probably engaging in the same activity as I was.
Or sitting an waiting for her next afternoon engagement, committing time to simply enjoying the moment.
Where Does the Time Go?
I’m trying to keep up with this blog, I swear. But I haven’t even had time to go through the plethora of photos from opening day of Farmers Market last weekend (except of course for the one above)… it’s been that kind of a week.
But in the meantime, here are a couple of links to check out:
Can Bike Change the World? An Epic Adventure Points to Yes
Saving Wildlife One Social Network at a Time
And the most inspirational quote of the week:
Because the truth is, our small behaviors really do add up. As proof, just look at the world we live in: it’s the product of hundreds of millions of people each behaving as if we don’t matter. The result is a catastrophe, which we have all participated in creating. And so it turns out, so far, that we all mattered without even realizing it. Each one of us really has made a difference, perhaps in a bigger way than we have the courage to admit to ourselves – Chris Jordan.
Friday Photo: Ready For an Adventure
That travel bug is starting to itch… fortunately there is some good stuff on the horizon.
Be Inspired to Do Something Good.
“To do good, you actually have to do something” -Yvon Chouinard
This quote has been inspiring me all week long (it’s pulled from a video created for American Express), and it has reminded me, that sometimes, even when tasks seem small and unimportant, often they are part of larger efforts affecting change. An important thing to keep in mind, particularly when you get down on yourself for not doing enough.
Maybe it’s helping to spread a message, maybe it’s donating time to a cause, or maybe it’s as simple as educating yourself on an issue so that you can inform others; even though are efforts are small in comparison to the size and scope of the world around is, we all have an effect on our surroundings and the planet as a whole.
What good have you done today?
IKEA Takes Over Paris Metro
Ah the combination of my two foreign loves, Sweden and France… Here’s a fun Friday post:
Forget a boring commute. In Paris, between now and March 24, the metro is being turned into a comfortable living room. That’s thanks to a marketing initiative by IKEA, which is turning 4 metro stations into furnished interiors.
A crazy marketing campaign? Maybe, but it is ingenious in that it gets people passing by to interact with the product. And ask any metro goer and I’m sure they’ll take a comfortable couch over a gum-covered steel bench.
More pics after the jump.
Celebrate Women All Year Long!
Monday of this week was International Women’s Day, and I spent a large part of the day checking out a number of female-focused causes and organizations and reading stories from women around the world celebrating their designated day. I didn’t really know about International Women’s Day until I lived in France during college.
People filled the streets with pro-women related signs that voiced their opinions on everything from education policy to reproductive rights. Pictures from celebrations around the world covered the front page of the newspapers. It seemed like the whole world was brought together for one big party, all focused on the global rights of women. Inspiring.
Unfortunately, I’ve never seen anything quite the same in the U.S., which is not to say that Americans aren’t supportive of women-related causes, but I have never experienced such a uniting event as I have in Europe. Fortunately, there’s the internet, and yesterday the web was swamped with stories, photos and videos of women all around the world. Again, inspiring. So inspiring that I kept thinking about all the cool initiatives and projects I could take part of in order to do my part to promote empowered women around the world.
Which got me thinking: why did it take one day to get me inspired and motivated to get active with some of these causes?
Having a day specifically devoted to a cause is a wonderful thing, because it allows for global targeted action that’s organized, which in turn makes the message stronger. But that energy needs to be rolled into everyday policy. Focusing on girls and women in both developing and developed societies is an integral part of creating healthy communities. Girls need to have the chance to be educated, healthy, empowered individuals no matter where they live; the results of which are felt the world round.
Did you know that an extra year of secondary school boosts girls’ future wages by 15-25%? And that when a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children. When we’re talking about big global issues like economic development and over population, these are important statistics.
Celebrating and empowering women needs to, therefore, be an everyday act, no matter how big or small. It’s our future we’re talking about.
Friday Photo: Spring Cherry Blossom Series
Winter barely started to creep away when spring sun graced the streets of Portland. Snow drifts elsewhere meant crocuses and cherry blossoms for us, and people filled outdoor tables at cafes, sporting heavy jackets of course, but ready to soak in the beginnings of the colorful season.
Cherry blossoms have lined the streets, the distinct spring aroma becoming a part of every afternoon bike ride. Rain squalls bring blossoms to the ground, dotting the asphalt with pink dots. A reminder that, yes, cold, gray winter days will once again be traded for sun and the ambiance of a city enjoying warmer days.
The City Girl’s Guide to Urban Hiking
Loved writing this piece for EcoSalon… but maybe that’s because I like in a city that’s particularly well suited for this sort of thing…
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Soot, screeching sirens and forbidding skyscrapers; is this your definition of the big city? Think again. The urban landscape might seem like the epicenter of everything that’s wrong with the world, but in fact cities are where some of the most interesting components of the green movement are currently taking place.
With everything from urban farms and electric cars, large cities are surprisingly livable, and now there’s another trend on the rise: urban hiking. Living the city life has long been equated with staying indoors and neglecting to feed our human need for spending time in nature, but the onslaught of urban hiking tours is showing us that it is in fact possible to get outside, be active and explore new places in the process.
What is Urban Hiking?
Forget the days of mindlessly jumping in a taxi to go from point A to point B. Urban hiking is all about planning, executing and enjoying the journey, another great example of slow travel. According to the Urban Dictionary, urban hiking is “the exploration of diverse urban environments on foot.” Conservation and travel groups alike promote urban hiking, as it not only gets people outdoors and active, but also allows them to explore the ins and outs of urban landscapes.
Friday Photo: Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?
In Portland, urban farming is big (there’s even a store completely dedicated to it), so it’s no surprise to find a chicken or too trotting down the sidewalk on an early morning. I’m off to get my own…
blog.annabrones.com 