The Portal to Boomeranger World

My Friend Gabrielle's Survival Story: With Port au Prince in Ruins She Issues Challenge to "Dare to Act as Never Before"

 Micro Loan Goat Project in Haiti

Gabrielle Vincent is one of the most remarkable women I have ever met. And one who instantly connected with my heart. She is deep, brilliant, a doer, a survivor and undaunted by the worst of circumstances. I received this message from her today. I hope you will heed her call. She is the co-founder of www.SonjeAyiti.com, a micro loan goat project, hot coca economic development, literacy and education.

Eyewitness in Haiti

Gabrielle speaks on Jan 18:

"I just got back from Port-au-Prince 2 hours ago. I can't explain how I came out alive of the PSI office in Petion-Ville when the earthquake struck I was inside. I saw the building went ups, downs, front, back, and sideways, we (me and 4 guys) got up tried to open the door, it was locked, then God let us out. Luckily, the building wasn't collapsed, but I see buildings collapsed before my eyes, children, adults dying, wounded, crying out for help, the sky went into smoke (concrete cement block)..

My heart aches for my people,

my land, my family. It's so sad that so much of the death could have been prevented. Such strong people deserve better than what they've been given. I know it is a natural disaster, however the damages could be lower. This is the result of 2 centuries of mismanagement, corruption, and irresponsibilities of our leaders. We lost a generation of university students, deans, intellectual elites, rich, poor, business people, and Government Officials.  Everything is centralized in Port-au-Prince, so people have no other choice than to overpopulate the city of Port-au-Prince for driver's licence, ID, passport, college, to name a few, the Government has no housing regulations or if there is they are only on paper. Anybody can satisfy their fantasy by building whatever fit their budget, move in with no inspection.

I don't understand how things happen how some people end up with so much and other people with nothing except that it seems very often there are people involved who do not care how they affect other people.

We must do something differently.

Dare to act like never before so that we can rebuild this country. Those people have suffered so much for too long and I am not confident that the Government can change things around without the International comunity full involvement. No more bandages, we can't afford to do the same things that were done after Hurricane Jeanne in 2004, Fay, Gustav, Ike in 2008, and now this earthquake.

I brought with me to Cap-Haitien 22 people who were sleeping with me on the street and had no other relatives in any country side. We are all fine. Dr. Henrys is fine.  Please go to Sonje Ayiti www.sonjeayiti.com for any assistance that you will be willing to provide and contact Lounna Marcius stateside at (404) 384-6166 or Issy Moskowitz "

The Light Inside or the Tap on Your Shoulder -- Pay Attention!

Haiti Bound

Can you feel it?   The light coming back after my favorite day of winter--the Solstice?

I can, I can already sense that the days are growing longer and the darkness is receding. Even more than the external darkness receding, I can feel my inner light flaring brighter. More energy, more creativity, more ideas flowing. More friends made.

I'm Writing a Book on Haiti

Tomorrow I leave for Haiti to begin researching a tri-lingual (Creole, French and English middle school book and its companion art activity book--the former, My Country: Haiti and the latter, Draw on Culture: Haiti.

These books will be part of the Culture series of Thimble Berry Press.

This trip parallels the earlier China trip I made, and the 2 books that resulted from that journey. The "Dragon's Daughters Return" was a chronicle of that heartfelt journey of 21 adoptee families.

Our "Draw on Culture: (China)" book is enjoying early success.  It is an activity book designed to introduce children to Chinese history, cultural ideas and images. It pairs ready-to-color artwork with explanatory text, a stroke guide for practice writing the simplified Chinese characters.  Order here:

And here is a video about that China trip:  Video

Serendipitous Events

Much of the future success of these two books for kids will come from the tremendous help I have already received from many people -- suggesting people to interview, places to visit, organizations to see. Folks networking with me via email and making contacts. It has been really wonderful. My vision for these books is that Thimble Berry Press will be able to raise enough money to give upwards of 25,000 copies of each book to school children across Haiti. And then afterward distribute them in the US, France and Canada.

In addition to all the help that has been already given, there are the happy unexpected Haiti connections --such as the chimney guy who came to clean mine out last week and ended up telling me about his friend whose dad is a close friend of former President Aristide. Another of those unexpected Haiti connections came from an press release about three books written by Frank McKinney http://www.frank-mckinney.com/--whose styles himself a real estate maverick. Frank is the author this year of  The Tap, Burst This! Frank McKinney's Bubble Proof Real Estate Strategies and Dead Fred: Flying Lunchboxes and the Good Luck Circle.

Sustainability in Haiti

And in addition to being a great dad, and husband, a wild real estate visionary, a cool guy to chat with... Frank is doing something really wonderful in Haiti. He is building self-sustaining villages--with clean water, nice houses, facilities for kids with no parents, health facilities, economic development and more. The organization that manages these projects is http://frank-mckinney.com/and as Frank says on the site--we are not in the charity business, we are in the self-sustainability business. In Haiti alone over that last 10 years 11 villages have been built. I'm visiting one this coming week and will report back. How enlightened is this? When I talked with Frank a few weeks ago, I said, well yeah, how many cars can you drive (he drives a purple Hundai ) and how many houses can you live in, and how many clothes can you wear. Exactly he said--this man who has made millions and builds exotic houses for the wealthiest. That's why I needed to reengergize my spirit by dovetailing my professional highest calling with my spiritual highest calling. Well, I think he's done a great job of it. 

And by the way, I have a copy each of Frank's new books to giveway. Get inspired by him.

And Our Book and Company Make Two!

If you are in Copper Harbour, Mich, on August 2, join us for a talk and signing

For Immediate Release

For more information contact Lloyd Wescoat at Grandpa’s Barn Bookstore (906) 289-4377.

 

What is a creative partnership?

Thimbleberry Press founders discuss their creative publishing partnership.

Laura Smyth, designer, poet and publisher of Thimbleberry Press, and Virginia Cornue, author, cultural anthropologist and executive editor of Thimbleberry Press will discuss their creative collaborations in making books and founding their publishing company at Grandpa’s Barn Bookstore on

South Fourth Street in 

Copper Harbor,  Sunday, August 2nd at 7:00 p.m.

Smyth and Cornue will talk about how they created Thimbleberry Press and collaborated on The Dragon’s Daughters Return (2007) and Draw On Culture: Little Friends Around the World (2009).

“When you’re at our kitchen table anything can happen...and it did. We founded a publishing company and mapped out our first book, The Dragon’s Daughters Return, all over dinner,” said Smyth. “But we didn’t do it completely on our own—

China was a big help, too!”

While on a heritage visit to China with her daughter in July 2006, Cornue developed the idea for the first book the two would create together. As an adoptive parent and a China scholar who had spent a great deal of time in China in the 1990s, Cornue secured the cooperation of senior Chinese officials for the printing and shipping of The Dragon’s Daughters, and unbeknownst to Smyth, volunteered her design services as well.

“We started the book before we started the company, but both were realities within six months,” said Cornue.

Some of the topics to be discussed at the August 2^nd book talk include:

• creating a vision / creating the reality

• complementary talents /  complimenting talents

• keeping a sense of humor / keeping the sky as the limit.

A Q & A and book signing will follow.

To find out more about Thimbleberry Press and their current and upcoming publications visit the website at http://www.thimbleberrypress.com or the blog at Thimbleberry Press Blog.

Thimbleberry Press,  P.O. Box 162, Copper City, MI  49917

Phone:  (906) 934-2050

Also on Facebook at http://tinyurl.com/krhl8c and on Twitter at http://twitter.com/thimbleberryprs.

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