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Where We Live - Colorado Springs
"We never planned to make Colorado Springs our home, but 'plans' can change. During the pandemic our 'very temporary' stay here ended up lasting much longer than expected. The pandemic confined us to our 'bubble', but it also led us to discover wonderful mountain views and a wide variety of parks and trails that allow us to live in the 'country' while still in the city." This week take an autumn walk with Tom and Viviane along the trails and nearby creeks leading into Colorado Springs. Click here
Happy Diwali - We send our greetings to all who are celebrating Diwali on Thursday, November 4th. May your Diwali bring peace and love to your life.
At the Movies - Last week was awards week at Innocenti's 2021 Film Festival. From the 38 entries there were nine winners. The winner of the the top prize, the 'UNICEF 75 Iris', was the Nepali film, The Scarecrow. See the trailer of the Scarecrow and of all the winners here. You can see all the entries in the Festival here.
Climate - COP26 opens this week in Glasgow at a pivotal moment for world leaders. Beyond the speeches, we wait to see whether action will follow. Among those not waiting are the young activists who participate in the Fridays for Future campaign. Don't miss the powerful NYTimes film, 'Greta Thunberg Has Given Up on Politicians', plus an innovative UNDP exhibit, 'Don't Choose Extinction' - click here for both. See also the article on how despite all the promises, politicians will double the production of energy from fossil fuels here - and all our recent 'climate' articles here.
Are You Fluent in UN(i)BS? - Ever heard of UNBIS? No? Us neither. Some years back we had the useful little document called the 'UN Thesaurus' where you could look up acronyms and check standard wording for UN documents. These days the Thesaurus has morphed into a whole section within the UN Bibliographic Information System (UNBIS). The UNBIS thesaurus currently lists 8,000 'concepts' in each of 6 UN languages. Without doubt, our generation in UNICEF likely contributed a fair share of those 'concepts'.
Are You A Vertical or A Horizontal? - These days, however, the UNBIS thesaurus likely finds it difficult to keep up with UNICEF's production of new jargon. We thought about this when reading an article about 'YuWaah' - UNICEF's Generation Unlimited in India. We learned that 'Generation Unlimited' is a UNICEF 'vertical' bringing a 'new inclusive approach' to 10 to 24 year-olds and emphasizing 'employability skills' for the 'future of work scenario'. If we are lost in reading the English language version, we wonder what the public in 190 countries make of all these 'concepts' in their own languages.
And much more - Baquer's surgery, the UN Day Concert, a young poet, satire on the selection of an ED, a fuel crisis threatening hospitals in Haiti, and the ED's keynote speech to the World Health Summit.
Don't Be Afraid to Speak Truth to Power. "These are their kids. Tell them what's wrong."- Jim Mayrides provides this week's interview in UNICEF's 'For Every Child' podcast series. He recounts how he started out with CRS and moved to a career with UNICEF. He describes a swath of UNICEF history from Latin America to East Africa and the personalities ranging from Dave Haxton to Harry Labouisse to Jim Grant. Don't miss the story of his meeting and phone call with Benazir Bhutto in which she was persuaded to push through Pakistan's ratification of CEDAW. Click here.
Cynthia McCaffrey, Gillian Mellsop, Yas Kimura
New ED - Ed Fragetit
Ken Gibbs - Pay Day is Weigh Day
Nuzhat Shahzad - Stateless in Kathmandu
Ramesh Shrestha - Profiting from the Pandemic
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