March 28th, 2009 by insighter
What will you do today between 8:30 and 9:30pm when you turn your lights off for Earth Hour?
Get creative. It’s a tiny window of opportunity to do things we don’t normally do anymore - like have a candlelight dinner! =)
The Global Movement:
Your Participation:
March 23rd, 2009 by insighter
Last year I learned about the urban gardening/farming movement for the 1st time. I started noticing my neighbors’ veggie gardens - wondering how the other neighbors felt about the new look in the streets. Front yards were being used for growing veggies and no doubt backyards were being used equally.
My mother who happens to love planting and who grew up this way insisted in starting a veggie garden in my fairly empty backyard as well. It was also a time when the food crisis was in the news intensely and different parts of the US were experiencing the ‘food crisis’. It seemed like a good time to get familiar with the earth again.
A few months later we were blessed with the experience of eating food that had grown in our own yard. It’s amazing and awesome! Every time we picked veggies for consumption we were amazed at how generous mother nature is. The experience gave me a regained respect for those who know how to make use of the earth and how to be self-sufficient and know their plants well.
We plan to do it again this year and make it a part of our lifestyle from now on. Hearing that the Obama’s are also planning to have a veggie garden in the White House to feed themselves surprised me a lot! I had heard of the White House Garden movement but I didn’t think they would make it happen. Nice job! Let’s keep the small positive changes happening. 
Alternative Lifestyles:
The White House In Process:
March 6th, 2009 by insighter
A Brazilian friend sent me this old video and I was shocked and embarrassed. Why? Because of the messages in Arnold’s video:
The sad part about this video is that too many people think like him. The human mind sometimes is self-limiting.
March 5th, 2009 by insighter
“…What are you waiting to talk?”
This is an ad I came across in CarlosQC’s blog that is meant to make Peruvians and Colombians (where these ads are running) realize what misadventures you could get into if you don’t learn English. A desperate attempt at further colonizing Indigenous People in South America through language. Some could say “encouraging” learning English with a fist - a little fear never worked against the US entities (like Berlitz).
I don’t wonder how the people who made this video thought nothing of this ad - colonizers think their actions are honorable. But as a Peruvian American I feel uncomfortable that it is usually “American” companies leading modern colonization. Uggg - so sophisticated and yet so ignorant still!
The video portrays, yet again, the Indigenous man as ignorant and possibly criminal. ‘Ignorant’ for his lack of English perhaps - the way a colonizer would see it since for the colonizer the world revolves around him.
February 27th, 2009 by insighter
Often we see how the minority (especially foreign) women are objectified to become sexual fantasizes, the “other” woman, the one from a far away land - that one who can stay far away when it comes to making commitments.
Judging by the messages I see in the mainstream media, ‘colored’ women seem to be mostly viewed as sexual objects - rarely good enough to be taken seriously. Our culture has been making more effort to portray them as sexy and ignorant and not as smart or worthy.
Hopefully with Obama and Michelle in the white house many of these mainstream social diseases will get treatment.
Sisters, don’t waste your time with men who “seduce themselves with your otherness”. The man who is worth your time is the man who can see and is interested in your realness.
January 22nd, 2009 by insighter
Obama’s First Task
Never thought I would see the day that a place like Guantanamo - located outside US territory so our laws don’t apply there and we can ignore them - could be closing!
Another thing NOT to be embarrassed about anymore. 