Free Hugs is a real life controversial story of an Australian named Juan Mann (and one man, indeed), whose only mission was to reach out and hug a stranger, here and there, to brighten up their lives.

In an era of increasing social disconnectivity and a lack of human contact, the effects of the Free Hugs campaign has been nothing short of phenomenal.  As this symbol of hope spread, police and officials ordered the Free Hugs campaign BANNED. 

The Free Hugs Campaign

What happened next is beyond any possible words: the true spirit of humanity comes together!  Yes, this is a story of how one person can make a huge difference, and how the smallest gestures can change the world.

Now, the Free Hugs Campaign is a worldwide endeavor.  You can find out more about a Free Hugs event in your city, and in the cities of those you love.

Please pass this on to everyone you love — and if you are really brave, to those who have crossed you.

Learn more by visiting the FREE HUGS website:
www.freehugscampaign.org

(1) Australian news story about Free Hugs Campaign (2) Tel Aviv (3) Mexico
(4) Brazil (5) Venezuela (6) Melbourne  (7) Montreal (8) Oklahoma
(9) New Zealand (10) Korea  (11) Argentina  (12) Netherlands  (13) Chicago
(14) China (15) Poland (16) Iran (17) Moscow (18) San Francisco

The Raw Food Movement is showing up everywhere! More and more people are discovering the miracle of it: overcoming life-long diseases like asthma, arthritis, high blood pressure, cancer, obesity and weight issues. They are literally transforming their bodies and their lives by embracing this nutritional approach.

The principle of it is simple: eat only live, raw, foods. There are no stoves in a raw foodist’s kitchen. Nothing is cooked or fried or baked. Instead the appliances in this kitchen are blenders, food processors, food dehydrators, and juicers. Instead of cheese, you make nut pates. Instead of pasta, you use vegetables.

Matt Monarch Story

Matt Monarch read a book about raw foods and the effect of processed starches adn refined sugars on his body and instantly changed his diet to a completely raw food diet the very next day. That was over six years ago.  The following very inspiring video is Matt telling his story.  He discusses some of the issues and high notes of his experiences. Also in the video is Matt’s friend Angela, who weighed 300 pounds and lost much of it using only a raw foods diet.  You can see for yourself.

Read about Raw Spirit, a book by Matt Monarch

The Raw Family

The Boutenko family, now known as "The Raw Family," is another case in point. 
They were seriously ill in 1994 when they embarked on a diet of entirely raw
foods.  Victoria had arrhythmia and edema and was obese and depressed. 
Igor suffered from painful rheumatoid arthritis and sever hyperthyroid. 
Sergei was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes and was supposed to go on insulin. 
Valya had asthma.



Today they are healthy and have completely overcome their disease.  They
did this through a raw foods diet.  Their story is chronicled in the book
The Raw Family, available through their website, rawfamily.com, by clicking on
their photo. The site is a storehouse of resources and information on raw foods, preparation, reference material and a whole lot more. Be sure to sign up for their newsletter.

Merz Apothecary
4716 N Lincoln Ave.
Chicago, IL 60625
(773) 989-0900
www.smallflower.com

In 1875, Peter Merz, a Chicago pharmacist of Swiss descent, opened the Apothecary on the city’s north side. It was not much different from the other corner drugstores which existed in every American neighborhood and town at the time. Since the clientele at his shop consisted mainly of European immigrants from the surrounding neighborhood, Merz decided to call the store "apothecary" in the European tradition. He focused mainly on herbal medicines and traditional formulas, which were already popular and familiar among his international customers.

The apothecary also served as a gathering place for Europeans. Comfortable
leather chairs allowed patrons to sit and chat as they waited for their
prescriptions to be filled or their remedies to be prepared. Ralph Merz and his
pharmacists spoke many languages allowing customers to shop and seek advice in
their native tongues. It wasn’t long before the store’s reputation spread.

In the early 1960s, corner drugstores throughout the United States began to die
off. Low margins on prescriptions and competition from large chain drugstores
like Walgreen’s drove independent pharmacies out of business. But such was not
the case at Merz Apothecary, since its traditional herbal approach to health
allowed it to thrive during this difficult period.

In 1972, Ralph Merz was ready to retire – without a successor. The store, which
had been in the family for three generations, was about to close permanently.
One month before the scheduled closing, Pakistani pharmacist, Abdul Qaiyum, was
told by his German parents-in-law that Merz was looking for a successor. As a
recent pharmacy school graduate, Qaiyum had quickly become disenchanted with his
job at a large drugstore chain and was ready to leave the field altogether. But
Merz Apothecary, with its focus on traditional natural remedies, reminded him of
his family’s business and the healing traditions in his homeland of Pakistan. He
purchased it a few days later.

Over the next few years Qaiyum managed to expand Merz Apothecary’s business
dramatically. He also noticed that more and more American customers were seeking
out the store because they needed a quality source of natural products and
information. So in 1982, he moved Merz Apothecary to its current, larger
location, only a few miles from the original one. The new store was custom-built
to replicate a turn-of-the-century European apothecary. The store’s original
antique pharmacy jars and herb containers (which were still in use) now had a
fitting home. With the move, Qaiyum expanded the store’s inventory to include
homeopathic remedies, vitamins, supplements, and other natural medicines.

In 1998, Quayum and his son Anthony founded www.smallflower.com, which now offers many of the health products on the internet. Merz is one of the few places you can order homeopathic remedies to spec!

Raw Food Resources Links

Raw Food Information – directory of providers and resources in your area
Alive Foods – detox retreats, products, recipies
Raw Links from Soystache
David Wolfe – raw food nutritionist
Live Consultations and a wealth of resources
Living Foods Institute – classes and seminars
Raw Foods Society of British Columbia
Learn Raw Food – seminars / certification course
NatuRAW Events and Seminars
Alissa Cohen – Raw Food Diet – classes, seminars, consultations
Home delivery of live organic meals – San Francisco Bay Area
The Boutenko Family’s amazing story + resources

If you know of a resource or link, please post it here. Thank you!

Raw – Roxanne Klein & Charlie Trotter.

Beautifully done book with amazing recipes and tips. I highly recommend this book, especially in hardcover.  The photo of the cover doesn’t do it justice.  Roxanne Klein had an incredible restaurant and then a take away deli for a period of time in Larkspur, California, near San Francisco.  Charlie Trotter is an award-winning chef from Chicago.  The book is so beautiful you could put it out on your coffee table!

ISBN 978-1580084703

Raw: The UNCookbook – New Vegetarian Food for Life. Juliano Brotman, Erika Lenkert. 

Raw: The UNCookbook is a must read for every aspiring raw foodist.  It’s a great companion to Klein/Trotter’s book RAW.
ISBN 978-0060392628

SAVING KKUCHAMAMA

Uniting North and South to save the Pacific Ocean

ORCA, a Peruvian environmental NGO, and Turning the Tides, an Alaska based non profit organization, are inviting all groups concerned with the rapid decline of the ocean to join as equal partners in a giant musical event on the beaches of Peru and North America to dramatize the crises of the ocean, its affect on planetary and human life, and call for an end to the manufacture of PCBìs and other poisonous molecules. Titled “Saving Kkuchamama” (a Quechua Andean word for ocean mother) led by indigenous leaders and rock bands, this is a wake-up call about the rapid decline of the ocean, its connection to all life, the contribution of plastic bags and bottles to its decline and a plea to honor the ocean by minimizing and eventually stopping their use.

Saving Kkuchamama is envisioned as the beginning of an annual music event that celebrates the ocean, raises awareness about her importance to humans and the earth, and suggests lifestyle changes ordinary people can make to help return her to health. It proclaims that we are all part of the problem and calls for everyone to be part of the solution. It is envisioned, in ensuing years, to eventually include all Pacific Rim countries. Fifty percent of the planet’s surface consists of the Pacific Ocean.

Anyone, professional and amateur – high school and college rock bands – on the eastern Pacific Rim is invited to participate in this effort.

Organizers hope to dramatically decrease the use of plastic bags and bottles in Pacific countries, states and provinces – helping to reverse the rapid decline of the ocean.

BACKGROUND

The ocean is dying. Marine scientists have diagnosed the ocean and its inhabitants as suffering from immune suppression syndrome (similar to AIDS) and call their work “documenting the decline.” Eighty-five percent of the world’s nitrogen that sustains plants, and most of the world’s oxygen that sustains animals are produced by the ocean. 75% of the planet’s surface is ocean. Without the ocean, nothing can live.

We are learning that everything on earth recycles through everything else – oxygen, water, food and chemicals, natural and manmade, life supporting or poisonous. Millions of animals die every year from eating plastic – their digestive systems clogged – birds try to dislodge it to feed their young. In huge parts of the ocean, there are six times more plastic bits than plankton. Eventually this reduces to tiny plastic particles that are consumed by fish and shell fish which are eaten by larger animals, including humans. When the animals die, their bodies decompose, leaving these particles to be consumed again and again.

PCBs, polychlorinated biphenyls, are artificial molecules created by humans in the 1970s that do not metabolize or break down and are now everywhere – in air, water, food. They are used in all industries – including plastics, soaps, oils and detergents. Because the ocean is used as a giant toxic dump, they are especially prevalent there.

They store in tissues – kidney, brain, heart, liver, fat – suppress immune function, trigger cancer and organ failure. They mimic estrogen and cause massive sexual organ dysfunction, infertility and deformities in frogs, birds, mammals and humans. Eagle egg shells are often as thin as rice paper.

Humans can hold 0.5 to 3 parts per million (ppm). Orcas, the most polluted animal on the planet, hold 200 to 300 ppm. A deceased whale found in Washington had 10,000 ppm – technically classified as a toxic dump. Eight out of the ten most polluted animals are sea mammals (the other two are eagles and sea turtles). Marine animals, like humans, are on top of the food chain. Both breathe poisoned air, eat poisoned food and drink poisoned water. Both are getting cancer and new lethal viruses. Humans are the fifteenth most polluted animal on the planet.

El NiZo, the cause of freakish and violent weather around the world – hurricanes, tornadoes, drought, floods – arguably the biggest environmental event on the planet – begins on the Peruvian coast. The cold Humboldt current that runs from Antarctica, bringing fish, plankton, krill and other food up the South American coast, is pushed down by a warm (100 degrees) current, that kills everything in its path and causes the weather that kills tens of thousands of people, animals and crops around the world. Krill, millions of little animals on which whales feed, die, and the algae that normally live in balance with these tiny animals, has toxic overblooms, traveling to the North Pacific, leaving dead animals and plants in its wake. Hungry sea mammals are heard crying in the ocean off the Peruvian coast during an El NiZo. The phenomena is currently accelerated and more aggressive due to global warming. .

What happens on the Peruvian coast has immediate effects on the health and well being of the entire planet. Everyone feels the effects.

The state of the environment in Peru is one of overwhelming crisis and emergency. The Peruvian coast is desert with blowing sand and dust. Lima, a noisy, polluted, gray city of about 7 million, is a coastal city, with little thought about the health of the ocean or its connection to it. Factories dump tons of poison and a natural gas line and processing plant is due to open on the coast (according to local media, financed by the U.S. president’s family).

Camai is now Turning The Tides

Micro-credit is a really innovative way for large population groups to find ways in which to break out of poverty. This in turn advances democracy and human rights. Micro-credit is basically tiny loans, most of them under $1500, that are lent to people in third world counties to start or grow their business, and then repaid.

Muhammad Yunus, of the Grameen Bank, did exactly this. He wrote a book about it called “Banker to the Poor”. His long-term vision is to eliminate poverity in the world. Of course, it cannot be realized with micro-credit alone. But this is a major part of the equation. For his efforts, which single-handedly lifted entire regions out of poverty by empowering them to help themselves, Mr. Yunus won the Nobel Peace Prize for 2006.

You too can get involved!

Kiva.org is a website that helps you to do just that. Simply create a lender profile and start lending money to those in need all around the world, all from the comfort of your own home! You can read profiles of people who need loans, and also profiles of those who are already lending money. While there is no guarantee of return, the repayment rate is very high (almost 100%), with repayment usually within one year.

January Project will keep adding a percentage of our profits to an ever-growing, revolving fund that keeps re-lending any repaid amounts and new funds. Our goal is to reach $10,000 for the fund! You can do the same for as little as $25. All you need is a giving heart and a paypal account.

Here are some of the borrowers Kiva helps, including their inspiring stories:

Ennio was born in 1960 in the beautiful city of Venice, next door to the house of Carlo Goldoni. The son of an espresso machine repair engineer, everybody expected Ennio to continue the family tradition – except him.

Inspired by the Disney cartoons he watched in childhood, the modern choreography of Pina Bausch and growing up amidst the Venetian Carnivale, Ennio daydreamed himself into flights of fancy – amusing his family and friends – with visions of Marilyn Monroe dressed in white paper. At the beginning of the 1980s Ennio used to make extravagant costumes and masks for the re-emerging carnivale. Growing from strength to strength, his dream became reality with the creation of his first cabaret show winning him the prestigious Golden Lion Award, at the Venetian Entertainment Festival and The Golden Mosquito award for comedy.

When he met his collaborative partner Sosthen Hennekam, a fashion and costume designer, they developed enough paper characters to create a full one-hour show. Only a year later London based producer Glynis Henderson invited Ennio to perform at The Edinburgh Festival. He quickly became a cult hit and achieved massive critical acclaim. Things started to move very quickly and in 1994, after several UK Tours, West-End runs and International festivals, Ennio was nominated for the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Entertainment. That same year Granada Television made a one-hour documentary called ‘Celebrations, Paper Marilyn’ about Ennio’s life and career.

A year later, Ennio appeared at the first European MTV Music Awards in Berlin, together with several stars who were in his repertoire at the time such as Prince, George Michael and Bjork. Ennio also performed with The Spice Girls, Brian Adams and other artists for HRH Prince Charles at the Royal Variety Show, broadcast for the BBC. For his off-Broadway run in 1999, Ennio was nominated for a Drama Desk Award. Shows in San Francisco and Los Angeles followed. In L.A. the show won the Garland Award. In the summer of 2001 he performed at Elton John’s ‘White Tie and Tiara Ball’ – an important AIDS benefit held every year at Elton John’s private estate in Oxfordshire. Ennio has since continued his charity work having performed at this year’s esteemed Lifeball in Vienna.

Ennio has performed in over 70 countries world wide, everywhere from Singapore to Mexico. His side-splitting performances of our best-loved celebrities and his adaptability to different cultures has brought his show to royal and celebrity attention giving Ennio a huge following and a massive international fanbase.

Ennio continues to tour the world – he’s a global phenomenon and a fascinating man with an incredible history.

The following are facts from Algalita Marine Research Foundation and other scientific organizations that study the effects of plastics and plastic bags on the marine environment.

Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, they photodegrade (they’re broken down into smaller and smaller toxic bits, less than the diameter of a human hair) and contaminate ocean, air, soil and food. They contain PCBs and other toxic manmade chemicals now found throughout the food chain – from shellfish to humans. These toxins are now in human breast milk, in children and adults around the world and are one reason cancer rates have risen from 1 in 25 in 1970 to 1 in 2 today. Many marine animals contain so many of these toxins, they can legally be classified as toxic dumps. Thousands of their bodies are washing up on beaches around the world.

There are six times more plankton-size plastic bits than plankton in huge areas of the ocean. Birds, fish and marine animals ingest these thinking they are food – and millions are dying. Their bodies biodegrade, but the plastics remain – to be eaten by other birds and animals.

Plastic bags cover miles and miles of ocean floor – no one knows the extent. In some areas of the deep ocean, scientists have been unable to find the floor because it is so heavily layered with plastic bags. Half of all plastic in the ocean sinks, and under these bags, the shellfish, worms and other tiny animals that help make up the bottom of the food chain are dead.

Every year the United States consumes 100 billion plastic shopping bags and throws away an estimated 8 billion pounds of these bags.

The world uses one million plastic bags per minute.

It is estimated to take up to 1000 years for plastic bags to degrade in a warm landfill – longer in a cold ocean environment.

We don’t need plastic bags. We are killing the ocean, ourselves and our descendants for short term convenience.

Paper bags are not a viable alternative because they use millions of trees and their processing spews more poisons into the environment.. Many people around the world use cloth and string bags instead.

There are biodegradable bags available that are made from potato and corn starch.

Expect bans around the world as facts about the terrible effects of plastic bags on human health and the planet become known. They are now banned in South Africa, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Paris, Mumbai, San Francisco, some Chinese cities; and many Alaska villages. They are taxed in Australia and Ireland. States besides Alaska are debating taxes and bans.

The ocean is 71% of the earth’s surface and supplies up to 85% of the world’s oxygen and nitrogen. No human, animal or plant can live without the ocean. Its health is rapidly deteriorating and we must find a way to reverse this trend. Stopping the use of plastic bags is something everyone can do.

Dixie Belcher is a volunteer with Turning the Tides, a Juneau organization dedicated to raising awareness about the deterioration of the Pacific Ocean.