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| Current Projects / Events |
Peace can be achieved in many ways. Following is a list of upcoming and recent projects focused on building peace. For the latest on current projects, please follow the links to their respective sites. |
May 2010 |
Project Tents for Haiti Expo
A fantastic collaboration with fashion designers in SL, the Project Tents team, Peace Train and Shelterbox USA. More about this unique effort to provide essential help to disaster victims: Over four months ago a devastating 7.0 earthquake hit the country of Haiti just outside the capital of Port-au-Prince. Four months seems like a lifetime ago, so many other natural occurrences have impacted citizens of the world since then, but the work in Haiti has only just begun. The May 24th issue of Time Magazine reports concerns that living conditions in Haiti are getting worse with the storm season now upon the region. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians still are without any permanent shelter, their only protection from the elements are makeshift tents created from materials found in the rubble. Without a solid base to these structures, many Haitians go to sleep at night in extremely damp surroundings sometime unable to escape pools of water left by the torrential rains. Relief organizations are working as fast as they can to provide permanent shelter but it may be years until any normalcy is brought back to Haiti. SLURL to the immersive Haiti Cube, built by Moeuhane Sandalwood and Ally Aeon. SLURL to the Expo to shop and donate! |
March 2010 |
March has turned out to be a busy month for Peace Train. During our Board Meeting in February, we welcomed Erica d'Aquila to our Board as Secretary. We also have identified ASERELA Maine as a beneficiary of a couple of efforts: a live interview on March 14th with discussion and a concert series on March 20th to raise funds. ASERELA represents refugees from Darfur and southern Sudan who are working to build schools to educate the children of the region. They have already built one school in Uganda, and are now working on another in southern Sudan. More about ASERELA Maine, here.
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November / December 2009 |
November and December saw two events that Peace Train supported: The virtual 16 Days of Gender Violence awareness, and our kiosk at the virtual Copenhagen Climate Summit (One Climate sim) in Second Life.
During the 16 Days, Peace Train coordinated events and moderated panel discussions that included women from Mexico, Canada, Israel, Scotland, South Africa and the United States. Following is an image from the panel discussions:
More photos from the event here.
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July / August |
July 31 - August 2 : PeaceFest 09 Our goal for 2009 is to organize the second annual PeaceFest! This is a woodstock-style event, featuring live music, visual and performing arts, mini-conferences, and direct action to advance the cause of peace worldwide.
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| April |
April 18-26 : Earth Week in Second Life. The first Earth Week Festival in Second Life builds from the world wide celebration of Earth Day on 22 April. It embraces shared values and celebrates our efforts toward creating a sustainable human presence on the Earth. Events included a global folk live music concert, events sponsored by the Centre for Water Studies, experiences at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration sim, the HumLab Swedish University, a Green Ideation Question by the University of Innsbruck, a Gathering of Nations (Native American) event and events sponsored by Greenpeace. |
March 21 : Coming to the Table; The Monticello Descendants. During Thomas Jefferson’s lifetime, he had children with one of his slaves, Sally Hemings. Some years ago, there was a coming-together of both sides of the family – the blacks, the whites, and everything in between. Slave and slave-owner descendants together, making peace. The focus of this talk was on the experiences of race - particularly the history of black/white relations in the US - and the eventual reconciliation that this family is undergoing to realize their common ancestry, and ultimately humanity. An interview with two wonderful ladies provided truly amazing stories, and an open conversation with attendees. Attendees had the added benefit of viewing photos from the reunions that have happened. Photos from the event here.
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February 21 : Women in the Palestinian / Israeli Conflict Alexjo Magic is a PhD candidate in Women's Studies in Melbourne, Australia. She has lived in Israel for 5 years, and has made it her life's work to understand the experience of people (especially the women) on both sides of the Palestinian / Israeli conflict. An engaging interview with Alexjo, hearing first-hand her stories from Gaza, and discussion with attendees in Second Life, combined with music and poetry. Photos from the event here. Junivers Stockholm is a musician and composer. He is organising for this October's Imagine Festival. He composed the rock opera The Rings as part of the Carp group. He took part in Amnesty International's small places world tour for the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Serene Bechir has been reading poetry across SL for over a year and is best known for her improv poetry. She says of herself, "I am only a mirror, the poetry is in each of you." Medora Chevalier is a writer, lyricist and storyteller. She is a core organiser of the Human Rights & Imagine Festivals. She also performed in the Rings, a theatrical production in Second Life.
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December 29 : Health Care Community Discussion (US) Peace Train Engineer Siri Vita moderated a discussion about health care reform in the US. This was part of The Presidential Transition Health Policy Team's effort in encouraging Americans to host and attend Health Care Community Discussions across the country between December 15h and December 31. These Community Discussions were part of the then President-elect’s continuing effort to reach out and directly involve the American people in their own government. Photos from the event here. December 10-15 : Human Rights Festival Primarily organized by Medora, juni, any1, and others, Peace Train supported their efforts to produce a fantastic set of events over 5 days, yet another great example of how a globally distributed set of people with common goals for peace can come together and create meaningful experiences. Be sure to look at the blog for this effort - there are photos and links to videos from the events. Thanks to all who made this happen, and in particular our Peace Train engineer Siri Vita, who spent several days getting together a compelling display of photos and information related to child soldiers, and who pretty much single-handedly orchestrated a set of performers for the 14th.
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August 15-18 : PeaceFest 08 Over 100 live acts.
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