Jul

Sweet Dreams of Ice Cream and Primal Rhythms

by Meredith Mullins on July 18, 2016

Ingoma Nshya Drummers in Rwanda, breaking cultural barriers. (Image © Lex Fletcher.)

The unifying power of music
© Lex Fletcher

Conquering Cultural Barriers in Rwanda

An open-air truck bumps along the rutted streets of Butare, Rwanda. The beaming woman in the back broadcasts through a crackling microphone.

Hello. Hello. You are about to experience something new.

Do you want to have a good life?

Do you want your children to grow up healthy?

Sweet dreams. The answer to your prayers.

Ice cream.

If you’re old, it will make you young again.

Come and see the dreams of women.

Ice cream.

It will change your life.

Her words are true. The ice cream in this African town has changed lives.

Rwanda girl tastes ice cream, breaking cultural barriers. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

Sweet Dreams: The first taste of ice cream
Courtesy of Liro Films

The first ice cream shop in Rwanda, Inzozi Nziza (translated as “Sweet Dreams”), broke cultural barriers in many ways.

The shop changed lives not just by bringing the first taste of ice cream to Rwanda. It also deeply affected the lives of the cooperative of women who made these sweet dreams come true.

Hope and joy were leading characters in this moving story, documented in a film by siblings Rob and Lisa Fruchtman called “Sweet Dreams.”

Rwanda houses and countryside, a place where cultural barriers must be broken. (Image © Sloot/iStock.)

A beautiful country shadowed by its history.
© Sloot/iStock

Rebuilding from the Horror of Genocide

In a country where the burden of the 1994 genocide touches everyone, the need for unity and reconciliation is critical to moving forward.

This need was felt deeply by Rwandan playwright/poet/musician Odile Gakire (“Kiki”) Katese. The country was slowly working through the rebuilding process. But, as Kiki noted, “People are not like roads and buildings. How do you rebuild a human being?”

Map of Rwanda, a country where women are breaking cultural barriers. (Image © bogdanserban.)

Rebuilding Rwanda after the genocide.
© bogdanserban

To help the healing process, Kiki called on music as a powerful universal force. She formed a drumming troupe—Ingoma Nshya (translated as “New Kingdom”).

She wanted to start a new chapter in Rwanda’s history, a new era. She brought together a group of women and challenged yet another cultural barrier.

Kiki Katese: Challenging cultural barriers. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

Kiki Katese: Challenging cultural barriers
Courtesy of Liro Films

Women had been forbidden to even touch the drums in Rwanda. Drumming was exclusively for men. But when Kiki asked why, she was told only that “drums were too heavy for women to carry.” Kiki’s response: “Okay, if it’s only because it’s heavy, let’s see how strong we are.”

The women proved their strength . . . and their ability to move beyond the past. They came from both sides of the genocide—Hutus and Tutsis. Many had lost Tutsi family members, friends and neighbors; and some had Hutu family members imprisoned for their role in the murders.

Rwanda women drummers, breaking cultural barriers. (Image © Lex Fletcher.)

Joy and power in the drums
© Lex Fletcher

“People have to reconcile with themselves, with happiness, with life,” Kiki suggests. When these women lose themselves in their drums, the past is forgiven. They come together as friends, as a unified rhythm—with obvious joy.

And Then There Was Ice Cream

Drumming began transforming the women’s lives. It gave them purpose . . . and pleasure. But there was more transformation to come.

Kiki believed that when you introduce one new idea, it creates the space for other new ideas. With that guiding philosophy, Kiki then met Alexis Miesen and Jennie Dundas, co-founders of Blue Marble Ice Cream in Brooklyn, New York.

Alexis Miesen and Jennie Dundas, founders of Blue Marble Ice Cream, breaking cultural barriers in Rwanda. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

Alexis Miesen and Jennie Dundas, Co-founders of Blue Marble Ice Cream
Courtesy of Liro Films

Kiki explained that she wanted to bring ice cream to Rwanda, and with it, an opportunity for members of the drumming troupe to become active in a small business.

A partnership was formed and the team rose to the challenges. They needed machines and furniture. They needed to find good local sources for milk, fresh fruit, and honey. They needed to learn the basics of business. They needed to select the shop staff from many members of the cooperative. They needed to set salaries and prices so that people in the town could afford this new treat.

Sweet Dreams manager and menu board, breaking cultural barriers in Rwanda. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

Building a business one item at a time
Courtesy of Liro Films

The processes were democratic. They even decided as a group the names for the sizes of ice cream—teta (baby) for small and nyshuti (friend) for medium.

The film documents the winding road, filled with obstacles. It culminates with the ultimate joy of success.

A dish of soft serve ice cream in Rwanda, breaking cultural barriers. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

A towering treasure
Courtesy of Liro Films

Ice cream arrives in Butare in all its sweet cream, passion fruit, strawberry, and pineapple glory. The curious townspeople overcome their trepidations and taste this new treasure.

“We’ve seen it in the movies, but we never had it in Rwanda before,” says one young man.

“It’s like eating hailstones,” says a more skeptical customer.

“Oh my god, give me more,” says a new fan, immediately falling prey to the velvety taste.

Rwanda drummers in front of Sweet Dreams ice cream shop, breaking cultural barriers. (Image courtesy of Liro Films.)

Opening Day in 2010—still a success six years later
Courtesy of Liro Films

Oh I See: The Path of Possibilities

Six years after the arrival of the new treat in Rwanda, a few more ice cream venues have appeared, but the women’s cooperative is keeping pace with the times. They now sell snacks, pizzas, juices, coffees, and teas to ensure their continued success.

The drumming troupe is performing near and far, with joy and passion.

The film “Sweet Dreams” has won awards and accolades around the world.

The rewards of this new era of breaking cultural barriers go beyond the obvious. The directors shared a moving moment after a screening of the film in Armenia when a woman in the audience stood tall and said, “This film is not just about Rwandan women. It’s about all of us.”

The final “Oh I see” moment comes in a quote from Kiki: “When you believe that something is possible, it’s done already.”

Yes, indeed, Rwanda. Give me more.

Find out more about the film “Sweet Dreams.” View the trailer below.

If video does not display, watch it here.

Find out more about Blue Marble Ice Cream and the nonprofit Hope Shines.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Meredith Mullins 2 Comments

Cultural Do's & Taboos/Rwanda

Jul

A Ticket to Surf (No Fear)

by Eva Boynton on July 11, 2016

A shark fin in the ocean, prompting creative thinkers to invent shark repellent (image © DIgitalStorm/Thinkstock).

The shark fin—native to its ocean habitat and symbol of horror films.
© DigitalStorm/Thinkstock

Creative Thinkers Invent Shark Repellent

Ahhhh. A beach vacation with adventure—

Catching a wave in Australia

Diving in Hawaii’s coral reef

Kayaking the coast of California

You won’t be alone . . . dunah . . . dunah. That’s right, there will be other tourists there too! And of course, marine life, possibly sharks.

Surfers, who decide to play in the playground of a predator, are used to taking a ration of fear along for the ride. But now ocean enthusiasts and other creative thinkers have teamed up to develop a shark repellent that relaxes the mind and eliminates the fear for surfers.

And it just might provide an answer for coexisting with sharks, who are essential animals in the ocean environment.

A beach full of people, showing the need for a shark repellent by creative thinkers (image © Blackeyedog/Thinkstock)

Beach tourism is no longer two chairs on an empty beach.
© BlackEyedDog/Thinkstock

Too Much Fun In the Sun?

Why are shark attacks on the increase? The number of people in coastal waters has skyrocketed. For example, Toronga Conservation Society of Australia reports this population increase for Australia:

1900 = 3.7 million
1950 = 8.3 million
1990 = 17 million
2011 = 22.7 million
2014 = 23.5 million

Of course, more people going into the water will result in a higher chance for contact with marine life, including sharks.

A person giving surf lessons at the beach, showing the reason for creative thinkers to invent shark repellent (image © Anthony Ong).

Where there is an ocean to play in, there are surfers ready to play.
© Anthony Ong

The recent rise in shark attacks has set in motion reactions from governments, organizations, scientists, surfers, and other ocean enthusiasts.

The goal: reinstate a relaxed vibe by protecting ocean goers. Meeting this goal can manifest itself in government plans for shark culling—the trapping and killing of sharks—or lenient policies on hunting sharks for their fins. Even as shark numbers are decreasing, 100 million are being killed annually for shark fin soup in Asia.

But, what about the sharks?

Step into the Fins of a Shark

Sharks get a bad rap for simply surviving in their habitat.

Consider Hollywood horror movies like Jaws, Jaws 2, Cruel Jaws, and Jurassic Shark. In my opinion, they are due for a required disclaimer:

Beware! Side effects may include an irrational fear of the ocean and demonization of the shark species. Watch at your own risk.

In a real shark attack, the media often portrays the survivor as hero and the shark as villain. But it’s not that simple.

In reality, humans depend on sharks for keeping a natural balance in the ocean.

A shark swimming in the ocean, showing why creative thinkers invented shark repellent (image © Ajlber/Thinkstock).

Sharks are to be revered and respected in their blue home.
© Ajlber/Thinkstock

Sharks have been on earth for over 200 million years; humans, 200,000 years. We need sharks around because they eat marine animals that are sick and weak, leaving a healthier animal population in the ocean for the food we eat. Humans, as it turns out, are only accidental prey.

Graffiti of sharks and a sign against shark finning, showing why creative thinkers invented shark repellent (image © Nathan Garrison).

Graffiti in Wellington, New Zealand, protests shark finning and illustrates the first smiling shark.
© Nathan Garrison

Elyse Frankcom, who was bitten by a shark while guiding a scuba tour, supports shark protection. She explains that government money is better spent on investing in a solution that not only thinks about human safety but will also “preserve the wildlife in the ocean that’s a natural beauty and belongs there.”

Like-minded people began asking, “Might there be a way to protect both the ocean enthusiasts and the sharks?” That’s when the creative thinkers got going, and the idea of shark repellent was born.

The Science Behind Shark Repellent

Surfers, scientists and ocean enthusiasts put their heads together to invent products that allow people to have fun in the sun while protecting sharks living in their natural habitat.

How do the products work? Sharks use electroreception, an electrical signal detection that can spot prey without using their eyes.

An illustration of how sharks sense their prey, showing the danger to surfers and why creative thinkers invented shark repellent (image © Shark Shield).

How sharks sense prey
© Shark Shield

New products from both Sharkbanz and Shark Shield repel sharks by overriding that sense without causing long-term effects to the shark.

A woman surfer wearing a shark repellent bracelet, showing the invention of creative thinkers (image © Elyse Lu).

Shark repellent does not come in a can. It comes in a stylish Sharkbanz wrist band.
© Elyse Lu

Sharkbanz, a band placed on the wrist or ankle, sends out magnetic waves that disrupt the shark’s electroreception, and the shark abruptly turns around. Dr. Stroud, senior chemist for, a company researching shark repellent technology, explains it this way:

It is “like a person suddenly shining a very bright light in your eyes in a dark room, and it’s not pleasant.”

A spear fisherman swimming with shark repellent, showing the invention of creative thinkers (image © Jose Debassa).

“Save a shark. Use a Shark Shield.”
© Jose Debassa

The Shark Shield comes as a cord attached to the ankle or as an antenna connected to the grip pad of a surfboard. These send out electrical waves that cause short-term muscle spasms in the electroreceptors of sharks, also repelling them. They dart away into the blue.

Although Sharkbanz and Sharkshield cannot confirm 100% effectiveness as a repellent, they are absolutely effective in reducing the fears of surfers, divers, kayakers, swimmers, and spear fisherman.

As Dean Gregory from Perth in Western Australia says:

“It takes that little niggle out of the back of my mind, helps you relax and just surf.”

Protecting Surfers, Protecting Sharks

Lindsay Lyon, CEO and managing director of Shark Shield, explains,

“I’d say the biggest ‘Oh, I see’ moment in the business was realizing that selling on fear was a very bad thing. Our brand is about ‘enabling’ our customers to enjoy their adventure sport, it’s not about selling fear, this is the wrong approach.”

Reducing the fear also reduces the need for harmful action against sharks. A win-win for sharks and humans.

Those who enjoy using the ocean have a responsibility to preserve the habitat for all living things. Shark repellents are encouraging us in that direction: to find solutions that work for humans and for the animals in the natural environment we play in.

A surfer wearing shark repellent, showing how creative thinkers have found a solution (image © Josh Letchworth).

“Get out there. Surf without fear.”
© Josh Letchworth

Perhaps these Hong Kong children, creative thinkers themselves, said it best when they showed their respect for sharks on Kids Ocean Day:

Thank you, Lindsay from Shark Shield and Nathan from Sharkbanz, for providing me with information and photographs about shark repellent, and thank you especially for your conservation efforts.

Educate yourself about sharks and shark safety at Taronga (Conservation Society of Australia).

Check out shark myths at the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Eva Boynton Comments

Adventure Travel/Innovations/Rides (Land, Sea, Air)/Worldwide Sites

Jun

Bookmarking the British Library

by Joyce McGreevy on June 20, 2016

The carved lettering of the British Library's main gate, an artifact of English cultural heritage designed by David Kindersley, (Image C.G.P. Grey)

As designer of the iconic main gates, David Kindersley was truly a man of letters.
By C. G. P. Grey – C. G. P. Grey’s Photography, CC BY 2.0

Online Treasure Hunt of the World’s Cultural Heritage

Search engines—including some that rhyme with kugel, king, and kazoo—are the world’s “auxiliary brain,” the one we count on to have all the answers, all the time. But when it comes to repositories of cultural heritage, literary artifacts, and linguistic wisdom, all search engines lead to London. There you’ll find the ultimate must-know for all who must know: The British Library.

The interior of the British Library, with the smoked glass wall of the King's Library reflecting England's cultural heritage.

Every year, six million searches are generated by the British Library
online catalogue–more than 12 times the number of on-site visitors to the building.

Global Treasure Trove

The British Library is that figurative extra room that householders often dream about. And with 14 stories, nine above ground, its stacks are packed with treasure.

This 1899 book cover, A Floral Fantasy in an Old English Garden, found at the British Library online reflects Victorian English cultural heritage.

From the whimsical to the wonderful, the library’s
digitized images inspire obsessive exploration.

Officially tag-lined “The World’s Knowledge,” the library’s a mere babe by British standards. It was founded in 1973. Before that, collections were chambered within the British Museum. In those pre-digital days, “oculus” referred to an eyelike opening in the dome of the passholders-only Reading Room. And how did one obtain a reader’s pass? It helped if your name was Charles Dickens or Virginia Woolf.

The oculus in the dome of the British Museum Reading Room was part of Victorian England's architectural cultural heritage.

The oculus of the British Museum Reading Room
watched over a privileged few.

Today everything from the handwriting of Woolf and Dickens to artifacts of punk rock are on offer to everyone who navigates busy Euston Road, crosses the brick piazza beside King’s Cross and St. Pancras Stations, and enters the stately portico.

Or who simply logs on.

Want to see the world’s earliest dated printed book? Here it is. Care to leaf through Leonardo da Vinci’s notebook? Leaf away. Shakespeare’s First Folio? Hie thee hither.

A design by Leonardo da Vinci for an underwater breathing apparatus, one of the treasures of world cultural heritage found in the online archives of the British Library.

Da Vinci’s design for an underwater breathing apparatus rises
to the surface of the British Library’s digital archives.

Oh, I see: There are more things in the British Library, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. If you looked at five items every day, it would still take 80,000 years to see the entire collection, give or take a century. So let’s tour just a few highlights of the Library’s incredible treasures.

Sounds Amazing

An image of two birds on branches from the book British Ornithology (1811), reflecting the visually rich cultural heritage of the British Library.

A pre-digital era “tweet”?

The Sound Archive dates back to 19th century recordings made from wax cylinders. So after reading the Incomparable Bard, listen to an “Immortal Bird.” It sings in the manuscript of John Keats’ “Ode to a Nightingale” and in this recording. You can even tweet it to your followers.

Discover the origin of the word soundscape and explore countless such audible places. Travel in two clicks, from the Amazon riverside at night to a distant thunderstorm in Zambia.

You can also experience the peaks and valleys of language itself. Anyone who’s seen Colin Firth onscreen as George VI in The King’s Speech will appreciate the poignancy of this example from the real-life royal.

Mystery Miscellany

Does your curiosity tend toward mysteries? Point your online magnifying glass at text evidence of how J. Sherrinford Holmes—alias Sherlock—became the world’s most famous literary detective.

Then hear the chief witness, Arthur Conan Doyle, reveal his real-life model for Holmes. The famed empiricist also enthuses about Spiritualism, reflecting a popular obsession of his era made all the more understandable by the tragic losses of World War I.

The library hosts hundreds of historical resources from both sides of the conflict, from personal letters and poetry, to speeches and posters.

The cover of Revelations of a Lady Detective (1854), reflecting the range of artifacts from English cultural heritage found online at the British Library.

The trail of online clues leads to 1854, when the fictional
Mrs. Paschal became one of the first female detectives to appear
in a novel—30 years before real-life women could land such jobs.

Artifacts of Peace

Humanity’s quest for peace and universal cultural respect is also represented here. “When I despair,” wrote Mahatma Gandhi, “I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won.” Nelson Mandela, in a now-famous speech, urged his audience not to let fear get in the way of racial harmony and freedom.

The original pamphlet of Nelson Mandela's speech during the 1963 Rivonia trial in South Africa, reflecting the range of world heritage artifacts at the British Library.

After Mandela’s 1963 speech, he was sentenced to 27 more years in prison,
not to be released until 1990.

You can read their words in such primary resources as Gandhi’s letter to a South African newspaper in 1903 and a booklet of Mandela’s speech at his 1963 conspiracy trial. Mandela, who refused to testify in his own defense, instead expressed his ideals.

Sights Onsite

Here, too, are more than one million public-domain images, including maps to get lost in, art for finding creativity, and illustrations and photographs for traveling through time.

A lion-shaped historic map (1617), reflecting an artifact of cultural heritage available online at the British Library.

The British Library holds a vast collection of historic maps,
some of them meticulously “drawn within the lions.”

Travel to specific moments—like the day that T.S. Eliot wrote a rejection letter to an aspiring author:

A rejection letter by T.S. Eliot to George Orwell, reflecting England's literary and cultural heritage, as archived at the British Library.

In his 1944 rejection of George Orwell’s manuscript, T.S. Eliot suggested that what the novel
really needed was “more public-spirited pigs.”

Or, listen as a former drugstore employee recalls how she found a more fulfilling career.

Unlimited Discoveries

Still, you’ve only scratched the surface. From apps that put library collections on your cell phone to music that puts a smile on your face, the online universe of the British Library rewards exploration.

The one thing this resource of British and world cultural heritage cannot offer you is a proper cup of tea. For that, there’s simply no substitute for the piazza café known as—what else?—The Last Word.

A graphic treatment of "Finis" (The End), one of countless free images reflecting the world's cultural heritage and available online at the British Library website.

The end? Or just the beginning of
another online search?

Unless otherwise stated, all images in this article are in the public domain.

Tour British Museum highlights here. Explore the 1,023,705 images here.

See a totally hip video on “A Day in the Life of the British Library” here.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Joyce McGreevy Comments

Cultural Heritage & Traditions/England/Language & Culture

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