I’d like to begin by wishing everyone a wonderful International Women’s Day (IWD). For just about a hundred years, March 8th has been set aside to commemorate the contributions (great and small) made by women everywhere. For a really interesting short video, produced by Russia Today, on the history of IWD in the Soviet Union and Russia, click here, and if you’d like to see a country-by-country list of events planned for the day, stay on that same page and scroll down just a touch. The list will be on the right-hand side of your screen.
Last Friday, I was sitting in one of my favorite restaurants in my neighbor, a place I’ve blogged about before called The Green Mill. While I was waiting for my lentil soup to come out of the kitchen, I was looking at the day’s edition of The Egyptian Gazette, one of several English-language newspapers published in this North African country. (By the way, the soup I was preparing myself to eat is also made by the Turks and is called “mercimek.” Unfortunately, I don’t know what the Egyptians call it, but I’ll be sure to find out as soon as I can.) Anyway, so I was reading the newspaper and came across an article that had a nice little factoid: It seems that women are the primary breadwinners in 60% of all Egyptian households. My immediate reaction was that that percentage seemed too high, but then I thought about it some more and came to the conclusion that it sounded about right.
After downing my soup, I strolled back home, got online and did a little research for my next blog topic. While doing so, I ran across the clip I’ve embedded. It’s such a nice little video that I don’t want to include any spoilers here. I will say this, though. It shows a wonderful example of why this world needs a day that is set aside for thanking women for doing all the things that they do.
It’s no secret that Cairo is one of the most polluted cities in the world. Often, the air is so dirty that the sky actually looks brown rather than blue. That’s right, you heard me correctly; I said the air in Egypt’s capital is frequently BROWN. Of course, my lungs are not especially happy about this fact.
As an American who lives in such a place, I am aware (sometimes painfully) of what can happen when human beings abuse the environment. I think if more of my compatriots could come to a city like Cairo, they’d become overnight converts to the Green Movement. They’d understand that we can’t trash up the whole place without having it come back to bite us.
I often despair for the future of the planet, but then I see something, like the video I’ve included in this week’s blog, that gives me a bit of hope.
(Note: There is a problem with this video’s embed code, so clicking on the image will redirect you to the site where the clip originally appeared. You’ll have to return to the blog by hitting the “back” button. Sorry for the inconvenience.)
After watching this clip once again, I do feel that the world, and all of us who call it home, might just have a chance after all. But what we need, if this hope is to be realized, are more countries like Sweden and more programs like Climate Pilots and more people like the Stokeses.
I know that what I’m about to say might come across as hopelessly utopian, but I don’t care. I’m going to say it anyway. So here goes. I hope the day comes when a country’s power is no longer measured by how large its army is or by how many weapons it has but rather by how clean it keeps it water and air and land, and thus, by extension, how strong and healthy are its people.
