Calendar

May
21
Thu
2020
People’s Hub Workshops: Getting Through Economic Downturns Together @ Online
May 21 @ 1:00 pm – Jun 11 @ 1:00 pm

TODAY.

Where have we been?

Where are we going?

What might be possible together? 

https://peopleshub.org/project/getting-through-economic-downturns-together-workshops-and-circle/

https://www.facebook.com/PeoplesHub-1695905997109684/

The Circle may be over but the workshops are coming up! 

It’s time to sign up!!

This has been a time of organizing. We are moving from our deep roots in community to challenge the status quo. We are building systems that work for our people. We are imagining a different way. 
 

It has been a time of reckoning. 

Covid-19 has magnified the disparities and injustices of our world. Specifically, the ways that Black, Indigenous, People of Color, chronically ill and disabled people experience higher levels of violence, housing insecurity, and job discrimination. We continue to lose people to white supremacy: 

Nina Pop

Breonna Taylor

Ahmaud Arbey

There is a missing and murdered indigenous women’s epidemic. 

Capitalism and white supremacy will attempt to make us forget this time and return to a disconnection from each other and the earth. 

We cannot and will not return to a normal that devalues people and planet. 

“We can impose beauty on our future.”
–Lorraine Hansberry 

Instead, let’s make a promise, a commitment to honor community. For those of us with privileges it’s a time to risk comfort,  #share your check.

Together, we can be a part of community-based solutions, be a part of the radical imagination. As Lorraine Hansberry stated, we can impose beauty on our future.

Join us for a deepened understanding of economic downturns and solidarity economy. What we do now matters. 

May
29
Fri
2020
Village Building Convergence – 20th Anniversary – Online Events @ online
May 29 – Jun 7 all-day

https://www.facebook.com/pg/cityrepair/events/ for more info

VBC Starts This Friday, May 29th!

Our annual Village Building Convergence is just about here! This newsletter includes info about the online events, workshops, and yes – DISTANCE DANCING!

Feel free to browse the website https://villagebuildingconvergence.com/ for more details, including two placemaking-at-a-distance projects. And, check out this short video for an overview of the Convergence: https://youtu.be/wPBhwO-Bgto

Registration is required to receive zoom links. All events (except the design course) are sliding scale donation, no one turned away for lack of funds, and Queer, Trans, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color encouraged to hop on in!

Time Capsule Project: Knowledge across time

Time capsules reflect the values of a current culture, but are designed within an imagined future. They exist across time holding hopes, fears, and desires for a future civilization.

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Village Building Convergence, Artist Jordan Rosenblum is working in collaboration with City Repair and event organizers will use the form of a time capsule as a collective artwork. The time capsule will document knowledge and insight generated during the events and you are invited to participate, dreaming our future/s, and acknowledging our present/s through a series of questions posed at each event.

On the closing of the VBC, a time capsule will be created in a distributed form, with participants offered to take back accumulated knowledge to our own communities.

AND!!! Stay tuned for info as we will be breaking out a time capsule the City Repair founders prepared and buried in cob 20 years ago. We’re going to break it open and share the contents over VBC!

 

 

 

 

Upcoming Events
MAY29
Fri 5:30 PM PDT97 guests
MAY30
MAY31
Sun 4 PM PDT17 guests
MAY31
May 31 – Jun 3by Village Building Convergence – Portland
Live Sessions Online
JUN5
JUN6
JUN6
JUN7
JUN7
Sun 8 PM PDT21 guests
Aug
1
Sat
2020
The Ribbon 2020 – Tangible Hope for No Nuclear War – 75th Anniversary of the Nuclear Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki @ Global
Aug 1 all-day

The Ribbon 2020 – Tangible Hope for No Nuclear War

The Ribbon was founded by Justine Merritt who had visited Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in 1982. She was greatly affected by the tragedy caused by the Atomic Bomb. After arriving home, it came to her to create a Ribbon, and decided to have a Ribbon event on the 40th memorial anniversary of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It was in the middle of the Cold War between The United States and The Soviet Union, and using nuclear weapons could happen again at a moments notice.

On August 4, 1985, in Washington, D.C., fifteen miles of Ribbons encircled the Pentagon and other important monuments: With the message of “What I cannot bear to think of as lost forever in a nuclear war”. The Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima was also encircled.

The Ribbon International is now a Non Governmental Organization in Association with the United Nations. Since 1985, many Ribbons have been created around the world. People carry Ribbons and pray for Peace at many occasions such as; community memorial gatherings and marches related to nuclear, peace and environmental issues. Ribbons have been exhibited in various places as well.

Nowadays the world is closer to the tragedy of nuclear war or a nuclear accident more than ever before.

On August 1st 2020, the 75th Anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, The Ribbon International is planning to have a Ribbon event in New York City and in other cities around the world. Please join us, and pray for a world without nuclear weapons and never another nuclear tragedy. (If you cannot join, please pray with us wherever you are.)

______________________________________________________________________

How to make Ribbon
(Please also see our website: www.theribboninternational.org)

  • Cut a panel of sturdy cloth, double thickness, of any color.
  • Finished size: one meter by a half meter (or one yard by a half yard)
  • Sew 20cm (9 inch) pieces of ribbon to each corner so the panels may be easily tied together.
  • On this panel, sew, paint, write, embroider, weave, knit, tie-dye or use any other kind of ornaments to express what you most love about the world and want to protect from what is endangered on this earth.
  • If you wish, write your name and/or any message on the back of the panel.

______________________________________________________________________

BECOME A LOCAL CONTACT FOR THE RIBBON IN YOUR COMMUNITY – organizations, schools, places of worship, individuals, artists, teachers and many others have adopted the Ribbon project for such celebrated days as Earth Day, World Peace Week and United Nations/Global Citizenship Day to promote local awareness and action. Create Ribbons to display at local events, advertise in newspapers, organization newsletters, on radio and TV.

THE NEW RIBBON: TANGIBLE HOPE
THE UNITED NATIONS HAS DESIGNATED SEPTEMBER 21 THE INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEACE
Honor this day of global cease fire
CREATE RIBBON EXHIBITS FOR PEACE

To help support the Ribbon project and keep it growing around the world please send tax exempt donations made out to – Peace Action Education Fund, 40 Witherspoon St., Princeton, NJ 08542, USA and direct it for The Ribbon International.

We invite you to join the Ribbon project, there is no fee. Just create and display a Ribbon, you have then symbolically joined with others world wide in creating and thinking in terms of care and protection of the earth and its inhabitants.

______________________________________________________________________

Pieces to Peace,

There will be no check-in table in Arlington in August
with an aging, greying teacher with a red Bic pen
waiting to grade assignments for more than ten miles of Ribbon.
All the pieces belong there:
all the symbols of a nation’s yearning for peace.

Who would want to judge the pieces?
Choose one as better than another?
Work of Art?
Work of heart?

Who would want to judge the pieces?
Lay aside a child’s rain-touched, felt tipped rainbow
for an artist’s gessoed work?

Who would want to say the eighth-grader’s acrylic basketball court
held more promise that the quilter’s careful stitches
holding her aching heart together after the evening’s late news?

Each one makes The Ribbon:
the pizza, poison ivy, pomegranate seeds
the ladybugs, mid-Hudson bridge,
poetry,
and creed;
each segment makes The Ribbon.

It is in the addition we find the sum:
for it is one yard
plus one yard
plus each yard of cloth
that we honor the diversity,
that we celebrate the unity.

Each piece makes The Ribbon;
each piece brings the piece.

Amen

JOURNEY. Justine Merritt
CA: Hope Publishing House
1993. (p.111) -Arlington, VA 1985

___________________________________________________________________

Some Events in the Life of the Ribbon

1982: Justine Merritt is inspired to tie a Ribbon around the Pentagon in Washington, DC, USA from the theme; “What I cannot bear to think of as lost forever in a nuclear war”, and writes about it to friends on her holiday card list.

1985: August 4th: Over ten miles of Ribbons encircle the Pentagon and other Washington, DC buildings. The Atom Bomb Dome in Hiroshima, Japan is also

Washington, DC – several people holding multiple ribbon panels by the Capital’s reflecting pool.

1986: In New Zealand, Ribbons connect US and USSR embassies. In South Africa, Black and White mothers unite using Ribbons to tell their government they don’t want their children killing each other. In Japan, Ribbons are used to protest the razing of Ikego Forest. 10,000 Ribbons link B’hai temple to the ocean in Austrailia and USSR World Leader Mikhail Gorbachev is presented a Ribbon by Justine Merritt.

1987: In Okinaw, Japan, Ribbons help surround the largest military base in the Pacific and are displayed in Zushi for the environment at Ikego Forest. In Holland, panels connect the US and USSR embassies. Tamel, Sinhalese and Christian segments are exhibited together in Sri Lanka.

1988-1989: In the Middle East, the Interns for Peace calendar shows Ribbons made by Arab and Jewish children.

Two colorful ribbon panels.

1990: In London, Ribbons are exhibited in the Houses of Parliament. In Geneva, Ribbons are displayed in the Palais des Nations during the NTP Conference.

1991: In New York, Ribbons are exhibited at the United Nations during the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Conference. Included are panels created by Iraqi and American children. New York State Museum in Albany has an International Ribbon exhibit.

The ribbon in a New York City parade.
Alternate picture of the New York City parade.

1992: Ribbons are displayed in Brazil and around the planet during the UN “Earth Summit.”

1993: Ribbons are displayed at the Human Rights Conference in Vienna, inspire an environmental Ribbon contest in Singapore and is cosponsor of the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago.

1994: The Canadian Ecumenical Council Calendar features Ribbon segments as part of UN related art. Gas City and Marion Indiana create and exhibit Ribbons in preparation for the UN 50th anniversary.

1995: Ribbon displays celebrate the UN 50th anniversary Year. With the help of divers, Ribbons are carried under water and connect Egypt, Israel and Jordon. Segments are contributed by Switzerland, Germany, Italy and China.

Family with Ribbons

1996: International Mothers of Liberia use Ribbons to help protest the stealing of children for the army. Towns in the Ukraine create panels calling for a world without wars or violence. Ribbons are given to all the UN Missions. Mayors for Peace through Inter-city Solidarity learn of the Ribbon.

1997: Estonia uses Ribbons to celebrate peace. Ribbons are taken to Haiti to promote a culture of peace. In Magdeburg, Germany, the Mayor inspires the city’s population to create and display panels for Human Rights Day and other occasions. The Bonadssamlingen Museum in Stenstorp, Sweden exhibits Ribbons.

1997 Stenstorp - several panels

1998: Ribbons are displayed at the UNESCO Culture and Developement conference in Stockholm, Sweden. *1998 is the UNITED NATIONS INTERNATIONAL YEAR of the OCEANS. Show on your Ribbon the beauty of our never ending oceans.

1999: Ribbon panels are displayed for Human Rights Day in Copenhagen, made in China, are exhibitied at the Hague Appeal for Peace (HAP99) in the Netherlands and created for the International Year of Older Persons.

2000 – 2006: Ribbons are given to all U.S. Congressmen for the UN Culture of Peace Year. Lake Havasu City, AZ, USA creates and display Ribbons for UN Day. Africans and Cubans receive Ribbons for peace. A Ribbon is given to Pope John Paul II in Rome in honor of the Decade for a COP and Non Violence for the Children of the World. 9/11 annually Ribbons are carried from the UN to the World Trade Center, NY with an Interfaith litany read.

2001 – 2010: The United Nations International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-violence for the Children of the World. Show on your panel a “Culture of Peace.” Church Women United (CWU) initiates the Ribbon as part of their celebrated days of prayers for peace such as World Community Day.

Pope John Paul II greeting ribbon participants.

Founder Justine Merritt and Michele Peppers present Ribbon panel to Pope John Paul II, in honor of the United Nations resolution for the Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non Violence for the Childrend for the World (2001-2010), October 17, 2001