Enlightenment: August 2007 Archives

The Daily Mantra’s not sure why, but we’re compelled to sign up for things online this week (we’ll have to ask our astrologer Maria what’s going on with our stars right now). Anyway, after signing up to help a businesswoman in the developing world on Tuesday, and to get our name on a racing car on Wednesday, today we logged on to GetGoodKarma.org to check out our karmic health. Apparently we did quite well, with a score of 165 on their Karma Approximator. Find out how you’re doing kamically – and don’t forget to register to vote if you haven’t already – since voting to make the world a better place is what the site’s there to promote.

In the 10 hours since Daily Mantra last posted (see earlier story), Kiva investors from Sweden, Iceland, Belgium, Canada and the U.S. came up with the additional $325 Juliet Egieda needed to complete her loan.

"A small gesture repeated by many people can make a huge difference where it's really needed," says Chris, a Belgian web developer who invested in Julia's business. "I can't imagine a better way to help make the world a better place," says fellow investor Dan, an online marketer from Boston, MA. "We need to help people with their solutions to their problems. We have in the past tried to give them our solutions - that is demeaning, and doesn't work," says Marian, a retiree and Kiva lender from Ontario, Canada.

Julia, who needed $625 to expand her business selling grocery items in her village of Illushi in Nigeria, will repay her Kiva loan over the next 8 months. The Daily Mantra wishes her well in her business, and will check back in to see how she's doing.

If you would like to invest in the future of someone like Julia go to: www.kiva.org

The Daily Mantra has never met Juliet Egieda, a wife and mother of three, who lives in Illushi village in Edo State, Nigeria, but our worlds are now linked. Juliet has been in business for four years, selling food to her local community, and needs a modest loan to expand her business. The Daily Mantra has been able to invest in her business through an innovative micro-investment company called Kiva. The San Francisco based non-profit matches would-be investors, who make individual interest-free loans of $25 and up, with small business owners in the developing world. Kiva does not take any commission for loans given through their site. The money reaches the investor's chosen businesses via field partners such as the Lift Above Poverty organization. So far Kiva’s network of 93,000-plus investors has loaned over $10 million to 15,000 entrepreneurs from 36 different countries. The default rate on these loans is less than 1%.

It seems that teams of scientists from Yale and the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies in Rome have successfully been able to teach monkeys the value of money and how to use it to shop. According to a Daily Mail article the clever primates have learnt to deal with different denominations of currency, and have figured out how to bargain for their purchases.

But will these savvy shopping monkeys be happier now they have purchasing power?
Not according to writer David Wilson, who says unequivocally that “shopping does not make you happy” in an article for the Times Online. He goes on to suggest we stay out of the stores and stick to leisure pursuits nearer home or in peaceful pastoral settings for a stress free life. “Avoid the stress. Save your money. Save your time. Save the planet. Stay in the neighborhood or get out into the countryside. You don’t need a loyalty card there.” That’s great advice for us folks that are over the shopping thing, but what about the poor monkeys who’ve only just made it to the mall in evolutionary terms?

Then again, most of us evolved humans are trying to minimize consumerism in our lives, so it’s certainly debatable as to whether going from freeganism to consumerism is a step up for these not-so-primitive primates, especially when you consider that unlike humans, the monkeys don’t even have to dumpster dive to pursue their already freegan lifestyle.

Let’s just hope that now these monkeys can shop, Capital One doesn’t start mailing them pre-approved credit cards. I’m waiting with bated breath to hear about the first monkey to dispute a late payment fee.

Rocks are supposed to be inanimate objects, but at a spot called Racetrack Playa in California’s Death Valley National Park they mysteriously scoot around the flat desert landscape, leaving long trails of dust in their wake. The phenomenon has been studied by scientists since the 1950’s. Though no one has actually seen the rocks move, it’s apparent from their meandering paths in the sand that they do. A 1996 geological survey mapped a total of 162 rocks and their trails using GPS technology. The rocks weighed in at up to 700 lbs, and their tracks varied from just over 1 ½ meters to 880 meters in length. Though the cause of the roving rocks remains a mystery, some scientists theorize that strong winds slide the rocks over slick mud and ice on the seasonal lakebed in cold and wet weather, though this theory has been refuted by other scholars. More fanciful explanations include magnetic fields and alien activity due to the site’s close proximity to Area 51.

Devita’s amazingly effective line of botanical skin care products has become a firm favorite with the Daily Mantra. For those that need regular exfoliation, their Acne Solution Pads are quite simply transformational. With both salicylic and glycolic acids to slough off dead cells, witch hazel to tone and aloe vera to soothe and moisturize, the pads pack quite a punch without being drying. Other favorites in the range are the 2-Step Home Alpha Beta Peel Kit, the Tomato Leaf Mud Masque and their Daytime Solar Moisture Protection 30, which contains vegan hyaluronic acid (a molecule that can hold 1,000 times its weight in water and is normally harvested from animals) to keep skin super hydrated, and micronized zinc oxide to protect without giving you that ghostly white sheen that other less refined SPF products do.

The Daily Mantra loves the taste and the good intentions of boutique bottled water brand H2Om. Their water is sourced in the Palomar Mountains of Southern California, and is rigorously filtered and sanitized using both UV light and ozone, which unlike chlorine, breaks down into oxygen in a few hours, leaving no aftertaste or aroma. The labels feature words of positive affirmation (love, perfect health, prosperity, gratitude, will power, joy and peace), the idea being, as H2Om’s own mantra states, that you “think it while you drink it.” The folks behind H2Om claim it is the world's first vibrationally charged bottled water. The colors in the packaging are said to resonate with specific chakras, and once the water is bottled they play a mix of music, sound and spoken word to infuse the water with good vibes.

“I want everyone to own something with a peace sign on it,” declares clothing and jewelry designer Julia Gerard. “You could say that’s my mantra.”

The daughter of a Nazi concentration camp survivor, Gerard emigrated from Russia to Los Angeles with her father when she was ten. “I didn’t know what peace was until I came here,” she says. Surrounded by racks laden with her rock-chic designs, Gerard explains that September 11th was a defining moment. That night she was inspired to make two massive twig wreaths in the shape of peace signs. They now hang in the window of her West Hollywood Peace Gallery store.

Since that fateful night, Gerard, who had been working as a clothing designer for over two decades, started to incorporate the sign into the outfits she wore. Demand from customers then prompted her to open a gallery devoted to her peace-promoting designs. Fans include Tina Turner, Elizabeth Taylor, Heather Mills, Natalie Cole and Gloria Estefan. Gerard’s designs range from high-end couture and customized distressed jeans made from recycled denim, to affordable designer T's and glamorous diamante earrings, all featuring her signature motifs. As Gerard’s website states, “True peace comes from the inside...so show it on the outside.”

Photo: Peace pin © Julia Gerard

The unassuming mid-brown upright Steinway piano John Lennon composed "Imagine" on is touring sites of hate, violence and needless death as part of a peace project it's former owner would surely have approved of.

So far the piano has visited the Oklahoma City Memorial, post-Katrina New Orleans, and the site of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. It has also turned up at the assassination sites of Dr. Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln, and poignantly made its way to the State Penitentiary in Huntsville, Texas on the day of a prisoner's execution. Lennon's ode to peace is performed on the piano at each stop.

The instrument is now owned by pop star George Michael, who bought it from a private collector for $2 million at a Sotheby's auction in 2000. The idea for the Peace Project tour came after it was displayed at the Dallas art gallery owned by Micheal's longtime partner Kenny Goss as part of a war photography exhibit entitled IMAGINE. At Michael and Goss' special request the piano visited the home of Gabi and Alec Clayton. The Clayton's son Bill committed suicide when he was just 17 after being assaulted by a high school gay bashing gang.

"Kenny and George's deepest wish is to imagine a world of peace, a world without violence," says creative director Caroline True, on the project's website. "The selection of these sites evokes a deep sense of emotion for everyone. Capturing these images of this special piano on which a song of peace was composed is the heart of this project."

Images from the piano's journey will be compiled for a book and DVD, with proceeds going to charity.

Tales of deep thinking dolphins, empathetic elephants, gesticulating orangutans, and clever canines are causing us to rethink our ideas of animal intelligence.

In an article for Parade, author Eugene Linden chronicles numerous tales of animal acumen, including a dog named Scooby who took himself to the vet after being hit by a car, a rottweiler named Faith who speed dialed 911 after her disabled owner took a tumble, and the story of Sophie the elephant who helped her zoo keeper with chores.

Searching for hard facts on animal aptitude scientists from St Andrews University in Scotland have found that the communication skills of orangutans are more complex than first thought, being akin to a game of charades, after they observed the primates using a series of gestures to score tastier treats from their keepers. Meanwhile, at the Institute of Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi, a devious dolphin named Kelly figured out a series of sophisticated scams to score more fish. And a paper penned by Friederike Range of the University of Vienna shows that dogs are capable of learning in a similar way to humans by use of selective imitation.

"Every day, we're discovering surprises about animals and finding out animals are far more intelligent and far more emotional than we previously thought," says animal behaviorist Marc Bekoff in an interview with the Washington Post. "We're really breaking down the lines between the species."