Being the Change

Our blog posts for the next two weeks will be dedicated to highlighting stories from our Road to Washington Campaign.

Saturday was an astounding day for me. I’ve mentioned numerous times over the past year that one of the most profound aspects of this project is watching individuals and groups embrace this project and selflessly give themselves to this cause, but Saturday was really out of the ballpark.

All day Saturday I was attached to my cell phone, anxiously awaiting pictures and updates from our amazing organizers. When I did receive a picture all I could do was show it to everybody. The events were absolutely breathtaking. Check out a couple of the pictures so far from Louisiana, Texas, Wyoming, Florida and Arizona:

 Baton Rouge, Louisiana Austin, Texas

Tallahassee, Florida  Cheyenne, Wyoming

Phoenix, Arizona

Starting Saturday night I began receiving a slew of “Thank You” e-mails and while I do appreciate them,  I honestly believe that this entire campaign was a success because of our fantastic organizers. This morning I came in to the office and the first e-mail I opened was one from Kelly Himsl Arthur and Liz Overheul Curry Co-directors of the ThinkPeace Workshop for Girls, where they shared stories from both their installations in California and New York. The stories were so moving that we’ll have to dedicate an entire blog post to them. But, one sentence about the girls resolve, that really stood out to me was “When they say they want to 'be the change' they mean it!”

This comes from Ghandi’s quote “Be the change you want to see in the world” and when I think about Road to Washington and more specifically, the journey we all took leading up to this campaign, all of our organizers and participants were being the change. These organizers didn’t just make bones, they galvanized their communities and brought the issues of genocide and apathy front and center. They’re changing the face of what we think of as “activism”.  They’re proving that indeed one person can change their community, their country and ultimately their world and I can not help but feel incredibly lucky to know them. They are the ones that deserve our biggest THANK YOU!!  

Stories From Our Road to Washington

Written by Kathleen McEuen, One Million Bones National Liaison

This Saturday, April 28, 2012 is a really big day for us here at One Million Bones. We get to witness 34 capitals across the nation stand together in unity against genocide and mass atrocities by participating in the Road to Washington Campaign.

If you haven’t heard the story about how the Road to Washington came to be, it’s actually quite endearing. It was about a week or so before the Albuquerque 50,000 Bones Preview installation and Susan, Naomi and myself were making bones and just chatting about “what’s next” for One Million Bones when Susan replied “I really think having a mini installation in every State Capital would be so powerful”. Naomi and I obviously thought she was crazy, after organizing the one installation, we couldn’t even conceptualize organizing fifty.

We took away a lot from that first installation last August. I think one of the biggest surprises we encountered that day was how much participating in an installation can change a person and community. Suddenly, Susan’s fifty state campaign didn’t seem so crazy, it actually seemed like a good idea and thus, the Road to Washington Campaign was born.

What has been most amazing for me is to see these groups of leaders transform their communities. There have been so many success stories and I wanted to take some time to share a couple of them here. The International Studies Student Club at the University of Wyoming is a smaller student group but they have poured their hearts into creating an amazing event this Saturday for the Cheyenne community. They brought in Carl Wilkens to speak to their campus and coordinated bone making events across the state of Wyoming. What really touched my heart was this quote from Allison Beaufort: “We also won outstanding Student Organization of the year this year for our efforts, which was amazing – our club has never been recognized for anything!” To witness a small student group engage their campus and educate about these atrocities and then provide them with a direct action, the making of an artwork bone is so powerful and then for them to be recognized by the university for their efforts gives us an immense pride and inspires us to continue this work.

You can’t talk about a community embracing this project without mentioning One Million Bones/Tallahassee organizer, Jane McPherson. Through her leadership, the Tallahassee community has not only participated in this project but have accepted it with open arms making the Tallahassee installation the largest Road to Washington event. Jane started out with the goal of having 2,500 bones made for this weekend and now, because of the community support they've had, they’ll be laying down 6,547 bones. She has been featured in Tallahassee.com, ABC, the FSU College of Social Work Students on FAMU TV and many others!

On April 7, Naomi with a New Orleans based volunteer team organized another amazing 50,000 bones installation. One of the volunteers from that event, Dana Nguyen helped start the One Million Bones Baton Rouge Chapter based out of Louisiana State University who will be organizing the Baton Rouge event this Saturday. The chapter’s president, Firan Chauhan, and Dana have worked tirelessly, not only through the 50,000 bones installation but have continued on to create another meaningful installation for the greater New Orleans community featuring 5,000 handmade bones.

There are many other schools, groups, chapters and students who have made this journey memorable for us and we hope to speak more to that in the weeks to come. We consider ourselves so lucky to have such supportive and dedicated volunteers. We hope everyone can make it out to an event this Saturday! 

I'm so thankful to be able to share these stories with you and hope to share many more! 

One step up...

This very morning, President Obama announced the creation of an Atrocities Prevention Board.  It's an important step for the US, offering the opportunity, long overdue many people say, to recognize the signs of impending conflicts and work to stop them before they begin.  It's the best way to address problems, an ounce of prevention and all that...

But at the same time, we have relations between Sudan and South Sudan disintegrating and the "w" word (war) being tossed around. And all this less than a year after the hopeful moment presented when South Sudan became its own nation last July.

The Atrocities Prevention Board is important; we must be out in front of situations to be able to make a difference before people start to die.  But it's already happening in Blue Nile and South Kordofan, and now in Heglig and South Sudan.  Omar Al Bashir has already been indicted by the International Criminal Court in the Hague for three counts of genocide for crimes in Darfur.  He continues to rule, he continues to travel, he continues to orchestrate the killing of innocent civilians.   

There are many current situations that the new Atrocities Prevention Board will have to address, and quickly, and I hope that Sudan and South Sudan will top the list.

A Poem for Congo Square on a Friday afternoon.

R.G. Evans sent this poem, a Villanelle I believe, after participating in the bone laying in Congo Square. Thank you, Mr. Evans, for your words capturing the day.

OFFERTORY OF BONE

For 50,000 souls who aren’t there,

we kneel and bring this offering of bone,

these 50,000 bones in Congo Square.

These ribs, these skulls, these vertebrae we bear,

memento mori honoring those gone,

those 50,000 souls who aren’t there.

We carry them with elemental care

as if they were the bodies of our own,

these 50,000 bones in Congo Square.

Beat, drums, the way you did once in this square

in voiceless tongues that cried We’re not alone,

we 50,000 bones in Congo Square.

Place skulls, cross bones, proclaim Beware

and draw the gaze of those could condone

the reason there are bones in Congo Square.

With ease, we turn our backs, say C’est la guerre,

but these bones cry the war is here at home.

There’s 50,000 souls who aren’t there,

these 50,000 bones in Congo Square.

R.G. Evans

Hotel Monteleone, 4/7/12

In honor of the One Million Bones Project

Armenia

With April 24th rapidly approaching, the day of recognition of the Armenian Genocide, I happened across this photo series, Memory of Trees.

The photos are by a New Mexico-born photographer, Kathryn Cook, and this is what she says about this series:

"A place that has become central to this project is Agacli, located in southeastern Turkey. In Turkish, Agacli means “with trees” or, “place of trees.” Over the last few years, the Kurdish inhabitants of this former, predominantly Armenian village revived an Armenian silk scarf-weaving tradition that cultivates silkworms in the same Mulberry trees used nearly a century ago. The trees, the silk, tell a subtle story of the Armenian’s existence here, symbolizing the enduring legacy on their ancient homeland, hence the title for this project. 

In the early 1900s, as the Ottoman Empire collapsed, a fiercely nationalistic "Young Turks" movement took power. With the Empire’s fall, the multi-cultural attitude that had made it one of the most diverse world powers became eclipsed by the fledgling government's dream of a "pan-Turkic" country. As with all ideologies, their taking hold and taking root meant the termination of what didn’t fit its new identity, its Armenian citizens.

Recognized as "genocide" today by more than a dozen countries, Turkey still vigorously rejects that claim. Memory of Trees follows the remains and traces of an ambiguous, dark history - the definition of which is still being fought over nearly a century later."

It took me a few minutes to realize that if you use the bottom series of thumbnail images to move through the series, when you click on each new thumbnail, it will give you the option (in the upper right hand corner) to click to see information about the image.