A letter to my friends - Children first - New year wish 2017

Photo: Linda Gabrielli

My dear Friends,

Its been a while. But it is time. For change. I am writing to ask you a favour. Not for me, but for our children and our grandchildren.

It can be difficult to teach an old dog new tricks – a saying. The old dog being me and perhaps you. Still - we are the ones who need to teach the children new tricks. To educate them on how to take care of eachother and of the planet.

I believe the right way is not by exploiting nature, but by exploring nature – like small children do. In order to fall in love. When you are in love you want to nurture and learn how to do that in the best way and in the right way for love to flourish. Make the children fall in love with planet Earth.

I ask you to show the children, teach them, take them to the woods and the lakes, the oceans and the desserts. Show them the beauty and the magnificence of Nature. Show them her fragility and her strength. Show them the beauty of whales playing and purring between the ice-flakes. Show them the blue beauty of the snow and the ice. Show them the kind trees in the rainforests of Brazil and the sculptural coral reefs of the Red Sea. Show them a lioness hunting a Thomson gasell in the Serengeti. Tell her about the bees and the dolphins, and how the sweet-potatoes grow in the dirt and the apples on the trees.

Tell them this planet will have no place for them if we dont stop polluting and exploiting. Tell them that our consumption and demands is what makes the pollution and the exploitation: the new phone, the bike, the toys, the the sofa the car, the meat, the palm oil.

And just as important – live the change you want to see. Show them the change we need to continue life on wonderful planet Earth. Be the change.

So where am I going with this? You can easily do all this, but:

For a mother – in order to do and be this for her child – she needs the means to keep her newborn baby girl safe, warm and healthy. In 2015, according to UNICEF, 1.407.150 infants died in zones of conflict and displacement before they turned a month old. 5.9 million children did not reach the age of five years on planet Earth in 2015. 16.000 children under age five die each day and most from preventable and treatable diseases. The deadliest diseases affecting the poorest children is malaria, pneumonia and diarrhea. Help her.

A father running from his country at war needs help caring for his baby boy to give him the possibility to focus on the wellfare of the Earth and regain the knowledge of how to take care of, not only his son, but also nature that feed him. Help him. Thank you.

WE ARE  ALL CONNECTED

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