Tech innovations helping disabled people dance, run and compete

There are just not enough words to talk about these new inventions.

Read about them here and be amazed:


http://www.bbc.com/news/business-37174157

The steampunk capital of the world

The term steampunk was coined in the 1980s and is based on imagining inventions the Victorians might have created for the modern world. The movement was kickstarted by science fiction novels and has branched out to incorporate art and fashion while spawning a well-established aesthetic, typified by embellished hats and goggles.

Iain Clark is widely credited with launching steampunk in Oamaru, on New Zealand’s South Island, and likes to be known by the name Agent Darling.


https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/30/new-zealand-town-oamaru-steampunk-capital-of-the-world?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+main+NEW+H+categories&utm_term=188106&subid=19904740&CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2_footer

How grime gave a voice to a generation

A new music evolved in east London in 2002 – the sound of an angry but optimistic black Britain.

Check out Grime’s evolution, and its new wave:


https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/aug/28/grime-gave-voice-to-generation?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+main+NEW+H+categories&utm_term=187995&subid=19904740&CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2_footer

Bosnia

This bitter war happened not so long ago. Now, although many people still view Bosnia with trepidation, its dramatic landscapes and singular history are making it an increasingly popular destination.

People are people after all...and the human spirit is indestructible...


http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160825-the-village-that-survived-a-war

It is possible to recycle thermocol

This 12-year-old from Bhopal, India shows how:


http://www.thebetterindia.com/65874/anakta-prabhu-thermocol-recycling-foam/?utm_source=The+Better+India+Newsletter&utm_campaign=1b75f91961-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cd579275a4-1b75f91961-74060141

In Sweden and Finland, tech companies help refugees find work

No matter how you slice the numbers, migrants are a burden on countries offering comprehensive welfare services. But what's unexpected is the oversized role the tech industry in Sweden is playing in helping refugees find work -- and not just in tech. Local startups, consultants and global companies are cataloging migrants' skills and education, training them, setting up internships and placing refugees in jobs. They've also connected asylum seekers with investors looking to back new businesses, from restaurants and barber shops to web-based marketing companies.

It's the same thing in Finland too.


http://www.cnet.com/news/in-sweden-finland-tech-companies-help-refugees-find-work/?ftag=CAD1acfa04

The nurse who knew the first astronauts

One hardly gets to know the people who put astronauts into space - the behind-the-scenes people. And yet, each one is so important and vital to the project.

Dee O’Hara was one of the few women in the programme that put the first Americans in space. She recalls her experiences here:


http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160823-the-nurse-who-knew-the-first-astronauts-inside-out

India makes world’s first leprosy vaccine

G.P Talwar, Founder-Director of the National Institute of Immunology (NII), has developed a first-of-its-kind leprosy vaccine in India. This indigenous vaccine, mycobacterium indicus pranii, has been approved by the Drug Controller General of India (DGCI) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) department of the US.


http://www.thebetterindia.com/65669/vaccine-india-cure-leprosy/?utm_source=The+Better+India+Newsletter&utm_campaign=f07f1d25c2-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cd579275a4-f07f1d25c2-74060141

The last nomads of Iran

Nomads for generations, Iran's nomadic Qashqai, part of the Turkic peoples from Central Asia who settled in Iran during the 11th and 12th Centuries, have roamed the harsh deserts of southwest Iran for hundreds of years. Numbering just 400,000, the Qashqai are a strong and proud people who are fiercely resisting assimilation into mainstream Iranian society.

Each year, they travel with their flocks of goats and sheep from summer highland pastures north of Shiraz to winter pastures on lower (and warmer) lands near the Persian Gulf, roughly 480km to the south. Their way of life is a fine balance between man, animal and their environment.

Fascinating!


http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160817-the-last-nomads-of-iran

Musician Loyle Carner is teaching kids to cook

To the wider world he is becoming known as Loyle Carner, a brilliant young rapper. But in a test kitchen near London’s Old Street he is plain old Ben, a lively 21-year-old showing six teenagers with ADHD, and one with anxiety, how to make pasta with pesto.

Kids with ADHD can do lots of things. You shouldn't judge a fish by how it climbs a wall.


https://www.theguardian.com/global/2016/aug/21/rappers-delight-how-musician-loyle-carner-is-teaching-kids-to-cook?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+main+NEW+H+categories&utm_term=186912&subid=19904740&CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2_footer

'They are the true winners'

Two Brazilian graffiti artists — Rodrigo Sini and Cety Soledade — have decided to pay tribute to the Olympic refugee team by painting large-scale portraits of the athletes in Rio de Janeiro’s Porto Maravilha district.


http://www.huffingtonpost.in/entry/brazilian-artists-pay-tribute-to-olympic-refugee-team-in-stunning-murals_us_57b5cc0be4b095b2f542ce91?ir=World&utm_hp_ref=world

Using WhatsApp for medical care in remote Himalayan villages

Physicians working in the remote and hilly areas of Himachal Pradesh, India, are using WhatsApp in a unique way to communicate the status of a patient’s illness and get advice from specialists who are sitting several miles away.

Amazing!


http://www.thebetterindia.com/65207/whatsapp-alleviating-poor-patient-care-himachal-pradesh/?utm_source=The+Better+India+Newsletter&utm_campaign=35d544c722-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cd579275a4-35d544c722-74060141

Ibtihaj Muhammad

She didn’t win a medal, but she still scored an Olympic victory

Fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad is the first U.S. athlete to compete at the Olympics in a hijab. The New Jersey native said while growing up, she felt awkward playing other sports, such as track and volleyball, with her head, arms and legs covered. “Fencing found me,” said the 30-year-old Olympian, who took up the sport when she was 13.

http://www.huffingtonpost.in/entry/ibtihaj-muhammad-no-medal-us-olympics_us_57a8a48ce4b021fd98794e5d

Wayde van Niekerk

And the 74-year-old coach behind his golden run at Rio 2016.

South Africa's Wayde van Niekerk sensationally won the Olympic 400-meter gold at Rio 2016 -- smashing Michael Johnson's 17-year-old record along the way -- and he has his coach Anna Botha to thank.

The coach's philosophy is all about discipline and hard work, albeit leavened by laughter.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/15/sport/news-rio-olympics-van-niekerk-grandma-coach/

The Little Free Pantry

As we face huge, global challenges, simple, effective solutions like the Little Free Pantry are really inspiring to people who want to help but feel overwhelmed. What is it about this project that has created such a huge response?

http://www.dailygood.org/story/1359/the-little-free-pantry-cat-johnson/

How Google changed Rio

Although more than one in five of Rio’s 6.5 million people live in favelas, until recently, these neighbourhoods were just blank spaces on the map.

And today....

Read this unbelievable story:

http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160811-how-google-changed-rio

Rescuing baby rhinos

In a heartwarming gesture, children of a primary school in Assam voluntarily gave up their mid-day meal for a day so that eight orphaned rhino calves, saved from the flooded Kaziranga park, could be given milk.


http://www.thebetterindia.com/64280/children-give-up-midday-meal-to-feed-rhinos/

Israel's mysterious Druze women

The Druze community is a Unitarian offshoot of Islam developed in 11th-century Egypt and now practiced by about one million people scattered throughout the Middle East.

Today, women in this community are using their handwork, passed on from generation to generation, to ensure their future. They are part of a cooperative, making products not only for their community, but to sell as art to outsiders. They have also opened their craft circles, kitchens and homes to tourists.


http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160808-the-women-who-never-leave-home

Is storytelling making a return?

Is storytelling making a return?

It is - wonderfully so!

People are being given the chance to tell true, first-person stories in front of audiences at an event called The Moth.

Founded in the late 1990s, participants can talk for up to five minutes, without notes, and are given a score by a panel of judges.

Events are now held in 26 cities around the world including London, Sydney and Dublin.


Listen in:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p043hx36

Cuba's new revolution

As Facebook, Google, and American movies and music arrive, young Cubans are not only changing the way they dress and talk, but the way they communicate with each other and the world.


http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160728-the-new-revolution-of-cubas-youth

Many Olympians struggle just to make ends meet

All Olympic athletes all have lucrative sponsorship deals, right? Wrong. Many have to take side jobs just to get by.

These Olympians may leave Rio in a few weeks as temporary global celebrities, but many of them enter the Games as ordinary people riddled with extraordinary debts.


http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20160804-many-olympians-struggle-just-to-make-ends-meet

How one night changed my life

2011

The riots had broken out at a low point in the teenager's life. After an agonizing time of self-realization, Scott Bates got himself back.

Bates keeps on striving. He now has three young people working with him and does a couple of DIY jobs a week. He is looking into whether the youth charity YMCA can assist him with housing and is trying to secure funding for a van for the Handy Boys, with the help of YFC.

He plans to start training with the Street Pastors in September.


http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-36922807

India's forgotten African tribe

An African-origin ethnic tribe of about 20,000 people has been living in near total obscurity in India for centuries.

Read about this amazing people here:


http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160801-indias-forgotten-jungle-dwellers

You can make a difference even when you are technically 'old'

Residents of the Anandam Old Age Home in Chennai may not have much for themselves but that hasn’t stopped them  from giving back to society in every way they can. Here’s their inspiring story.


http://www.thebetterindia.com/63209/the-senior-citizens-in-anandam-old-age-home-believe-in-the-joy-of-giving/?utm_source=The+Better+India+Newsletter&utm_campaign=28699dcf53-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cd579275a4-28699dcf53-74060141

An understanding and a balm

Muslims attend Catholic Mass across France in powerful show of unity

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/muslims-catholic-mass-france_us_579e3c67e4b0e2e15eb63576?utm_hp_ref=world

Uplifting photos

Every so often, we all need a good pick-me-up. Here's a link that will help:

http://www.dailygood.org/story/1086/19-of-the-very-best-uplifting-photos-of-the-day-kindness-blog/