Valentine's Day

WAR ON WANT--Fight Global Poverty....this is a war I want to fight.

I apologize for the "lateness" of this post....some of you may have already bought flowers for your special someone. If not, ask for a Fair Trade product somewhere.

Vote for the world you want with your dollars!!

This Year's Fair Trade Festival at the Five Points Farm Market: the Entertainment Playlist

Sharon performing an awesome sword dance, one of the entertainers highlighted in the playlist, which you can watch by clicking here.

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For all of you who attended this year’s Fair Trade Festival on December 7 and 8 at the Five Points Community Farm Market in Norfolk on Church Street between 25th and 26th Streets, for those who couldn’t and wish they did, and even for those who have never even heard of the Festival or Market, here is a playlist I developed from some of the great entertainment Saturday, Dec 7, with some very fine belly dancing and a hot band to boot.

I shot this with my little Kodak digital camera and it did pretty good. There was some sound distortion, not too bad, although the Hot Boudin Brothers singer’s voice is really better than it sounds in my videos. Some day I will get one of those fancy and expensive video cameras and really get some professional sound recordings.

The Farm Market of course sells locally grown produce as well as a bevy of other nourishing products, and they love to host wonderful events like this Festival. You can check out their website at http://www.5ptsfarmmarket.org/.

A fair trade festival, by the way, for anyone who doesn't know, is a festival where products grown or crafted for certifiably equitable wages from around the world are showcased and sold, the idea being to offer a market to those companies who compensate their workers or contractors fairly, as opposed to many businesses who exploit and abuse employees as if they were chattel.

The video displayed here is the lead off for the playlist. Again, to watch the entire playlist, click here. It should cycle automatically ffrom video to video.

Enjoy the show.

PEACE FEST EVENTS

Friday and Saturday a capacity crowd attended Susan Posey's annual Fair Trade Festival at Sacred Heart Church in Norfolk. The entertainment was excellent with many crowd pleasing acts. Terra Nova was on hand with vegatarian meals made from local produce.

On Sunday thirty folks gathered for the Bringing It Home Seminar. A short video--The True Cost of Food--was shown. Farmer John Wilson was in attendance and he shared information about Community Supported Agriculture--CSA--and the benefits of local, sustainable, organic farming. Five Points Farmer's Market also sent a representative to discuss the community building and activism that is occurring in the Five Points Section of Norfolk surrounding the local Farmer's Market there.

There was intense discussion of what the community can do to support the local sustainable farm movement by volunteering at the CSA's, the local Farmer's Market, and creating urban vegetable gardens. The Fair Trade cities and zoning was also discussed.

Food Not Bombs folks are serving the homeless at two locations in Norfolk every Sunday afternoon and they obtained some additional food resources at this event. Approximately 15 folks have decided to continue meeting and volunteering their time and energy in these projects.

Afterwards some of the participants gathered to eat at the local No Frill Grill in Ghent.

On Wednesday night. Samdouin will begin with the filmamkers at a reception at Azar's in Norfolk at 6 pm. This will be followed by the multi media presentation of Samdouin and a discussion to follow. It is great to have an opportunity to discuss the middle east with two independent, investigative journalists who recently spent time there.I'll put up more on the Samidoun event later.