Dream Assistant

…and informative:

Avasin suomenkielisen blogin osoitteeseen:

http://vihaisiakirjeitarakkaudella.blogit.uusisuomi.fi/

Spent the Sunday writing something very disturbing. A short story called Menace Ragu can be downloaded here:

Menace Ragu

When I was a kid I was thinking why I couldn’t walk into a grocery store, get want I want and walk out… without paying. I didn’t see anything wrong in it. I would still be committed to learn and fulfill my place in the society.

The Zeitgeist Movement

Yesterday I was invited to a Sri Lankan get-together in Helsinki. I was so excited to go but had my reservations thinking that these guys are most likely so “Finnished” that it’s not fun at all. How wrong was I!

Entering a flat with ca 40 Sri Lankan expats, ranging from 2-month-olds to grannies and grandpas, can be an overwhelming experience even for someone like me who has spent 19 months in the country. Everyone seemed to be related to the rest somehow, and if there was no relation they were still brothers and sisters (malli, ayya, nangi or akka – depending on age and gender). The language spoken varied from English to Sinhala and from Finnish to Tamil… and even Swedish. Everyone was smiling, touching, serving, helping and just genuinely having a good time (without alcohol). I felt like being home again.

Of course they were a bit perplexed having a Finnish guy there in his Sri Lanka t-shirt, eating by hand and starting the conversation in Sinhalese. But so was I when I heard them speaking fluent Finnish. Weird but fun night indeed. I say it again: It felt like home again.

I gotta go back to the island…

Can you believe that a guy who sucks with numbers (like me) could get the best possible grade (laudatur) in the Finnish matriculation examination (high school end exams)? Sounds impossible, right? But it’s true. No, it’s not magic, it’s just the fact that the system is screwed. By managing to solve 10/15 questions you get the best grade. Silly.

Well, check out this guy for some real mathemagics:

A Canadian guy called Brendan Baker has been accepted to study social entrepreneurship MBA in Oxford Said Business School but he can’t afford it! Unlike in Finland, people need to pay for their studies. Brendan is asking for 3 dollar donation from you and in return he will send you a piece of his degree once he graduates.

In his own words: “I’m trying to get to Oxford to do an MBA, focusing in social entrepreneurship. I’m fascinated in the ways that business can be used as a tool for social change. Oxford’s Said Business School is one of the world leaders in social entrepreneurship. I’ve been admitted, but face the daunting task of raising $90,000 in two months to be able to go. I’m not going to be a banker afterwards, so the price tag is prohibitive. But I think it can work.”

His deadline is this Thursday and he’s way behind the goal. Help if you can. This small boy did: “Hi Brendan – Thanks for the note. I wanted to let you know that $3 of our donation was from my six-year old son Ben. We saw the story in the National Post and he asked me what you were doing with the children in the picture. When I read him the story, he decided he wanted to dig into his piggy bank to send you the money. His father and I agreed to match his donation.”

Wanna see this highly unreasonable person? Check this video:

Global Oneness project has some pretty neat videos. I got a DVD from them for free just by ordering it from the website. But there’s anyways more stuff on the web, so you don’t necessarily need the DVD.

Yet to go through How to change the world by Davind Bornstein – a book portraying some of the most inspiring examples of social entrepreneurs of our time – I ran across a fellow whose texts I’ve read before. The honorable Ajahn Brahm reveals the age old mystery of how to change the world in this video. You can choose not to watch it and use your one hour for something else, or you might as well forget about the 11 emails that wait responding and amuse yourself with Ajahn’s humorous but deep talk. For instance he ponders on how as a monk who’s committed to celibacy he could sell his carbon footprint quota for the government.

For the impatient ones… the secrets to change the world are:
1) First seek to understand (reminds me of Stephen Covey) and
2) Simplify your life.

Here we go – dhamma talk by my 2nd favourite demi-Aussie, Ajahn Brahm:

I tried out Google’s latest THING called Lively and created a room for social entrepreneurs: