Putting on the finishing touches

June 12th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 3 Comments »

I’m wrapping up another edit of my manuscript and am hoping to solicit some help with the passage below. I’ve never been the happiest with “a little girl’s opportunity”, but I’m not sure what else to write. Any suggestions?

The context of this is that I’m at the dump where kids pick through trash. The kids would be lucky to be garment workers.

At the dump one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. And in Cambodia, one man’s sweatshop is a little girl’s opportunity.

A thousand words

May 18th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

Flip-flop prosthetic. Pailin, Cambodia.

A thousand words…floating village

April 20th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

New World Vision Report Interview

February 19th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 1 Comment »

I recorded another interview for the World Vision Report about Where am I Wearing?. We recorded this one from Ball State’s David Letterman communication center. If you’ve listened to the previous interviews there’s not much new in this one, but it is much clearer. All of the other interviews were recorded continents away over the phone. This one was recorded over an ISDN line in the studio and it sounds like I’m in the same room with Peggy, the host, even though she was in Texas. It’s part of a one-hour special on fashion that will appear on many NPR stations across the country.

I’ve yet to hear myself on the radio, which would be a hoot. But last week a fella I met in China emailed me after hearing one of my previous interviews I recorded via phone in Cambodia, with Peggy was in Texas, with the producer in Seattle, and the editor in North Carolina. The World Vision Report works from a virtual office.

We live in a virtual world. This is a good thing for a writer living in Indiana.

A thouands words…People & Trash

February 18th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 1 Comment »

Phnom Penh Municipal Dump

7-year old naps with 16-foot python in Cambodia

February 4th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 3 Comments »

This is unbelievable. Someone needs to send in the Supernanny.

A thousand words…

December 30th, 2007 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

Spirit of Soccer featured on Fifa’s website

November 8th, 2007 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

My crazy buddy Scotty Lee’s organization Spirit of Soccer is featured on Fifa.com. The article is really cool for me to read because I’ve met all the coaches mentioned in it, but you should check it out.

An excerpt:

In a land where almost two million people died through war and hunger, Gne Kom’ Sorth’s story is unexceptional. On the day she was born her father was murdered by the Khmer Rouge. The young girl grew up in a terrifying environment involving dances with death through minefields as she fled between villages. But now, thirty years on, Gne Kom is fulfilling the vow made to the dad she never knew by helping to bring joy to the very fields that witnessed so much horror during Cambodia’s long civil war.

This year she became one of just two Cambodian women to pass the FIFA-approved D-license football coaching badge. Among the six to be recruited by the organisation Spirit of Soccer, a Football for Hope Implementing Partner and streetfootballworld network member, she is now imparting her knowledge of football and of the dangers posed by landmines to a new generation of children born after the fall of the Khmer Rouge but still being killed and maimed in high numbers.

When NGO’s employ locals – essentially, having a people help themselves – I think their causes are served much better.

Where am I wearing? The ultimate slideshow

October 31st, 2007 | By Kelsey | 3 Comments »

I raided my photo archive from the WAIW? trip and set it to Gary Jules’ Mad World and U2’s Yahweh. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get either one of them to play for me so I had to do it myself. Don’t worry, I don’t sing. This is more of a beginner guitar player’s shot at spoken word.

This will permanently live in the “About Where am I wearing?” section to the right.

All Hail the Blue Jeans

October 24th, 2007 | By Kelsey | 2 Comments »

I’ve talked before about how James Sullivan’s book Jeans is a little too much into the Americaness of jeans, but really it’s hard to argue with him too much. Here’s a passage:

All blue jeans, whether they are rough as sidewalk or burnished to a hand as fine as cashmere, share an “Americana” feel. They may be cut and sewn in Japan, Vietnam, or Hong Kong, using denim from mills in Mexico, India, Italy, or Turkey and synthetic indigo dye from Germany or Brazil. Yet wherever its origins, a pair of blue jeans embodies two centuries’ worth of the myths and ideals of American culture. Jeans are the surviving relic of the western frontier. The epitomize our present-day pre-occupations – celebrity and consumer culture – and we’ll likely be wearing them long after the business suit, say, has bee relegated to the dustbin of fashion.

One question: What the heck do Canadians think of such talk? Are blue jeans more American than Canadian?