mock up of a solar racing car

sample of new solar hot water tubing

sample of a solar house heater

I guess Coke is displaying here because they are using biodegradable packaging and shipping materials

The audience in the symposium where i spoke. My message was about the importance of empowering women and educating girls if we are to eradicate poverty and create sustainable development.

It is said that you educate a boy and you change his life. You educate a girl and you change her life, her family, her community and her nation. Every research study on development indicates that countries with the highest population of uneducated girls are at the bottom of the economic ladder and at the bottom of every development issue. We know that every year of education increases a girl’s income by 15 to 30% and every year she stays in school is a year later that she will marry and begin to have children.

Longitudinal research shows that when women (rather than men) control the family income, more money goes to education, health and nutrition. Increases in female income improve child survival rates 20 times more than increases in male income. Likewise, female borrowing, rather than male borrowing, has a greater positive impact on school enrollment, child nutrition, and demand for health care. This is why enabling women and girls to become wage earners, entrepreneurs and micro credit borrowers has become such a powerful force for development.

I got a big laugh and round of applause when I said that New York Times writer, Nicholas Kristoff, writing about the financial crisis asked, “Would there have been a global recession had Lehman Bros been Lehman Sisters?”

I also bragged a little about the fact that my ranch uses solar panels for hot water and home heating and solar photovoltaic cells for electricity and that I have a septic tank that recycles all water, including toilet water, so that it can be reused for irrigation etc. I also drive a Prius (Toyota Hybrid car). My daughter drives an old Mercedes that she fuels with vegetable oil that she gets from various restaurants around Atlanta.

The first of many individual TV interviews following the symposium

A beautiful woman who has wanted to meet me since she was a teenager because I inspired her to become an aerobics instructor

It’s been frustrating because the Dusseldorf hotel server was down so I haven’t been able to send my blog and now it’s a day late. Oh well… I have to remind myself that, not so long ago, we couldn’t have imagined communicating this way with so many people and be grateful anything works at all.

SO….to continue from the symposium where I gave my speech and girls. I was told Yusuf Islam (used to be known as Cat Stevens) and his wife, Fauzia Mubarak Ali, wanted to meet me. I so love his music which wallpapered so much of my middle years–”Where Will the Children Play,” “Moonshadows,” “Tea for the Tillerman,” “Wild World,” “Peace Train,” “If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out” among many others. As you may know, Cat Stevens almost died of tuberculosis in 1968 when he was 19. This began his spiritual quest. Brushes with death can do that. His second near-death experience happened when he almost drowned off the coast of Malibu, California. He called out, “God, if you save me, I will devote myself to you.” A wave came just then and swept him to shore. That was when he left his music altogether to search for what form his commitment to God would take. In 1977 he became Yusuf Islam, a devout Muslim.

Yusuf Islam (used to be known as Cat Stevens) and his wife, Fauzia Mubarak Ali

I was not sure what to expect when we met. Would he be a dour, overly serious, proselytizing man? Would his wife be silent and subservient? Would he shake my hand or refuse to be touched? How happy I am to say that the playfulness, the twinkle from the Cat Stevens days, (and the good looks) are still very present. He laughs, jokes, asks Fauzia if he’s correct in his interpretation of some aspect of the Koran. She listens and adds her two cents. She seems a woman of strength, centeredness and peace. She is also beautiful, with large, dark, soulful eyes. Fauzia is dressed in a crème colored robe but not veiled. My camera wasn’t working so I asked someone else to take our photo. The problem is they never sent it to me, so I took a picture of the two of them at our dinner table later on.

The three of us spoke about God, spirituality, how fundamentalism has distorted what the Koran actually says just as Christian fundamentalism has distorted Christ’s teachings; How the Koran actually speaks of women being equally regarded by God, not blamed for sin as Eve was in the Christian bible.

Yusuf gave up making music for years, unsure if music was accepted by the Koran. Then he learned that, in fact it was Muslim travelers who first brought the guitar to Moorish Spain. He started making music again in the 1990s. The tragedy of 9/11 showed him that while the extremes had becoming more dangerous, the middle was growing stronger. It was to the “middle” that he has directed his music, communicating through metaphor rather than politics. Music, he feel, is what is needed to sooth and uplift the troubled soul. Yusuf goes beyond metaphor, however, donating the proceeds from his music to a non-profit organization he founded, Small Kindness, which has helped survivors of 9/11, victims of the tsunami in Indonesia, victims of genocide in Croatia, children in Gaza among others.

He will soon begin a concert tour that will also introduce a portion of his new musical to the public for the first time. I hope he comes to the U.S.

Yusuf Islam performing a new song, 'Road Traveler,' that will be part of the musical play he has developed

Stefan Schulze-Hausmann, CEO of Coment, the organization that produced the event, presenting a Sustainability Award to Yusuf Islam.

Joschka Fischer

I sat at an interesting table at the evening ceremony. To my right sat Joschka Fischer, one of the founders of the German Green Party who was the first Green to be elected to the German government and later became Germany’s Secretary of State. He now focuses his work on encouraging corporations to become green and, together with our former Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, works on solutions in the Middle East.

Sky

On my left, the most handsome Sky, the well-known actor and TV personality who interviewed me for his TV show a year ago while I was staying at Troy’s.

It was a late evening, little sleep before I had to get on the flight to Frankfurt and then on to Atlanta. I took my grandchildren to dinner last night and had a fun sleepover. I was exhausted but this was a perfect, grounding way to end a fascinating trip and welcome me home. By the way, unbelievable as it may seem, even to me, I return in 5 days to Dusseldorf for a UNESCO event!!!

Home at last, having dinner with my grandchildren, Viva and Malcolm (and Tulea)

See you next time

PS: OMG! I cannot Believe that it took my daughter, Vanessa, to remind me that Cat Stevens lived on our ranch above Santa Barbara, the Laurel Springs Ranch, in a beautiful house on a hill, 3000-some ft above the Pacific. Tom Hayden and I later ran a performing arts children’s camp there for 15 years. For some reason, I never met Cat then. Maybe he’s the one who told Joe Cocker about the place cause Joe lived there for a long time, later marrying Pam Baker, one of our camp directors. (There were many houses on the property and the Hill House had a separate entrance…)

The cobblestone street where the Museum is located

I arrived in Dusseldorf early this morning. This city is the capital of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Situated right on the Rhine River, it is the second most economically important center of Germany after Frankfurt. After a short nap in my beautiful suite, a driver took me on an hour drive to Bonn where Dr Michael Ladenburger, Director of the Beethoven House and Museum, met me at the entrance of a narrow, picturesque, cobbled street, closed to cars, where shops and restaurants surround the birthplace and museum of the world’s greatest and most interesting composer. (That’s my opinion)

The old bar in the restaurant where Dr Ladenburger took me to lunch

Outside the Beethoven museum and Archives

The plaque

Outside the Beethoven House

On the left is the Beethoven House. The garden is behind.

This statue of Beethoven was sculpted by Naoum Aronson who trained with Rodin

The small dormer window above was the room where Beethoven was born

Another view of the house

Cello, flutes and other instruments used in Beethoven's day

A violin used by Beethoven

This is a piano forte that Beethoven played. Unlike the clavichord, the piano forte could be soft or loud as the name suggests

a bust of Beethoven made from a life mask (made of his face while he was alive)

Beethoven's desk

There's the room he was born in. Check out the beautiful slate tile roofing

This is the room he was born in, a small room where his parents lived as well. She would have 7 children only two of whom survived. Those are the original floor boards

This is the piano where '33 Variations' was first performed. I wish I was actually playing but I flaked out as a kid in spite of years of piano lessons. Dr Ladenburger played the beginning of 33 Variations on it for me.

There is a room filled with computers where scholars (or any interested party) can pull up all of his manuscripts, even details like these where you see he wrote with ink over the original pencil when he’d decided to keep something.

With Dr Ladenburger in front of Beethoven's house. The good doctor looks sterner than he is in life.

The archives are in a basement vault beneath the beautiful concert hall. I tried to photograph this hall but the pictures didn’t come out. Dr Ladenburger said the idea is that when the musicians perform, they can feel and be inspired by the presence of the great master beneath them. I was not allowed to take photos in the archives. It is a hallowed place where few people are allowed. I felt so privileged and moved. Dr Ladenburger handled the pages of manuscript so carefully, never touching them directly with his fingers.

Here’s a photo of a white truffle, in case you’ve never seen one.  Not that money always equates with quality but this truffle costs $400 but a friend gave it to Paula. Good kinda friend to have, huh? It was Paula’s first time cooking risotto but it came out scrumptious and with the shaved truffles on top and a good green salad we were in heaven.

Simone and my goddaughter, Hannah. They seem to like each other, huh? Hannah showed us her sketch book of figures and fashion designs. She's really talented.

Troy with Tulea. (I can't seem to get rid of the glare in her eyes. Sorry.)

Simone and Paula

I leave at the crack tomorrow for Dusseldorf, Germany. I go there twice in the next 10 days! Once to make a speech on sustainability and earn money for my non-profit. The second time to get an award from UNESCO. Thursday I will travel the short distance to Bonn, birthplace of Beethoven and the city where his archives are located. Almost no one can get access to the archives but during the run of “33 Variations” (about Beethoven and the play took place in the archives) I met the man who runs the archives and he invited me to see them. Some composers (like Mozart) composed in their head. Beethoven composed on paper so there are 1000s of sketches that record every thing he ever wrote, every false start, every rewrite, all there. Can’t wait. I’m told Dusseldorf is a charming city.

In between the two trips I will be in Atlanta seeing friends, Daughter and grandkids. In fact we’ll have a sleepover on Saturday.

I’ll blog from Dusseldorf.

See you next time.