DivaWire http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire en mail@adventuredivas.com Copyright 2012 2012-04-11T18:54:00-08:00 Filming in Ukraine http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/filming-in-ukraine/ Tomorrow we head out to Kiev - and then onto Chernobyl, for several days filming “The Babushkas of Chernobyl” in the Exclusion Zone.  This month marks the 26th anniversary of the accident and we’re going back to capture
the incredible/sad/timely/oddly inspiring stories of the women who insisted on returning to their ancestral homes after the disaster.  Holly Morris wrote about this unusual sisterhood in MORE magazine last year, and now for the documentary....

]]> 2012-04-11T18:54:00-08:00 Apne Aap carries on http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/apne-aap-carries-on/ Today a quick shout out the indomitable Ruchira Gupta and Apne Aaap who have been working to end sex trafficking for more than a decade.  When we interviewed Ruchira for Adventure
Divas- India she said :“What we want to do is actually eradicate sex trafficking and the exploitation inside prostitution...The good news is that the women are willing to fight. Six years ago, when I came into this brothel, they were so timid and they were so scared, they were not willing to even talk to each other. They did not let outsiders in, and today, six years later, you can see the laughter and the joy that they have.”
In honor of their first decade we’re highlighting an excerpt from that doc.

]]> 2011-12-12T19:26:00-08:00 Occupy for integrity http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/occupy-for-integrity/ Kiran Bedi, the rabble rousing Indian top cop and anti-corruption guru who we featured in Adventure Divas: India, makes the opinion pages of yesterday’s New York Times.  Check out her comments on the Occupy movement and learn about her role with team Anna Hazare.
“We’re not anti-capitalism,” she says in the article, “we’re pro-integrity.”

And you better believe it.  After all, Bedi’s first notable act as India’s first female cop was to tow the prime minister’s car (hey, we was illegally parked).  Then she went on to
reform India’s notorious prison system- with meditation and other unlikely revolutionary tools.....

]]> 2011-11-01T16:43:00-08:00 Follow the feeds…. http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/follow-the-feeds/ Many of the women featured in our doc series are too deep in the trenches to Tweet, others are living in Arab Spring-ish countries and Tweeting under pseudonyms, and still others embrace the tech under their real names.  Here are some feeds to follow in order to keep up with the work and spirit of the divas. 

@theKiranBedi
@ruchiragupta
@gaylene-preston
@smudgal
@HelenClarkUNDP
@Lazarailzette

]]> 2011-10-24T16:48:00-08:00 Bangladesh, Bangladesh http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/bangladesh-bangladesh/ "Bangladesh, Bangladesh, where so many people are dying fast, and it sure looks like a mess, I’ve never seen such distress,’’ crooned George Harrison in 1971, but forty years later there’s a different story to be told. The story features Dhallywood, 10 million environmental refugees and otherworldly rickshaw artists. As soon as I manage to peel apart my notes (currently fused together with sweat and humidity), I’ll post a fuller report. Meanwhile, feel free to check out the photos posted by Globe Trekker.

]]> 2011-05-26T18:06:00-08:00 Hanna Zavorotnya: Chernobyl babushka http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/hanna-zavorotnya-chernobyl-babushka4/ Activism, Adventure, Feminism, Globetrotters Hanna, 78, who lives in Chernobyl’s exclusion zone, is featured in this month’s MORE magazine. Our friend on the ground, Sergei Ivanchuk, dropped by to show her the story. “The main thing is that we have pig fat and vodka,” Hanna told me when I was there in December.  A single photo could hardly embody more culture clash…

]]> 2011-04-11T12:43:00-08:00 Chernobyl 25th & Syrian democracy http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/babushkas-of-chernobyl-syrian-democracy/ Here’s a quick round-up of some diva-related media:

The democracy movement is going off in Syria and you might want to check out Holly’s new Syria program - just released from Globe Trekker.

Check out the unstoppable Kiran Bedi, featured in Adventure Divas’ documentary ‘Holy Cow,’ in her recent TED Talk.

Babushkas of Chernobyl.  This month is the 25th anniversary of the world’s worst nuclear accident (and let’s hope Chernobyl keeps that title).  Check newsstands for MORE magazine’s ‘A Country of Women’ about the old ladies who refused to leave their contaminated homeland.  Also, Globe Trekker “Ukraine,” presented by Holly and featuring some of the babushkas, is airing nationwide on PBS throughout April.

]]> 2011-03-31T17:11:00-08:00 Ukraine & Egypt http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/ukraine-egypt/ Check out this thought- provoking story in the Kansas City Star that compares Ukraine’s Orange revolution to what’s going on in Egypt.  Adventure Divas spent a chunk of time this fall and winter
traveling Ukraine and becoming obsessed with the “resettlers” of Chernobyl who - in defiance of all officialdom and logic - live in Chernobyl’s Exclusion Zone, a 19 square mile highly contaminated area evacuated and cordoned off after the accident at the nuclear plant 25 years ago.  We’ll be posting material from the latest trip asap.  And have a look at next month’s MORE magazine and PBS’s Globe Trekker for Holly Morris’s full report....

]]> 2011-02-06T13:30:00-08:00 Syria flexing its secularism http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/syria-flexing-its-secularism/ In an interesting move, Syria is cracking down on its religious conservatives to stem threats from radicals.  The government is vetting the imams’ sermons, and has transferred 1000 teachers
who wear the face veil to administrative duty.  But hey, it’s still legal for men to marry 13 year-old-girls - so things aren’t changing that fast.

For lighter Syrian fare, take a look behind the scenes in on Holly’s recent shoot for Globe Trekker; airing on PBS now.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/04/world/middleeast/04syria.html

]]> 2010-09-17T19:55:00-08:00 Kiran Bedi, India’s top cop…. http://www.adventuredivas.com/divawire/posts/kiran-bedi-indias-top-cop/ Top Indian cop Kiran Bedi, who we featured in our documentary “India: Holy Cow" a few years ago, just won the 2010 EPIC Award which will be presented by Meryl Streep this week.  Bedi will be in NYC to accept the award, and to attend a screening of “Yes, Madam Sir” - a new documentary (a decade in the making) about her extraordinary, rabble-rousing life as India’s best-known and highest ranking police diva.  Check out part of our interview with Bedi here. 

]]> 2010-04-05T18:17:00-08:00