A couple from Dallas, Texas sells everything to aid in the rebuild of Haiti

Meet Orlando Alexis and his wife Rita Alexis. They have decided to sell almost all of their possessions. Their homes and family business will be auctioned off to help rebuild Haiti. And also find Orlando's mother which he hasn't seen since he was 7 years old. This is a reminder that someone somewhere is doing something awesome! I will stay up to date on what they will be doing, They plan on leaving to Haiti in March.

Link to the video on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMM_wrnMxLU

Record snow fall for Dallas, TX

As some of you already know, we have had a record snow fall here in Dallas. I went out and measured random places in my yard, there was 9-12" of snow! So when night fall finally came, I went out and photographed Dallas at night. The following is some of the nights fun! More photos to come.






Around 2pm we had 4".




And at 2am almost a foot of snow, which is pretty sweet!

Photographer Julie Platner in Haiti for WSJ

Photographer Julie Platner's photos from Haiti, You can see them here.

Typical Honduran dirt road. You'll see a lot of Toyota trucks, usually hauling people. They become more sparse the further you drive. This is a main road, before driving into the mountains where we were at 4-6,000ft elevation.
Photo Date: 1-6-10

A typical set up outside of a Honduran home in the village of Buena Esperanza. The Family that lived here was actually better off than most. They have some tools, bowls and cleaning supplies. What the photo doesn't show, off to the left were the family's drinking bottles. Water was stored in everything from old coke bottles, to paint thinner and anti-freeze jugs.
Photo Date: 1-12-10

From Kyle Anderson - Honduras Update

This is Kyle Anderson's post, that I would like to re-post here. Because it's a reminder that even small things make a BIG difference (especially in the lives that it impacts directly). Hope you don't mind Kyle, but this is great. - Ryan


Hi friends!!...and Jason,

This was such a great trip!! I tagged along with a group of volunteers from Kansas to assist with a clean water project for a very poor town of about 500 people called Buena Esperanza, located in a remote, mountainous region in southern Honduras. The trip was freakin' awesome! There are tons o...f reasons for this, and I'll try to explain them in the picture captions, but there was one aspect that really, really ruled. And here's a quick synopsis of it: Ok, in working in Honduras I've encountered tons and tons of people who are in desperate need of warm clothes, but it's logistically and financially very difficult to provide them with any more than what each volunteer group brings down in their luggage and leaves behind as a donation. But we may have stumbled upon a way to make that a thing of the past. Yay!

*YOU SHOULD READ THIS PART 'CAUSE IT'S AWESOME!!!*

So, after witnessing how cold and poorly clothed the people of Buena Esperanza were, I talked with Arnoldo (a friend from the capital whose knowledge and insights are priceless, he is aptly nicknamed "The Hero of the Hills"), and we came up with a plan. Before I left I went along with the local pastor to every home in the village (86 in all) and did a survey of each one's needs. I took a picture of each house and noted in a binder a description of the poverty level of each house, the measurements of the structures if they were in need of a new roof (almost all were), and, most importantly, we made a list of the ages and sexes of all those who lived in each house. In the near future we'll be putting together a roof project (which I'm super psyched about), but in the meantime we were able to put together and distribute warm clothing packages for EVERY SINGLE PERSON in the village!!!

The trick to doing it cheaply was instead of shopping at local second hand stores or paying for donated clothes to be shipped down, we purchased the clothes straight from the local distributors who get them shipped straight from the States in huge bulk. Apparently this has been tried before but the quality of the clothing was a constant problem. But not with the guy we found. I purchased 500 pounds of great quality adult and children's sweaters and jackets (seriously, better than the junk I have at home) for under a thousand dollars American. This enabled us to give each person (again, about 500 in all) in Buena Esperanza a full compliment of warm clothes for less than 2 dollars per person. It was Uh-freaking-mazing!!! I'm so stoked to see if we can implement a similar project on a larger scale throughout the country. That would be awesome!!!

Honduras Post-trip

As most of you know, I went to Honduras with a group of people who were just fantastic. I will be posting photos and videos from the trip. We spent most of our time in a remote village named Buena Esperanza.

A new blog for a new year!

Yes a new blog for a new year!
Stayed tuned for updates, more will come as I get ready to travel more. This will be the place to stay up to date. I will post as much as I can. Many places that I will be will have no internet. I will be gearing up for full-time travel and reportage, here in a couple of months. Until then I will be posting some logistics of what's going on and some other random ideas.

Thanks Everybody!