Bridge Building

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After an intense TEDGlobal week in Edinburgh, on my train ride to London, I had some time to think about what TEDGlobal meant for me for the year ahead.
First, I'll share with you a few commitments I am taking to contribute to TED and TEDx.
During the next year I will:
1- Start building the Portuguese (Brazilian) pages in our wiki, and will invite other Brazilian translators to contribute as well.
2- Coordinate the selection, reviewing and rating of TEDxTalks in Spanish and Portuguese, so that we come up with the best ones to be translated into other languages, this is part of a new effort to bring the Best of TEDx to the TED community, and it is a pilot project starting with only 4 languages (Corean, French, Spanish&Portuguese) (Originally they were going to chose either Sp or Pt, but I've asked them to do both together, that way we can bring Spanish&Portuguese speaking communities closer together, and work as a region and not as separate languages)
3- Recruit and coordinate translators to translate the TEDx talks I mentioned above, people whose native language is English and have professional command of Spanish and Portuguese and who are passionate about TED and TEDx.
4- Organize TED-Ed workshops for teachers during TEDx events in Brazil and Argentina
5- Write project - InternationalYouthCamp@TEDGlobal
6- Send names of Amazing women from Brazil and Argentina to TEDxWomen, and it would be nice to introduce an AmazingWomen recognition.


You must be asking yourself, what does bridge building have to do with any of this?
On Monday June 25th, some of us went on a Literary Tour of Edinburgh.
While visiting the Writers Museum, we found some quotes carved on the floor. Els and me, we absolutely loved this one: "Bridge-Building is my Vocation" by David Daiches 1912-2005.
Isn't this every translator vocation in a way? we are building bridges between our peer native speakers and other people, other cultures.
I actually love acting as a bridge builder in other areas of life, connecting people I think could do great things together. I see myself as a link in a chain, a connector.
And what a better occassion to practice bridge building that after attending TEDGlobal and meeting so many amazing people?
So the following list is a list of people I want to connect to other people, just to show the impact of the participation of ONE person.
And I am only one in a chain of many! As Anwar said, do little and you can still change a life.

1- Manu Prakash introduced his portable microscopes, which can be used to eradicate diseases such us malaria and Chagas. I want to introduce Manu Prakash to social entrepreneurs working in the health sector in Argentina and Brazil, and talk about him to potential investors in this area.
2- Juliana is a TEDFellow who is working to stop the trafficking of wild animals to be used as pets. I want to introduce her to two recipients of captured birds I know in Brazil
3- I was invited to lunch with Nespresso and some TEDGlobal attendees who are connected to social entrepreneurship and sustainability one way or another. Nespresso is thinking of ways they can help their small coffee farmers filter water before sending it back to the rivers. I happen to know probably the most experienced expert in water treatment in Brazil.
4- Meklit Hadero is a musician from Egypt and Usman Riaz is a talented musician from Pakistan, I want to introduce them to amazing Brazilian musicians and to entrepreneurs who invite foreign musicians to come to Brazil.
5- I want to help Paraty become a Unesco City of Literature, so will talk about this to the mayor of Paraty and to the organizers of the Literary Week in Paraty, and will help them write the letters and proposal to be approved by Unesco.
6- I want to introduce Julian Treasure's "sound theory" to hospital and school administrators in Brazil. As he said, healing and learning cannot happen in a loud atmosphere.
7- I want to connect Amy O'Toole to my 14 and 16 yr old daughters ;) and I will talk about her to the teachers at school, for them to be inspired by Amy's example.

I would also love to help build a story-telling center in Sao Paulo, like the one we visited in Edinburgh. I don't know who I should talk to about this yet.

In a personal level, I want to follow all advice from Alanna Shaikh and knit more, draw more, exercise more, be healthier and stronger. Again, small actions can have big effects! And Love is important.

So that's my list, and I will do one at a time, always finding a mono task within this multi tasking world! (The mono task concept was introduced by Paolo Cardini, TED University)

Elena Crescia, TED Translator - User:Elena Crescia