A Reason to Be Cheerful
An ingenious initiative by a high schooler to help abuse survivors
This newsletter reaches you a few days late because I started May by going on a ten-day vacation – my first travel in almost a year. We went to Yosemite, Sequoia, and King’s National Park. We were incredibly lucky to hit a week of sunshine and warm weather, swim in ice-cold rivers, watch climbers scale El Capitan, and cruise through the Yosemite valley on bikes, only to stop for bears crossing our paths.
The day after I got back, I took on a new job: I am now a contributing editor for David Byrne’s solutions-oriented platform Reasons to Be Cheerful. I believe David is one of the most creative and best writers on the planet, and his platform features exactly the kind of writing I am passionate about: presenting effective, science-based solutions for pressing problems.
If you haven’t read RTBC, check it out here.
And look at the fabulous team I get to work with:
The story below about a 17-year-old high school student who started an initiative to protect women from domestic violence during lockdown highlights perfectly what Reasons to Be Cheerful is all about and also what gives my work meaning: featuring initiatives and awesome people who truly make a difference for people and the planet.
Cheerfully,
Michaela
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“When someone places an order, we call the police.”
When Krysia Paszko, as a 17-year-old student in Warsaw, Poland, learned at the beginning of the pandemic that domestic violence had risen to alarming levels during the lockdown, she felt the need to do something.
Paszko began building a fake online shop for cosmetics in April 2020 with the innocuous brand name Chamomile and Pansies (Rumianki I bratki in Polish). Under the pretense of looking for face creams, visitors can use the site to draw attention to their situation via Facebook message, text, email, or phone. Instead of an aesthetician or a customer service representative, an experienced psychologist or a lawyer who has been specially trained by the Women’s Rights Center, a non-profit in Warsaw, will inconspicuously respond. Since its humble beginnings, Paszko’s initiative has helped more than 500 women and saved at least 20 from potentially life-threatening situations.
Check out my story about this amazing woman and her fabulous initiative on Reasons to be Cheerful!
Krysia Paszko in Warsaw, Poland Copyright: Jonasz Jezusek