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"When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?" --Thich Nhat Hanh
Hello! This week's feature stories conjure up the power of presence from wherever we are. From a fast food restaurant to college basketball game to rural mountains of Uzbekistan -- no matter where in the world we are, the quality of our presence and the ways we show up for others hold profound ripple effects. Just as the quality of silence between notes can define a song, the quality of the space between us and others is filled with offerings of what we pay attention to. May the space between the "notes" of your day and week ahead be graced with the glowing potential of your ways of seeing and being!
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CBS News via YouTube
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McDonald's restaurants serve billions of hamburgers every year, but there's one restaurant where the workers are the ones being served by a very special woman. Andrea De La Rosa is an assistant manager at a McDonald's restaurant in Lowell, Massachusetts, US, who has offered countless kids working at her store a heaping helping of love and guidance. "You never stop being a mother just because they're not your kids," De La Rosa told CBS News. Managing young people on their first job is about much more than barking orders, according to De La Rosa. It's about listening, helping with homework, college applications, and really anything for the kids who work in the restaurant. Employees say De La Rosa will pick up her phone no matter what time of day and gives some the mother figure they are missing. "It's a little bit of kindness. A little bit of love that means the world to somebody," she said.
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Sue Kinneer
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A Kentucky, US, coal miner who rushed straight from work to take his family to a University of Kentucky Wildcats practice game is on the shortlist for father of the year. Michael McGuire earned praise from legendary coach John Calipari who shared a picture of him and expressed admiration for his hard work and dedication to his son. The photo, which has now gone viral, shows McGuire and his son sitting in the stands at a recent Blue-White Game scrimmage that was played in Pikeville, in Eastern Kentucky. McGuire is still wearing his work uniform and heavy boots and his face and arms are covered in black coal dust. Sharing the picture on Twitter, Calipari said, "My family's American dream started in a Clarksburg, West Virginia coal mine, so this picture hits home. From what I've been told, after his shift, he raced to be with his son & watch our team. Don't know who this is, but I have tickets for him & is family at Rupp to be treated as VIPs!!" McGuire was identified shortly thereafter and the coach connected with the family, extending the special invitation.
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Noah | Unsplash
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Researchers at Swansea University in Wales, UK, have pioneered a process that can transform used face masks into high value materials and thus contribute to creating a circular economy and making industrial processes greener. The new process could be used to upcycle materials, which would otherwise be thrown away, and transform them into high-value materials with real-world applications. "We established that the carbon inside the facemask could be used as a pretty good feedstock to make high-quality materials like carbon nano tubes," said Professor Alvin Orbaek White of Swansea's Energy Safety Research Institute. The process is green not only in levels of energy use but also in product value generation as opposed to waste creation. "This is a crucial piece of work as it contributes to not only a circular economy but is also scalable and is viable for industrial processing and has green chemistry at its core," White says.
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Koon Chakhatrakan | Unsplash
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On Tuesday, October 25, Soraya Peke-Mason was sworn in to New Zealand's Parliament. She replaced former Speaker Trevor Mallard, who left to become ambassador to Ireland. With the resignation of another male lawmaker, the balance in Parliament has become 60 women and 59 men -- the first time in history when female lawmakers outnumbered males in New Zealand's Parliament. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, women make up 26% of lawmakers around the world, with just 6 nations that can boast a Parliament with at least 50% women: Cuba, Mexico, Nicaragua, Rwanda and the United Arab Emirates.
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Ministry of Preschool Education of Uzbekistan
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Every morning in Uzbekistan's remote mountains, preschool children climb into school buses to spend three hours painting, playing, making and singing. The Kindergarten on Wheels project is a model of how to bring pre-school education to remote rural areas. Five years ago, just one in four Uzbek children went to preschool, and in remote areas, just one in ten. Since 2017, preschool enrollment has jumped from 27% to 67%, and aims to be 80% by 2026. The fleet of specially designed school buses, fitted with solar panels to run air conditioning and a microwave oven, can function entirely off-grid. The buses travel through the mountains, stopping in a different village each day, providing three hours of play-based learning to up to 16 children at a time. "Giving all children access to preschool education that is inclusive, caring and creative is key," says Stefania Giannini, UNESCO's assistant director-general for education.
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