The stars must be aligned just right for the ICBIE, with so many new and exciting developments. Just the Italian tour of Julio and Bigode, and the subsequent opportunities to forge friendly relationships with the city governments of Salvador and Rome would be sufficient reason for optimism, but other big opportunities have been brewing, and it’s time to spill the beans.
Shortly after I returned from Salvador in late August, I received an email from an American lady named Elizabeth Caiva, who runs an organization called Voluntour, which organizes holidays in Salvador that include social work, and shortly thereafter, she met with Pietro at the ICBIE and they discussed possible collaborations. She also mentioned the ICBIE to another American, Phillip Wagner, who leads a group called Rhythm of Hope, which operates in Salvador, India and Nepal. Phillip then began an intense email discussion with Pietro, who, after a couple days of agonizing over his written English while answering Phillip’s detailed questions, politely delegated the correspondence to me. For the last three weeks, multiple daily emails have flown between Italy and Bloomington, Indiana. Phillip is an instructor at the University of Indiana, and his specialty is the African diaspora, which naturally drew him to Salvador, the focus of both his prolonged study and his growing determination to initiate a more meaningful breed of social activism, forging partnerships with the Projeto Dida, Ilê Aiyê, Projeto Axê, Circo Picolino, etc. With Rhythm of Hope, he has organized the construction of a human sewage disposal system in a blighted area of Itaparica island, where he enlisted the Engineers Without Borders for the execution of the work. As soon as we discussed ICBIE’s needs, he encouraged us to approach EWB for the construction of our theater. The two of us compiled a 26 page long application, which has already been sent.
Phillip is convinced that the ICBIE can be extremely useful for his projects. He has long been dissatisfied with the academic study of Afro-Brazilian culture, where the venerable professors bring their grad students to the Pelourinho and lecture them about life in the favelas… without ever setting foot inside one! He envisions developing a Center for Afro-Brazilian Culture inside the ICBIE, where academics can stay in our apartments and use our students as guides into the nearby favelas. We have agreed to build a small office and living quarters for Rhythm of Hope in our back courtyard, and plans are afoot to bring volunteers who would work on both ICBIE and ROH projects in Salvador.
As we worked out the details of this partnership, Phillip continued to weave his web of contacts, and soon he had an even bigger plan. He has joined with a big tour agent named Michael Eiseman, head of VIP Brazil, famous for its lavish personalized tours of Bahia, catering to wealthy Americans from New York, Atlanta and Florida. Michael is committed to helping the poor people of Bahia, and is intrigued by the possibilities inherent in the Rhythm of Hope and the ICBIE missions. Finally, we brought in Elizabeth and Voluntour, forming a large conglomerate of common interests that is big enough to obtain the coveted 501(c) status with the American Internal Revenue Service, making us a bona fide non-profit organization.
Last Sunday night, Michael and Phillip organized a conference call between India, Rome, Barcelona, New York and Bloomington, where we were all able to introduce ourselves and to agree on a common plan of action. The structure of the new and enlarged Rhythm of Hope can be summarized by the diagram below.
As you can see by the diagram, the ICBIE remains an independent entity, outside the new organization, but with me on the board, and the new organization will offer the ICBIE an umbrella for 501(c) coverage. This will open up many new possibilities for fundraising and donations, and the synergy between Rhythm of Hope, Voluntour, VIP Brazil and the ICBIE cannot help but bring fresh ideas and resources to our project. Evviva!!!
Roy Zimmerman
