Marching Orders

I had lunch with my boss today.  It was Linda Mandrayar's birthday and I wanted to treat her to lunch and talk about my upcoming trip to India.  We talk for a long time and in great detail over steak fajitas and chicken relleno burrito in the fabulous Estrallas.  We talked about the personalities and players that were already in place throughout India as a solid, mostly dependable,  but scattered,  foundation for the White Rainbow Project.  My job was to gather all the pieces together into a cohesive functional team to support the social entrepreneurship know as the White Rainbow Collection.

As Linda said, "You're like the Marines hitting the beach...."

Leaving the first week in July, I'll be flying into New Delhi where I will spend the first week securing a stable and steady source of fabrics for one of our new line of clothing, "Cut From The Same Cloth" - can't really tell you all about that now; more on this exciting and innovative approach to retail sales that give back, in future blogs.  It's all about new fabric logistics in Delhi, and designing label tags from recycled card stock.

...and locating an accountant who can set up our business in India as a Limited.

After my work is done in New Delhi, I'm catching an early train to Mathura/Vrindavan area, where the remainder of my two months work will take place.  Vrindavan is known as the "City of Widows" and is the essential focus of the White Rainbow's mission to help ease the plight of Indian widows.  Oprah Winfrey was there this winter and it was an eye opener for her!

Overall mission in Vrindavan:

• Locate a female tailor to train the widows to sew.  Hopefully she could also manage the entire sewing center.
• Secure sewing center!  We have been in negotiations with the Methodist Church of India to rent a building in their compound that is centrally located in Vrindavan.  I need to check it out; see if it is indeed suitable for our purposes; sign contracts and get it set up to run.
• Get and apartment or house in Vrindavan that will essentially become our headquarters there.  Location is critical, so it's important for someone (me) to be on the ground and doing the leg work!   Hope to have our cozy little home all set up and ready for when Katie and Abbie arrive in August.  
• Photojournaling - getting the word out and education is a huge part of what I do.  I will be continuing to photograph and blog, and other social media marketing endeavors, hopefully on a daily basis.

Now, I'm just setting up blogs and making sure all the feeds are correct and links functioning properly.  

I hope you will continue to follow me as I travel and work throughout India.  I think it will be a very exciting time!!  Looking forward to the next chapter in my life!!