THE NEW YORK TIMES: SKATEBOARDING TO UNDERSTANDING
Oliver Percovich, a 34-year-old from Melbourne, Australia, discovered that “Afghan kids are the same as kids all over the world…they just haven’t been given the same opportunities. They need a positive environment to do positive things for Afghanistan and for themselves.” At the new Percovich is developing, children from different social classes and ethnic groups interact–for better or worse–because of their shared interest in skateboarding.
Question to the Blogosphere: How useful do you think community initiatives like Skateistan, the skate park Percovich is creating, will be for the development of common ground among youth in the divided nation of Afghanistan? What are the cultural limitations of this endeavor that could derail the process? Should women’s rights be attached to any conflict mediation effort?
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