I finished my week at work feeling excited about an event I moderated on Girls Savings that was hosted by Women’s World Banking’s Young Professionals Network.  We had speakers from Women’s World Banking, International Rescue Committee and the Population Council.  All the presentations were compelling in terms of the difference it makes to a girl’s life if she has access to savings at a young age. It means she’s more likely to be able to go to school, get a job or have some form of income generation, marry later, have fewer children and participate in the life of her community.

And then it was the weekend! I’d wanted to see the movie, The Way, starring Martin Sheen, for some time given its focus on the Camino de Santiago, the pilgrimage across the Pyrenees in northern Spain.  When I first heard about it in 2001, I decided that I would do this pilgrimage before I was 50 – and that time is coming up soon!   So Josh agreed to see the movie with me and on Sunday night we walked to the village cinema through the gorgeous architecture of the West Village.  The movie is fabulous and captures the inner journey as much as the outer journey that such a pilgrimage promises.

On Saturday morning I went to the Annual EF Schumacher Lectures at The New Economics Institute, which works toward an economy that gives priority to supporting human well-being and Earth’s natural systems. It does this through research, applied theory, public campaigns, and educational events to describe an alternative socio-economic system that is fair and sustainable, and capable of addressing the enormous challenges of our time.  Several speakers talked about how to leverage green jobs, the creation of shorter working weeks to ensure jobs for all that need it, the need to support more local economy opportunities, climate change mitigation measures and the need to democratize the current political system.   It will be fascinating to see how all this plays out in next year’s US Presidential elections.

I wanted to know if the speakers had included gender in the solutions they were proposing.  The short answer was not overtly.  The problem with that response is that unless there is a gender inclusive approach we may achieve some of these changes but the continuing imbalance between women and men will continue. For instance, only 9% of angel investment went to women entrepreneurs in 2009. Yet female-led start-ups that receive the same level of capital investment as those led by men could add 6 million jobs to the economy within 5 years.  Girls in developing countries don’t have the same access to earning money as boys do unless there are deliberate ways to give them these opportunities, with all of the flow on educational and life benefits.

I was invited to the New Economics Institute Lectures by Michaela Walsh, founder of Women’s World Banking. She’d just returned from an event for the EARTH University in Costa Rica which she proclaimed as one of the most exciting universities in the world today.  They’d just secured a multi-million dollar grant to provide scholarships and synergies between Latin American and African countries in finding sustainable ecological solutions.  The university has been in existence since 1990 to give young people from developing countries opportunities to contribute to sustainable development of their countries and build prosperous and just societies.

Michaela had continued to invite me to events and gatherings that extend my connections as well as deepening my experience of New York.  Similarly, my regular dinner club hosted the amazing Australian, Audette Excel, last week, whom I’d met previously and who is the founder of The Isis Group and its not-for-profit arm, The Isis Foundation.  Audette uses the consultancy fees she earns to invest in the Foundation, which provides health services, neo-natal care and education for almost 20,000 mothers and children living in poverty in Nepal and Uganda.  The foundation also operates residential care for children rescued from child traffickers.  The Isis Foundation focuses on the village-by-village implementation of community programs that leverage alternative technology, renewable resources and other innovative solutions.

New York provides such rich opportunities for learning so much in double-quick time that it’s like continual speed-dating in an overly neurotic space.  I experience 360 degree head turning in a city spinning on itself in perpetual motion.  It’s exciting and energising – and conversely it can be exhausting and overwhelming. It’s why so many of those with means have places in the country, or the Hamptons or other places on the coast. Knowing that you can escape seems as essential as much as the rich rewards of continual cultural immersion.

In six weeks Josh and I will be making our own escape from winter and winging our way to Australia. That shimmery heat seems worlds away from soft flying snow.  I’m dreaming of that summer warmth and a friend has even told me of the pod of dolphins she spotted recently when down the coast.   Another friend sent me a clip of a kitten nudging a dolphin from a boat with both of them continually repeating the motion in a poetic act of play.  I hope for that same magic blessing when I’m home.  I know I’ll scoop down and kiss the ground in Piccadilly.  As Shakespeare said, one touch of nature makes the whole world kin.

Jane Sloane