May 26th or: the first step to fame

Today was the day TV Globo was supposed to come. TV Globo is the biggest TV channel in Brazil, and they were going to make a short documentary about us to broadcast in the primetime news. Primetime! 40 MILLION PEOPLE watching. That's like half of Germany's population or 27% of the people in the world who need glasses but cannot afford them. That's huge! 

on the verge of being famous

Only problem was: we looked like shit. Barely sleeping for three days was definitely visible, and especially hard to shrug off for our "old" guys. The reporter, who seemed very professional and nothing like the average media guy we had to deal in the past with, got there and right away started asking questions. It was a very interesting and exciting time for us and especially our trainees. One of them has been looking for his brother and his sister for over twenty years, and now tha 20% of Brazilians are watching, the chances of finding them have never been higher. It gives people who are ignored, frowned upon and basically outcasts of society the opportunity to share their stories and struggles. Here, it is not just about our project anymore, but about individual persons, and it is delighting to help them in any way possible. 

Alex telling his story

Of course, this won't hurt the project either. Our brazilian partners are hoping to raise more money through their crowdfunding campaign (http://www.kickante.com.br/campanhas/renovatio-oculos-para-quem-nao-pode-pagar), and for us it is great to raise the awareness of the project. It might help us in the future aswell.

Needless to say, training didn't really take place today. After all, it took quite a while and everybody was rather exhausted. So we spent the evening at Insper University, listening to a classical concert played by kids aged 8-18. It's another project of Enactus Insper, where music is used to give poor children a new perspective in life. Totally exceeded my expectations, their performance was great. It was especially cool to see an 8-year-old kid man up and play a solo in front of 60 people, very impressive.

great Enactus commercial in the men's bathroom of Insper

Afterwards, Jakob and I had a good talk about how basically everything doesn't matter and why Matrix is the best movie ever. Cheers.