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I received this email from Paul Freedman, director of Xtracycle Access Foundation, and creator of what I consider the most necessary form of night visability gear, the Down Low Glow. This is a wonderful project folks...

Dear Friends and XAccess supporters,

I am proud to report that in late April I traveled to Kenya to get a new XAccess project started in the western city of Kisumu.  A city of 800000 people, Kisumu has 10000 Boda Boda bicycle taxi operators, making it one of the greatest unsung bicycle success stories in the world. Kisumu has no pollution, traffic or smog, and few parking and road-maintenance issues.  Goods arrive in Kisumu by truck, but bicycles distribute them the last mile to businesses, shops, restaurants, and homes.

Despite the great promise of the bicycle economy in Kisumu, there is still intense poverty in the region. Rural families send their young men to the city to make cash --  cash they need for school fees, medicine, and food. The men become Boda Boda taxi operators, and spend their days shuttling passengers to town along the gentle slopes of the shores of Lake Victoria. Many are too poor to even purchase a bicycle; they rent bikes for nearly $1 per day, and pay for it out of their $2-3 in daily income. They feed their bodies with soggy French Fries in tin-roofed restaurants, and send home as much as they can to their families upcountry.

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A British Firm, Intelligent Energy, expects to be selling a hydrogen powered motorbike in the US sometime late next year. It is supposed to be non-polluting, super quiet, goes about 50 miles an hour and 100 miles to the tankful. A fillup is estimated at $3 per 100 miles at current rates, which is not all that great as it is about the same as when gas was at $1.00/gallon for a small car.

 In my opinion, this is a start, but it is a system that again ties people into a dependency on a resource that is controlled. If devices are made such that hydrogen fuel can easily and cheaply be made at home... then I will be a bit more excited.

I received the following email from my friend Uli who lives in Peru. It looks like he is taking the plunge....
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Hi there! I have decided to live my final dream. Do you know the book "The Self-Sufficient Man and his Life"? Self-sufficient in this book means: Technologically self-sufficient to live healthily, ecologically, without public services like electricity, drinking water, gas, sewage disposal, food sources etc. I mean: a house in the forest with all the comfort without bills: solar or wind powered, with bio-gas, ecological toilet, water purifier system, vegetable garden, orchard, fish farm, etc. That is what the book was about.
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