WORLDWIDE BUDDIES

Growing up in a divided country, we were brought up reading stories, hearing stories, sometimes even writing stories, of the "good guys" and the "bad guys", of "us" and "them", of classifications, drawn lines and boundaries. But the older we got, the more we interacted with different people. Some of the "good guys", some of the "bad guys", lots of "us", lots of "them", and many, many, many more. The stories we were brought up with became blurred, jumbled in a vibrant assortment of stories, they became only a fraction of our perception. We soon came to realize all the stories we never heard, the different perspectives we missed out on, the surprising similarities we discovered along the way, the striking peculiarities we were amazed by, the kindness and magic we witnessed in so many unfamiliar eyes! "Wouldn't it be lovely", we thought, "if we gave children these stories and experiences early on? Expand their minds and ability to learn and comprehend, fuel their imagination, and nurture their capacity to embrace all the friends they'll encounter in life? Wouldn't that turn them into the best adult humans yet?" We concluded that it would. So we did.