This podcast is to inform you about what Kreashon is, what the vision behind it is, and what we do with this organization. Bringing you inspirational stories from people that are actively engaged in positive actions. Maanarak has an extensive network of individuals in the development sector are actively driving change towards living more harmonious with our planet. She would love to introduce you to them so you can hear their stories and learn about ongoing efforts. Learn more: www.kreashon.org
Maanarak of Grey 00:00
Kreashon is here to ignite change and empower innovators. We envision a future where individuals are empowered to think critically and creatively, where citizens become agents of change by promoting self-governance, co-creation, and bottom up approaches. Welcome to our podcast. I am your host and founder of Kreashon, Maanarak of Grey alias Radinka Ustasia. And today I will be introducing to you this concept of Kreashon.
Maanarak of Grey 00:09
And I'll tell you a bit about myself, my background, and where this idea originated from, how it developed and where we are now, and what we're going to be doing in the future. Let's start with who I am. As I said, I'm Maanarak of Grey. This is my artist name and my legal name, as I said, is Radinka Ustasia and I am the individual that was born and raised in the Caribbean, on the island of Bonaire.
Maanarak of Grey 01:44
Maanarak of Grey
When I was 19, I moved to the Netherlands to study and study. I did. I studied tourism at first and then I had a year of business and small business study. And before I have, I found that study to be a bit too economic for my taste. I mean, too heavily focused on economy without thinking about the environment and people.
Maanarak of Grey 02:17
And that is where I switched to international development Management. And this is a bachelor program that I finished is the last study that I finished and a thing that I did because part of me always wanted to do something creative. In my third year, I found myself craving for being, for creativity, and this is where I did my minor and creativity Art and my major is in regional development and innovation, and this means that I'm trained to facilitate processes and programs or to manage projects that have to do with development of specifically a region.
Maanarak of Grey 03:10
But I can manage other things, but it's very broad. That means that I'm more equipped with those skills of how to manage these projects, how to mobilize people, how to do research, especially what they call action research, which means that I would go into a community and essentially find out what their needs are and then build the project from there.
Maanarak of Grey 03:46
And in 2020, I finished my studies of International Development Management and I started my business as Maanarak of Grey. And I published my book. And I've been building up my artistic career ever since. But this part of me always yearned to do something for, for and with a community. And before this idea started growing as okay, well, maybe where a community of artists, you know, doing artist ism and bringing awareness to things.
Maanarak of Grey 04:33
But as this idea grew, I thought, no, it really has to involve people from all walks of life, especially from marginalized groups, and that is where to develop. So the first name to give you an example, the first name of this idea was the Anomaly, because it was still very vague. And then the second name was Duna community, as I thought, do not means to give in my language, but your mentor.
Maanarak of Grey 05:08
So I was like, okay, it's a community that gives we give back to our community. So Duna. And then that also didn't resonate with my ultimate vision for this community. So finally the idea came to call it Kreashon and Kreashon, translated from Papiamentu to English means creation. Why did I choose this name? Well, I chose this name because we are creating together by creating art, but creating new ways of education, new ways of living together with other humans, but also with our environment, with planet, with nature.
Maanarak of Grey 05:56
And we are educating people about this. So yeah, that's why I find the name Creation to be much more fitting of the vision that I have for this community and, and thus I continued. And before I didn't, I knew it was going to be offline and online like hybrid situation going on. And it will be like, oh, global or at least networking globally.
Maanarak of Grey 06:33
And of course the online part will be publishing the research and education. So it's available globally and yeah, so I had that. And then last December I went back home and I saw the opportunity to do this project back home. Back home is in Bonaire and I decided to move back. So that is where we are now with Kreashon.
Maanarak of Grey 07:06
I am working on really solidifying the concept of connection I set up are I've made the projects. Then I set up our website and I'm working on the crowdfunding campaign in order to to really get this going. Well, I mean, the ball is already the ball is already rolling, but to really get started to set up the location on Bonaire and really start getting the community in place and start gathering our research data and making educational material from it.
Maanarak of Grey 07:53
And yes, so it says it's materializing. We are starting with this podcast to inform you more about what is Kreashon, what is the vision behind it, what do we do or what do we intend to do essentially with our with this organization and another day we will be doing is bringing you inspirational stories with people from our network, people that are part of the Kreashon community that are out there doing good, doing things such as climate activism, people that are working in the field of regenerative agriculture.
Maanarak of Grey 08:48
Well, people that are doing things such as zero waste management. Yeah. So I just I have a broad network of people in the development sector that are actively out there changing the paradigm, changing our way of living, sort of that is more harmonious with our planet. And I would love to introduce you to them for you to hear the stories of what is going on.
Maanarak of Grey 09:23
A lot of it is behind the scenes, a lot of it the a lot of it does not get the spotlight it deserves and I hope to change it. Bring that to you. Um, yeah. So a little bit more about the physical, the hub, the first creation, the hub, which will be in Bonaire. I hope to have more hubs, maybe in the Caribbean, maybe globally.
Maanarak of Grey 09:53
This will, of course, depends on the community and how we co-create this organization going forward, because of course I'm starting and I'm bringing the spark. But my intention is to really have a community around this organization that is setting the intention forward. And so this very first hub will be the head office and it will also have activities for the local community of Bonaire and such as workshops and trainings that, let me reiterate, the workshops would be like in terms of climate change or talking about climate change, but also talking about how we grow our food to be more resilient and in the sense of food security.
Maanarak of Grey 10:58
So it's a broad spread spectrum of things that have to do with our social, environmental and economical realities and systems. And yeah, how can we make them work better for us and the planet? And so those are workshops that we will be having along with that vertical garden to also facilitate the specialist part of food and food growing, looking at things such as plants that are more resistant to salt, which is a thing that we have to consider our when we're talking about a Caribbean island.
Maanarak of Grey 11:40
And aside from that we have trainings. I am a skilled facilitator, I am a member of the International Association of Facilitators, and that this too is one of the organizations that I would love to bring to Bonaire and train more facilitators to facilitate processes such as the action research or things like multistakeholder processes. That is where you bring people with different stakes, different points of interest in one big issue and bring them together and see how can we resolve this in a way that is fair for everyone.
Maanarak of Grey 12:37
Not a thing that we will be doing is that we have a studio, a media studio where we can do things like record a podcast, but also record educational material. And those are those are the basic things, also a co-creation space where people can come and co work together, create for sustainable solutions. And then you have the online component, as I said, which is basically that the the data hub with the research information, with the educational information on it that is available globally and that that is where we are going, where I am now is still in the Netherlands.
Maanarak of Grey 13:30
I am moving in a couple of months and I am currently working on the crowdfunding campaign so that I can get to Bonaire and start this project and for the crowdfunding campaign I am making a book for the backers of the crowdfunding campaign and it will be exclusively available for the backers of this campaign. The book is called Sentéa, which is a play on the word “Centella” in Spanish.
Maanarak of Grey 14:08
And I just love women to fight it, which means that I wrote it Sentéa instead Centella because it's the name of the main character. And she, I imagine, is a spark. A spark in the doom and gloom that a lot of us see lately in terms of like the crises not only climate crisis but economic crises, political crises that are going on at the moment.
Maanarak of Grey 14:56
And I hope that by imagining a someone from a future generation telling back to us her story, how she lives, how she and how humanity survive in the future from now until the future, that this can bring a spark of hope that there is most definitely things that we can do. And there, yeah, then there's actions that we can take.
Maanarak of Grey 15:34
We can want a different paradigm. We kind of want a different world to live in. We can want deeper connections with each other and with the planet. We can make it happen so that that is the world that I'm daring to imagine with Sentéa. And that is the book that will be exclusively available for the backers of Kreashon that we are offering as reward as a thank you as a gift for helping us make this vision a reality.
Maanarak of Grey 16:13
If you want to know more about this campaign, you can sign up for our event that is going to come up on the 4th of October. And in this event, we'll have a panel with people that are on the forefront of the climate crisis, actually taking a positive action each day and be talking about the the climate crisis.
Maanarak of Grey 16:44
What is it? Can we still do something about it and what exactly can we do about it communally, but also individually? Because I think both are essential. So on that day you'll learn more or see more about what we want to do in the meantime. And then after that event, we will continue with this podcast as well. Another thing about signing up for the event is that you'll be a part of our mailing list and you'll be staying updated or as soon as the crowdfunding campaign comes out, you will get an update.
Maanarak of Grey 17:28
So I'm excited to bring you along with me on this journey, to start this community together, to co-create it together. Stay tuned for more updates. Stay tuned for new episodes of the Kreashon podcast, and that is all for today. Thank you so much for tuning in and listening to me and getting this first insight. Look into what I have.
Maanarak of Grey 18:02
I've been working on until next time on the Kreashon Podcast, bye.
An Introduction.