I’ve had one of those days catching up with all the long overdue emails… usually days of great torment (as you realise just how much there is to be done), but today I’ve really enjoyed it – connecting with lots of new people and hearing about lots of great things.

Two of them were so good I just had to share them with you.  The first is Ark°, a group dedicated to Acts of Random Kindness.  They’re a not-for-profit clothing company who hope wearing their stuff gives you that daily reminder to perform an unprovoked, undeserved act of kindness for a complete stranger.  They’re starting a new initiative to set up yellow benches in capital cities all over the world – each bench inscribed with the words By sitting on this bench, I am open to a conversation with a complete stranger. It’s an initiative to build community in a fractured world – and as we found out in The Dock last Saturday, there’s nothing quite like the buzz of being present while strangers strike up friendships.  What a brilliant idea!

You can connect with Ark° here.

The second great link is to a website called Tell It In Colour.  It’s a site dedicated to redressing some of the endless negative doom-and-gloom reportage of so much media coverage of Northern Ireland.  They’re telling good-news stories of this new era, and they’re seeking to connect people (there’s gotta be more of us!) who think that there is actually hope – great big heart-swelling blood-pumping hope – for this province and its people.  If you’re a long-term reader of this blog (thanks!), you’ll know that this is a bit of a soap-box issue for me (here, and again, and again… oh there’s loads of them…) – it’s great to know I’m not alone!

You can Tell It In Colour here.

Both Ark° and Tell It In Colour are local – NI born-and-bred initiatives with world-class ideas and creativity.  (And utterly fab websites, which are well worth checking out).