Duncan posted a new video from his organization, OA’s, ongoing project in Africa. Check it out here:

You can find out more about what they are doing on their website: www.oaprojects.org.

This Saturday Dave got to hang and chat with his idle, Venum, one of breakdancing/B-boy’s biggest names.

Venum has an amazing story. Growing up between two projects in Tampa Bay, Venum and his three siblings were raised by his mother; while his father was in prison.

In grade 9 Venum dropped out of school. He soon got in trouble himself; getting arrested for breaking into a car.

It wasn’t long after this that Benji, a friend of his cousins, arrived in town.

One night Benji invited Venum down to a club, but when they arrived Venum, having only 5 dollars, decided to stay outside and save his money. He waited for a while, but hearing the music finally decided to check it out. When he got in he saw a group of dancers, among them was a “B-boy”, a term he’d learn later, who was using a style he’d never seen before. As it turns out, the B-boy was Benji and the dance was breakdancing.

That was 1997 and Venum hasn’t looked back. He threw himself into the culture and soon excelled at. Before he knew it he was being hired on by Universal Studios, and the jobs kept coming. 10 years later he has risen to the top of the game, competing just about everywhere, doing shows for names like Janet Jackson and Avril Lavigne.

Here’s a clip of Venum doing what he does best.

Check out next week when Venum gives some advice and answers the question: What do you Want to do Before you die?

Venum is currently on the Avril Lavigne tour, check him out and see if he’s headed to your town.

Also check out Venum’s site: www.venument.com

Inspired by Romeo Dallaire’s Shake Hands With the Devil, Duncan and a team of friends started a Canadian NGO called Opportunitas Aequa [OA] in 2006. Their mandate is to use sport to bring positive change to impoverished areas around the world. They’ve already shipped over 1000 soccer balls & pairs of cleats to Ecuador and are planning a trip to Rwanda in ‘09. Below are two videos from their website:

a journal entry showing OA’s incredible work in Ecuador

OA’s charity soccer tournament gets dirty!

Check out OA at oaprojects.org - they’re planning some cool stuff!

View Park Elementary School grade 1 class

Big News for the New Year, here’s the story: As some of you may know, we were fortunate enough to cross off #83: Teach an Elementary Class while we were in Watts in Los Angeles, CA (Check out USC Video). We spent a memorable day teaching grades 1, 3, and 5 at View Park Elementary School and were left struck by how incredibly awesome these kids were.

So, when we heard that View Park did not have a single computer in their entire school, we hit Venice Beach boardwalk and street performed to raise enough money to buy them a new computer.

street performing on Venice Beach to raise cash - Duncan on guitar, Ben on kitchen pot

We managed to raise enough money to purchase 2 new computers for the kids with the big smiles at View Park Elementary School.

presenting the new computer!

When we got back home from our Tour, the kids from the inner city had stayed with us, so we launched our ‘1st Ever Buried Life Computer Drive‘. Our goal was to raise enough money to buy a full computer lab and many people donated here.

Now, to bring the story full circle, the big news for the New Year is that we have just found 5 more computers View Park Elementary! We managed to get a hold of a company in L.A. that was upgrading their computer systems and they donated 5 of their sparsely used computers to! What a cracka!

View Park grade 3’s very excited

Now we are officially on our way to a fully functioning lab! With 7 computers under our belt and nearly enough for an 8th due to the grand ol’ Computer Drive, our sites are set.

Stay tuned - when we called Mrs. Harris (View Park Elementary’s principal) and revealed the news, our cameras were rolling… let’s just say she was a little bit pleased - Video coming soon. If you’d like to help, please do so HERE. Thank you everyone for your generosity, it will change these promising children’s lives.

Here’s to a more crackas to come in 2008! -ben

(P.S. Buried Life Store is officially up!)

Our man Sol’s show, 4real, is airing tonight at 7:30pm on CTV. You gotta take a look. This kind of social entertainment is going to change the world.

First episode Sol teams up with Jaoquin Pheonix and heads deep into the Brazil rain forests to meet this revolutionary chief Tashka Yawanawa whom at 26 became the youngest chief in Yawanawa history; taking responsibility for over 600 people and 90,000 hectares of Amazon rainforest.

Check out Sol chatting about the adventure on Buried Life Radio December 14th.

My dad called me the other day excited about a new item he wanted to add to his list of things to do before death. He told me about a scene from Sydney Pollack’s “Out of Africa”, where they take off in a biplane across South Africa. This is what my dad wants to do before he dies.. -Duncan

great list item, chalk it up for Buried Life 2009

Thank you Marty in Montreal for this lesson on interviewing. We’re can only hope to one day be as articulate in our run-ins with the press

Ann, a journalism student at USC, caught up with us in Los Angeles to do a piece on the completion of #86 - “Teach an Elementary School Class”

Check it out