John Rudoff

Physician Works to Tackle Racism

There was the patient who made a sarcastic remark when she wouldn’t prescribe an antibiotic that was the wrong one for the ailment being treated.  

Sankar Raman

Creating Community In Portland

“The moment I stepped into the Chinese classroom, I knew it felt different,” Aria Chen says, remembering her first day at Franklin High School. “The teacher

John Rudoff

A Longing For the Tastes of Home

In a recent novel, The Committed, by the Vietnamese author Viet Thanh Nguyen, the narrator laments his inability to recreate dishes he craves from home, and

Sankar Raman

Two Homes, One Life of Music

“Mount St Helen’s reminds me of Mount Fuji,” says Fumino Ando, comparing her two beloved homes, “And Mount Fuji reminds me of Mount St Helen’s.”

Ali Estefam

Moving Away to Give Back

For her first 25 years, the only home Ali Estefam knew was a 23-story apartment building in São Paulo, Brazil. From swimming in the first-floor pool as a

John Rudoff

Weaving a New Life into a New City

When Francisco Bautista married, his father gave him the family’s 250-pound wooden foot-pedal loom. When he left Teotitlán del Valle, Mexico for the U.S.

Sankar Raman

My Community Sustains Me

Ruth Zuñiga grew up in a rural, evangelical Christian town in Costa Rica. Both restricted and supported by her community, she eventually set out on her own, 

John Rudoff

Bounding Into the Unknown

Wambui Machua stood in front of a classroom of eager students ready to learn how to cook traditional Kenyan dishes.  “I had never taught anything!”

Ford Fischer

Always Ready to Answer the Call

When Alla Shapiro answered the phone early one Saturday morning, her father was on the line, warning of a rumor he had heard from a U.S. radio station. 

Sankar Raman

Ready to Make Something Better

Kapila Narayanan Chandramouli was just a third grader when he travelled to Chennai, India, to learn how to craft a veena, a traditional string instrument,

John Rudoff

Manifesting the American Dream

Dollars would line the streets of America. It’s what all the Hollywood movies promised. Lazeni Koulibali believed he would stay in America for a short time,

John Rudoff

Conquering a Life of Uncertainty

Daniel Franco Núñez’s earliest memory is being smuggled across the border into the US in his grandfather’s arms. Núñez was born in Guadalajara, Mexico In 1985.

John Rudoff

Helping Others as a Lifelong Mission

Just days after the terrorist attacks on New York City of Sept. 11, 2001, Hazar Jaber’s landlord gave her one week to leave the Boston apartment

Sankar Raman

A Rabbi After All: Fulfilling a Calling

By the time he was seven, Eliezer Schwartz had already learned that if he ran fast enough and threw a lot of stones, he could protect himself from the schoolyard […]