7.23.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome. This is Marsha for RADIOI, and today I will
be reading National Geographic magazine dated June twenty twenty five,
which is donated by the publisher as a reminder. Radio
Eye is a reading service intended for people who are
blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult to
read printed material. Please join me now for the first

(00:22):
article titled the Future of Fashion is Farm to Closet
by Claudia Cawb. For her part, Riadini Flesh admires the
French brand Visa, which makes sneakers out of organic cotton
and Amazonian rubber like Visa, which rebranded the shopping frenzy

(00:45):
of Black Friday to Repair Friday. Suka Chita encourages customers
to return their clothing for mending or re dyeing, and
the brand offers a lifetime repair guarantee. As Riadini Flesh
sees it, these kinds of ventures offer new ways for
people to understand that there's an alternative to extractive faction.

(01:07):
I never consider ourselves to have competitors, she says, it's
about changing the paradigm. One of her latest efforts transpired
in November twenty twenty four, when Suka Sita opened a
pop up boutique at an upscale mall, its second location
in Jakarta. While the garments for sale range from an

(01:28):
indigo shirt decorated with geometric stars to a yellow dress
whose color is derived from Java's golden gilawe plant, one
of the store's primary purposes is to showcase a traveling
exhibition about Sukasita's supply chain. Glass containers hold soil from
the villager's farms. The life cycle of a cotton plant

(01:50):
is on display, and a video features interviews with the
ibis showing the invisible love and labor behind each product.
One of the most striking presentations explains how the brand's
garments are specifically made to return to the earth rather
than wind up in landfills. A display case lined with
soil shows a single cut of Sukasita cotton as it

(02:13):
degrades progressively over the course of six weeks, ultimately returning
into tiny fragments that can be used in compost. Riadini
Flesh hopes to take the exhibition international, sharing it at
more pop up stores in part to inspire other brands.
She's also tracking how well her practices are working by
earning fair labor and environmental impact certifications from watchdog groups

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like NEST, a nonprofit that verifies ethical work standards, and
the Science Based Targets Initiative, a climate action organization that
measures greenhouse gas emissions. Recently, Sukasita became the first fashion
company in Indonesia to secure b Corp certification as a
business that is committed to transparency and account of BBILIT.

(03:01):
The brand's approach signals a remarkable mix of business acumen
and social purpose. By not just scaling for profit, but
also scaling impact, says Sarah Schwimmer, who runs b lab Global,
the nonprofit behind the certification, she is demonstrating a new
way forward. Shwimmer says, over the past four years, the

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brand has opened four additional craft schools, launched a spin
off materials platform so that others can source Sukasita's regenerative materials,
and established partnerships with eleven villages. The company plans to
cap rather than grow that number so it can boost
the resources it provides to each location. So far, Sukasita

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has helped communities transform roughly one hundred eighteen acres of
previously commercial farm land, which has had a direct impact
on more than fifteen hundred lives. There By twenty thirty,
it expects to ramp up to more than twenty four
hundred acres in reach up to ten thousand people. One
thing Sukusita will do will not do is follow traditional

(04:04):
seasonal fashion calendars or over exert the artisans or the
land it manages. If demand for our product's sky rockets
and the elements won't allow it, the company will simply
be sold out. You cannot have infinite growth on a
finite planet. Riadini Flesh says it is wisdom shared by
the Ibis, who also taught Randini Flesh a philosophy that

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inspires her every day. Urip Iku urup. We live to
bring light next expeditions on safari, there's no telling what
might crush your path, and in South Africa's Greater Kruger Area,
rhinos have right of way. But there's a lot more
than walk wildlife watching to the newest land itinerary from

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Northern Geographic Expeditions. The Nine Days Southern Africa Living History
and Legendary Species Journey begins with a visit to a
vibrant neighborhood of Cape Town and a walk in Table
Mountain National Park. After taking in turbulent seascapes at the
Cape of Good Hope and a colony of endangered African penguins.
Guests head to Sabi Sabi Private Game Reserve ordering Kruger

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National Park and home to some four hundred species of wildlife.
A bush lodge is base camp for three days of
safaris and talks with trackers, rangers and national geographic experts.
The trip ends in Zombia at the foot of Victoria Falls,
near where elders of the Lea people share their traditions

(05:31):
during a village tour. That rhino encounter might not even
make your top five list. Next Explorers of the Year
Pablo Poppy Garcia Borboroglu and Bertie Gregory. As a boy
growing up in Argentina's Buenos Aires Province, Pablo Poppy Garcia

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Borboroglu was enchanted by his grandmother's tales of her youthful
visits to the teeming penguin colonies of Argentine Patagonia. He
was a nineteen year old tour guide when he first
glimpsed one, and it dawned on him then how important
it was to share with others his sense of awe,
inspiring them to protect penguins and their habitats a hemisphere away.

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Bertie Gregory came to a similar realization as a teenage
wildlife photographer roaming the English countryside. Today, at thirty one,
he's an accomplished wildlife filmmaker and leads storyteller behind the
new National Geographic series Secrets of the Penguins, on which
he worked with Warboroglu, now a marine biologist and founder

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and President of the Global Penguin Society. For their efforts,
Warbaro Blue and Gregory have been named the twenty twenty
five Rolex National Geographic Explorers of the Year. Pope Garcia,
Barbaro Blue and Bertie Gregory exemplify the power of collaboration
in exploration, says National Geographic Society CEO Jill Tiefenthaler. By

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uniting crown breaking conservation science with me master storytelling, they
not only deepen our understanding of penguins, but galvanize global
action to protect them. Barbaro Blue's initiatives to create protected
areas for penguins have helped conserve some thirty two million
acres of habitat on land at sea. Now fifty five,

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he takes inspiration from the bird's resilience the way they
swim hundreds or even thousands of miles for food, avoid
predators and pollution, and survive in environments increasingly affected by
climate change. When you see penguins making that big effort,
he reflects, you say, how can I give up? Warbaro
Glue and Gregory shared a spotlight in last month's Secret

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of the Penguins cover story, and there's more on their
adventures with penguins at Nationalgeographic dot com. Being recognized as
an Explorer of the Year alongside his filmmaker friend Boubaroglue
says is fantastic, a great combination of different kinds of
explorers and expertise. When you see penguins making that big

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effort for Baro Glue reflects, you say, how can I
give up? At first, Gregory says he was hesitant to
make a documentary about penguins. The Emmy winning host of
the Disney Plus series Animals Up Close, who was shot
for iconic series like Planet Earth and Frozen Planet, knew
that filming in penguins harsh habitats would be tough, and

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worried the species was already plenty documented. If you're going
to make a series called Secrets of the penguins. He says,
you've got to show people something they've never seen before.
But Gregory embraced the challenge to film one of the
series three episodes. He camped for more than two months
near an Emperor penguin colony in Antarctica's at Kabay. He

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was documenting a critical phase in a penguin's life cycle,
when juveniles abandoned by their parents are left to figure
out how to become a proper adult penguin, getting themselves
to the ocean to swim and hunt. He succeeded spectacularly
in capturing behaviors never before filmed, including footage of hundreds
of young Emperor penguins entering the sea by base jumping

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off a fifty foot cliff. I really think it's going
to blow people's minds, he says. I thought I knew
what penguin's limits were. I was wrong. This article by
Renee Ebersol next the candy colored beauty of sea urchins.
These tiny animals protect coral reefs, but they need protection too.

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Beneath sea urchins, exterior spines, rounded skeletons called tests are
jewels of color, texture, and symmetry. There are hundreds of
urchin species, and they're found in every ocean on Earth,
from the intertidal zone to more than four miles below
the surface. In twenty eighteen, Anders Holland, a research associate
at the Australian Museum in Sydney, began photographing urchin skeletons

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that had washed up on beaches or been collected by
divers and tho on fishing or research vessels. He created
the composite image over a course of a week in
twenty twenty four, using seventy six individual photographs. The project
comes at a perilous moment for these creatures. Since twenty

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twenty two, sea urchins have been plagued by a scuticlotiniate,
a single celled pathogen that eats away at the animal's
soft tissue and makes their spines fall off. A mass
die off that started in the Caribbean that year has
since spread east, likely through the Mediterranean, into the Red
Sea and Indian Ocean. In some survey locations, researchers found

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thousands of dead urchins. The animal's survival is vital to
the health of reefs, where they eat algae that can
smother coral. It's one of the many reasons Halan is
committed to capturing their beauty. They are really quite ingeniously evolved.
This by Hicks Wogan. The next articles from March April

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twenty twenty four National Geographic History Magazine. Three thousand year
old tombs surprises scholars in Peru. A high priest's grave
dates to an earlier era than expected, yielding a new
understanding of the history of the ancient Andes. Archaeologists in
northern Peru have discovered a three thousand year old burial.

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Inside it lay one of the first priests in ancient
Andean history, a man who lived well before the time
of the Inca. The discovery was made in the Paco
Pampa Archaeological Complex, a forty acre site of monumental and
ceremonial structures that was active between twelve hundred and seven
hundred BC. Over nearly twenty years, the project of archaeological

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Investigation has discovered numerous fines at Paco Pampa. The latest one,
a skeleton of an ancient religious leader interred there around
one thousand BC, has been named the Priests of Pacopampa
because of his tomb's contents. Buried with him were three
stamps or seals The first seal resembles a jaguar, indicating

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the priest's status as a leader who could harness the
animal's spiritual power. The second one depicts a human face,
and the third is in the shape of a hand.
Scholars believe people dipped the seals in paint and then
stamped the images on the priest's skin. The find is
extremely important, says Yuji Seiki, who leads researchers from Japan's

(12:25):
National Museum of Ethnology and Peru's National University of San
Marcos Deep Connections. The discovery of the priest is helping
archaeologists at Pacopampa pinpoint when a powerful priestly class first
appeared in the region. Seiki explains that Pacopampa was at
one time a pilgrimage center where people from near and

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far came together to participate in religious rights. These group
rituals are credited with creating the social conditions that allowed
the earliest Andian civilizations to rise, says Siki. Similar burials
such as the tomb of the Lady of Pacopampa found
in two thousand and nine and the Tomb of the
Serpent Jaguar Priests found in twenty fifteen, have important connections

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to the priest of Pacopampa, whose tomb may be as
many as three hundred years older. Saiki believes that these
later spiritual leaders made their relationship with ancestral elites visible
through their burials. I consider this to be evidence of
the incorporation of ancestor worship into the succession of power.
Worshiping ancestors was of central importance to later Andian cultures

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in the region, such as the Wari ad five hundred
two one thousand, the Tiawanaku circa a d. Six hundred
to one thousand, and ultimately the Inca circa a d.
Twelve hundred to fifteen thirty three. Excavations continue at the
Pacopampa complex, with new discoveries on the horizon. In twenty

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twenty two, a priestly tomb the site was uncovered. Some
believe it could be even older than the priest of Pacopampa,
but analysis of the tomb and its contents is still
under way. This article by Braden Phillips next Portsia, loyal
Heroine of the Republic, a woman of firm political convictions.
Porsia was the steadfast wife and staunch ally of Brutus

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and a key supporter of his murderous plot against Julius Caesar.
When Julius Caesar seemed increasingly likely to embrace authoritarian rule,
two men emerged as the Roman Republic's fiercest defenders, Cato
the younger, who led resistance to Caesar in the Senate,
and his nephew Marcus Junius Brutus, who led the conspiracy

(14:42):
to assassinate Caesar. But there was another key player in
the tumultus events surrounding Caesar's end, a woman who would
come to embody strength under pressure an unwavering loyalty. Her
name was Porsia, daughter of Cato and wife of Brutus.
Porscha Catonis circa seventy three to forty three BC was

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the only woman who was privy to the plot. As
the Roman historian Cassius Dio described her. PUSH's courage, logical mind,
and willingness to sacrifice were celebrated by Roman historians and
centuries later immortalized in William Shakespeare's fifteen ninety nine Tragedy
Julius Caesar. Many factors shaped to this extraordinary person, but

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two stand out. The volatile political climate and the teachings
of her father. Growing up Stoic. Much of what is
known about Portia comes largely from Greek historian Plutarch in
his books about Brutus and Cato, and from Cassius Dio's
Roman History, along with mentions and other works. In all
ancient references, she is remembered as the member of younger

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Cato's family who is most committed to her father's cause.
According to Judith P. Hallett, Professor Emerita of Classics at
the University of Maryland, an author of Fathers and Daughters
in Roman Society, Women and the Elite Family, Porsia's father,
Cato the Younger, so named to distinguish him from his
great grandfather Cato the Elder, was an old Guard aristocrat

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and Republican. A devotee of Stoic philosophy, Kato put virtue
and civic responsibility above all else, an uncompromising idealism that
deeply influenced his daughter. Early in the second century i d.
Plutarch wrote that Portia was addicted to philosophy and praised
her sober living and greatness of spirit in keeping with

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the Stoic rejection of luxury and commitment to justice. Based
on his depiction, Porsia is often regarded as the first
female Stoic marriages and divorces. As a very young woman,
Portio was wed to a political ally of her father.
She and Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus would have due children together

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before their relationship became complicated by a distinctive Roman practice.
In addition to arranged marriages, elite Romans also practiced arranged divorces,
ending one match in favor of another that was more advantageous.
Portia was about twenty when one such proposal came her way.
Another of her father's allies, Quintus Hortensius Hortalus, asked to

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marry her. The aging childless widower wanted Portia as his
wife in order to have an heir with her. After
she gave birth, you promised to return her to Bibulus.
Bibulus was not a fan of this proposal and refused it.
Cato also disliked the idea of breaking his contract with Bibulus.
To avoid alienating Hortensius, Cato agreed to divorce his own wife,

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Marcia and offered her instead. Hortensius agreed, and the plan
went ahead. After Hortensia's death, Cato would remarry Marcia. Portia's
high profile family was deeply involved with the Roman Civil
War that began in forty nine BC. When Caesar refused
to yield his armies and territories to the Republic. Rome

(18:00):
split into two factions, one led by Caesar and the
other led by Pompei. The conservative Cato and Bibelius both
aligned with pompe and found themselves on the losing side
of the war. Bibelius, leader of Pompey's fleet on the Adriatic,
died of illness around forty eight BC. Cato took his
own life in Utica modern day Tunisia when Caesar's troops

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won the nearby Battle of Thopsus in forty six BC.
In Rome, Portia watched as Caesar amassed power. Rather than
resign herself to a dictatorship, she continued to believe in
the Old Republic. In forty five BC, she married Marcus
Junius Brutus, a one time alli of Caesar who would

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famously turn against him during the war. Brutus sided with Pompey,
but in the after meepa the war, Caesar pardoned him
and even made him governor of Cisilpine Gaul northern Italy.
Brutus's sympathies for the Old Republic, however, had not waned.
Marrying Cato's daughter and divorcing his wife Claudia. To do
so was a way to reaffirm his commitment plans and plots.

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In the months that followed, Brutus, along with other senators,
alarmed by Caesar's ambition, embarked on a plot to assassinate him.
Although politics was primarily a male domain in Roman culture,
Pusia pledged to aid her husband because of her family's beliefs.
According to Plutarch, she noticed a change in her husband
and questioned him. When Brutus wouldn't answer, she wounded her

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own thigh with a knife. The act was a plead
that her husband show her trust and respect. Brudus, I
am Cato's daughter, and I was brought into thy house,
not like a mere concubine to share thy bed and
board merely, but to be a partner in thy joys
and a partner in thy troubles. Her resolve prompted Brudus
to reveal his plan to assassinate Caesar. Moreover, wrote Plutarch,

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she inspired him to see his plot to the end.
When he he saw the wound. Brutus amazed and lifted
his hands to heaven, prayed that he might succeed in
his undertaking and thus show himself a worthy husband of Portia.
After Caesar's death on March fifteenth, forty four BC, Brudus
fled Rome to avoid the wrath of caesar loyalists, while

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Porsia remained in the capital. She followed her husband's fortunes
as he fought to defend the republic against Octavian, Caesar's
heir in alliance with Mark Antony. Finally, Porsia received the
news that Brutus had been defeated in the Battle of
Philippi forty two BC, and, like her father, Cato, had
taken his own life. What happened next is not known

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for certain. The more dramatic ending has a devastated Porsia
killing herself, either by swallowing hot coals or inhaling carbon monoxide.
In one version, the poet Marshal Route that Porsia, seeking
a weapon to enter life they had hidden by attendants, exclaimed,
you know not yet that death cannot be denied. I

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had supposed that my father had taught you this lesson
by his fate. She spoke, and with eager mouth swallowed
the blazing coals. Plutarch tells a similar story symbol of strength.
One key piece of evidence, however, puts Porsche's suicide in doubt.
The Roman statesman and orator Cicero wrote a letter to
Brudus in forty three BC lamenting Porsche's death, which means

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that Porsia died before her husband. Cicero's words implied that
she died of natural causes. The legend of a violent
suicide appeared later, but took root in the popular imagination.
Plutarch has Brutus say of his wife, though she lacks
the strength of men, she is as valiant and as
active for the good of her country as the best

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of us. William Shakespeare in particular, found great inspiration in
the character of Porsia through his reading of Plutarch. In
addition to the historical character of Porsche in Julius Caesar,
her name also appears in The Merchant of Venice fifteen
ninety six to ninety eight, in which it is given
to the brilliant woman determined to assert her herself in

(22:06):
a male world by impersonating a lawyer. As a symbol
of bravery and devotion. Portia has resonated through history. Abigail Adam's,
wife of John Adams, the second U S President and
first US Vice President, signed letters to him as Portia
in recognition of the patriotic sacrifice of Brutus's stoic wife.

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This by Juan Louis Posadas. Next medieval times gave birth
to modern fashion. Draped, shapeless garments were replaced by taller, pointier,
and tighter clothes in fourteenth century Europe, when newly rich
merchants vied with nobles to be in vogue. Plague, famine
in war blighted the fourteenth century, but the period was

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also marked by an exciting revolution in fashion. Out went
the beggy, amorphous robes that had been swathing people for centuries,
and in came startlingly lean bodykindus styles that revealed the
silhouette silhouette, at least for men. The sweeping transformation in
European elite clothing is regarded by many historians as the

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birth of modern Western fashion. Aristocratic men and wealthy merchants
started downing short, tight doublets, brightly colored woolen tights, and
elaborate hoods with date dangling tails. Footwear that had long
been hidden under robes was now revealed to the public gaze.
These pointed leather shoes were known for their extremely long toes.

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Although the change was less marked for women, a shift
in feminine style was also notable. They still wore dresses
that concealed their legs, but the garments came in more
colors and fabrics. The greatest change for women sat atop
their heads, known as henyans. These head dresses could be
a short, flat cap or a tall, pointy cone, veils

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often draped off the back, while the hat itself added
height and accentuated the wearer's forehead. Tailored for individuals. Advanced
as in garment construction played an essential part in changing
the fashions. Earlier, textile manufacturer was shaped by rectangular looms,
producing large, square, angular material that did not conform to

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the contours of the body. But in the fourteenth century,
wealthy men's clothing started to be made from smaller, separate
pieces of fabric, which allowed greater construction and more variety
in design. Designers began to shift from draping fabric to cutting, sewing,
and tailoring it. The idea of clothing, which for the
first time was truly custom made to fit an individual's body.

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Implies a new relationship between the clothing and the wearer,
said Laurel A. Wilson, a researcher in the history of
fashion at the Center for Medieval Studies at Fordham University.
Wilson points to the thirteen thirties as the pivotal decade
of change. That's when various social and economic factors helped
redefine fashion. An emerging merchant class was seeking social recognition,

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while above them aristocrats were evolving gradations of status, both
to distinguish themselves from other aristocrats and from the ever
wealthier merchant class beneath them. These status wars were expressed
through their clothes. Tailors were in demand, and soon they
grew too expensive for people in the lower social orders.

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This sea change in fashion quickly conquered Western Europe, likely
because of a sheared court culture. Expanding choice gave rise
to markets and industries in specialized fabrics, ornaments, and garments.
Along with Europe's well established woolen's industry, Exotic fabrics like silk,
damask and velvet, previously imported, were now manufactured in Italy

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and Northern Belgium, with access to greater choice and growing commercialization,
came another mainstay of modern fashion, rapid change. During the
fourteenth century, men's fashion change as rapidly as decade by decade,
when before it was over the course of century. Wilson
explained that system is still with us, only to a

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greater extreme. Constance's artorial change was not to everyone's liking,
especially those with more conservative outlooks. In the thirteen forties,
the anonymous English author of the Westminster Chronicle took offense
at changing various deformities of clothing yearly and abandoning the
ancient honesty of long loose garments. The deformities was a

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reference to the variety of tailoring short, tight, dagged, cut,
laced and tied with unbuttoned everywhere, with sleeves and tippets
of surcoats and hoods too long in their clothes and shoes.
Such work, he concluded, belonged more to torturers and demons
than men. In the thirteen forties, the French chronicler Jean

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de Vinet added his voice to a chorus of indignation
at the shortness and tightness of men's clothing, noting that
men cannot bend or kneel without showing their underwear and
while was inside it. Later in the fifteenth century, medieval
fashion was centered on the courts of the Dukes of Burgundy,
based mainly in the wealthy cities of Flanders modern day Belgium.

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As the biggest cloth making area in Western Europe, Flanders
drove fashion trends. Philip the Good thirteen ninety six to
fourteen sixty seven, the most important of the Burgundian dukes,
made sumptuous black his signature color. In wearing it, he
combined style and spectacle with an expression of mourning for
his father, killed in France in fourteen nineteen. His sister

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Anne was also a fashion icon, regularly depicted wearing the
day's latest passions. Printed in fourteen thirty, the Bedford Book
of Ours shows Anne at prayer while wearing a long
gown known as a hupeland, made of a richly colored
fabric covered with intertwined red branches, green leaves, and blue
fruit against a yellow background. This conclude's readings from National

(28:00):
Geographic Magazine and National Geographic History for today. Your reader
has been Marsha. Thank you for listening, Keep on listening
and have a great day,