Our coworking space is located right next to the steps of Rathaus Schöneberg, Berlin’s district town hall where John. F. Kennedy once famously told us how many jelly doughnuts he was. “One” is the answer. These difficult times, however, remind us of another much-used quote of his about how we should look to help each other rather than ourselves. We all know the various programs, grants and loans being made available to freelancers and businesses by the government, so we won’t go into that. No, now is the time to look at what we can do to help others (health and resource-permitting, of course). Here are some suggestions:
- Donate your computer’s processing power
Turn your computer into a data processor for the engineers at “Folding@Home” (https://foldingathome.org) as they crunch proteins and try to get to the bottom of Corona faster. - Help out tuesday member, Elad Leschem, who is building a global platform for sharing data, analyses and 3rd party tools relating to the Coronavirus so we can come up with new solutions to the virus and its impacts. He’s looking for volunteers, partners and funders as right now there is no existing solution doing this. If you have some time to spare, Elad would love to hear from you!
Here’s the online project description: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZLEMXTF_cq8IHsV_ujSDSTE0mmslOZcZSWrU8U3pO18/edit?usp=sharing - Buy vouchers for your local businesses: If you want to help your favourite café / hairdressers / trinket store, etc. survive the crisis, helfen.berlin has put together a shop where you can buy vouchers for your favourite places and redeem them once things have settled down. It might make the difference to a lot of people’s livelihoods.
- If you haven’t noticed the “Gabenzäune” (Giving Fences) springing up all over town, this is a great new initiative to help out the homeless who previously scraped their pennies together on the now empty underground trains. Next time you’re out for a jog, why not bring some food, tea, disinfectant, soap, tampons, tissues in plastic bags and clothes (on hangers) and leave them at these fences. You’ll find them wherever there are mesh fences.
- Join the, as of Friday, 27 March, 35,195 “Quarantine Heroes” on quarantaenehelden.org if you’re able to help others with their shopping, running errands or dog-walking. The suggestion is one helper per household.
- Call elderly homes to ask how to remotely help residents who might be less tech-savvy with loneliness like sending them some old-school letters, drawings, poems, audiobooks, etc.
That’s just a start. I’m sure there are thousands of great ideas out there. Feel free to add anything you think could help below.
Stay healthy!
