Posted on 05/10/2006 9:33:07 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
BERKELEY — Wavy Gravy, the activist clown, former Ben & Jerry's ice cream flavor, hippie icon and self-proclaimed psychedelic relic, is turning 70, and he wants a birthday gift from you. Gravy wants you to buy a ticket to a big-name concert May 20 that will benefit the Seva Foundation, a nonprofit organization that runs public health programs in India, Nepal, Tibet, Cambodia, Bangladesh and Tanzania to eliminate curable blindness.
"Please," he begged recently in a telephone interview from his Berkeley home, where he said he has been on a strict diet to get healthy for his golden years.
"Seventy is the new 50," Gravy said. "I'm losing weight, I go to the YMCA every day and do aqua-aerobics with my wife. ... I feel like a teenage yodel."
Benefit performers will include Bob Weir & Ratdog, Mickey Hart & Friends with Kitaro & the Rhythm Village, Steve Earle, Gillian Welch, David Lindley, John Trudell, Linda Tillery, Nina Gerber and Hamza El Din, as well as a pack of real, live clowns.
Gravy, who hopes to raise $100,000 for Seva, will emcee the event at the Berkeley Community Theater. Doors open at 6 p.m.; the show starts at 7.
Gravy was born Hugh Romney on May 15, 1936.
Even at his age, he said he is more active than when he stood on the stage nearly four decades ago at Woodstockand announced, "What we have in mind is breakfast in bed for 400,000."
Gravy was at Woodstock as a member of the Hog Farm, an entertainment and activist commune that is still around and collectively owns and operates the 700-acre Black Oak Ranch in Laytonville in Mendocino County. The ranch is where Camp Winnarainbow, a circus and performing arts camp, is located. The camp draws about 700 youngsters every summer. There is also an adult camp for one week in June.
Gravy, who jokes that he is "fast approaching official geezerhood," was a founding board member of the Seva Foundation in 1978. Since then, more than 2 million people have received sight-restoring surgeries.
In Mexico and Guatemala, Seva assists indigenous communities with training and resources to help people become literate and economically self-sufficiency.
In the United States, where diabetes kills American Indians at a rate of four times the national average, Seva offers diabetes prevention and small grants programs, created and directed by American Indians.
I wonder if we could have some sort of a concert to raise money to buy DDT for Africa? I bet THAT would get a lot of press!
Wavy is a pretty good guy. More humor for his messages.
SEVA is also s pretty good non-political group from what I've seen. And his Camp Winnarainbow is a pretty good deal also.
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