Moving through Jerusalem with a surfboard (from Israel to Lebanon)

Well gang, I've been showing up to a number of events lately (#StartupSB) and people have been asking, "So literally, how do you travel with a surfboard in the Middle East." And I reply . . . it's exactly how you think.

This is a media excerpt from the Surfing the Middle East iPad App:

The Generation of Broken Dreams (TV show?)

The Generation of Broken Dreams

By Jesse Aizenstat

Since the Great Depression Americans have looked forward to a better standard of living than their parents. A better job market. A better way of life. It has been known around the world as something “distinctly American.” Now, times have changed.

The Generation of Broken Dreams dives into the gritty personal stories of young Americans who went to college, got a degree, and now face a job market that feels hopelessly crowded. Few options. But tough times for these bright young graduates doesn’t necessarily mean bad times. For these young Americans, it is the very prospect of NOT getting a job after college that pushed them to explore their entrepreneurial spirit (something that perhaps they never would have found otherwise).

Hosted by Jesse Aizenstat, author of Surfing the Middle East: “It’s like Maui with rockets”, The Generation of Broken Dreams is in itself a product of The Generation. Aizenstat’s work is truly the first attempt to examine these issues from the inside. He is as serious as he is entertaining, and he draws on humor to follow the same formula he used in Surfing the Middle East: “first entertain, then educate.”

The Generation of Broken Dreams will be packed with the looming danger of real-life issues such as no healthcare, college loans and the sheer terror of going bankrupt. The adrenaline of these characters will give the show a risk-taking, against-all-odds kind of feel. A real-life dose that isn’t afraid to spend time with a whiskey bottle—into the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. Strange places, foreign places, all places—anywhere that these young Americans went to find their ingenuity will be explored and experienced.

The American Dream is still out there… but only for those young Americans daring enough to dream it.

Update: Some of you folk have written in asking if "we" are making this TV show on The Generation of Broken Dreams. The answer, unfortunately, is NO . . . though I'm working on it.

Arianna Huffington's Address to Sarah Lawrence College's Class of 2011

"There is, however, a silver lining to graduating in such tough economic times. Conventional wisdom says that today's graduates are going to be less likely to take chances, less likely to pass up the safe bird in the hand, but, in fact, there is now a higher premium on taking risks and following your dreams, creating your job instead of just looking for one."

--Arianna Huffington