flickering pictures

In Greenlandic, the word “Timmissartok” means “to fly like a bird,” and it also happens to be the name of the airplane soaring over the Namibian desert at the top of this page. That plane lends its name to an outstanding grant-offering foundation that helps would-be travellers fund their adventures and feed their passion for exploration.

Co-founded by bush pilot Tom Claytor - (incidentally, it’s his plane) - the foundation has funded 12 expeditions so far. A list of grant recipients can be found here, and it looks like these people have done some pretty marvelous things.

In the spirit of Saint-Exupéry and his flickering pictures, this is from their website:

The Timmissartok Foundation was founded in 2000 to assist individuals with adventurous projects that will take place in a foreign country. The foundation believes that one individual with a dream can be more powerful than a string of committees. Albert Einstein showed us that “imagination is more important than knowledge.” Ideas inspire people. The Timmissartok Foundation wants to invest in the people with the big dreams - “the hungry dogs” - who have a strong enough heart to make their dreams come true.

Passion is the fire that makes us do the things that are not possible - “La passion a toujours raison.” It is also this same passion that can reward us with the wisdom from experience. The Romans called this experior. The Timmissartok Foundation supports people who are not afraid to take a risk and who realize that if you stay away from risk in your life, you are staying away from precisely those areas where the greatest achievements are possible.

The Timmissartok Foundation will partially support projects that involve “travel with a purpose” in which a particular passion is to be explored. Travel is one of the world’s greatest teachers, and the German saying “Der weg ist das ziel” is very relevant, because the journey is more important than the destination. The foundation looks for projects which embody the philosophy of Canadian astronaut Roberta Bondar - “The greatest adventure is still the voyage of the human spirit.”

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