One year ago, I ran the London Marathon with my good friend, Kiran Gandhi. Kiran was on her period and it bled through her spandex. Her essay recounting running the marathon on her period without a tampon went viral internationally, and she has since used her experience as a platform to work towards destigmatizing menstruation. A musician and a feminist, Kiran talks about how 2015 was the year of the period and how she plans on furthering the discussion that the London Marathon created about periods into real change in society and cultures where it is often ignored, stigmatized, and shamed.

Kiran's essay on running the London Marathon without a tampon:

https://medium.com/endless/going-with...

Kiran's music (Madame Gandhi):

https://soundcloud.com/madamegandhi

Cathy White, Seedcamp's Communications and Marketing Director and organizer of GeekGirl Meetup UK talks with us about her experiences as a woman in the tech and startup world, and offers advice to other women hoping to get into the field.

For more information on Seedcamp:

http://seedcamp.com/

GeekGirl Meetup:

http://www.geekgirlmeetup.co.uk/

This video is in collaboration with One in Ten Films, an initiative by MondoTV:

http://www.mondotv.co/

The original video was broadcast live on Meerkat:

https://meerkatapp.co/

109world is an organization that harnesses social media to create a space for global awareness and social change through service trips in different parts of the world. It was founded in February 2015 by Olivia Rothschild and Rachel Brathen. Olivia and Rachel discuss how they came up with the idea to create a space for global awareness through social media, the challenges of founding an NGO, and some of the current and future projects of 109 World.

Jesse Sanchez, a dream director for the Future Project, talks about his journey to Harvard as a first-generation college student. He also discusses the work of The Future Project, which helps equip U.S. high school students with entrepreneurial skills. You can find out more information on The Future Project at:

http://www.thefutureproject.org/

Smitha Mallaiah, a mind-body intervention specialist at MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses how practicing yoga benefits cancer patients, and the research study being conducted at MD Anderson currently about the effects of yoga on breast cancer patients.

To learn more about the Integrative Medicine Center at MD Anderson, check out:

https://www.mdanderson.org/patients-family/diagnosis-treatment/care-centers-clinics/integrative-medicine-center.html

Dr. Sarah Prinsloo, an Assistant Professor at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, explains how neurotherapy is used in helping cancer patients manage acute pain, in addition to being used to treat things like attention-deficit disorder and anxiety. To learn more about neurotherapy , you can read Dr. Prinsloo's article:

http://www.neuroregulation.org/article/view/14293/9286

On the Map, Off the Radar is a weekly news digest that covers stories that the mainstream media largely neglects. While the news is full of stories directly affecting the Western world, more structurally complex or less obvious stories from other parts of the world are often neglected. We are bringing these underreported events back to attention! We don’t claim to present a whole picture, or know everything but rather try to encourage an open discourse about things that one should know more about!

If you want to add to a story by sharing personal accounts, alternative opinions, showing support or even voicing disagreement, or if you feel like the world should know more about certain issues that are not currently covered, please drop us a mail at [email protected]

This week, we will be discussing the upcoming presidential elections in Nigeria with Sa'eed Husaini, who is a student at Oxford University reading for an MSc in African Studies.

If you'd like more information on the Nigeria elections, you can check out Sa'eed's op-ed in the Daily Nation at:

http://www.nation.co.ke/oped/blogs/dot9/Goodluck-Jonathan-Buhari--Nigeria-election/-/1959700/2622748/-/1dskg2z/-/index.html

A (very) brief overview on how the media portrayal of the conflict in South Sudan doesn't reflect the reality of the conflict on the ground. I haven't gone into much detail on the dynamics of the conflict, but for those of you who are interested, I would recommend starting with Young's book 'The Fate of Sudan', along with Copnall's 'A Poisonous Thorn in Our Hears'. Le Riche and Arnold's 'South Sudan: From Revolution to Independence' is also good.

For shorter articles on the conflict, I would mainly rely on reports from various organisations like ICG, HRW and Small Arms Survey. Some good links are:

http://www.smallarmssurveysudan.org/fileadmin/docs/working-papers/HSBA-WP-20-Armed-Violence-Southern-Sudan.pdf

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2014/08/07/south-sudan-s-new-war

http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/horn-of-africa/south-sudan/223-sudan-and-south-sudan-s-merging-conflicts.aspx

Jok and Hutchinson have also done some great work on identity issues in South Sudan - they have both written a lot but I would particularly recommend http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/525368?sid=21105962592633&uid=4&uid=2&uid=3738032

If you have any questions/comments/requests for further reading, please either leave a comment or email us at [email protected]

Thanks for watching!

In this episode of 'On the Map, Off the Radar' I look at how the rise in quinoa popularity around the world affects the locals in Peru and Bolivia where it is grown.

For further reading, here are some more interesting pieces about quinoa in the global and local spheres:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/jan/25/quinoa-good-evil-complicated

http://www.peruthisweek.com/news-quinoa-causing-competition-among-peru-and-bolivia-105070

If you have any comments, suggestions, or concerns, please e-mail us at [email protected]