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I grew up in Los Altos, CA. Ever since the age of 10, I knew that I wanted to be a writer, and since the age of 12 I also knew that I would be a traveler, when I read a complete encyclopedia set called Lands and Peoples. This has led me to visit 106 countries, with the bonus of learning 7 languages along the way. I met my husband, Joe, as a fellow Peace Corps volunteer in 1973. We were volunteers for 5 years in Honduras, Kenya and the Seychelles. Upon finishing Peace Corps we took a 3/12 year trip that got us from the Seychelles, down the Nile for 1000 miles, 7 months crewing on a 55’ trimaran in the Caribbean, then overland from Venezuela to Tierra del Fuego and back. We spent 5 months on an uninhabited island in the Galapagos, tagging turtles for the Darwin Research Station, and went to Antarctica for 3 ½ weeks with the Chilean navy. From 1981 to 2001 Joe worked for CARE and we lived in Sierra Leone, Indonesia, Honduras, Mexico, Niger, Mozambique, Sudan, Ethiopia and Mali. Between Niger and Mozambique we took a seven-month trip to the South Pacific. In 2001 we moved from the southern reaches of the Sahara Desert to the Caribbean Sea on St. John, USVI. My philosophy in life is “Any trip, Anywhere, Anytime!” I visit Africa at least once a year, and sometimes twiceI began writing for children in 1981, when I sold my first manuscript to “Highlights for Children”. Since that time I have written for magazines in Asia, Africa, America and Europe. I have also worked for various international organizations, doing the writing, photography and lay-out design for fund-raising materials. Just recently I have started my own program called KIDSCARE, organizing kids in the Western world to help fellow students in schools in Africa or to raise money to buy wheelchairs for kids around the world. I love it – helping kids help other kids. The pilot projects for this program were done here on St. John. I connected the Julius E. Sprauve School with a school in Maasailand, Kenya. During the school year the students raised $8777 toward a $10,000 goal. The St. John community topped us up to $10,000. Our money helped build a well near the Merrueshi Primary School in Kenya. I also worked briefly with another school here on St. John, helping them organize fundraising activities to buy new wheelchairs for kids in Africa. They raised enough money to buy 25 wheelchairs, which was donated to the Wheelchair Foundation. In 1998 two Ethiopian friends and I began a small NGO called Women on Wheels (WOW). It is through this NGO that I originally got involved with the Wheelchair Foundation of California. I approached them in 1998 for wheelchairs for Ethiopian women. In 2002 they were finally ready to give chairs to WOW and, because I never gave up, they invited me on a trip to 7 countries in 11 days, giving away a total of 7000 brand new wheelchairs.Since 1998, WOW had gotten more than 3000 women, 250 kids, and 100+ men off the ground for the first time in their lives. The most exciting thing in my writing life right now is helping women start their own magazines. In 1998 Women to Women was born in Ethiopia, and in 2001 La Parole aux Femmes (Women Speak Out) started in Mali. Giving women a voice is thrilling, and both magazines work to provide inspiration and information to young and old, urban and rural women. Please visit my new website www.cristinakessler.com

I grew up in Los Altos, CA. Ever since the age of 10, I knew that I wanted to be a writer, and since the age of 12 I also knew that I would be a traveler, when I read a complete encyclopedia set called Lands and Peoples. This has led me to visit 106 countries, with the bonus of learning 7 languages along the way. I met my husband, Joe, as a fellow Peace Corps volunteer in 1973. We were volunteers... More