Photo by DTJ
By Shea Parton & Luke Warner
On Thursday June 9th, we will be releasing the second addition to our Apolis Conversations film series, featuring Jonathan Olinger, executive director of Discover the Journey. During Raan’s recent visit to New York, he stopped by the DTJ office to learn more about their current progress and ask Olinger the same questions we asked co-founder of Invisible Children, Jason Russell, in our first Apolis Conversations film (Watch: 1m 31s).
The nomadic globe trotter, Jonathan Olinger, has been a close friend since 2006 and one of the few people I get to see most often when traveling abroad. I first met Olinger when he was trying to fix his van while documenting a project in Uganda. He stopped at a mechanic in Gulu where I was volunteering with Invisible Children and we shared a few meals and pick-up soccer games with the locals until his beater van was revitalized. Since our first encounter we have been great friends, crossing paths in Nepal and every February in Washington DC.
In 2004, Jonathan founded DTJ, which exists to help tell the stories of children around the world. During a journey with friends he came to witness the suffering across the globe and most notably the disproportionate impact of over one billion children living in crisis.
Olinger was born in 1983 in the small ski town of Steamboat Springs, Colorado and grew up in a house surrounded by aspen trees and the Rocky Mountains. As a child he endured severe heart surgeries which have given him a unique insight to the courage and strength it takes for a child to overcome hardship. He was raised by his mother and grandfather who passed on to him the notion that he could do anything if he put his mind to it, a phrase which became a family mantra and guides his work today.
Today he considers himself to be a filmmaker and child advocate who uses collaborative storytelling to bring people together and draw attention problems that need solving. His daily routine is anything but a routine and on any given morning you might find him filming in New Dehli or editing on the east side of New York. Each day he surrounds himself with individuals who also are seeking to shed light on the crisis facing children worldwide. Through his work, he believes that children are the leaders of tomorrow and are too often underestimated in creating lasting change. We are constantly inspired by his undaunted commitment and are proud to consider him an Apolis Advocate. We will be sharing more on Thursday, June 9th.
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