This past weekend we travelled to the farm land
of Goedgedacht Olive Groves for a humans rights training weekend. Along with all of us UConn
students, young people from various parts of Africa including South Africa,
Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Zambia attended and participated in all of the workshops
presented. Upon arrival we were immediately split up, assigned a new roommate,
and got the chance to settle in. My roommate was from Cape Town, named Sahleen,
and got involved with the program through a previous organization she worked
with regarding human rights for farmers
The very evening we arrived, our
workshops began. First, the program was announced and explained… a bit (much of
the time everything was a surprise). Africa Unite is an organization that works to
educate and spread awareness about human rights through various different
workshops, involvement opportunities, fundraisers, and so on. And it just so
happens to be the very organization that one of our beloved professors Vincent
is a board member and facilitates these workshops.
Looking back on everything now, the
weekend almost seems a blur. We did so many workshops and activities revolving
human rights that I’m a bit on overload at the moment. Every workshop related
or emphasized a different aspect of or about human rights. One of the major
ones we did was to actually break into different country groups, I was Somalia,
and then put together a whole presentation about our country and why we
deserved to win a 2 billion dollar check from the world bank. In my group we
actually had a guy from Somalia that educated us all on the history, its
troubles with human rights, the economy, its culture, and so much more. It was
such an amazing opportunity to learn about another country from someone with
first hand experiences in addition to working so closely with people from
honestly all over. This truly was my favorite part of the trip because before I
get to the final presentations, for many of the other workshops throughout the
weekend we would gather in our country groups to discuss and complete the
assignments. Each time a different humans right concept was brought up and each
time we had opinions from people from at least three different countries and a
dozen different opinions. The amount I learned in those small gatherings was
not only beneficial to my personal knowledge of human rights and what they mean
as a whole and to those individually, but it was such an eye-opening experience
hearing the personal stories that go with each thought of everyone in the
group. We shared experiences, ideas, and feelings all different, or similar at
times, from everyone else because of our different backgrounds and cultures.
To end the weekend, on the final
evening each country presented their own creative plea for the money. My group,
Somalia, did a bit of dramatic story-telling. We had our local Somalian play
the role of a heart-sick grandfather aching for change and help as he told his
story through the translations of another member of our group, Julia. As the
story was being told, various members such as myself acted out each scene in a
humorous, yet tasteful manner. We ended
the act with a song and dance to rally up our supporters. When the winners were
announced we were honestly SHOCKED when Somalia had won but couldn’t of been
more excited. It was such a great way to not only learn and understand another
country and its problems but to enjoy it too. This weekend exceeded all
expectations before I could even make any.
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| Christina (second from left) with her Somalia country group. |
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