Help Haiti

A massive, 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti near the capital of Port-au-Prince on Tuesday, January 12th.  There are several GYV alumni with family suffering in Haiti.  Find a relief organization and donate now. 

•   Haitian-born music star Wyclef Jean  has a charitable organization www.yele.org.  Via twitter he recommends donating $5. You can text a $5 donation to 501501
• Donate to Unicef
• Help Habitat for Humanity respond  
• Donate or volunteer through Red Cross  

 Go to PBS to learn more from people working on the ground.

Recession and Camp?

If you are wondering whether you should allocate funds for a summer experience for your child,  here are some things to think about.

In a recent blog on parentdish.com  Kathy Unruh, executive director of the Camp Fire USA Orca Council in Tacoma, Washington, says that compared with an expensive family vacation, camp can be a less costly way to provide kids with summer fun while mom and dad get a break.

The price of a three week program at GYV is $2000 and your child will get more than you can imagine for that amount of money – lifelong memories and friends.

Living your values

How does one person make a difference?  How do you take what you value in life (justice, integrity, fair play, compassion) and apply it?  How can you become a leader?  These are all questions pondered during a panel discussion with our two recipients of the 2009 Service to Humanity Award.  Watch this 6 minute video for some inspiration.

Identifying Universal Values and Building Common Ground

At first, one would think Iraqi and US teens would have little in common since their life experiences are so different. However  during GYV’s  Peace-building Program, there has been incredible connection, integration, and appreciation between the youth from the U.S. and from Iraq. Friendships have become so strong and people have bonded over open discussions of cultural differences.

A moment that brought us all together came from a speech GYV founder, J.E. Rash, gave the first day the youth arrived. He pointed out that there are certain universal human values that transcend cultures and continents. The young people from both countries added compassion, honesty, integrity, respect, courage, family, community, strength, open-mindedness, humility, and the ability to listen to a list of universal values.  Recognizing that we all aspire to and agree upon the same ideals created a foundation for open communication and respect that was perfect for living in cabins together, participating in our peace-building workshops, and engaging in all of the other fun activities around the Global Youth Village.

One 16-year-old Iraqi participant described her experience at GYV this way:

The Americans were so nice. I learned a lot of stuff here – to be responsible for myself, to care for myself and my friends in hard times, and it was a great experience for me to meet the Americans and talk with them. My thought about Americans changed when I came here and met them. The way I talked to them, we talked about a lot of stuff we have in common, and the workshops were great and fun. Yesterday we were all dancing.

Despite diverse cultural practices, variations in religion, and differences between our governments, recognizing the universal human values we all share transcends these separations and provides hope for a peaceful world community.

30 Things We’ve Learned from Each Other

Collected from Iraqi, American, and other International Participants and Staff

1. New Dance moves
2. How to communicate – with and without language
3. The Iraqis know as much about American music as the Americans do
4. How to do Henna tattoos
5. How to write our names in Arabic
6. We all enjoy Peace building – yesterday one class was literally building
7. How to make some of the new sounds in Arabic
8. Jewelry making
9. How to dance the Chobi (Iraqi dance)
10. Telling time in Arabic
11. How to ask for someone’s number in several languages
12. Book cover making and decoupage
13. That everyone’s experience of conflict is different
14. Ping pong techniques
15. How to say “hello” and “thank you” in lots of different languages
16. The Iraqis speak Kurdish, Assyrian, and some European languages, in addition to Arabic
17. About Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, Jr.
18. Yellah!  (Arabic for “Let’s Go!”)
19. The way we tell dates is different – the Iraqis say the day first, then the month, and Americans do the opposite
20. We all like the same music
21. There is no verb “to be” in Arabic
22. How to make collages
23. Improving our English
24. How to make tacos
25. What guacamole is
26. How to do paper mache
27. That Iraqi families tend to be larger, and sometimes extended families all share one large house
28. Iraqi weddings are HUGE!
29. That not all Iraqis are Muslim and not all Americans are Christian
30. That we all like to play soccer!

30 Things American and Iraqi Teens Have in Common

30 Things American and Iraqi Teens Have in Common

When we asked U.S and Iraqi teens participating in the Global Youth Village Session A, this is what they said. Share your ideas.

1. Board and Card Games!  The Iraqis taught us backgammon, and we taught them Bluff.
2. We all want the war to end.
3. We want to learn about each other.
4. Competitive nature – we’re constantly playing games and sports.
5. Tolerance.
6. Refusing routines.
7. We listen to the same music, and are having fun singing together.
8. Friendship.  We actually share a similar culture.
9. We’re teenagers!
10. We all love Harry Potter.
11. We like talking about boys, girls, and flirting.
12. Ice cream!
13. We all use Facebook.
14. We all plan to go away to college.
15. We like bowling.
16. We hate bugs.
17. We like to dance.  We learned traditional Iraqi dances from our friends.
18. We all like pizza.
19. We brought the same kind of pajamas to GYV.
20. We like hip-hop, especially Akon and 50 Cent.
21. We like to gossip.
22. We like President Obama.
23. We keep our parents in the dark about some things.
24. We’re stressed about college.
25. We want to change the world, and our communities.
26. We like making art together
27. We’re enjoying our language classes – Arabic and English.
28. We like to sleep.
29. We’re into fashion and design.
30. We’re building peace at GYV!

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