Child Soldier Conference

The facilitation of this conference is making blog entries next to impossible. Between directing foreign dignitaries, organizing power point presentations and keeping minutes of the workshop discussions, I am fortunate to have 2 minutes before leaving for the University of Winnipeg for the third day of the conference proceedings. This has been a great opportunity for people to learn about Never Again, and the youth involvement has been both eye-opening and inspiring. The youth delegation had, by far, the most entertaining presentation at yesterday's plenaries. Yesterday evening would have been an opportune moment for some great photos, both with Peter Mackay, who was speaking on Child Soldiers, and with General Dallaire. Unfortunately, my camera seems to have been destroyed. I returned from a wonderful day yesterday and when I turned on the camera to take some pictures during Mackay's speech, the display was completely broken. How that managed to happen whilst I was in the plenaries and workshops, I will never know!

Today promises to be a great one as it will be an opportunity for the delegates from the military, humanitarian, human rights, conflict and transformation and academic groups to come together for the workshops.

Here's a link to Nick's blog in Rwanda. It would be great to take a trip to the refugee camp where he is whilst I'm in Kigali. Fresh from Rwanda

Mama Justa's visit to Winnipeg

Coverage of the International AIDS conference in Toronto is already flooding CBC Newsworld. It is wonderful to see the media's eye on such a critically important event. CBC Newsworld's documentary Hemispheres was covering an opening event with all the grandmothers from Africa and from Canada who are in attendance. They stressed the importance of needing enough to safeguard the health of their grandchildren and themselves and the importance of having enough for education.

Despite the excellent coverage, something is clearly lacking at AIDS 2006, and it's not from lack of planning or efforts on the part of the organizers. Our own Prime Minister declined to go to this historic event - obviously this is not on Prime Minister Harper's key priority list. Whether this is a political statement on the part of the Prime Minister, or whether he indeed is unavailable is a matter of some contention, but in any case, I think the point is clear that one makes choices. When it came to the Rwandan genocide, the world made a conscious choice to ignore the plees of Romeo Dallaire and to passively standby and ignore the cries of the hundreds of thousands slaughtered. Now, Stephen Harper is making another conscious choice. Lessons learned? A concept in peacebuilding that just does not seem to translate into the political agenda of the day.

Thanks to a lot of effort from the Never Again crew, we had a wonderful jigsawing session yesterday. Through the miracles of Skype, we were able to carry on a conference call with Marian, Heddy, Albert, Clare, Nick, Will and Poppy and through the miracles of technology, I was able to simultaneously get Sophie's call confirming that we would be able to have Madrigaia perform for Mama Justa. There is definitely no shortage of miracles going on.

As it turns out, Gary and Milly, our ministers are both acting to try and see that the church can contribute to our fundraising for the Kigali trip. Gary is away at conference this week but managed to have a quick talk with Joe about that before he left. We also got the details on the newsletter which we will try and assemble this week to give the congregation an update on what's happening. Rumor has it that our trip to Kigali is going to be mentioned!

Thanks to Albert's inspiration, we started to watch the American President last night. Didn't quite make it to the phrase "I'm going to get the guns!" but I think my body was telling me to get a few hours sleep to be fully awake for church and our next jigsawing conversation in...8 hours and 15 minutes! This time Joseph should also be able to participate. I am really looking forward to it - I can just feel the energy in the "room"!!

Akim dropped by the invitations and tickets for the fundraiser with Roméo Dallaire and hopefully we can get those sent off by tomorrow. Hopefully, if I can't get Evasio into the Child Soldier conference, he will at least be able to attend the African Canadian Heritage fundraiser.

Speaking of sending things off in the mail...this afternoon, Joseph and I are going to put the final revisions on our fundraising letters. I'm also going to see if a conversation with Lloyd Axworthy will prove fruitful in raising funds to support Never Again. With his passion for war-affected children issues and the Global College, I can't see him being able to pass it up. I think he can be a valuable contact in forging a network for Never Again here in Winnipeg and across the country.

Before I forget, Happy Birthday Corey!!!! The big 33? Ga! Where has the time gone? I'll refrain from posting a before and after shot on fear of linching :)

After talking with Jessica yesterday, I discovered that her daughter is actually married to the son of Igbal Riza. It is amazing the way the world connects. Thanks to Nick, I was reminded yesterday of Google Earth and was able to see close up satellite shots of Kigali. It's hard to believe from those pictures that such terror and atrocities could occur there. It looks as though it has the potential for such peace from God's eyes. I was able to see the airport where we will be landing and Amarhoro stadium where Roméo Dallaire was with his soldiers and was "home" to thousands in 1994 during the genocide. I've included a picture of Roméo Dallaire sitting in Amarhoro stadium in Rwanda in April 2004 (taken from the website of the documentary film Shake Hands with the Devil - the Journey of Roméo Dallaire. The film is directed by Peter Raymont and I would recommend it as a must see).

When I have a minute, I will set up Skype on my laptop so that I will have a way to communicate in Rwanda if Albert can find us a way to connect with the internet. As we discussed in our jigsawing conversation, that gap in connectivity is holding us back in our efforts to promote the responsibility to protect.

Now as I hear We Rise Again,sung by Canterbury High School at la service commémoratif en l'honneur des parlementarires decedes, on CPAC, I am moved to rise again and begin my day with the spirit of all God's blessings.

It's been a hectic three days without a moment to spare. Plans are well in motion for the CUSO Mama Justa forum a the end of the month, and thanks to Traci's guiding hand, my job as first rep for CUSO on the MCIC is not nearly as intimidating as it sounds. I couldn't be having more fun. Zack was kind enough to forward me a job advertisement for the Institute for this term, and if I didn't already have my plans set in motion to go to Rwanda, I would be VERY tempted! It seems that I am being blessed with all these wonderful opportunities at once.

Going to the travel clinic on Wednesday was the best experience I could have ever hoped for in terms of getting vaccinated. Practically painless! (although I'm not sure that Joe would agree). I'm thinking my supposed egg "intollerance" didn't quite mix well with the egg-based Yellow Fever vaccine though. As soon as she injected it, I felt light-headed. I would highly recommend going to a travel clinic prior to any international travel. They were very conscientious and were so concerned about my dizziness that I stayed at the clinic for half an hour after the injections, was given two yogurt granola bars, and watched a great video on the do's and don'ts for international travellers. They also have a medical travel kit that you can take with you so that if you do run into medical problems, you don't have to rely on the needles and medical equipment of the local clinic. The kit itself is 20 dollars and although the nurse didn't think it was necessary, I'm still thinking it would be a wise idea to take two. Even if I didn't use it, I'm sure it could be put to good use in Rwanda. I held off on purchasing it until I return to give me time to decide how prudent the purchase would be. Suggestions anyone?

I received the exciting news on Tuesday that I will be helping to facilitate a Child Soldiers conference in Winnipeg prior at the end of August. After being in touch with the Search for Common Ground organizers, I was able to let them know about the African Canadian Cultural Heritage fundraiser that is nicely coinciding with the conference. Hopefully, we will be able to maximize the number of people who actually get the privilege of hearing Romeo Dallaire speak at the fundraiser. Somehow, I'm going to find time to get the word out on Romeo Dallaire's talk, contact the people for the Mama Justa event (which is coincidentally happening in the same week at the conference and fundraiser!) and continue my fundraising efforts for Never Again International. Speaking of Never Again, I met with someone yesterday who was interested in learning more of the organization, so we're already starting to find a place here in Canada. With the help of Will, I'm confident that we will have a thriving NA chapter soon.

Still trying to figure out the best route for the trip and was talking with two different travel agents yesterday to try and price the various options. I want to find out the logistics of using some of my air miles to get me part of the way, but whether it's possible to coordinate using those with paying for another leg of the trip from Europe is another question altogether. I wonder if the people who plotted the terrorism which was just uncovered considered that there are people who are wanting to actively help alleviate the poverty and strife that is running rampant in the world. How do we get out of our little bubble here in the West and make everyone aware of the hardships of so very many people in the world when people employ such tactics? I know that everyone has a different way of expressing their beliefs but I cannot ever comprehend the logic of complaining about Western ambivilance and simultaneously trying to obstruct people who want to help people all over the world, especially those suffering in developing countries.

Smartie is here wondering why I am ignoring her and probably also questioning why I am awake at 4:30 in the morning so I should probably take the hint and hop into today's work!

Today, everything seems to be coming together. I couldn't be happier to hear that Joseph and I will be joined by Anna in Kigali. On top of organizing our trip, I feel confident now that my CUSO team is well on the way to having a exciting forum for Mama Justa, when she arrives in Winnipeg from the World AIDS conference on her Speaker's tour. Hopefully, she won't be scared away by news of the recent tornado in Manitoba this past weekend.

Melanie's Internship in Kigali

We are in the midst of preparing for our internship. Clare has been such an immense help! Currently, we are in the process of putting the final touches on our fundraising letters and are optimistically looking forward to an enthusiastic response. We have been already rewarded by the response that has been given by our friends and colleagues to our internship.

One of the first steps on our journey was to get our passport photo taken and have that stamped by the photo shop and signed by the doctor. This morning, we both had our first Twinrix shots, which is a combined hepatitis A and hepatitis B vaccine. The vaccine is administered in 3 doses, so we are looking forward to getting our second dose in another month. Note that vaccines really should be budgeted for because just this one costs $176.59 a pop! (and that's not counting the $18 doctor administration fee). Really, to anyone who is concerned about needles, it barely hurts at all - and this is coming from someone without a high pain threshold. This week, we will be visiting a travel clinic to get all of our other vaccinations up to date. Hopefully, by Monday, we'll have the official go ahead to begin fundraising