Summer 2008 TRINIDAD and TOBAGO: "Thinking Global acting Local"
The Village experience was a single session that lasted for 17days and had three main parts. The Summer of 2008 Village based in Cumca, a small village in the Northern Range of Trinidad, West Indies. It consisted of 24 youth from the major ethnic, social and religious groups with historical animosities and 4 adults who are conflict resolution and peace practitioners. The program consisted of:
Part 1: Experiential workshops- Communication, Conflict Resolution, Violence Prevention, Being Agents of Change, Soul Force , Soul of a Citizen, My Carbon Print
Part 2: Joint community service learning project with Habitat for Humanity T'dad Ltd where we built an orphange.
Part 3: Dialogues and Debates: In this culture we have debates and talk at each other instead of to each other. Using the dramatic problem solving youth were taught to dialogue even over difficult topics like race and crime.
Part 3: Dialogues for reconciliation and community building.
August 2008 Summer Peace Project Outline
Schedule:
Week 1 August 3-8: Conflict Resolution and Peace Building Workshops
Villagers learned crucial life skills through interactive experiential workshops. They had opportunities to do core workshops and also to choose from a buffet of current topic workshops that are of interest to them.
Week 2- August 11- 13: Joint Venture Initiatives: Community Action
Villagers engaged in a joint venture with an International NGO, Habitat for Humanity to build an orphanage, "Operation Smiles". This enabled them to explore new experiences but also to use the skills learned in the workshops such as collaboration, trust, commmunication and mutual cooperation. As well they got to gain global insight while engaging in superordinate goals and working on a project which needed them to go outside themselves and pay it forward by giving to others .
Week 3 August 14- 17: Reflection through Facing History Facing Ourselves
On returning to home base in Cumaca the Villagers used the tools they learned from the previous weeks to engage each other. Oral tradition and story telling are powerful tools which were used to engage all Villagers in speaking the truth for reconciliation and healing. Exercises served to break and point out stereotypes or erroneous assumptions we hold of others. It also addresses the Transgenerational Transmission of Trauma that have been passed on through family, community and national stories.
