hi everyone my name is Teresa so it’s my
first day and I’m all alone I’ve gotten
into an airplane at JFK 116 hours lost
across the Atlantic studied for two
months and I’ve gotten into a bus and
traveled across the barren landscape of
Botswana where the landscape changes
from dry and dusty with ostriches Romijn
to lush and green with elephants in the
streets and so I’m a Peace Corps
volunteer I’ve landed in the village
where I’ll be I’ll spend the next two
years a village called ketchup a Lewis
wanna which is in droving National Park
which has the highest concentration of
African elephants in the world I arrived
at my house and I’m doing all the things
anyone who’s moved into a new home would
do and putting up curtains and putting
photos of loved ones on the wall and
most importantly I’m worrying about
Meredith there’s a little shop where I
can get toilet paper it wasn’t a big
deal but it was a concern I’m taking a
deep breath because it’s the first time
I’ve been alone in the past two months
I’ve been living with a host family
training with 60 noisy and
Peace Corps volunteers and it feels so
good to be a look but I also realized
that I’m alone and for anyone who’s ever
been alone they know what that feels
like
so I’m standing there thinking what did
I do and I’m alone and how am I going to
move forward and I hear shuffling
outside my door and some giggles and I
hear cocoa cocoa which is the equivalent
of knocking on my door I go to the door
and I meet say pond she have their hands
behind their back
she takes the biggest deep breath and
she says Jamila took you out to a pond I
laugh and I say doom a life keeping you
out
Vanessa give me thumb few up these boy
which means my name is Theresa and I’m a
Peace Corps volunteer and she
immediately burst into giggles as
everyone will do for the next two years
whenever I introduce myself in Setswana
and from behind her back she produces a
book she asks if we could read I quickly
realized that this book is actually a
song that many of us are familiar with
and we sing it every single night for
[Music]
for you my dress so many you will
recognize that song at the little tremor
point and for me religion aside the song
that that’s the story that that song
holds became so important because it’s
this message little boy has no material
gift is looking for what heat bring to
someone he really admires he doesn’t
have material wealth he’s not
particularly connected and that lesson
was something that tsapok and i built
within our relationship what are the
gifts we could give each other for her
she was continuously giving me the gift
of community the gift of affection the
gift of music and laughter I always felt
like I was on the receiving end more
than the giving end I hoped that I was
giving her the opportunity to practice
English and to have a friendship with an
adult who took her seriously and this
became my motto in the Peace Corps what
can I bring that I that I don’t really
know exactly what I’m doing
and so as a Peace Corps volunteer you’re
tasked with addressing some enormous
problems like global poverty okay thank
you
and though the one of the tasks I was
given was to address gender-based
violence and as many of you know
gender-based violence is historic it
cuts across all cultures regardless if
you live in the United States if you
live in puts Juana
one in three women will experience
violence in her lifetime it went to my
colleagues and they said we talked about
the idea that people weren’t engaging
with this topic because it was
politicians that we’re talking to them
or public health workers that were
talking to them or people who didn’t
look like them talking to them and it
meant nothing so working together if you
came up with the model where we got
everyone to first reflect on what
gender-based violence
meant to them and their families and we
talked to everyone we talked to cashiers
and cleaners in grocery stores we talked
to women who took care of children in
nursery centers we talked to police
officers who worked at the United
Nations and and what we found was
everyone once they have reflected on the
problem wanted to do something and we
had to give them a way to engage and
interact so we came up with this idea of
using art and music and dance because
it’s something we use when we talk about
important problems or have big events in
our lives so if there’s a wedding we
dance if there’s a funeral or singing we
have when we’re dealing with some of the
biggest problems we’re bringing in art
and music to kind of cope with them and
so we organized these large events that
happened across the country where
everyone brought their own unique gifts
so traditional dancers this isn’t
everyone dresses everyday these people
dressed in traditional dance the same
way if someone was dressed in like
Revolutionary Guard for a German sized
court that’s that’s the equivalent but
traditional dancers came and danced
songs of sorrow singers who are on
national television saying songs about
losing loved ones or having loved ones
go through horrific acts of violence and
that was one of the most impactful
things we did everyone came up every day
to me and all of my colleagues and said
I never thought about this topic because
I’ve never been engaged because I’ve
never been able to contribute something
to it and so as we’re thinking about all
the problems facing the world and
there’s a lot of them we’ve
traditionally had this model of
hierarchy where at the top we place the
people who make money and at the bottom
we place the people who make art or take
care of children or who in other ways
are healing the world are taking care of
farms we have to move from this model
where we’ve stopped people on top of
each other and move to one that’s more
synergistic if we’re talking about
poverty in America we need politicians
we need policy wonks
we need business makers but more
importantly we need people at the table
we’re going to talk about things like
institutional racism and a broken
criminal justice system we need local
farmers who will talk about how to bring
their products into school systems where
kids might be going hungry
we need artists we’ll share their
stories their own communities we
we need everyone to think about what is
it that I do in the world that lights me
up how can i educate myself so I can
take that skill that I have whether it’s
public speaking or taking a photograph
whether it’s exploring underwater and
making sure that 55 percent of your team
is female to address these problems
because the fact is 65 percent of the
drugs that this generation that kids
will have today are in industries and
fields we haven’t even dreamed up yet
we’re gonna have to develop our skills
like critical thinking our passions like
Instagram maybe we’re gonna have to take
those to address these problems because
it’s if no one survives right
if society is structured in a way that
people are being oppressed at the bottom
none of us are free so I’m going to ask
everyone to think that what gift do you
bring to the world the Dalai Lama said
that our most important meditation of
today is critical thinking followed by
action we’ve been thinking critically
about a lot of the problems now it’s our
time to think about what we have but if
we have what way we can put that into
action in the world so start small meet
someone today introduce yourself say hi
my name is Teresa I really like bringing
people together how can we you and I
work together bring it to your community
bring it to the state of Connecticut and
keep having those Congress
patience and move that triangle to a
network that works synergistically that
was interconnected and complex and
values everyone because that’s the only way
first day and I’m all alone I’ve gotten
into an airplane at JFK 116 hours lost
across the Atlantic studied for two
months and I’ve gotten into a bus and
traveled across the barren landscape of
Botswana where the landscape changes
from dry and dusty with ostriches Romijn
to lush and green with elephants in the
streets and so I’m a Peace Corps
volunteer I’ve landed in the village
where I’ll be I’ll spend the next two
years a village called ketchup a Lewis
wanna which is in droving National Park
which has the highest concentration of
African elephants in the world I arrived
at my house and I’m doing all the things
anyone who’s moved into a new home would
do and putting up curtains and putting
photos of loved ones on the wall and
most importantly I’m worrying about
Meredith there’s a little shop where I
can get toilet paper it wasn’t a big
deal but it was a concern I’m taking a
deep breath because it’s the first time
I’ve been alone in the past two months
I’ve been living with a host family
training with 60 noisy and
Peace Corps volunteers and it feels so
good to be a look but I also realized
that I’m alone and for anyone who’s ever
been alone they know what that feels
like
so I’m standing there thinking what did
I do and I’m alone and how am I going to
move forward and I hear shuffling
outside my door and some giggles and I
hear cocoa cocoa which is the equivalent
of knocking on my door I go to the door
and I meet say pond she have their hands
behind their back
she takes the biggest deep breath and
she says Jamila took you out to a pond I
laugh and I say doom a life keeping you
out
Vanessa give me thumb few up these boy
which means my name is Theresa and I’m a
Peace Corps volunteer and she
immediately burst into giggles as
everyone will do for the next two years
whenever I introduce myself in Setswana
and from behind her back she produces a
book she asks if we could read I quickly
realized that this book is actually a
song that many of us are familiar with
and we sing it every single night for
[Music]
for you my dress so many you will
recognize that song at the little tremor
point and for me religion aside the song
that that’s the story that that song
holds became so important because it’s
this message little boy has no material
gift is looking for what heat bring to
someone he really admires he doesn’t
have material wealth he’s not
particularly connected and that lesson
was something that tsapok and i built
within our relationship what are the
gifts we could give each other for her
she was continuously giving me the gift
of community the gift of affection the
gift of music and laughter I always felt
like I was on the receiving end more
than the giving end I hoped that I was
giving her the opportunity to practice
English and to have a friendship with an
adult who took her seriously and this
became my motto in the Peace Corps what
can I bring that I that I don’t really
know exactly what I’m doing
and so as a Peace Corps volunteer you’re
tasked with addressing some enormous
problems like global poverty okay thank
you
and though the one of the tasks I was
given was to address gender-based
violence and as many of you know
gender-based violence is historic it
cuts across all cultures regardless if
you live in the United States if you
live in puts Juana
one in three women will experience
violence in her lifetime it went to my
colleagues and they said we talked about
the idea that people weren’t engaging
with this topic because it was
politicians that we’re talking to them
or public health workers that were
talking to them or people who didn’t
look like them talking to them and it
meant nothing so working together if you
came up with the model where we got
everyone to first reflect on what
gender-based violence
meant to them and their families and we
talked to everyone we talked to cashiers
and cleaners in grocery stores we talked
to women who took care of children in
nursery centers we talked to police
officers who worked at the United
Nations and and what we found was
everyone once they have reflected on the
problem wanted to do something and we
had to give them a way to engage and
interact so we came up with this idea of
using art and music and dance because
it’s something we use when we talk about
important problems or have big events in
our lives so if there’s a wedding we
dance if there’s a funeral or singing we
have when we’re dealing with some of the
biggest problems we’re bringing in art
and music to kind of cope with them and
so we organized these large events that
happened across the country where
everyone brought their own unique gifts
so traditional dancers this isn’t
everyone dresses everyday these people
dressed in traditional dance the same
way if someone was dressed in like
Revolutionary Guard for a German sized
court that’s that’s the equivalent but
traditional dancers came and danced
songs of sorrow singers who are on
national television saying songs about
losing loved ones or having loved ones
go through horrific acts of violence and
that was one of the most impactful
things we did everyone came up every day
to me and all of my colleagues and said
I never thought about this topic because
I’ve never been engaged because I’ve
never been able to contribute something
to it and so as we’re thinking about all
the problems facing the world and
there’s a lot of them we’ve
traditionally had this model of
hierarchy where at the top we place the
people who make money and at the bottom
we place the people who make art or take
care of children or who in other ways
are healing the world are taking care of
farms we have to move from this model
where we’ve stopped people on top of
each other and move to one that’s more
synergistic if we’re talking about
poverty in America we need politicians
we need policy wonks
we need business makers but more
importantly we need people at the table
we’re going to talk about things like
institutional racism and a broken
criminal justice system we need local
farmers who will talk about how to bring
their products into school systems where
kids might be going hungry
we need artists we’ll share their
stories their own communities we
we need everyone to think about what is
it that I do in the world that lights me
up how can i educate myself so I can
take that skill that I have whether it’s
public speaking or taking a photograph
whether it’s exploring underwater and
making sure that 55 percent of your team
is female to address these problems
because the fact is 65 percent of the
drugs that this generation that kids
will have today are in industries and
fields we haven’t even dreamed up yet
we’re gonna have to develop our skills
like critical thinking our passions like
Instagram maybe we’re gonna have to take
those to address these problems because
it’s if no one survives right
if society is structured in a way that
people are being oppressed at the bottom
none of us are free so I’m going to ask
everyone to think that what gift do you
bring to the world the Dalai Lama said
that our most important meditation of
today is critical thinking followed by
action we’ve been thinking critically
about a lot of the problems now it’s our
time to think about what we have but if
we have what way we can put that into
action in the world so start small meet
someone today introduce yourself say hi
my name is Teresa I really like bringing
people together how can we you and I
work together bring it to your community
bring it to the state of Connecticut and
keep having those Congress
patience and move that triangle to a
network that works synergistically that
was interconnected and complex and
values everyone because that’s the only way
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