On May 7th a great event took place: ”World by Word: hiSTORY behind us”.
This online program was in Russian and English and led to incredible results and conclusions. The participants connected online from Romania, Belarus, Georgia, Ukraine, Netherlands, Russia, Artsakh and from other countries. We are happy that, despite the difficult moments that the Covid19 crisis brings, we still manage to connect. We are also happy that so many participants shared their opinions and stories related to commemoration and remembrance. Central themes were the Second World War and hate speech against minorities.
During the first part of the event participants did some games that made them feel more connected and comfortable with others, even when these lived in vastly different countries. With these games they also shared who they were and how long they had been connected with the YMCA.
In the second part of the event we used Menti to do some questions reflecting the future.
The event was filled with stories about war and peace, as well as difficult situations of exclusion and violence. Most of these stories were family stories.
Jonathan van Varik’s story about his grandfather, for instance, made us understand that when you are in this context sometimes you need to see two sides of a conflict. In either side you can see terrified people and no one is happy. It’s not easy to look for both sides, especially when a conflicts seems to have a clear ‘bad guy’. Sometimes people are just following orders given to them.
Following this story, one of the participants told another one of his own family. It’s not easy to see beyond the hate that conflict bring. Especially when people lost family members or loved ones. This doesn’t mean kindness doesn’t persist; in some cases people helped prisoners that didn’t have food.
One of the conclusions was: “The peace comes with empathy. And without this feeling of empathy, hate will remain and war and violence will repeat itself. So it stays important to fight against hate.”
The story shared by Irina Berdzenishvili was about memories and the trauma related to these memories. It can be very difficult to overcome these traumas. She felt that no one can help her. She had to overcome these alone. She gave us an example of her friendship to a girl from another country and how difficult it can be to be a friend of someone that belongs to the other side of a national conflict.
We reflected on how to build bridges rather than walls. One of the participants gave an opinion about the importance of love. She stressed how important it is to respect another’s reality, even when you cannot understand or agree with this person.
We believe that stories can connect people. The synergy of being together and telling stories is an important task that can change lives. Telling stories and exchanging our points of view is essential in order to prevent future conflict. During the current days of COVID19 we cannot have this type of exchange face-to-face, but by organising these types of online events we reach closer to this goal.
The last story told was “Maria’s Story”. It is a family story told by Valentin Chukhlatyi. It’s a love story that made us understand how difficult it is to fall in love with someone everyone sees as an enemy. A love affair between a local girl and a soldier may put her family at risk. Her father would not allow of this relationship. For this family it was difficult to overcome the constant fear the war brought.
The central theme is that it is sometimes really difficult to understand and define the actions some people take in times of fear. It is difficult to call an action ‘right or wrong’ when feelings and emotions are involved. This love story made another participant reveal the story of her parents.
In the end of the event the organisers explained that people can share more stories by sending these by e-mail to jonathan@ymca.nl . These stories will be placed online on the blog of World by Word. They also encouraged the use of the hashtag #historybehindus. In the future, a Instagram page of the project will be launched.
At the end of this event there was one minute of silence. We also lit a candle in remembrance of the tragedies of the Second World War. The event closed with a Menti-survey. The results showed how the event changed the thinking after hearing these stories. Sharing impressions and thoughts is, after all, a crucial element of peace building.
The event was recorded (video above) and streamed on the Facebook page of YMCA Europe.
Written by Maria Costa, (Portugal) – Roots Peace Work Institute Alumna
This article is part of the World by Word campaign. This project originated at YMCA Netherlands and is a multinational cooperation of YMCA Europe Roots for Peace project, and the Dutch former Soviet Cemetery Leusden. World by Word is a prelude to an Erasmus+ funded Youth Exchange “Then, now and later: towards a composite memory”, taking place in the Netherlands in 2022.
