FJ to UK - let the QYL journey begin

Let the journey begin. 

First I must say that it took a lot of energy to mentally, psychologically and physically prepare for this trip. There were a lot of mixed emotions and I tried to keep my excitement on a low. If you wondering why, you read about it here. 

Tuesday: 14th June. 
Since it is the holy month of Ramadan I woke up around 4am for Suhur and later went into work.I spent the day at work making sure I had handed over documents to my team and set up my vacation notice. I came home for Iftari and got busy with my final assignment for the semester. I thought if I was tired enough I could sleep on the flights (I just cant sleep on the 
flights). And I ended up staying up all night. 

Wednesday 15th June.
5.15am - We left Suva for Nadi. 4 hours later we were in Nadi and I slept for an hour in the car. We stopped over for breakfast and headed down to the airport. Check in time started at 11am and after checking in I waited for Luisa (QYL 2016). We ate at the airport and went on inside before boarding time. The flight left around 2pm and we were headed for NZ! 

5pm we arrived in NZ and went looking for the emirates counter to get our boarding passes. Lucky for airport WiFi we also contacted the QYL's from NZ and Tonga and met up with them. 
Next leg was from NZ - Dubai. Luisa and I had seats together and believe when I say I never want to fly this route ever again in my life. 18 hours!!! 18 hours has a few hours to many to be on a flight. The food on emirates was great! Lucky once again. but sitting there for so long and it was a night flight so most of the people are sleeping and I felt bad turning on the little lights and doing some reading/writing. I tried really hard to sleep. When I woke up I thought at least 3 hours would have passed - behold - I was asleep for 45mins. I attempted this maybe 3 or 4 times and each time I woke up in less then one hour. After that I gave up and watched the TV Show Blackish. Hilarious show by the way. There is only so much walking around you can do on the flight so it was a very tiring flight indeed. 
FINALLY we were in Dubai. 

As we headed to our gate we met with QYL from Australia, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. We had a little QYL Pacific family. And this felt great. Before you know it we had to board our flight to London. 

Only another 8 hours and we would be in London. Once again I tried to sleep but had very little luck so I carried on watching movies in flight. It amazed me that the flight had WiFi. Thank you Emirates! You are the best airline so far.

And finally we touched down at Heathrow airport in London. FINALLY we were here. I know all the QYL's were excited to be here - but I almost cried. After last year I wasn't sure if I would make it, but I did. The boarder security lines were long but the staff was nice and we were out in LONDON. 

Thursday 16th June 12.45pm we are in LONDON. This was Thursday 11.45pm back in Fiji. 
The QYL volunteers greeted us at arrival and we headed to Goodenough College on a big blue coach (double deck) bus. YUP!! This was my first time on a double deck bus. The The Pacific Islanders were already chatting and laughing. This was a great sign to the beginning of a new friendship. 

The residential week has only just started. 

I met the QUEEN

June 2016 I traveled up to the UK for the Queens Young Leaders residential week and award programme. 

The entire week was AMAZING but the highlight of the week was meeting her majesty the Queen. It is not everyday we wake up thinking - I will go meet the Queen today. The winners from the Queens Young Leaders programme are indeed privileged to be among the those selected individuals who have the honour of meeting her majesty. And it was worth the wait.  
She is such a sweet lady! She spoke to each and everyone of us when we walked up to receive our awards and this is a moment we will cherish for the rest of our lives. 

(Official photo from the Buckingham Palace) 

At 90 she is still walking around on her and took out the time to speak to each and everyone of us for a few minutes. 

I am now among the 120 Youth from across the Commonwealth who have received their medals from her majesty, in recognition for the youth work we do in our respective communities.  I cant think of a better way to leave behind a legacy then by investing in the youth to carry forward the leadership and social causes. 

Earlier that day Jacob and I were asked how we were feeling about meeting Her Majesty that evening. Here is what we had to say :-)

And later that day we had one hour to get dressed so I tried to motivate my fellow QYLs through this video. 

About the outfit: I stitched my outfit to wear for awards function :-) Kept it simple but put in a little bit of thought into it. So the salwar kamiz highlights my Indo heritage (ancestors from India) and the woven shoes represent my Fijian heritage (Fijian - Nationality). Woven mats are symbolic to Fiji and the Pacific communities. My brother-in-law printed a Samoan design on my veil so I could also share my extended family heritage. I was very happy to receive compliments from so many people on the outfit. I must add - all the QYL's looked amazing in their respective outfits. JOB WELL DONE guys!!! 

(photo from Google)

Its only upwards from here... 

Until next blog. 

THINK GLOBAL AND ACT LOCAL

PIANGO conducted the first round of workshops in November (2014) and the second round took place in March (2015).

DAY 1:
The first day of the workshop began with all participants having to share what accountability meant to us; who we were accountable to and how we ensured our accountability?
This was very interesting for me as I listed down the various groups I am part of, beginning with the group I was representing at the workshop. I was the last person to share my thoughts and hearing everyone else I noticed that a common group we listed was family. Some of the participants began sharing with their accountability to god/religion and to family. I set there listening how family plays such an important role in the work we do with the other sectors. I started to briefly think about the Bronfrenbrenner's Ecological theory. Individual and family are core.

As I evaluated my own little summary I noticed most of us had similarities in how we were ensuring accountability; proof of receipts, three quotes, reports, black and white evidence and sharing information.

We had a panel discussion with IFRC (international Federation of Red Cross); Pacific Students Association and PIANGO. they shared their journeys of code of conducts, principles, good governance and best practices. We than had a world cafe activity where we listed how we were being accountable (Financial management); planning and resource management;  human resources (from recruiting to departure) and monitoring, evaluation and learning. 

Before the day concluded we discussed having a working group to compile the Code of conduct for CSO (Civil Society Organizations). 

Day 2:

"The village knows best"

the mantra for the day.

We started with a panel discussion where UNOCHR, Pacific Council of Churches (PCC), Fiji Council of Social Services (FCoSS) and IFRC spoke on their roles in the community and about disaster preparedness. A few things that stood out for me in these discussions were;

• First 72 hours of disaster situation are very critical,
• Help/assistance doesn't arrive immediately,
• The community/ faith-based organizations are usually the first respondents,
• The first respondents deal with the main and the most stress plus trauma, 
• There is a grave need for accountability within organizations and teams that respond to those who have been affected by disaster, 
• teams of volunteers should be trained in vulnerable communities so they can provide assistance in time of need, 
• mapping/community profiling is extremely important so we know who needs most assistance and how we can assist.

The UNOCHR got the participants involved in another world cafe activity. This one mapped out issues of disaster management. Some of the emerging and recurring themes were;

• Defining disaster; (1) Natural and (2) Man made. While we are aware of natural disasters including cyclones, flooding, tsunami, hurricanes and even earthquakes the man made disasters were deliberated on. These include; violence (of all types), bully, cyber crimes, theft, dictatorship, censorship, political upheaval, and deforestation (which contributes to natural disasters).
• Include youth in disaster management. 
• Community profiling and mapping is crucial. 
• First aid kits; provided to communities and the community needs to know how to use the it. 
• Population growth after the disaster period (condoms should be included in first aid kits distributed). 
• Profiling vulnerable groups in the community (eg; persons with disability, elderly and babies) as they would require immediate or extra assistance in time of evacuation. 
• Including disaster management in school curriculum so children are educated about this topic, 
• Having information sessions on disaster management for stay at home mothers or those who have not had much (formal) education. 

There was so much more shared by the groups and once we receive the full report on our discussions I will edit this post. 

A presentation was made on the Post 2015 SDG (Sustainable Development Goals). While there are 17 goals and 169 targets the theme is to Leave no one behind. 

Some of the important things we noted were;

• PPP: People, Planet, Participation. 
• Red Flags; (Aspects that will not be negotiated):

> Equity > Accountability > Human rights > Economy > the planet > peace > Participation

The two days were exciting, challenging and thought provoking. 

Exciting with all the networks I made and the information I received. 

Challenging as I tried to keep in mind all the networks I represent. 

Thought provoking because of the comments and information shared by others. 

If you are part of a CSO and your organization has not networked with PIANGO yet I suggest you get sending an email to them and get on their radar. A code of conduct for civil society organizations is being established and as many CSO's as possible should be included. 

Until next blog :-)