Hello again orb 28! Although today was only the Congress registration, I met two very interesting women – a young girl from Uganda and an Ambassador from the West Sahara Refugee Camps.
After getting to the Universidad Compultense and registering for the Congress, I waited around for further instructions. Beside me sat seven year-old, Mbabazi. Mbabazi was lying on the steps, drawing pictures. She told me that she lives in Uganda with her mom, dad, and brother. I met her mother who is the Head of the Gender Mainstreaming Division in Kampala, Uganda. Her mother helps women be admitted, and stay, in university level education. As a third grader at an American school, Mbabazi studies French, and plays basketball, among other things. Speaking to me in English, she told me that she also speaks Ugandan. Already I had met a smart, friendly girl who, like me, was attending the Women’s Worlds Congress with her mom.
Next my family and I went to the cafeteria in the un-air conditioned University to get water. Around us sat women of many ethnic backgrounds, all of them very intellectual and amazingly accomplished.
We spotted one of the main conference speakers sitting alone and my mom suggested I interview her. I was nervous when I introduced myself to Senia Ahmed as I didn’t know what language she would speak. She spoke no English but she did speak Spanish and so this interview represents my best efforts to understand her words and message. She is the Ambassador of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic. She works on behalf of the refugees in West Saharan Refugee Camps. In her words, she is a fighter for her country, occupied by Morocco; for her generation who has lived in exile; and for the rights of woman for full participation in community. I asked her about education for girls in the refugee camps, about life in the camps, and what message she has for girls in the world.
On education: Ambassador Ahmed surprised me by saying that gender doesn’t determine the kind of education that children receive. That means that boys and girls are educated equally in the camp with the full support of both women and men. Children there start going to camp schools at age 6, just like us. At age 9 they begin studying Spanish, which will be of good to use later because at age 15 many are sent to schools in Cuba, Libya, and Algiers. 9000 children, sponsored by solidarity committees, are placed in households, which I understood were Spanish-speaking. Teenagers who don’t go away to school can get sponsorship to go to Spain during summer months.
On Life in the Camps: I was dismayed that people have lived in refugee camps for a whole generation. That means some people who are grown ups have never known life outside the camps. Ambassador Ahmed explained that conditions aren’t good. Life is very hard. Heat and thirst are big factors for refugees. It’s regularly above 100 degrees Fahrenheit, there are no trees for shade and little water, which is salty. Each family lives under a fabric tent. Recently, kitchens and bedrooms were moved from these tents to separate tents because there were many accidents having all the rooms under a single tent.
On Ambassador Ahmed’s message for girls: We have to study and become strong in our voices and actions. We are the future and Ambassador Ahmed believes this is a way for us to repay and honor all women and their struggles that have come before us.
This was only the first day. Tomorrow all the women of the Congress will sit together for the plenary speeches by women telling about their challenges and triumphs in global activism.
Until then, Aida
