The youth action of the day yesterday was a “bed in” organized by YOUNGO (youth non-governmental organizations). Katie and Tara both participated, while Jessica videotaped and I (Deon) took still pictures. The “bed-in” was held outside plenary 1 at about 1pm. Many of the youth were dressed in pajamas and holding pillows, toothbrushes, and signs that had messages such as, “we can work it out”, “give youth a chance,” and “come together.” In honor of John Lennon, on the 29th anniversary of his assassination, they sang his song “Give Peace a Chance” with new lyrics, which are as follows:
Rap:
Everybody’s talking about droughts and bushfires
Ice and sea levels
Devastation Devastation Devastation
Singing:
(x 3)
All we are saying is give youth a chance
All we are saying is cut greenhouse gas
REPEAT ALL
In all, about 30 youth participated, and at least twice as many people and press watched and documented the event. One network even asked some of the youth to perform it again later, in front of a spotlight and tripod. We hope that all these spectators also listened to the message that everyone was trying to convey: youth want an opportunity to work at saving their world too.
4 comments:
This event seemed like it was a really cool way to meet new people and integrate yourself within other peoples ideas and experiences. Did the amount of kids from each area affect the roles they played and the activities they got to participate in? Especially coming from SES with such a small population of students, does it seem as if their are a lot less of you guys?
It seems like there are a lot of people there. Were looking at a lot of maps here about what age range has the highest percentage of population in their country. Are you noticing different age groups represent different countries?
I think it's awesome that you all got a chance to participate in protest like this. Based off of how many people were there I'm sure this Bed-In made an impact. As DJ said above, we are learning about age ranges in different countries. I noticed that Africa has a huge amount of young people. (Ages 15 and under). Have you guys noticed a large amount of teenagers from Africa at COP15?
Sadly I have no met any youth delegates from Africa, but I know of some. We get this email from a google group called unfccc_youth (feel free to join!) and it give you all the cool updates on what the youth are doing and who is here and if people want to meet up or stage actions. Anywayyy I was reading one that said that there are three youth delegates here from Swaziland here, one 18, one born in 1994 and one born in 1995. So there are definatly at least a few youth younger than us. There are only about three other US highschool delegates at COP, so we are 10 out of 13 highschools, pretty cool.
Another thing with age ranges is that youth are being considered all the way up to like 26 or 27. So someone could look quite a bit older to be but still be a youth delegate.
As far as the most (besides the US) youth delegates I have personally met it would have to be the youth from Austrailia. They have a big team that has been doing a lot.
OH AND! There are a few youth who are actually party members so they are able to have official votes and work their countries on negoiations. Pretty cool.
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