i've decided that i would just share to you the article that I wrote for the IH magazine since it practically summarizes my whole experience (well, the good and clean fun side of it anyway)
so here it goes:
Last July 18 to 24, 2011, over 130 delegates from 17 countries participated in the Asia Pacific Youth Conference (APYC) in Philip Islands, Melbourne.
The week was jam packed with quiet time and sharing, storytelling, workshops, cultural night, night market and a lot more. And in that week, none of us expected it to the way it would be. The conference focused on personal transformation, the mantra: to be a good leader, you should understand and appreciate yourself. So, that’s what we did.
Every morning, we started with self-reflection during quiet time and we would share our thoughts with our family groups. After that, we would all gather in the meeting room and have our plenary sessions to fully understand the four values of Initiatives of Change (IofC)—Love, Unselfishness, Purity, and Patience—wherein there would be different speakers that would help us understand the values. Then, we would go to our workshops (that we personally chose) that would help develop our understanding in different areas, as for me, I chose family development, wherein we had to create a three-generation family tree and share family stories that shaped who we are today. After that, we would go back to our family groups and share our stories by showing a timeline of our lives from birth to the present day. Honestly, at first I thought it was a pretty hard thing to do, whatever your story may be, because for me, these were people whom I just met, and so for sharing and trusting them with my life problems was a little bit too confusing. But now, as I write this, I feel this bond with them, knowing that even for a short while, I knew these people as to who they really were and I felt honored that they shared these stories to me and as they listened to my story as well.
But then of course, the conference wasn’t always serious. First of, we always had 30-minute tea breaks between sessions, so that we could all somehow reach and speak to all the delegates. Second, every after dinner, we would have what they called cultural night, where each country could share something about their country. I was the one who represented the Philippines, and so I shared a little bit of fun facts about my country and ended up being a “makata” for the night. “Makata” in english means public speaker. Why? Well, I can’t sing and I can’t dance, so I decided that it would be best if I just read them a famous Filipino poem about the youth. We also had the night market, where people can have their own stall and sell some of their products. Last but not the least, every night we would go down the beach and spend more time together—sharing, learning, and enjoying each and everybody’s company.
We also had a day to tour Philip Islands, which I think was a good breather from the conference because we all got to hang around without thinking of being late to our workshops or anything like that. And even though it was raining so hard that day, that did not stop us from going to the Koala Reserve, the farm, and the penguin parade. The experience was price less as many of us have not seen a koala or penguins before. Also, having a day with my new friends made the connection and bond even deeper.
And if you ask me what my favorite and most unbearable part of this whole experience was? I would say, “love the Open Space activity, hate the last day.” The open space activity enabled each person to choose a topic that s/he wanted to discuss for an hour, and if people wanted to discuss about your topic, they would just go to your table and talk openly about their ideas and experiences. I chose the topic “group dynamics for better trust” where I met the most awesome person (and now my new mentor), Mr. James McIvor and got to talk to different people about love, alcohol, and saving the world. As for the last day, well, how can you say good-bye to 100 people knowing that you might not see them anymore? How can you say good-bye to the people whom you got to share and listen to our most deepest and heartfelt stories with? How can you say good-bye to the people you started loving and appreciating?
As I am finishing this article, I start singing the phrase, “from little things, big things grow!” that the Australian delegation sang during cultural night. It truly does summarize the weeklong conference for everybody. These people and their stories, truly made me appreciate who I am, what I have, and have inspired me to be the leader that I want to become.
