National Association of the Deaf

Submitted by Melissa.Malzkuhn on Mon, 03/21/2011 - 22:48

There’s a perk in every commitment. May it be meeting new people, networking, exchanging of ideas…or, even better, warmer weather. On January 27th, I flew from a frigid, freezing, icy Washington D.C. to balmy and breezy San Jose, Costa Rica for the 17th Board Meeting of the World Federation of the Deaf Youth Section. (It’s “WFDYS” for short.) I’ve been serving on the board as secretary (and, as well the website developer, translator, videographer, and organizer) since 2007. My four-year term is actually coming to a close, up to the next Youth General Assembly, where elections will be run to determine the new board, camp locations, and the priorities of the WFDYS. This is going to be an exciting time, welcoming delegates representing national Deaf Youth organizations from all over the world, to discuss, bring up motions, vote, and make connections.

Our 17th meeting in Costa Rica happened alongside the board meeting of World Federation of the Deaf. We haven’t had a board meeting “side by side” since the Copenhagen meeting in 2007. It was good to see the elders, exchange news, and get a pulse on the planning of the World Congress in South Africa (July 18-24). As the norm, our board meetings are hosted by Deaf Associations, and in this case, it was a wonderful partnership between the Deaf Association of Costa Rica and the Deaf Youth Section. The hosts will take care of our meeting needs, in booking a room, set up of facilities (such as a projector), and arrange our schedule. This tends to involve giving workshops or presentations to the local Deaf community about the work of WFDYS, human rights of Deaf Children and Youth, our youth camps, and how people can become involved, and be good advocates in their own local communities. I always have viewed this as the perfect ‘trade-off’ – the host country ensures we are comfortable during our stay, share their culture, customs, and then we give back by sharing information, meeting people, chat, and exchange stories, thoughts, perspectives, and most importantly – embody the meaning of being Deaf Youth advocates. We meet plenty of young people, and there’s never a shortage of questions. Often they are curious about our own lives back in our homes, what we do for a living, do we have jobs, or do we study? If we study, then what is it that we study? And, what is our country’s Youth Association like? What kind of activities? Do we have local camps?

I often find ‘youth camps’ to be an extremely popular topic. In Europe, youth organizations often have this ‘exchange camp program’ in which, two Deaf Youth Associations will agree to send an even number of delegates to one other’s camp. For instance, Belgium and Italy had such an agreement, in which ten delegates from Belgium attended the youth camp in Italy, and then in turn, 10 Italians attended the Belgium camp. The concept of exchanging delegates depends solely upon good partnerships between two countries. To inspect upon this closely, all it takes are two really great friends to go, ‘Hey, let’s do an exchange.’ And a couple of motivated ‘travelers’ who want to explore another country.

In Costa Rica, the agenda of our 17th board meeting focused mostly on the upcoming 5th Youth Camp to take place prior to the World Congress, and the planning of the Youth General Assembly. Each country is to send two youth delegates to the Camp and Assembly. All camp participants certainly have a big perk – their camp registration also includes the World Congress registration! There, they would be able to learn, discuss, and enjoy the camp program (which includes local guest speakers, day trips to amazing parks, and more), then head towards a huge international event where there will be fascinating topics being given forth, ideas shared, people of different walks of life coming together in what unites us in common: our sign language.

As WFD President, Markku Jokinen said, (during the WFD and WFDYS presentation with the Costa Rica Deaf Community), his travels as WFD President has taken him near and far, around the globe where he met so many deaf people, of all colors, ages, sizes, religion, and more; yet there is one same thing in all the deaf people he met.  “Sign Language is what we have in common,” Markku emphasized, repeating, “That’s our gift, the gift we have, that hearing people don’t.”

Most certainly, he’s right. Through my experience on the board with the WFD Youth Section, I’ve attended international events and always felt humbled and moved by the simplicity of communicating with people from far-flung places, through our same, precious language of signs. Turning away from our own national sign languages to adopt a more gestural-based sign, which we know as “International Sign” was a bit daunting to me at first, slipping away from the comforts of my vast vocabulary knowledge, later turned fun and exciting. To figure out our common signs and gestures to meet halfway, our points have hit home as we nod and recognize what we wanted to say to each other.

And that is a very important message both the WFDYS and the WFD continue to give to Deaf people all over the world. Most often we are aware of poor educational access and standards, limited opportunities, and living conditions that violate human rights that Deaf people from developing countries have to face everyday. This knowledge, this sense of pride and identity is important, to recognize one’s self-worth in society.

Our agenda went through the planning of the Youth Camp, where we hope to see an increase of youth delegates from African countries, than ever before. Another important part of our agenda was the organizing and planning of the next Youth General Assembly. There were documents to be sent out to Deaf Youth Associations, information to be shared so they can best prepare for the Assembly, and most especially in directing the priorities and direction of the WFDYS for the next four years. That would be 2011 – 2015.

Since joining the board in 2007, I have become great friends with other board members, visited some of their home countries, learned vastly about the needs of deaf youth, and what it takes that drives us to work independently in our own countries till we meet again at camps and meetings. We tend to meet twice a year, which is pretty good, considering we have board members from New Zealand and South Korea. For the Costa Rica meeting, only four members were able to attend: Juan Angel De Gouveia, our President who hails from Caracas, Venezuela; Florian Gravogl from Vienna, Austria; and Roberto Suarez from Madrid, Spain. We will reunite, at last, a full board for the 5th Youth Camp, and World Congress.

Our time spent in San Jose (the capital city of Costa Rica, with 1.5 million people) went wonderful, especially with many thanks to the fabulous host committee, the Deaf Association of Costa Rica and the Deaf Youth Section. One of the local organizers, Irene Coen, was a fellow youth delegate back in Madrid in 2007. It was nice to connect with her again and take up where we last left off. The world is big – yet so small! We had our meeting at a hotel along with the WFD board, sharing one room but sat at different tables. We also met with Deaf Association Presidents of Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, and Dominican Republic to discuss the relations between youth associations and national Deaf Associations and upcoming events for Central America. Central America recently established a Central America Youth Regional Section – Secretariat. A Youth Regional Section would focus on organizing youth camps, facilitate communication, and give support to fledging Youth Associations. To date, there are two Regional Sections going strong: the European Union Deaf Youth and the Asia-Pacific Deaf Youth Section. They have been hosting youth camps.

Our meeting ended on late Friday evening, at the Costa Rica Deaf Association building, where a lot of local deaf youth came to observe us concentrating on our agenda. On Saturday, I met with Juan (WFDYS President) to go over some documents we would be working on back at home, and then Irene took us on a short tour out of the city to see an active live Volcano (Volcano Poas, as it was called) and to a town nearby with the world’s biggest ox cart, Sarchi. I departed very early the next day, with hugs and goodbyes from Costa Rica, only to turn back right into winter wonderland in D.C.

Now, I’m busy at work with updating our official website, in preparing documents for the upcoming Youth General Assembly, and in answering the many emails we get. On a thought, maybe cold weather’s good for the work I’ve got. Again, a coming perk is to meet more people, experience, learn, and grow.

WFDYS Website: www.wfdys.org
World Congress: www.wfd2011.com