20th August Thursday we got an opportunity to participate Project arranged in hand by Rotaract clubs of University of Colombo ; Faculty of science , Faculty of management, Faculty of arts and Faculty of law to educate people about the gender equality and change the attitudes of people about sexual harassment s.This programme was the first phase of “OTW” : On The Way ans named as “TOT” Training of Trainers.Specially as Sri Lanka is a South Asian country with cultural basement attitudes of people are very different from other countries.There are”do”s and “don’t”s for boys and girls separately which were practiced from childhood.
This project which was conducted by United Nations – Sri Lanka to give an understanding and some education of “gender equality” was held at United Nations head quarters Premises, Colombo 7.
It was held in two sessions.
First session which started 9.30 am was a presentation by Miss. Naushalya Rajapaksa social change entrepreneur , about gender inequality. session started with every one introducing them selves and why they were present there for the programme.
First part of the session was called “ice ice baby” which was an ice breaking and every one explained how being a guy or a girl prevented them from doing some of the activities. For an example being a guy prevented growing hair long, piercing, wearing pink, wearing nail polish and being asked out , And being a girl prevented wearing sarongs , going on trips with friends, asking out a guy and getting drunk. It was a funny session where every body came up with ideas and their thoughts. Naushalya was very good at twisting every one’s idea in to very funny one making her presentation more interesting.
Second part of the session was called “sex boxing” and every one had to explain what they expected in their ideal girlfriend/ boy friend.
For example, some ideas suggested by girls on qualities their ideal boy friend should have were being tall and dark, being intelligent, being independent. Some of the ideas suggested by boys for their ideal girlfriend were being independent, being shorter than him self, having a dowry and being a virgin.
At the end of the two sessions everybody realized most of these roles were imposed on our selves by the society. And because of these differences we were alienated by the opposite sex. With that understanding every one were educated how that alienation could lead people to harass the opposite sex.
Second session was about us, the university students expressing what we thought as pressing issues the youth today had to the United Nations Youth delegates this year. This included short videos expressing what we felt that should be changed. UN Youth delegates represent Sri Lankan youth in the upcoming 70th session of the General Assembly. They will adress the problems that were raised by US throughout the year.
You too can tell them about issues that our youth faces by using the tag #TellUNYD in twitter or other social media.
Special Thanks : Bhasura Perera ,Prabath Swarna Sri, Oshira Peris , Warren Manuel and Navindra Keerthisinghe
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