Students gather to promote peace
By HEATHER MOLINE Special to the Daily Press
PLAYA VISTA In the arched sunlight of Sacred Heart Chapel at Loyola Marymount University, 100 high school students sat attentively on the altar, listening to the testimony of Imani Ephriam, a junior from Santa Monica High School.
“I’m part Native American, part Mexican, and part African American, and I’ve experienced racism my whole life,” Imani said into the microphone.“I met a Latino girl at a language academy who asked me to hold out my hand. ‘See that? You’re darker than me. We could never be friends.’ I walked away stunned.”
Imani next shared two instances of physical abuse at the hands of lighter skinned students.
The chapel erupted in head-shaking and murmurs. One small, vibrantly dressed Mayan woman leaned toward a translator so that she could understand Imani’s story. Rigoberta Menchú Tum, the 1992 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and hero to indigenous peoples everywhere, was one of six Nobel laureates present at PeaceJam’s Global Call to Action Conference, held this year at Loyola Marymount University from Sept. 11-13. The PeaceJam foundation’s goal is to inspire one billion simple acts of peace before the year 2018 by bringing together youth from around the world with Nobel Peace laureates. Imani participated with students from as close as Pasadena and as far as Tibet.
Students broke out into personalized workshops with the laureates. Rigoberta’s focused on racism and hate. The former candidate for the presidency of Guatemala witnessed her family tortured and killed before she was 30, and her own people, the Quiche Indians of Guatemala, are slowly dying off.
“Estoy triste cuando oigo ‘No seas Indio (Don’t be an indian),’”Rigoberta announced into her own microphone, replying to Imani. Her translator explained her story. “Don’t be an Indian” is a phrase used over and over by Mayan children in Guatemala, who learn their heritage is shameful from an early age.
“I am sad for you,” Rigoberta told Imani. “I sense a lot of pain in your life. I hope you can find inner calm and courage.”
This attitude was exactly what the laureates hoped to inspire in the students, their own lives providing examples of the resilience they preach. In addition to Rigoberta, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Jody Williams, Shirin Ebadi, Adolfo Pérez- Esquivel, and Betty Williams were in attendance. None of the laureates could enter a room without the enthusiastic cheer of the world’s best and brightest youth.
PeaceJam fever is spreading. Gilberto Flores, a freshman from South Central L.A., arrived at LMU asking nothing more than when lunch was, and left asking where he could find more information on the United Nations. Nafasi Ferrell from Gael Blair Academy in Pasadena said she wanted to begin her simple act of peace by sharing Rigoberta’s story with her friends who are members of the Black Panther Party.
“I think there’s a better way to change society, like [Rigoberta] did,” Nafasi said.
At a campus-wide talk with the Nobel laureates on Sept. 12, Tutu took to the stage with rhythmic cheers of “Tutu! Tutu!” He shared that all winners of the Peace Prize must have three things: a big nose, an easy name, and sexy legs.
And the archbishop couldn’t stop there. “Do you ever consider how God feels, when he sees his beautiful people destroying each other? I think God weeps,” Tutu said.
The 3,000 who were gathered to hear the laureates testify quieted significantly following Tutu’s remarks, but if the six stars of the conference knew how to do anything, it was how to turn sadness into stimulation.
“And then God sees all these young people and says ‘Ah yes. Look at how beautiful they are. That’s why I created humanity,” Tutu exclaimed.
Once more the congregated erupted in cheers. Students came burdened and open, and left ready to change the world, beginning with their communities.
Imani says there’s no doubt she’ll be at the next PeaceJam Conference.
“I don’t care where it is,” she said. “We’ll make them get us a bus.”
And what is her next goal, after sharing her stories of racism with Rigoberta Menchú-Tum?
“I want a picture with the archbishop with sexy legs.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 19, 2008. Read the original PDF.