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Life Onboard |
LAST UPDATE
November 7, 2007
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| site design imagesparkle.com |
| October 28, 2007 |
In Pictures – Photo Tour II of Life Onboard |
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Twenty-five participants joined an overland programme from Singapore to Cambodia, where they witnessed the damage done by the Khmer Rouge and the lingering effects of the country’s war and genocide. Their onboard presentation, titled “The Cambodia We Saw,” described their visit to the Killing Fields, Toul Sleng Museum (formerly a prison where thousands of executions took place) and the Cambodia Handicraft Association (CHCA) which helps those affected by landmines earn a living through making and selling handicrafts. They also spent time at a school near the Koh Ker ruins in northern Cambodia. This school was funded by Peace Boat which also raised funds to have the area around the school and village de-mined. The participants met with the Cambodia Mine Action Center (C-MAC) and learnt that, despite continued efforts to remove landmines, there are still six million active mines left in Cambodia. |
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Cool enough to go by only one name, Japanese painter Dragon joined Peace Boat from Singapore to Port Said, Egypt. From art school dropout to so-hot-right-now clothes designer, Dragon now earns his living as a painter who does both commercial work in Japan and Europe as well as more personal art that has strong minority themes and African influences. In addition to holding art workshops onboard, he painted a mural of children on a wall in a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan with Peace Boat participants that calls for peace. Here he expresses his experience on Peace Boat with a painting showing the words “Liberty” and “Freedom.” |
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Participants rifle through the exquisite Batik patterned fair trade clothes and accessories made by Filipina women who are supported by the Development Action for Women Network (DAWN). This organization helps vulnerable Filipina women who have worked in the entertainment industry in Japan establish a livelihood through producing and selling these items. Many of these women come to Japan to work as hostesses in nightclubs and end up having babies with Japanese men who then abandon them or take little responsibility for the situation. These so-called “Japanese-Filipino international children” are not acknowledged by their fathers, thereby leaving the mother and child living in a very difficult situation. Usually, they are forced to return to the Philippines where they are stigmatized and the mother cannot find work. Through DAWN, the women find meaningful and stable employment, and DAWN also tries to connect the children with their fathers in Japan. |
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The night before arriving in Cochin, India, Peace Boat’s top deck came alive with streamers, a lilting flute and a haze of smoke from the barbequed tandoori chicken sizzling on the grill in preparation for India Night. Highlights included special theater performances from artist and performer John Devaraj who worked with an entourage of participants to express the suffering of child laborers around the world into a series of pantomimes. Dancing, traditional Indian dress and Indian food added to the festive atmosphere. |
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The Sanaa Auction was held onboard Peace Boat to raise funds to build a children’s playground in the biggest Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan, Camp Baqa’a. The auction was named after a child Peace Boat met on a previous visit to the camp. Her father named her Sanaa which means “light” in Arabic, as the family prays everyday for some relief from the darkness of their existence in the camp. A wide-range of items were up for auction, including dates with the volunteer staff, massages, and expensive French wine. However, paintings by artist Dragon fetched with most, with a large painting of a camel fetching a cool 210,000 yen (USD2,000). A total of 650,000yen (USD6,400) was raised. |
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On October 17, 233 Peace Boat participants contributed to shattering the Guinness World Record for the United Nations-led Stand Up against Poverty campaign which drew 38.8 million participants around the world. More than 600 events in 110 countries used this day to protest against poverty and to support the Millennium Development Goals which aim to slash poverty, hunger, disease and illiteracy by 2015. The vast majority of participants on the day were from the world’s poorest countries, highlighting that this day has given them a chance to voice their concern about what matters to them. |
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Several athletic Peace Boat staff members, all clad in orange, braved the outside decks and participated in an onboard basketball tournament. Their team, imaginatively named the Peace Boat Staff Team, put up a good fight in the first half but, in front of dozens of enthusiastic spectators and supporters, lost 14-2 to the participants’ all-girls team, the All Stars, who outshone the competition. |
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