SHARING EXPERIENCES AT YOUTH FESTIVAL

I was proud to have been invited to take part in the Young Hearts Youth Media Arts Festival in Bangkok yesterday. I spend a couple of very enjoyable hours chatting to around 80 young people from India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, The Philippines, Malaysia and, of course, Thailand.
I was joined by Khun Adam of FukDuk (yes, really) Productions, and for a short while by Jeanne Hallacy, the Executive Director of Insight Out - a project that enabled young people impacted by the Asian Tsumani to tell their stories through words and pictures.
The young people seemed to be genuinely interested although, an the organisers explained to us beforehand some of their come from extremely difficult backgrounds with limited grasp of English.
A quick show of hands indicated about 5 per cent read newspapers, slightly more read magazines and far more - but by no means all - regularly use the Internet.
Two of the best questions came from the Bangladesh and Philippines students, the latter asked 'How important are pictures as evidence when you write a story"?
The top picture here is of two of the Bangladeshi participants that were brave enough to come on stage, the second is of me and the third is of Khun Adam and me. The last two were taken by one of the Thai youngsters. Thank you.