Archbishop Desmond Tutu took the stage at the PeaceJam conference Sunday morning, fizzing with energy – and ready to spread that energy to every one of the 2,700 teenagers before him.
“Nobel laureates don’t come floating down from heaven,” Tutu, one of the 10 Nobel Peace Prize winners at the event, told the young activists. “There was a time when we were like you. I have said this many times this week – I am in awe of you. I mean that as seriously as I could ever be. You are remarkable young people.”
The final day of PeaceJam – historic in its 10th year because it included the largest gathering of Nobel Peace Prize winners ever in the U.S. – focused on inspiring young activists to initiate peace projects.
The weekend closed with five female laureates chatting on a cafe- style set at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House, where the audience Sunday night included PeaceJam teenagers and the public.
Sunday morning, students who represented all 50 states and 31 countries were invited to step to a microphone in Magness Arena at the University of Denver to tell Tutu what inspires them. The line to speak soon wrapped halfway around the arena’s floor.
Kaatje Jones, a 16-year-old from Louisville, recalled a card her dad gave her on her birthday.
“Remember, my dear child, only dead fish go with the flow,” it read.
Others read poems, made political statements or just said thanks to PeaceJam organizers.
After lunch, participants broke into small sessions with nine of the 10 laureates who were in Denver during the weekend and gave presentations on community projects such as cleaning up the environment and striving to end violence.
A group from Frayser High School in Memphis, Tenn., talked about holding peace rallies and raising money to help the homeless.
“It was a great experience for me,” student DeQuvalen Smith said after having his picture taken with Tutu. “With our program, basically we just do it through the community. But now we’ve met someone with a lot of experience working around the world who can inspire us and teach us how to do this kind of thing.”
The female winners of the peace prize offered advice specific to girls during their evening talk at the opera house.
“Recognize that your exterior beauty is fine,” said Jody Williams, who won in 1997 for campaigning to ban land mines. “But don’t sacrifice your inner person to be popular and pretty and shallow.”
Rigoberta Menchú Tum, a Guatemalan who who the prize in 1992 for working for the rights of indigenous people, said, “If you have a lot of self-esteem, you can cultivate your spirituality.”
The women, who pretended to meet at a red-and-white-checkered “international cafe,” dissolved into fits of laughter over their acting abilities in between moments of seriousness.
They said that if the world had more women in positions of power, there would be less war.
“Because women can sit around a table,” said Betty Williams, a Northern Ireland activist.
The women broke from their skit to show a recorded conversation with Aung San Suu Kyi, a 1991 winner under house arrest in Myanmar for her efforts toward democracy and human rights.
“Freedom would mean that I would be able to do what I understand to be right,” she said. For PeaceJam participants, Suu Kyi offered this advice: “The best solution for those who feel helpless is to help others.”
Tutu kicked off the day with a “ceremony of inspiration,” where he sometimes spoke seriously and sometimes jokingly. Among his qualities he listed as being vital to his success in winning a Nobel prize: a big nose, an easily pronounced name and sexy legs. But when it came to talking about doing good in the world, Tutu was direct.
“Don’t allow yourself to say, ‘What can I do? Poor little me,”‘ Tutu said. “Poor little me can do a heck of a lot.”
Students paid $235 each to attend the event, though about 15 percent received a scholarship or other assistance, said Jes Ward, the Rocky Mountain region affiliate director for the PeaceJam Foundation out of Arvada.
It cost about $2.4 million to put on the conference, Ward said. PeaceJam raises most of the money though fundraisers, donations, grants and sponsors.
At a closing ceremony Sunday afternoon, the teenagers raised their hands and swayed as they sang, “All we are saying is give peace a chance.”
“I believe you are symbols of our new world,” Jody Williams said. “It doesn’t matter what your age is, you can understand the problems, and you can make them go away.”
Students said they left not with sadness but with the goal of making the world a more peaceful place.
“This is my third year coming to this,” said Sam Galler, 17, of Boulder, “and every time I come back from these, I feel like a new person.”
Staff writer Karissa Marcum contributed to this report.
Staff writer John Ingold can be reached at 720-929-0898 or jingold@denverpost.com.
Staff writer Jennifer Brown can be reached at 303-954-1593 or jenbrown@denverpost.com.
Nobel winners’ “global call”
The 10 Nobel Peace Prize winners in Denver this weekend spent the past year meeting in small groups around the world and in conference calls to develop their “Global Call to Action.” Their group statement identified 10 core issues standing in the way of global peace, calling them a 10-year challenge to the youths of the world:
Unequal access to water and other natural resources. When needs are met, “basic human nature is more gentleness,” the Dalai Lama said.
Racism and hate and the “growing divide between rich and poor.” The laureates’ statement said racism makes it easier for “demagogues to fuel hate and to rule by fear.”
Global disease, because rapid movement of people and goods has made diseases of the Third World everyone’s problem.
Poverty, because the “world cannot be secure when so many billions of people are forced to exist on less than $1 per day.”
Social injustice and a lack of human rights. “Who ever thought we’d live in a world of Guantanamo Bay?” asked Mairead Corrigan Maguire, who won in 1976 for working to end conflict in Northern Ireland.
The rights of women and children, including a decent education. Shirin Ebadi, who won in 2003 for advocating for human rights in the Middle East, said illiteracy and ignorance breed prejudice, which leads to terrorism.
Environmental degradation, because “global warming is a reality” and the Earth “is wounded.”
Nuclear weapons and the international arms trade, because it is “incomprehensible that the world still wastes nearly a trillion dollars each year on weapons of war.”
Disarming our “armed consciousness” and thinking beyond the fear of terrorism to society’s most basic evils. More than 30,000 children die of hunger every day, said Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, an Argentinian who won the prize in 1980.
Focusing on human security, because the “time has come to shift our energy and our resources from military security to a long-term investment in true human security.”
-Jennifer Brown, The Denver Post
