One Young World: An Eye-Opening Experience

By Jeremy Gallays, Monday, September 26, 2011, at 10:00 am.

I have always considered myself a well-traveled person. Throughout my life, I have lived in six cities in three countries on two continents. I learned at a very young age to be sensitive to local and cultural differences, and this has formed the way that I think about the world today. From a young age I understood that I needed to adapt to differing cultures to go to school, make friends and integrate myself into my surroundings.

Entering the hotel lobby in Zurich on Aug. 31 (the day before the start of the summit) challenged the notions I had built throughout my life of adapting to my environment. To whom do you adapt when you are in a room with people from the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, Nigeria and the Philippines? I went to One Young World with the goal of diversifying my knowledge base about different cultures. OYW exceeded my expectations—I not only learned about new cultures but I also gained insight about ties that transcend culture and bring people together.

One Young World’s premise is that it brings together ambitious young people from around the world so that they can work with one another to make a positive change. For some delegates, it is a platform through which to gain international support for already established projects. For others, eager and ambitious to make a positive change but not sure how to begin (I would count myself among this group), it is the catalyst to get involved with those projects, or a way to meet potential partners with whom to start a project.

I have decided to lend my support in helping an OYW ambassador with his project: It’sOneHumanity. It’s a social network that brings the OYW experience online, connecting people with humanitarian interests from around the world so that they may inspire each other and collaborate on projects for the greater good. OYW has motivated me to use my multicultural background and the power of social media to bring about change, and it has provided me the platform and motivation to get involved for our future and start making an impact now!

Photo Credit: mindthis/Shaaz Nasir

This entry was posted on Monday, September 26th, 2011 at 10:00 am. It is filed under Features, Insights, Social Media, Youth and tagged with change, cultural differences, cultures, future, global, It'sOneHumanity, One Young World, OYW ambassador, positive change, Social Media, Zurich. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.