SI MONTHLY NEWS June 2006 Editorial
From SI Exco News
Will Football to solve all the world's disagreements ............
This was suggested by a 13 year old student
when the class was looking at countries coming
together to play in the World Cup. We were
looking at world news and noting the problems of
fighting. We were also noting how countries were
mixing together during the World Cup. So the 13
year old (boy!) suggested that when countries
disagreed with each other, then they should each
provide a football team. The two teams would
have a football match and the country of the
winning team would then have won the argument.
It would have been good if we could have
discussed this concept to look at its flaws. Time
did not allow it, but perhaps another lesson .....
However in Servas we can look at this idea as
part of our ways of Conflict Resolution. Would a
football match solve the problems? What about
people like myself, who dislike football and will
keep away from watching things like World Cup.
Would we agree to this to solve problems? What
would happen to the winning country, would they
then take it out on the losing country? Would the
losers accept their loss? Who would referee?
Would that referee be fair and unbiased? What
about the attitude of other countries? Is it fair to
depend on the skills of people who are nothing to
do with the initial problem? Supposing a country
does not specialise in football? Supposing a
good player is off sick? Is it really solving the
problem or just pushing it to one side? ...........
Come to think of it, is this not like two armies
fighting to try and prove a point? .............
So how shall we solve problems?
SI News 2006 & Thank you
to all those people who have been sending me the
post cards and emails to say that SI News 2006 has
arrived and the state of the package. It is really useful
to know when they have got to you and helps me with
the planning.
For your information, if it arrives in a post office bag it
does not mean it is damaged. It is because that is the
way I packed it for a cheaper postage rate.
Languages:
In the article on communication on page 2 it is noted
that those looking at the Servas web site are
generally from areas of the world designated as
North and West. Looking back at the language
pages it can be seen that the same generally applies
to the languages that have been given to me so far.
Please can people from the South and the East
provide me with some languages to fill that page -
but please can they be in European script, just as the
Arabic languages have been put into European
script.
I look forward to being inundated with a wide range
of languages from Africa and Asia.
Thanks, Asante, Xiexie.
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