By Jenneley Malone (YES 2017 - 2018, Suriname, placed by American Councils for International Education in Elkhart, IN)

On March 5, three Surinamese YES alumni and I hosted the Talk and Paint project. This project was an opportunity for young people to discuss mental health and learn painting techniques. We recruited 19 students from the Maria Internaat Boarding School to attend the session. 

The day began with an opening welcome statement from myself and Cheraine Amelo, another YES alumna. We shared about YES alumni projects, our alumni community, and the YES program.  After our introduction, the speaker, Gwamungindi Mwakipesile, who is a mental health coach and advocate, began her session. The interactive session focused on topics that the participants had requested, such as how to navigate relationships with parents and how to let go of bad experiences.

After the “Talk” session with Gwamu, the participants were given 20 minutes to write two letters. One letter was for their future self as a reminder of what they had learned in the session and to look back to see to what extent they had applied the lessons in their life. The other letter was to be shared on the Suriname YES Alumni Facebook page to spread the messages they learned in the session with the community.

After writing the letters, Shaquille Brian Bottse (YES ‘10) led a painting session with the participants. She started the session by explaining what a painting can be and that it doesn’t need to be perfect or neat. She also discussed the primary colors, how other colors are created from the primary colors, and what meaning and symbolism can be derived from different colors. The participants were free to choose what they wanted to paint and everyone was very excited and proud of their work. Out of the 19 paintings, five were chosen by Sister Boomiki, the chaperone of the boarding school, to be displayed at the Maria Internaat Boarding School and the remaining paintings will be donated to other boarding schools in the area.

My favorite part of this project was bringing YES alumni and non-alumni together to create something that was impactful and beneficial. Through this project, I learned that asking what the audience can benefit from - in this project, the topics of the “Talk” session - plays such a big role in being able to impact them. I will definitely incorporate this in future projects, because it shows the audience that you genuinely want to share information and an experience that they can benefit from.