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A few decades ago, when it came to having their say on significant issues and policies that are generally discussed by grown-ups, young people were faced with an uphill task; how to reach out to each other and share their vision with everybody. But the ever changing trends in communications and ground-breaking social reforms since then have seen to their freedom of expression and delivered their voices to the adults in power. Youth concentrated organizations have already taken center stage and a direct result of this is the creation of the Saudi-British Youth Forum.

a LegacyCreating

by: Syed Shabbir Siraj

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The Saudi-British Youth Forum

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Focusing mainly on cultural ties, the forum brings together young men and women from the countries of Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom and enables dialogue on cultural issues and lets interaction between the groups to flourish. The initial forum was held in London in October of 2007, coinciding with the visit of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia to the United Kingdom, and was deemed a success.

In early January of 2009, the 2nd Saudi-British Youth Forum took place in Jeddah and later in Riyadh. The Council of The Saudi Chambers of Commerce and Industry under auspices of the Saudi foreign ministry and the British Youth Council hosted the forum where forty participants from both countries were given the opportunity to forge bonds with one another and to bring forth ideas that would encourage a better understanding of the cultural differences and to build upon the similarities.

The young people belonged to institutes and organizations from both countries, namely Islamic Relief, Fainak.com, Mouth That Roars, King Abdul Aziz National Dialogue Centre, BYC, Jeddah Youth Empowerment, Minorities of Europe, Saudi British Council, European Alternatives, Effat College, Black Training and Enterprise Group.

The British Ambassador with some of the participants

During a session at the National Museum, Riyadh

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A Saudi participant from an organization called Fainak, described the first few days of the forum in the port city of Jeddah as quite memorable. “The ice breaker bingo on the first day was a fun activity for all of us. It certainly helped in getting to know more about each person in the large group that was taking part in the forum,” she said with a beaming smile.

She also shared an interesting experience from an outing to the historic downtown of Jeddah.“After our daily session of inter-cultural dialogue, the group went sightseeing in old Jeddah and near the end of the tour we made our way to the rooftop of Naseef House, one of the oldest houses in the city. Soon after came the call for Maghrib prayer from the many mosques in and around the area. The sight of the setting sun and the beautiful calls to prayer were overpow-ering and this was felt by the visiting friends. A tremendous spiritual sensation had taken over, especially amongst our visiting counterparts who were of diverse faiths.”

The British youth’s trip to Jeddah set the stage for things to follow in Riyadh, where the latter phase of the forum saw them engaging in more bilateral discussions that touched on cultural tolerance and the challenges facing the youth of today. After four days of these important exchanges, the whole group was rewarded with a journey to Shaybah; a modern industrial town in the Rub’ al Khali, the world’s largest sand desert. The youth were unanimous when it came to the positive outcome of their participation. “Building on our sense of shared values we’ve been able to move from simple to complex and searching questions and further on to underlying sensitive issues,” said Tom Le Feuvre, one of the British students.

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A big part of the forum was the Two Kingdoms’ projects for the youth of both communities and pilot projects were brainstormed by the young men and women. One ambitious idea to emerge from these sessions is a film project titled “Our Everyday Lives” which will have a young person from Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom illustrate their daily life in the form of a visual narrative. Another proposal is to develop training and games to support youth participation and intercultural dialogue in Saudi Arabia and the UK. The projects will be given due attention at the 2009 Two Kingdoms’ Conference in Riyadh and will be implemented subsequently.

The culmination of the 2nd Saudi-British Youth Forum is, in essence, only the beginning. There will be many more forums such as this and our British guests will return another time, but for now the youth from both sides have spoken; the future is theirs and it is their right to have a hand in making it an exemplary one.