This blog was written by Irene Alatzakis, the ONE member and volunteer from Toronto pictured above.
Canada, take ONE step up!
As members of the ONE Campaign, we know the powerful effect that volunteer advocates can have on the world. Yet, after spending 2 days with the ONEonTour team in Toronto on a mission to get U2 fans to sign the Poverty is Sexist petition, I realized how transformative volunteering can be for the volunteer!
Like other #ONEonTour volunteers, I am passionate about advocacy and dream of a world without extreme poverty and where people do not die from preventable disease. As a woman I would like nothing more than for all women to enjoy the freedom and safety that I have in Canada and I would like to share with them the access I have had to education. I volunteered because I agree that #PovertyisSexist, and I want Canadian leaders, influencers and world leaders to focus more attention on these issues as a result of a record breaking petition.
The Executive Director of H2O 4 ALL, Tim Muttoo, was one of the Toronto volunteers asking people to sign the petition on his Ipad.
So, on July 6 & 7th I joined other passionate ONE members all on a mission to get the #PovertyisSexist message out to as many U2 fans as possible. We donned ONE t-shirts and took our trusty iPads to the crowds of waiting fans looking for signatures. In exchange for a signature we gave out exclusive U2 concert bracelets: “Use your voice, CHANGE THE WORLD”.
To encourage us to talk to more people, there was a prize for the person at the end of the day with the most signatures: a loot bag full of ONE swag. We all wanted to win but I soon realized that first night I wouldn’t get many signatures if I just spoke to the people who came up to me. The second night was challenging because many people had a bracelet from the night before. I needed to change my tactics if I was going to earn my keep with signatures. So throwing aside insecurities, I decided to engage everyone and immersed myself in the experience. This personal pep-talk worked brilliantly and I started to have a lot of fun. Fans came up to me asking to sign my petition; some even came back with others to find me.
Even his watch says “ONE”!
As people walked by me and held up their bracelets from the night before, I felt the momentum building. The signatures flowed and many even thanked me for doing this! I felt a huge rush of both relief and pride, and ended up meeting all sorts of interesting people who had personal ties to the issues ONE cares about: One fan was a journalist who just published a piece on women’s lack of access to agriculture in the developing world and another was a high school teacher who uses the ONE.org site to research class lessons!
The volunteers and fans were amazing. Take a look at some of the images posted on Twitter!
Thank you ONE and U2 for this experience, it will forever be embedded in my DNA. My passion for both the issues and advocacy was made even more powerful because of the solidarity I felt at the event. Now, I don’t want the action to stop. Let’s keep up the momentum! If you haven’t yet, help us tell our leaders that we can do more for the world by signing our petition here. Let’s all step up for ONE.
This is me doing the “Strengthie” pose, after I won the competition the second night! It actually looks like I’m about to punch myself but I promise I was trying to do my best Rosie the Riveter pose!
