International Relations

Youth & Community Media

The Suai Youth Centre - Centro Juventude CovalimaThe Youth centre was one of the earliest organisations to secure Friends of Suai support. Founded on April 4, 2001, its mission has been to build the skills and self-esteem of young people. Forty-three percent of the district population is aged between 15-34 years, with 26% illiterate.

The centre has won support from other non-government organisations and offers a variety of computer and media courses, together with sporting events, peace camps and HIV Aids awareness courses. It also provides counselling for young people who experienced torture and trauma. Over the past four years, its theatre group has presented a swag of successful performances.

Community Media

Media training workshops run by St Kilda filmmaker and member of the FoS Taskforce Jen Hughes, in 2006 and 2008 have uncovered lots of talent. YoMaTre’s documentary about traditional methods of reconciliation, Reconciled by Drinking Sacred Water, won first prize at the 2008 Dili Independent Film Festival.

Community media has proven to be a simple and smart way to provide educational programs on health and agriculture to people who are illiterate.

With support from Friends of Suai in 2008, Jen and youth centre coordinator Ergilio Vincente set up the Suai Media Space, an on-line site in English and Tetun, connecting the communities of Suai and Port Phillip (and the world) through videos, photographs, artworks, blogs and chatrooms: www.suaimediaspace.org

Suai Media House – Uma Media

Following USAID and AusAID funding in 2009, Suai has become one of five media houses (Uma Media) set up around the country with broadband, additional computing power and training to enable journalists to contribute to Timor news online (www.timornewsline.com).

Digital Photo Workshop

In 2009 unemployed young people studied digital photography for a month with Richard Jones, formerly from Port Phillip, and Afreo Sanches from Arte Moris in Dili.

Through Friends of Suai, the students were supplied with cheap digital cameras and they used computers to hone their images. The larger collection, was exhibited to great acclaim in the market and at Suai’s Independence Day celebrations. Thirty student portraits were included in the exhibition at St Kilda Town Hall during May-June, 2010 to celebrate the ten years of friendship.