Passion that has made a dream come true

The Gift from Beate” is a documentary film that describes a series of facts of women’s fights to establish human rights since the end of the WWII. Helping its screening in Switzerland and all over Europe and beyond has become my passion since 2005.

In 2010, School of Orientall and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. will present the film “The Gift from Beate”, followed by a symposium on the strategies and challenges of modern women to move forward to make human rights for women better built-in society.

The event is a result of a lot of work done by my friend in London, Rela Iwano. After meeting Ms Beate S. Gordon in Paris in March 2009, Rela started working to make her dream to come true; “I want to have Beate to come to London to talk to us”. She is a freelancer. She had no connection with sponsors for the event. She walked all the way through.

I organised a presentation of “The Gift from Beate” for the first time in Switzerland in Geneva in May 2006. I knew nothing about what should be done to organise a film event without a sponsor or budget. I had no professional knowledge on the film industry or events. None. I worked from scratch with Ryo, a good friend of my in Geneva, who shared the same passion for the film.

Passion was the key word, for Beate, Rela and myself, and many other women & men who worked to present the film in their own cities.

I have seen the film unleashing energy of women in all the cities where the film was presented in Europe and beyond; in Switzerland, Italy and Morocco.

“The Gift from Beate” is non-commercial and has to be presented by citizens’ volunteers or municipalities since its release in Tokyo in 2005. The messages of the film is always fresh and has power.

In fact, the film has been initiated by a group of Japanese women chaired by Ms Ryoko Akamatsu, who had wished to create a documentary film to record the facts of women’s fights to make their human rights recognised and built-in in Japanese society. Passion was the key word that motivated the group, later named “The Gift from Beate Film Committee”.

What is “The Gift from Beate”? What in the film inspires us so much? — If you wish to know it, let’s meet at SOAS on 9 March! I’ll be there. Look forward to seeing you there,

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