We had a joint Dover-East IFP session for TEDx with the theme of Peace by Piece. I have to say that it was a very beautiful and interesting experience. One of the speakers that I felt moved by the most is Joy. It’s the first time that I’ve heard that she used to be a refugee. I think it’s amazing and it kind of just trying to remind us again as to how you will never know what the person has been through just by the smile on her face. You might hate someone just by the fact of what you heard and saw, and that’s just so shallow of you. A girl you called a slut, she’s a virgin. A man you said he’s weak because he cries, her mother died. A student who slept in class and you called “lazy”, he got 9 siblings to take care of at night. Sometimes, what you see is just a small part of the truth, hence try to sit and talk to them first, about their lives, about who they are, getting to know them first, go deeper before forming a judgement IN your head. Because it can work the opposite, too, you never know that sometimes, the greatest sadness can also be found behind the greatest smile.

Another speaker that I really look forward to is Jean. The fact that I kind of know her personally, make things more interesting. And I really want to see how she’s going to make the connection between the cryptography to peace. And the fact that in the talk, she brings up the story of Alan Turing and the Enigma machine. Because it’s one of the saddest human real-life stories I’ve ever heard.

(Out of topic: I mean Alan Turing is a socially-awkward but a genius man. He spent years trying to break the Enigma machine and when he finally did it, he was told to keep everything a secret. One of the real-life heroes, Christopher has helped save millions of lives from the war. But during the life, while he lives, no one knew he’s the hero. No one knew he’s the one who has helped the country. All they ever did to Alan Turing, is treating him with awkwardness and disgust by the fact that he’s gay. The fact that he prefers to be with men is greater than the fact that he’s helped the nation. Which in the end, force him to commit suicide by biting to a cyanide poisoning apple. And only later on, then the fact that he’s the one to decode the unbreakable Enigma Machine surface in the society. And only after that, then the queen gives him a posthumous royal pardon for being convicted of having an affair with the same sex in 1952. What’s the use of that? The man lives his lives with the society frowning upon him. Humans… How do we know if there are in other cases like this that the government hasn’t let us know? And it’s just stupid that we lost one of the greatest minds in the world, the father of computer science, to the rights of one’s sexuality. )

Anyway, Jean reminds me that age doesn’t really matter. She’s really brave to go up there and talk about what’s she passionate about. And it just makes me reflect on myself whether I have been brave enough every day to just try and make changes in the smallest possible way in the world. I think most people have identified the difference they want to change, and we’ve discussed it every day. But sometimes I feel that it leads us to nowhere. People tend to complain a lot about things but do nothing about it. Jean makes me realise that “Don’t complain about things you’re not willing to change.”