PRESIDENT'S CORNER: TURNING TRIALS INTO TRIUMPH AND CELEBRATING WOMEN'S RESILIENCE

March has been a very rich month in terms of women's events around the country and the world, especially at the CSW62 events at the UN in New York!

When so many women- mothers and young women- come together at an event and share not only their concerns, but also wisdom, insights, and deep experiences of how they have overcome the most unthinkable challenges, then the event becomes like a giant classroom where one can learn valuable lessons and be inspired by stellar examples.

During CSW62, I had the chance to attend a Parallel event that caught my attention on "Women in Rural Areas in North Korea," in which two North Korean women, Ms. Mai Yoo and Mrs. Lee Yun Cha, shared their heart-wrenching stories. Both spoke of the extreme poverty they had to endure in North Korea with their families and aging parents, where they ate grass and sometimes a bit of rice once a day, for years. They spoke of the deep poverty, unsanitary conditions, multiple forms of abuse from men in the village, being sold through human trafficking to China, and more, and somehow, in spite of it all, even after many more indignities committed against them, they made it to South Korea and on to the United States! Both marveled at what they saw in America, thinking they had literally landed in the Kingdom of Heaven.

As they told their stories, there was no one in the standing-room-only meeting hall who didn't have tears flowing down their cheeks or in their hearts.

The amazing resilience, perseverance, and heart to help their families kept these women going, and now "by God's amazing grace," as Mrs. Lee said, they are free.

(I attended the session with a small delegation of women from South Korea who cried almost the entire time. We all took a photo together with the speakers at the end.)

Both women, the younger one (Mai Yoo), who is now a student in South Korea, and the older mother (Mrs. Lee Yun Cha), are now strongly advocating reconciliation for the Korean Peninsula through the North Korean Freedom Coalition and other organizations. They, like so many other women from various other countries whose stories we heard during CSW62, were able to turn their trials into triumph!

If there is anything to celebrate and to be grateful for, it is that women and mothers have an amazing, almost supernatural resilience and the ability to never ever give up and many times to turn from victims into victors. This is what I would like to celebrate and remember. As Women's History Month comes to a close, never will the work of mothers and women do so, for they indeed carry history in their hearts and on their shoulders and are the real pillars of hope for a better future for the world.

With this said, I wish you a very Happy Easter, Happy Passover, and a hopeful SPRING 2018!

Warmly,
Angelika Selle