Update January 2005

On 22 January 2005 the Federation of the Deaf of Cyprus (FDC) organised a seminar with the following theme “Organising and Development Perspectives of the Deaf Community in Cyprus in an enlarged European Family”.

The seminar was open to all Deaf Cypriots to join in and take a new concept at becoming EU citizens and took place at Intercollege in Nicosia. More than 80 participants joined in, among them was an interested crowd of young deaf, students and women. Many of the Board members of the deaf associations of Nicosia, Limassol and Larnaca were present. Interesting was the presence of the 4 Turkish-Cypriots, who came from the Turkish part of Cyprus to attend the seminar.

And EUD was also there!

Keynote speaker Mr Tassos ANASTASIOU, Vice-president of the FDC introduced the seminar. Greetings were spread to the attendance by Mr Yannis YANNAKIDES, President of FDC and representatives of the School of the Deaf, Association of Parents of Deaf children, Welfare Fund etc.

EUD Board Member Ms Helly CHRISTOPOULOU gave a presentation on EUD with a quick introduction of the general background, aims, work mission, visions and examples of EUD’s continued work.

From the speech of the Director of the School of the Deaf (Mr Y. SAVVIDES) on the Education and the Deaf Community of Cyprus to the lecture of the Lecturer of Social Sciences of Intercollege (Mr Steve PRICE) on the wrong-identifying Psychology of Deaf individuals and systems to approach to Deaf experience: participants did not let the seminar go by unnoticed. There were discussions to attend, experiences to be shared etc.

After lunch and Christmas cake-cutting -with a hidden gold coin inside- (a tradition vividly kept in Cyprus and in Greece, too), wishes for “good luck” in 2005 were spread to all participants, followed a training session on the role of the FDC on national level regarding to legal questions.

Finally Helly CHRISTOPOULOU led a keynote speech on basis leadership with workshops, empowering the participants to push back frontiers and open up the horizon.