Istanbul's first Int'l Women's Empowerment Festival is underway

This week, in honor of March 8 International Women's Day Onar, a multicultural organization supporting foreign women in Istanbul, will be holding the first-ever Raise Your Woice International Women's Empowerment Festival, which will continue through the week until March 13.

Under the slogan, "A voice for women," Onar is an organization that supports women's empowerment by providing workshops, legal seminars, group support, social media campaigns, and festivals. Titled "Raise Your Woice," a medley of "women" and "voice," the festival kicked off with an opening ceremony on Monday and continues with a flash mob at noon today followed by a full program of fun and informational events in support of and honoring women.

I had the opportunity to speak with Valentina Elmetti, an Italian expat and one of the founding members of Onar to talk about what they do and their innovative festival. "Onar is a non-political Turkish NGO born two years ago to support the community of foreign women in Istanbul. Created by "women for women," Onar works on self-awareness development, prevention against physical and psychological violence, legal support and tools for female empowerment and smooth integration into local communities," explains Valentina.

I asked Valentina how the organization came about and what sort of activities they engage in, to which she said, "Onar was founded by a group of women, both foreign and Turkish and with different backgrounds yet all related to civil society, from integration to gender studies and human rights. Our members are people who believe in the potential of women empowerment and solidarity."

At the moment, the executive board of Onar is made of four foreign women and one Turkish male, Valentina tells me, sharing that she is an Italian lecturer at an Istanbul-based university. Valentina is joined by Martina Pavone, an Italian performer, trainer and socio-cultural manager, Liz Manion, who hails from New Zealand and is a legal consultant and human rights activist and Mary Gioffre, who is also from Italy and is an English teacher and aspiring social entrepreneur. Kıvanç Özdemir is a Turkish lawyer and human rights activist.

"Our members come from different cultural beliefs, religion and socio-political backgrounds. From an erasmus student to the spouse of a business man, to independent working women, we all share the status of double discrimination of being women and foreigners" said Valentina. I asked if members were solely foreigners to which she said, "Absolutely not. Our members are both foreigners and Turkish. Our organization is focused on foreign women, but any English-speaking woman (that means Turkish too) is more than welcome to join Onar. In fact, Onar operates thanks to the efforts of many Turkish collaborators and volunteers. We do believe that it is only through a close collaboration with locals that we are going to be able to become more and more impactful."

As for their activities, Onar collaborates with many universities such as Bahçeşehir, Bilgi and Koç universities organizing seminars for their students on the topic of gender-based violence and women empowerment. "We also do activities of training through storytelling both for men and women, activities based on self-development and emotional intelligence and organize legal seminars and psychological group support."Onar is a part of Bilgi University's Sosyal Kuluçka Merkezi, a center devoted to civil society efforts, and now they have joined forces with Bahçeşehir University to host the first edition of the Raise Your Woice International Women's Empowerment Festival.

This week's festival has a full schedule of events, a majority of which will be held at Bahçeşehir University's Galata Campus and Sunday's closing in Beşiktaş. In addition to hosting yoga sessions and self-defense classes there will also be activities such as 'Speed Networking for Women," a "Gender Workshop for Men," a legal workshop and one to "Improve Your Life," There will also be a series of seminars on topics such as "Women as Changemakers" and "Women leadership" to name a few. All of the events will be held in English with the exclusion of two panels, "Women and Humor" and "Women and Communication," which will be in Turkish. On Thursday evening, there will be a special Onar Storytelling event with the focus on being a foreign women in Istanbul and on Friday evening, there will be a screening of the documentary "Girls of Hope," which will be held at the Dutch Consulate in Beyoğlu. There will also be a "Women's Rights and Istanbul" convention on Saturday afternoon and a "Raise Your Voice in Choir" session on Sunday followed by a closing charity event and evening of performances.

All the events are free of charge, attendants just need to register on the festival's website www.raiseyourwoice.com. For the closing ceremony on Sunday, March 13, it is suggested attendants donate a symbolic amount to witness the long line-up of unique performances. Taking the stage will be the AZOT Improv Theatre Group and Turkish stand-up comedians. The Istanbul International A Cappella Choir, the Boğaziçi A Cappella group and Note Istanbul will perform as will singer Martina Pavone and song-writer Behiye Süren, while fashion designer Süheyla Sahil will be showing pieces from her latest collection and will even be donating a dress that will be up for auction.

To find out more about the festival, you can also visit their Facebook page www.facebook.com/raiseyourwoice and check out www.onaristanbul.com.