A fitting end

01 February 2009

WSF 2009

Sunday is the final day of the forum, a day for the assemblies to convene in order to address the 10 themes of the WSF. They are meant to bring together the statements, plans and calls that have emerged from the forum. This is a difficult process of course, but over the last three days thousands of people had been working into the night to produce common goals. This underlines how the WSF is trying to forge a common vision of what the world might be like, but without squashing or crowding out any views or perspectives. It can tiring and sometimes frustrating, but it's also inspirational.

The statements produced in the morning were then taken to the Assembly of Assemblies; these statements formed the final call of the WSF 2009. The call took place at a big outdoor stage and we hurried to get some food from one of the numerous stall by the campsite. Walking through the crowd we sensed a feeling of good humour and calm as the forum drew to a close. After a buffet lunch (priced by the kilo, the Brazilian way) and came across a game of capoeira being played by the path. This was the fist time during our trip that we had seen the famous dance/martial art and it was great to listen to the singing of the capoeiristas and see the big smiles on their faces.

Finally we got back to the stage. As the speakers took their turns to read, a large crowd stood in front of the stage waving flags, chanting and sometimes dancing despite the rain that had turned the field boggy. The passion behind the calls to action was easy to see and left us feeling that people were coming together to take on all the crises that face the world - food, financial, energy and more. We hope that action and solidarity will come out of the forum to prove that another world really is possible.