We’re super excited to report that in mid-December of last year, TEDxMlatiWomen, the first-ever TEDxWomen conference to take place in Indonesia, went down in the country’s city of Yogyakarta. The gathering, the theme of which was “Rewrite the Rules”, was both organized and attended by a diverse cross-section of individuals from the city who all share a passion for gender-related issues. TEDxMlatiWomen’s attendees had the opportunity to listen to talks by various experts in the field of women’s empowerment, as well as network with each other.
TED Translators was well-represented at the inaugural event by Indonesian translator Deera Army Pramana, a Yogyakarta local who teaches biology at a boarding school in the city (and whose curriculum includes TED Talks and introducing students to the TED Translators program). Prior to TEDxMlatiWomen, Deera contacted the conference’s organizer and secured a TED Translators promotional booth at the gathering. She also helped add a couple TED Translators swag items to the 100 goody bags that were gifted to the audience and speakers: our idiom cards, and one of our bookmarks with both the TED Translators tagline in Indonesian and our website address on it.
Deera was joined at TEDxMlatiWomen by fellow Indonesian TED Translator and Yogyakarta resident, Dzaki Jabbar Mahdi. As she told us: “Dzaki and I met before the event started and set up our booth near the entrance of the conference hall; this way, we could engage with attendees after each session. We had an assortment of TED Translators pins, stickers and other similar items to hand out to people who stopped by.” Deera also noted to us that a large number of visitors to the booth were on the younger side and unaware of the TED Translators program. “We spoke with them about the initiative—many were quite interested—and I provided my contact info to multiple enthusiastic visitors so they could reach out to me afterward.”
Overall, TEDxMlatiWomen was an excellent occasion to further broaden TED Translators’ global community, particularly in Indonesia. Thanks to Deera and Dzaki’s exhaustive efforts at the conference, we did just that.