World Village Festival 24–25 May 2025 – Menstrual Hygiene to Arusha!

Our association took part in the World Village Festival last weekend – an event that traditionally marks the beginning of summer in Helsinki, at least for me! For as long as I can remember, this festival has been one of the highlights of May, and it was wonderful to attend this year’s event, which also celebrated its 30th anniversary as Finland’s largest development cooperation event. Once again, the atmosphere was full of community spirit, delicious aromas, and goodwill. The flags of Palestine and Ukraine waved high, and the theme of the festival was peace work. Our association contributes to peace by strengthening civil society, and we had some truly meaningful conversations about this over the weekend.

Participating in the festival required planning, resources, and energy. This year, it was the youth section’s turn to take the lead! The FSE board consists of professionals of various ages and fields. I am the youngest member of the FSE board – in fact, I’m three years younger than the festival itself. Today I work as a midwife, but I began volunteering with FSE in 2016, right after finishing high school. My mother is Eva’s cousin, so the association has been familiar to me since its early days.

In February, I invited some of our younger members over for coffee to share thoughts on development cooperation and the newly launched Arusha, Especially! project. Around the table sat our board member and healthcare colleague Sini, whom I became friends with while doing a nursing internship in Kenya in 2022, my high school friend Marikki, who has often volunteered her graphic design skills for the association, Abby – an exchange student from the US who interned with FSE this spring – and freelance event producer Erkka, whom Sini randomly met at a Halloween party the previous autumn. Together, we brainstormed ways to improve FSE’s marketing and whether Erkka might use his contacts to help organize the next fundraising event.

Sini realized that the application period for the World Village Festival was about to close, so we informed the senior board members of our willingness to take responsibility for the festival weekend. They were happy to step aside, especially since most of them were still busy in Arusha earlier this year. We divided the tasks according to each person’s skills and availability. Over the spring, we produced new promotional materials and t-shirts, ordered handmade crafts from Maasai women via Eva and Aino in Tanzania, and designed a meaningful intangible gift card to support the menstrual hygiene and sexual health project that Sini and I are launching. Sini also worked hard on handmade products: vegan soap bars and reusable menstrual pads, which we will also teach local women to sew in Arusha next autumn.

Visual communication students from Omnia created stunning roll-ups, posters, and flyers for us. It was a joy to be part of their advertising agency course and collaborate with them throughout the spring. At the festival, it was clear that the impressive roll-ups drew visitors to our booth.

As the festival week approached, our stress levels began to rise. The t-shirts designed by Marikki were ordered at the last minute, and we didn’t expect to be waiting anxiously until Friday evening for them to be ready. Erkka had to pick up the tent from Turku (finding the right size tent was surprisingly difficult – in the end, we succeeded thanks to the “Women Entrepreneurs” Facebook group!), my van wasn’t returned from the repair shop in time, and printing the intangible gift cards turned out to be trickier than expected. Time felt like it was running out. Yet somehow, on Friday evening, we managed to set up our sales booth at the festival area, and I finally breathed a sigh of relief – from here on, everything would go smoothly.

Almost every board member spent some time behind the sales counter over the weekend.

The festival atmosphere was wonderful, and the cloudy weather didn’t diminish the buzz around our tent. The Maasai women’s crafts, Sini’s soaps, and my graphic prints sold well, and many people also purchased the intangible gift cards and reusable menstrual pads. Menstrual hygiene and the sexual health of people with disabilities in Tanzania sparked important discussions. Sini and I had the chance to introduce our upcoming project, in which students with disabilities at Patandi Secondary School will participate in afternoon clubs focusing on well-being, menstruation, and the right to bodily integrity. Inadequate menstrual hygiene causes frequent absences for girls, placing already vulnerable students in an even more unequal position. With the proceeds from the festival, we will hire a Tanzanian trainer and provide sustainable menstrual products such as menstrual cups and period underwear.

The booth spot at the World Village Festival cost €470, and tent rental was €80. We had budgeted €350 from project funds for festival participation, and we sold over €1,000 worth of products, leaving us with a nice surplus and a great boost in visibility for our association’s Instagram account. All in all, the festival was a success and summer has officially begun! A warm thank-you to everyone who visited and supported us over the weekend.

– Taika Wiikari

The beautiful roll-up ads featured in the photos were designed by Omnia students Jenna Vuoristo, Fiona Lehtonen, and Linda Anttila. The poster and flyers were created by Anfisa Golubeva.