Peace Child for Primary Schools

Buntingford and designed to be performed by a cast of 8 to 12-year olds

Songs & Lyrics by David

Based on The Peace Book by Bernard Benson

© Peace Child International – July 2018

Script by David Woollcombe

Gordon

P E A C E C H I L D

– a story of children rising to their generational challenges –based on the original Peace Child, written by the cast with David Woollcombe, Director; songs and lyrics by David Gordon inspired by The Peace Book by Bernard S Benson;

Copyright © Peace Child International 1982 – FREE for educational performances

Explore the issues using the SIX Primary School Lesson Plans

Setting: Bare Stage; risers at the back for Chorus / audience; central playing area with a chair and cushions downstage left for the Story-teller and her small group of younger children; Tables, chairs; Video Screen;

Cast: 10 Children (age 10-12) for Core Cast(CC); 6 children (age 5-8) for Story-teller’s group(Child); 50150 children and parents (any age) for the Chorus; 1 x adult (teacher / parent) to play Story-teller; 3-5 other adults for Audience Plants and teacher, diplomats (should you wish).

Story Concept: The Story is set in 2050, when the Global Goals and their successor targets have been achieved. Every year, all over the world, children celebrate “Peace Day” to commemorate the day when the world came together at the United Nations to work – across generations, nations and ethnicities – to achieve the Global Goals and end poverty and war for ever. Every year, a new group of children act out the Story of the Peace Child to remind children of future generations how that original Peace Day came about – and the 2 key values required to maintain it.

Values: Peace Child is an entirely non-political, non-religious, supra-national story that promotes the key values of ‘Selflessness’ and ‘Integrity’: by selflessness, we mean the opposite of selfishness: it requires young people to care for others as they care for themselves, to ‘leave no one behind’ in the language of the global goals. Integrity means, of course, telling the truth at all times – an important value in this era of fake news and ‘post-truth politics.’ It speaks to the value of expert knowledge –science that keeps asking questions and accepts uncertainty, and ensures that all discoveries and analyses are properly peer-reviewed. It requires all people to respect expertise and detailed knowledge and probe for the truth in all things – political, financial, scientific, historical, emotional and artistic.

Create your own Peace Child: Apart from the key characters – the Story-teller, Sami and Becky, the dialogue in this script is assigned to unnamed characters: CC 1 / CC 2 / Child etc. This is because we want the children of your cast to give their own names to the characters and imagine themselves to be the children of the story. Also, at several points in this script, there are “Drop-in Sections” – parts of the script which we require you to re-write – after exploring the Lesson Plans, discussing and improvising around the issues, and coming up with new ideas and dialogue. This is hard work: much harder than doing the script as written. But if you do that research and come up with new lines, your cast will learn and internalise so much more about the Global Goals than if they just glibly repeat lines, parrot fashion. They will also feel more like Peace Children themselves and, hopefully, be inspired and empowered to take action. You can – of course – take this a lot further ( – and many producers have): you can create your own songs and raps; you can write new scenes, a new climax – even a whole new musical. But, if you want to call it Peace Child, we require that you set your story on Peace Day in 2050, and that you use at least five of David Gordon’s songs.

Royalties: Peace Child is an educational vehicle designed to help your children understand and feel ownership of the Global Goals. Therefore, for educational / school performances, neither the authors, nor the Charity, Peace Child International, charge a royalty. Rather we encourage you to raise money by selling tickets or taking a collection and then give the money to a charity of your choice, preferably one that promotes the achievement of the Global Goals. That can – of course! – be Peace Child International – which works in Africa to help youth find / create, decent jobs for all. (SDG Goal 8)

Scene ONE Peace Day – 2050

The show starts in silence. A spotlight splits the darkness picking out the figure of a child coming forward downstage right to sing:

Song ONE: Peace Day

SCORE VIDEO AUDIO INSTRUMENTAL

Child ONE: Come into my joy!

A second child comes downstage left singing:

Child TWO: Come into my pain!

Both children move towards each other, singing together:

Childs 1 & 2:

Come – you be a friend of mine!

I’ll be the same! (repeat x 2)

Child ONE: As I go through my years with many thousand tears I never see my guiding light

The clouds in front of me won’t ever let me see I’ve grown so weary of the night

Child TWO:

Childs 1 & 2:

I’ve tried so many times to read between the lines

But the words keep turning round

And a thousand fears keep ringing in my ears

And I’m so weary of the sound –

So give me Peace Enough, Peace Enough, Peace Enough

So give me peace enough, for peace of mind Everything’s coming up sunshine! (x2)

Both children come forward, clapping their hands, as the Houselights come up – and the children / parents of the Cast, Dance Troupe, Story-teller’s group and Chorus, enter down the aisles – singing and dancing – all dressed in white and colourful Mayday ribbons;

Chorus Come into my joy. Come into my pain.

Come you’ll be a friend of mine

I’ll be the same X 2

They all reach the stage, and move to their places on the risers as the dancers perform centre stage, and all sing:

Chorus (Majestic)

Peace Day, Peace Day we all say Happy world. Happy Day

Wear a leaf and show the way Celebrating this peace day

Peace Day, Peace Day we all say Happy world, holiday.

Wear a leaf and show the way Celebrating this peace day.

Peace Day, Peace Day sing and dance

Chorus

It will be a big romance

People of the world as one Peace Day, Peace Day has begun.

Celebrations, jubilations, Laughter, shouting , lots of fun

Singing, dancing, take your partner

Happiness for everyone

Peace enough for all mankind

Healthy body, happy mind

Faith and love the world as one Peace Day. Peace Day has begun

Come into my joy.

Come into my pain.

Come you’ll be a friend of mine

I’ll be the same X 2

Come into my joy. Come into my pain.

(Ralentando) Come you’ll be a friend of mine.

I’ll be the same.

Everyone is on stage at the end of the song – in a tableau. The tableau breaks and every one falls into the arms of their neighbour, greeting them saying:

ALL: Happy Peace Day! Happy Peace Day!! A

Child Hey Look! It’s the Story-teller!

Story-teller (ST) enters greeting first the younger children (5-12) who rush up to her.(The Story-teller can be male or female – but, out of habit, we refer to throughout as “Her” – in respect of the original Story-teller, Susannah York.)

ST Happy Peace Day everyone! Happy Peace Day!

ALL(Severally) Happy Peace Day, Story-teller!!

Drop-in ONE: What follows is one way of doing this crucial first scene. There are many others – which you can check out at Lesson ONE – the World in 2050. However you choose to do it, you must ask your cast the question: “What would you like your world to look like in 2050?” Get each child to give ONE answer, or to write one idea down on paper. Then read them out – or put them up on a chalk board. Or give them a home-work assignment to go home and ask the same question of their family and friends – and come back on another day with their answers. Tell them the old lines, like: “If you don’t know where you want to get to, you have no idea which way to go!” “Dare to Dream!” / “Some look at the world the way it is and ask ‘Why?’ – others look at the world the way it could be and ask: ‘Why Not?’” This is probably the most important Drop-in of Peace Child: do spend some time at the start of rehearsals exploring it.

ST So – WELCOME to Peace Day 2050 – the day we remember what children did all those years ago to bring peace and prosperity to our entire human family. And all around our world on this day – in every town, and every village, children and leaders are coming together to watch and learn from the Peace Child story. And we shall in just a moment. But first – can any one tell me what time it is?

They all look at their watches – and answer with whatever time it is in the theatre.

ST No! – What TIME is it? Is it the Stone Age?

Children No!

ST Is it the Iron Age?

Children No!

ST Is it the time of the Industrial Revolution?

Children NO!

ST So – what TIME do you think we are living through now?

Child A Time of Peace

Chorus (applauding loudly – whistling, and shouting) Yes! Right! Spot on! Etc.

Child A time of healthy people with doctors and hospitals everywhere…

Chorus (applauding loudly – whistling, and shouting) Yes! Right! Spot on! Etc.

Child A time when every child in every country can go to a good school!

Chorus (applauding loudly – whistling, and shouting) Yes!

Child A Time without poverty

Child – where NO ONE is left behind.

Child A Time without Hate

Child – without angry people

Child – without fear of anything

Child A time when we take care of all the flowers and the trees and the animals

Chorus (applauding loudly – whistling, and shouting) Yes! Right! Cool! Etc.

ST A Time of Peace – where no one is left behind. Sounds pretty good to me!? Well done us! So – is there anything wrong with this time we’re living through?

Older Child Well – we’re still using too much coal and oil

Older Child It’s so stoopid!! What do those people think they’re…

ST Ah-ah! Wait – no more angry people!

Older Child I’m not angry – I’m just so disappointed that some people think that it doesn’t matter – that the science is all wrong.

Older Child That climate change isn’t happening

Older Child When it so obviously is.

ST Thank you. Do you all understand? (they all nod assent) That is the most pressing challenge facing your generation. There will be others – for though we live in a time of peace now, history tells us that wars, and anger, and terrorism will break out again. That is why it is so important to remember the story we’re going to tell again today. The story of how children of my generation – children not much older than you – rose to their generational challenges and set the example that changed our world.

Child The Peace Child?

ST Yes – the Peace Child. (Music starts)

ST (to the Core Cast) So – do you all know the parts?

Core Cast Of course, Yes – sure!

ST (to her group of young children) – and one day, you will too, and then you can tell the story every Peace Day. Because, in your lives, you must work, as we did, to try to leave the world a better place than the one you were born into.

Core Cast Yes!

ST

ST

miles in diameter flying, in formation with the moon and 8 other planets, at 60,000 miles an hour around a star we call the Sun. And yet our world was in trouble – big trouble.

Population going up – stuff available to feed and clothe them going down. Plants and animals were disappearing. There was climate change: sea-levels rising and yet instead of dealing with these problems, people were fighting and killing each other for what – looking back on it – were ridiculously trivial matters. So, of course, we kids were cross. Very cross! You say it, team:

Song THREE: World SCORE VIDEO AUDIO INSTRUMENTAL

Music starts. Two of the Core Cast come forward: (Images of war and misery appear on the screen behind.)

World – look at the way we are

Look at the things we do

Look at the words we say

Life! – look at the way we live

Look at the love we had

Look at the things we’ve made

Gone, gone are all those lovely days

Gone are all the peaceful ways

All that’s left is old and grey

And our world is fading

Our world is dying – today!

Can’t you see the tide is changing?

Don’t you know that truth is fading?

People coming out from under Slowly rising to the thunder

Listen to the shouting people

Broken churches, broken steeple

There’s no one for them to follow Every one’s a God tomorrow

Can’t you see the world is dying? Repentant people all are crying

Law and order has been drowned Chaos rules and has been crowned!

World – look at the way we are

Look at the things we do

Look at the games we play

Life! – look at the way we live

Look at the things we build

Look at the love we’ve killed

Gone, gone are all those lovely days

Gone are all the peaceful ways

(Diminuendo) All that’s left is old and grey

(Diminuendo / ralentando) And our world is fading

Our world is dying – today!

ST Of course, our WORLD was not dying. Neither was the human family – though some of them were. It was the essential infrastructure of the planet – the rivers, the forests, the oceans, the wild animals and their natural habitats: that’s what we – like a terrible, cancerous disease – were killing and that would have ultimately killed the human family too. But Planet Earth would have been fine: it would have shrugged us off like so many fleas and carried on hurtling around the sun. So who are this Human Family? Let me take you back to a wonderful School Assembly led by a wonderful teacher which I remember vividly to this day.

Enter – the Teacher: (you can cast one of your teacher colleagues in this role, but we find it funnier to have a student play the role – dressed up to look, and act, like a well-known, well-loved teacher from your school / community. Either works.)

Teacher Today, we’re going to learn about the Human Family – and I want you to imagine all 7.5 billion of us as a Village of 100 people. That’s all of you… (S/he organises the Chorus to the centre of the stage in a tight group. Or – if you only have a small chorus –you can get the Teacher to organise the audience to be the “village”. As s/he reads out the statistics, the quoted number of village members who do NOT have what’s being discussed come forward.)

If the world were a village of 100 people, 86 are able to read and write; 14 are not. (You understand, don’t you? There are a billion of that 7.5 billion people in the world who can’t read or write. But – a billion is a big number to get your head around – where 14 is that group over there. Easy, right?!)

78 have a roof over their heads, 22 do not;

91 have access to safe drinking water; 9 do not;

40 have access to the Internet; 60 do not;

25 are children; 75 – adults, of whom 9 are over 65 (They separate accordingly)

Of those 25 children, 7 will go to college, 8 will finish secondary school, 9 will finish primary school – and one will not go to school at all; (Focus on the one!)

26 have easy access to doctors and health care; 62 have seen a doctor at least once in their lives, and 12 have never seen a doctor ever. (Focus on the twelve!)

?? live in democracies; ?? live in dictatorships where their human rights are not respected. Less than one is caught up in an active war or terrorism.

Drop-in TWO: We encourage you to check our figures and do your own research. The original idea of the world as a village of 100 people was developed by Donella Meadows, and repeated in the UN’s Millennium Declaration, drafted by John Ruggie. Oxfam does an annual study of how the richest 5 – 50 – 100 people on the planet own more than the poorest billion. (Insane, right?!) We got most of our figures from the 100 People Project But it is an intriguing Math project to get your cast to find out new figures – for health, sanitation, welfare, jobs etc. – and figure out how many in the village of 100 people that represents.

Teacher Now let’s have a World Feast! When the village sits down to a meal, 6 are served a 5-course banquet; 22 are served a substantial 3-course meal; 38 are served rice with meat; 25 have a bowl of rice usually without meat, and 5 mostly do not eat at all. With the result that 22 villagers are over-weight, 11 are severely under-nourished and 1 is dying of starvation.

The Meal is served: You don’t have to be too precise about this. The main point is that the six having the banquet, are continuously getting more food served to them while the five who rarely eat at all sit on the ground and look sad.

Teacher So – what are we going to do about this, then?

The answer is obvious: the children having the banquet and those having a substantial 3-course meal take their food to those sitting on the ground with no food. Those with meat in their rice share it with those who don’t. The teacher – or the children – can explain it – or you just act it out as a mime.

Child Why can’t we do this in real life?

Teacher You tell me!

Child Because we’re too selfish?

Child Because it’s too difficult to transport the food from here where we have it to the places where we don’t?

Child Because the people that don’t eat have no money….

Teacher All good answers but the basic answer is: the world is not fair. It never was fair and to my mind never will be. The poor will be always with us – and I prefer to focus on the things that I can change, rather than the things that I can’t. And what’s the one thing I can change at the World Feast?

Child The menu at the banquet?

Child The kind of meat you have with your rice?

Child Maybe not to have meat: be a vegetarian?

Teacher Exactly! Because we are what we eat – and if we eat fatty, unhealthy foods we are all going to get fat and unhealthy – and fall sick and die young! So – let’s talk about that….

The Teacher shepherds the chorus back to the Risers ( – or the audience back to their seats) – as the Storyteller comes forward

ST And so we did! And we learned how fruit and vegetables are good for us – and too much butter and sugar and sweets and biscuits are bad for us. And how important it is to brush our teeth and wash our hands and wrap up warm in winter so that we can all grow up and be good, healthy people! But some of us were worried about that line: “The poor will be always with us…” Why? Why couldn’t we help the poor become richer? Let’s meet them:

Scene THREE

A School Classroom – NOW

The Core Cast(CC) sit on chairs in serried rows waiting for their teacher. They include Sami and Becky – who become the main characters in the story. The Teacher comes in looking harassed

Teacher I’m sorry – something’s come up with the Year threes and the head’s asked me to sort it out. Sami, Becky? You’re the class captains: can you lead a discussion on what we just did – and create a home-work assignment to be handed in by Friday?

Becky Yes, Miss! (The Teacher leaves)

Sami So – what do we think about all that then?

CC 1 I don’t buy it!

Becky Buy what?

CC 1 The fact that the poor will be always with us.

CC2 I agree! We should make sure all poor people have enough food, homes, doctors, schools –everything during our lifetimes.

Core Cast Right – Yeah! Let’s do it!!

Sami That’s really hard!

Becky Sure – but my father says that our only purpose in life is to leave the world a better place than we found it!

CC3 What’s he? A vicar?

Becky No – a Rabbi.

CC4 What’s a rabbi?

Sami A Jewish vicar. Kind of…

CC3 Doesn’t matter. It’s a stupid idea

CC5 Why?

CC3 Because surely the purpose of life is to be a success, be famous, get rich – get to the top!

CC6 Get a fast car – big house, nice yacht, holiday home by the beach. (Sami looks at them as though they were mad.)

CC7 (To Sami) You don’t agree?

Sami Well –

Becky Of course he doesn’t agree: his country is having a civil war. Hundreds of people are dying and living in refugee camps – or trying to get here on leakey boats

Sami Yeah – so the only way to end poverty there is to have Peace first.

CC 8 – and when will that happen?

Sami Not any time soon. One side’s dropping bombs on hospitals – the other side’s putting suicide jackets on 10-year olds and blowing them up in market places.

CC9 That’s horrible.

Sami You’ve no idea how horrible. My cousin was killed by one of them.

CC10 Why doesn’t some body stop them?

CC2 Some people are trying. The United Nations is trying – but when mad dogs are fighting, it is almost impossible to stop them.

CC5 But people aren’t mad dogs

CC6 Some are.

Sami (Standing and coming to the front) There’s your homework assignment! “Are people mad enough to destroy the world?!” Look back at history: Hitler – the French Revolution – the English Revolution when they cut the King’s head off…. We know that there are some crazy people, but are we all crazy enough to destroy our beautiful little planet? BLACK OUT

Lights come up slowly: the core cast have gone. Sami and Becky talk alone

Becky So – are we?

Sami Are we what?

Becky Crazy enough to destroy our world?

Sami The people in my country certainly are.

Becky Tell me about your country?

Sami Now? – or how it was?

Becky How it was.

Sami It was warm – and beautiful! The most beautiful place in the world, especially in spring with the almond blossom, and the goat bells tinkling under the olive trees. My home had a big garden with a fish pond, and a stream running around the terrace. All gone now –

Becky Why?

Sami Bombed – blown up. Destroyed.

Becky So – had you stayed home, you might be dead?

Sami Almost certainly.

Becky I don’t want to be dead

Sami Neither do I! My dad tells me that we will be going home soon – and I really want to but I don’t want to die.

Becky No!

Sami I want to live! To grow up – have a full life – a family, children of my own. I want to be old like my grand-parents and tell my grand-children stories like they tell me. I want – I want – I want to live.

Song FOUR: I Want to Live

SCORE VIDEO AUDIO INSTRUMENTAL

Sami (Sings)

I want to live, I want to live

The right to live my life I want to search far and wide

Have the right to wonder why I want to fly through the air

Like a bird in the sky, I want the chance to see the world

What I am before I die.

Becky (Sings) I want to be, I want to see

A world that’s good and free I want a home, someone to love

To share their life with me I want to have and to hold

A child of my own I want to live, I want to love

The right to grow old..

BOTH (Sing) I want to live, I want to live

The right to live my life

I want to search far and wide

Have the right to wonder why I want to fly through the air

Like a bird in the sky, I want the chance to see the world

What I am before I die.

Sami & Becky: I want to live

Becky Why are we just writing essays about this?! We need to DO SOMETHING!

Sami What can we do?! There’s nothing that kids can do. I’ve seen those guys and they’re totally crazy! They cut people’s heads off and drop them out of helicopters just for fun

Becky But I want to do something.

Sami Me too! I lie in my bed at night and can’t sleep for thinking about it.

Becky We have to think of something. We’ve got our whole lives to think about it.

Sami But if the United Nations can’t think of anything, what chance do a couple of kids have.

Becky Every chance! I hadn’t given it a moment’s thought until this morning – but I’m sure that, by tomorrow break-time – I will have a ton of ideas to share with you.

Sami See you tomorrow, then?

Becky Deal!

They shake hands and run off either side of stage.

Scene FOUR School Playground – The Next Day

The Core Cast(CC) are playing football – and getting quite rowdy – until the teacher blows the whistle. Sami rushes in – looking for Becky. The rest of the Core Cast exit leaving the two alone:

Sami I’m sorry! – I had to go see the Head.

Becky What did you do wrong?

Sami Nothing! – oh! I’m just so confused!

Becky Why? What happened?

Sami I don’t know what to do!

Becky Sit down – and tell me what’s going on?

Teacher Come along you two – you don’t want to be late for class!

Becky We’ve got a free period!

Teacher OK (He Exits)

Sami Liar – you’ve got history.

Becky That’s history until you tell me what’s going on?

Sami My Dad’s being posted back to the Capital – and he wants us all to go with him.

Becky But that’s dangerous!

Sami Exactly – which is why my mum doesn’t want to go. She wants to keep us here!

Becky What does the Head say.

Sami She says I should follow my conscience. What would you say?

Becky The same, I guess. But I’ll be sad to see you go: so will a bunch of other people. You’re a popular guy round here.

Sami Thanks! It’s sooooo difficult. My Heart says: “Go Home!” but my Head says “Stay!” Anyway – did you think of anything that kids could do to help the people in my country?

Becky I thought of lots of things – but probably only one that could do any good.

Sami What’s that?

Becky We could be friends.

Sami What?!

Becky I know it sounds silly – but so many people from your country hate my people, and so many of my people think that you’re all terrorists, that if we could show that it’s possible to be firm friends – I think that would be a good start.

Sami Well – of course! That’s a given! Why wouldn’t I be friends with a great person like you?

Becky I can think of a thousand reasons.

Sami Name one!

Becky I’m really messy!

Sami Who cares?! What else did you think of that we could do to help my country find peace.

Becky Oh – silly things: letter campaigns; hunger strikes, boycotts, marches, demonstrations outside the embassies.

Sami Those are all pretty good ideas. Where did you get them?

Becky They’re the bog-standard protest stuff. Trouble is, I don’t think any of them are going to work

Sami Me neither. I really think that my country would be better off without the people! We should ship them out – to Antarctica or somewhere – and let them fight it out there with snowballs. And then, when they’re done fighting – we would let them come home.

Becky That’s a great idea!

Sami But stoopid!

Becky Yeah – stupid! But quite funny…. (They laugh)

Sami Look – you should get back to class.

Becky When do you have to go?

Sami I don’t know – soon!

Becky So you’re going to go – to follow your heart not your head!

Sami I guess

Becky I’ll miss you

Sami But we’re friends, right? So – I will keep in touch.

Becky Sure

Sami And we can keep having our stoopid ideas about making peace.

Becky Of course. You tell me how it is – and I will think of something….

Sami I know you will. You’re the best!

Becky So are you. I believe in you… (Music starts)

Song

FIVE: Reach Out for a Star

Becky(sings) Reach out for a star! Come out from where you are Show me what you can do Believe in me, I believe in you!

Reach out for your dream

It’s not as hard as it may seem Together we can make it through Together – me and you!

Sami Wake up – open your eyes, This is our world, our paradise.

Reach out, don’t be afraid Come on now, we’ll find a way

There’s a whole new world for us to see There’s a universe in you and me. Sami & Becky

Reach out, put your hand in mine!

Oh see! – see how we shine! Together – we’ll make it through, Together me and you!

Don’t be shy, just be yourself! You are your greatest wealth!

Reach out for a star!

Come out from where you are Show me what you can do Believe in me, I believe in you!

Show me what you can do Believe in me, I believe in you!

They hug – then separate. Becky watches as Sami runs off stage. Black Out

Scene FIVE

School Exterior – Some Weeks Later

filled with fun, dancing and colour as the kids show what it is to have a good time as untroubled children. Until one of the tinkles is discovered to be Becky’s mobile phone : Becky It’s Sami! He’s on Skype…

CC 1 Let’s go

They run off – excited. Black Out

Scene FIVE(Contd.): School Interior – Classroom

A Screen is lowered from the ceiling. The kids rush in and sit in front of it. Becky fiddles with her mobile phone – and a grainy image of Sami comes up on it. [If your school has a projector and a laptop computer with a camera this should be fairly easy to organize with the boy playing Sami sitting off stage and speaking to the laptop. If not – it is possible to do it with sound only.]

Drop-in THREE – Sami’s Speech: In 2016 / 17 – everyone asks: “Where’s Sami from? – Afghanistan? Yemen? Syria? Central African Republic? Somalia? South Sudan?!” And we answer: “It doesn’t matter…” Because if you say where he’s from– you limit his identity. He is every child who’s ever been caught up in a war – from Bosnia to Ingushettia, from Kashmir to the American Civil War or the World Wars fought by our ancestors. So this speech has to be re-written – not just by the actor playing Sami – but by every child in your class thinking themselves into the shoes of any child whose witnessed the horror and tragedy of war. Painful to do – but, in the context of Peace Child, OK – because we know we’re heading for a happy ending where Peace reigns.

Sami Hi guys –

Becky How are you?

CC 2 You look terrible!

CC 3 No – that’s just the connection

Becky No really, Sami: you don’t look well. What happened?

Sami Who’s there?

CC 4 All of us!

Sami The whole class?

All Yes

Becky We’re all worried about you

Sami Thank you

CC 5 How have you been?

Sami Terrible

Becky Tell us what happened, Sami…

Sami I don’t know if I can – but I’ll try: you know we live in the Compound for the government and diplomats. It’s like a bubble – and I’m not allowed out because it’s so dangerous. But our driver goes out every day to get food – and he refuses to take me. So yesterday, I climbed into the back and crouched in the foot-well until we got to the market. When he got out, I raised my head and looked around. It was all destroyed – everything! Ruined blown up buildings, only a handful of market stalls, practically no food – hundreds of starving people begging for something, anything that our drive could give them. It was like a hell. And some children saw me and came over and started banging on the window, their arms like thin sticks. I have never seen children so thin and hungry-looking. I felt like a visitor from another planet. And then, of course, my driver saw me – and bawled me out for coming. And I said: “I just had to see – see what’s happening to my country.” And he said: “So you want to see, yes? I’ll show you…” And he drove me back past the schools that had been bombed out –with children’s bodies lying unburied on the playground, tower blocks with their windows blown out and families living in the bombed out ruins like cave people. And then – just

before we came back into the compound – we passed the hospital where I was born. And they’d bombed that too. The driver told me that 17 babies had died because the maternity unit had taken a direct hit. And the doctors laid the babies out on the pavement for the journalists to see – except there are no journalists because the government refuses to allow any journalists in. But I saw them – little bundles of rags with dead babies inside. And the worst bit, sitting up against the ruined wall as though she was looking after them, was a dead nurse still in her uniform but with her face blown off. It was so horrible…

I’m sorry. Why am I telling you this? There’s nothing you can do…

CC5 There has to be something we can do –

Becky (wiping tears from her eyes) What would you like us to do?

Sami Tell your government to stop sending bombs to the enemy. ‘Cos every bomb that’s dropped on schools or hospitals in my country has “Made in America” or “Made in Britain” printed on the side. Why?? Why are they still selling those bastards bombs? They must know.

CC6 Did you get any photographs?

Sami Yes – I had my mobile phone with me

Becky Great! Well send those over.

CC 7 If there are no journalists there – you can be our man on the ground.

Becky My dad knows some people who could use them.

Sami Please do it. Do something – it’s mad what’s happening here

Becky We will – [There’s the sound of a small explosion. Sami looks around, scared.]

Sami That was a bit close… (he smiles)

Then there’s a huge explosion – the sound goes silent and the picture of Sami on the screen breaks up and disappears replaced by white static.

CC 8 Oh my God!

Becky (leaping up, clawing Black Out

Music starts, soft, gentle. Spotlight

Song SIX: I WHO AM SCORE

Girl (sings)

INSTRUMENTAL

I – what am I, what is my cause, What must I be?

Is there a reason for living

And having this place of our own

What power conceived me?

Abandoned me to the unknown?

Out of the darkness, the chorus emerge and join her singing:

We, who are we? What is this place? Why are we here?

We, who are we to be so lost And all alone?

Is there a reason for living

And having this place of our own

What power conceived me?

Abandoned me to the unknown?

Becky(sings) I – who am I, what is this world, Why am I here?

As the song ends, the chorus separates and Sami is wheeled in on a wheel-chair. Hold for the tableau – the chorus all looking at him in a mixture of pity and horror. Sami’s face, stoney, impassive. Becky hugging him. Fade to Black

Scene SIX

Media Medley – Some Days Later

The bouncey, rhythmic music of the Press Song as Becky proudly pushes Sami down stage in the wheel-chair. Some camera people are setting up a camera on a tripod and a make-up person comes over and fusses with Becky and Sami’s faces – making sure that they look good for the camera. The music stops and the interview begins:

Interviewer So how did you get those pictures?

Sami On my mobile

Interviewer I thought you lost your mobile in the explosion

Becky He did – but then he found it.

Sami When the bomb hit, it was blown out of my hand but when I came to under the rubble, it was just there, by my side. The screen was all smashed up, but the hard drive still worked. Interviewer And what are you going to do now?

Sami/Becky (together) Stop the War!

Interviewer How?

Becky By being friends. Friends don’t kill each other…

Sami – and by stopping this country selling bombs to my country!

Becky Or any country.

Interviewer How are you going to do that?

Becky (Very angry) By telling our government: “STOP IT!!” We’re supposed to be a civilised country – and civilised countries don’t make money by selling guns and bombs and killing machines to any one who can pay for them. That’s not right! We’re in this world now – and we may be young – but we’re going to be living in it for a lot longer than you old guys. So we’re going to start making some rules, right NOW! And the first of those rules is: DO NOT BOMB HOSPITALS! How dare you??!!

Sami How dare you kill babies – and the nurses who look after them? How dare you kill the doctors who are trying to cure people and heal the wounds that your bombs give them? It’s not right! And all you clever big people can chatter, chatter, chatter – on TV and at the United Nations – but my friends, my family are dying in my country. And I might have to spend the rest of my life in a wheel chair because of your bombs.

Becky WHY??

Chorus (Moving forward, quietly at first, then louder) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? WHY?!

Song SEVEN: IT’S A STORY SCORE VIDEO AUDIO

INSTRUMENTAL

Music starts – and the camera people look at each other. They’re impressed by these kids – and they have an idea about how they can exploit their anger to their advantage. So they start singing:

Interviewer(sings) It’s a story! We really gotta story!

Camera people (responding) Headline Story, definitely front page news –

Interviewer I’ll arrange everything!

The Core Cast start arranging the chairs in a chat show format. The Interviewer puts on a glitzy sequined jacket and comes on as the screen above him flashes: “APPLAUSE – APPLAUSE”

Interviewer Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen – and welcome to my show. Now this evening, I am very happy to welcome here two courageous young people who have made it their purpose to fight for peace and a ban on Arms Sales. Will you welcome please – Becky and Samir.

Becky and Sami come – smartly dressed but looking incredibly nervous, holding hands for mutual support as the screen flashes: “APPLAUSE – APPLAUSE”

Interviewer And I’m also very pleased to welcome tonight the minister responsible for selling those weapons, the British Minister of Defense!

Again, the screen flashes: “APPLAUSE – APPLAUSE” as a child, greyed up and dressed in a formal suit comes on as the Minister.

Interviewer Now Minister – you’ve seen Sami’s photographs. What’s your response?

Minister First – I must applaud this young man’s courage in getting his photographs out of the country so that the world can see what is going on his country. If there’s any justice, a Pulitzer prize is in your future, sir.

Interviewer But how do you justify selling British bombs to governments that inflict such terrible damage on innocent civilians?

Minister There is no conclusive evidence that they were British. Governments buy ordnance from any number of countries…

CC 3 What’s “ordnance”?

Sami Yes sir – what is “Ordnance”? Why do you use long complicated words when you could use simple ones that every one can understand.

Becky Yes! If you mean “Bombs” – please say “Bombs”!

Minister Point taken. But you must understand that selling – er – “Bombs” and other military equipment – which is a big part of British Manufacturing industry that employs thousands of people and earns huge amounts of foreign currency for our country – is very complicated. We have what we call “end-user certificates” which authorises only the government to whom we sell it to use it for self-defense and other specific circumstances.

Sami So you authorised your end-user to use British bombs to try to kill me??

Minister (shocked) – NO!

Interviewer Well if you didn’t authorise them, who did? End user certificates are public documents –and I have one example here with your signature on it.

Minister Look – what happened to Samir was a mistake. Mistakes happen in war. It’s what they call ‘collateral damage’ – another long word, but it means is that no one deliberately tried to target the diplomatic compound. It was a bomb that went astray.

Becky Like the ones that bombed the hospitals

Samir – and the schools and the wedding party, and the funeral procession.

Becky There are just too many mistakes, Minister!

Interviewer So what do you propose we do about it, kids?

CC 4 – and we’d give them food at mealtimes.

CC 5 But we’ve all got to learn: you don’t stop wars by killing your enemies

Samir You only stop wars by making your enemies your friends.

Interviewer Who said that?

Samir Abraham Lincoln I think!

Interviewer So – why don’t you do that, Minister?

Minister We have some of the very best diplomats in the world, and they are working round-theclock through the United Nations and other international channels to bring about a ceasefire in this war. These things take time – you have to be patient.

Samir (wrestling in his wheel chair) Patient?! PATIENT?!! This war’s been going on for seven years –that’s most of my life! If you say you have the best diplomats in the world, you can tell them from me: they’re not doing a very good job….

Becky It’s not just his country: you’re not doing a very good job anywhere! Look at Israel! – we’ve been waiting for a 2-state solution since before my grand-father was born!

CC 6 We were on holiday in Cyprus last year. That island’s still divided.

CC 7 My cousin lives in Kashmir: he says the problems there have lasted for generations –

CC 8 Same in Morocco

CC 9 North Korea –

CC 10 Many, many countries – all over the world!

Becky It’s such a mess.

Samir At the very least, stop making and selling the bombs. I am very lucky to be alive and sitting here. My cousin and many of my friends and countrymen are dead because of the bombs you make in this country. (looking straight at the camera) I beg you – if you get up in the morning and go to a factory to make bombs, stop now! Go on strike! Resign.

Becky And if you are married to some one who makes bombs, refuse to make them breakfast, lunch or dinner until they stop.

Interviewer What do you say to that Minister?

Minister If we stop, some one else will make them. And our country will be the poorer for it.

Samir How can you sit there and make it a matter of money! You tried to kill me with your bombs and you nearly succeeded: I could be in this wheel-chair for the rest of my life because of you. And you sit there and tell me that trying to killing me was necessary to make money?!

Becky It’s disgusting! Music starts

Minister I’m sorry.

Becky Sorry’s not good enough!

Samir You’ve got to stop it. Right NOW!

Becky You’re the government! That’s your job

Samir Get to it!

CC 5 (gets up, moves round the back of her chair, and starts to sing)

Song EIGHT: WORLD SO BLIND

CC 5

CC6

CC7

CC 6 & 7

For every gain there is a natural loss

In every church each temple and each mosque

For every paradise there must be a hell

In every saint the devil dwells

For every mountain there must be a plain

In every sea a piece of land

But what we gonna do when it all runs out

What we gonna say when its to late

Are we going to blame it all on someone else

Just not ourselves??

Becky Hungry children with their sunken eyes

Holding out their hands in vain

Wealthy nations with their mountains of food

Excuses flaunted without shame

No one seems to be responsible

No one wants to take the blame

Chorus

But what we gonna do when it all runs out

What we gonna say when it’s to late

Are we gonna blame it all on someone else

Just not ourselves??

Chorus

Samir

Chorus

World so blind, pretending as if nothing is wrong

Hey there man, I’m talking to you

Wait a minute don’t walk away now

Yes it’s you, not someone else on a different floor I mean you, they’ll be breaking down your door

Blaming you forever more

Little families in their broken down boats

Going for a sail today they’d say

Tankers laden with the wealth of the world

They wave then turn away

Countries argue over who when and where But do they really care

And what we gonna do when it all runs out….

What we gonna say when it’s too late

Are we gonna blame it all on someone else just not ourselves??

World so blind, pretending as if nothing is wrong

Hey there man, I’m talking to you

Wait a minute don’t turn away now

Yes it’s you, not someone else on a different floor

I mean you, they’ll be breaking down your door

Blaming you forever more (Repeat)

The rest of the Core Group and the Chorus join in – singing their anger to the Minister, and to the adults in the audience. It moves to a climax – they hold for a tableau. The audience – and the interviewer – applaud, but not the Minister. And the kids go back to their chairs.

Interviewer: Your thoughts, Minister

Minister We’re doing our best! Sitting in a school room, or in a comfortable house in the suburbs –you just can’t understand the complexity of what’s happening. So – I say again: be patient.

Interviewer I get that these young people are in no mood to be patient, are you?

Children No

CC 1 We want the problem solved tomorrow!

CC 2 Today if possible.

Interviewer So what are you going to do?

The children don’t know what to say – they look to Samir in his wheel chair. Becky waits for him to speak. He thinks very carefully before looking at the Interviewer:

Samir I don’t know’ is my honest answer. My parents elected his government to solve these problems – not me. And until last week, I was sitting in a comfortable house in the suburbs of my city waiting for him to do so. Now he’s bombed my home and I’m back in exile here in your country, I admit my patience is running out. And if he’s not going to do anything – we shall have to. But what that is….? – we’ll all have to think very carefully about.

Interviewer Well – be sure to come back to us when you’ve decided.

Children We shall

Interviewer Goodnight – and good luck!

The screen above flashes: “APPLAUSE – APPLAUSE” as the Interviewer walks off escorting the Minister Fade to Black

Scene EIGHT

Hanging Out – Some Days Later

The children take off their jackets and flop down on large bean bag / cushions. It’s a weekend afternoon – and they are hanging out in Becky’s home, drinking soft drinks and watching TV. A football match commentary plays softly in the background. A mobile phone rings:

Becky Can you get that?

CC 3 Sure! (Answering the phone) No – she’s not here at the moment. He’s not either. Yes – yes of course. I will – as soon as they get in. (she hangs up)

Becky (Stretching out on the cushion) I’m on strike!

Sami So am I! I don’t take calls from the Media at the weekend.

Becky Are they still camped outside?!

CC 6 Only about ten of them

CC 7 Fewer than yesterday!

Sami Good.

Becky We’ve still got to come up with something to do –

CC 8 – ‘cos the governments sure are not going to!

Sami And we will! Just not on a Sunday

CC 5 I still think the idea of a Pantomime Horse Parade outside Parliament is the best idea

CC 4 A Show of Hands is much simpler

Sami It’s all gesture politics. Fancy flim-flam demonstrations. My grand-father used to go on ban the bomb demonstrations he told me. Every year – without fail, marching miles and miles – with thousands of other people. But we still have the nuclear bomb.

Becky And this stoopid governments just about to spend trillions building new ones.

CC 8 Billions isn’t it.

CC 5 Who cares – it’s a lot of money that would better be spent on other things like hospitals and schools.

CC 6 Which we could do very easily if only there was peace.

CC 1 You know that every government has signed up to “promote peaceful societies” and “end violence everywhere”?

Samir What’s that?

CC 1 The Global Goals: one of the reporters gave me this pamphlet about them. They’ve signed up to a whole lot more besides:

Sami Like what?

CC 2 (Taking the pamphlet and reading) Jobs for everyone by 2030

Becky No more poverty

CC 4 Education for every one

CC 3 No more climate change

CC 6 What’s that?

CC 8 Melting ice caps, sea-levels rising, dead polar bears. Just your average end of the world stuff

Sami And what did your reporter friend tell you that the world’s governments are doing to achieve these Global Goals.

CC 1 She didn’t!

Sami Why am I not surprised?!

Becky But look, Sam: they’ve promised some pretty cool things. No one left behind. Food for all, shelter for all, education for all, health for all – that’s what we were saying after that World Banquet we did.

CC 2 Why would they promise all those things if they weren’t going to do them?

Sami Because promises are cheap. Doing it is expensive.

CC 3 And, as we saw, money is the only thing that governments care about.

Becky I hope that’s not true….

Sami C’mon Becks. Get real. Kids don’t have money

CC 4 – that’s why Governments don’t care about us.

Becky But they do care! At least they say they do – and they give us all these fancy schools and universities to go to.

CC 5 Just so that we can learn how to make bigger and better bombs to make their country richer.

CC 6 I hope that’s not true.

Becky I know that isn’t true. There are some good people in government – and we must get them on our side.

Sami How?

CC 4 I don’t think a parade of Pantomime horses is going to do it….

Sami No – it’s got to be something Bold!

CC 6 Something that will catch their attention

CC 8 Something awesome!

CC 3 – something that will give them a great big kick right in the bottom!

Sami Wait! What was that you said, Becky – just a moment ago!

Becky About the Global Goals?

Sami No – about the media and week-ends!?

Becky We don’t do media at the weekends?

Sami Right!! – “I’m on strike!” you said. That’s it. Yes! How does anything ever happen in this world?

CC 2 We go on strike?

CC 1 How can we? We’re not even working…

Sami Sure we are! – they make work us to death every day at school! And you remember what I said about encouraging factory workers who make bombs to go on strike? That’s it! If we get every kid and every worker to go on strike until… until –

Becky – until they make all these Global Goals happen?!

Sami Yes! Why not?

CC 6 That would get their attention!!

CC 3 How would we get every one out on strike?

Sami We tell them!

CC 5 How?

Becky Social Media!

Sami Yes! – We’re a billion strong on Facebook – and our TV Chat went viral on Youtube. We’ve got the Media from around the world lining up around the block outside our homes. We can tell everyone: “Put down your tools; do NOT go to school – do NOT do your homework. Learn up about the Global Goals and do not go back to school until your governments work out a good way to make sure that they happen!”

All (severally) That’s brilliant! I love it! Cool! Very cool! Mad! Wicked! Excellent!

Becky It could work.

Sami What do you mean “could”?? It must work! It’s our future – our world! We have to make it work. Are you with me?!

All YES!

Sami Are we a team!

All YES!

Sami (launching himself out of his wheel-chair) Do you believe children CAN change the World?

All YES!

Becky Sam? (very worried) Sam?? – are you OK?

Sami What?

Becky You’re standing!

Sami Oh?! Wow?! How did that happen?? I can walk – watch me. (He stumbles forward a few steps then looks to Becky for support)

Becky Oh Sam!! (holding him up) It’s a miracle! You’re walking!!

All (Clapping and hoisting Sami on to their shoulders) Yes! Yes! YES!! YES!! EXIT Fade to Black

Scene NINE

2050 – Storyteller Scene

The Story-teller with her group of younger children comes on downstage left. They stay there while they watch the Action of the Core Cast Centre stage and Stage right. Scene NINE and Scene TEN alternate. (You should rehearse all of the ST scenes and CC scenes separately – and put them together at the end.)

Child Was it a miracle?

ST Not really. He wasn’t nearly as badly injured as he thought he was – he was just a bit of a drama queen, our Sami. He liked bigging up the sympathy.

Child So what happened then?

ST We went and told the Reporters

Scene TEN

Kids on Strike – NOW

The Core Cast kids come on again, Sami walking with a limp. The Media people all come forward eager:

Becky We’ve decided what we’re going to do!

Sami Go tell your friends to come back.

CC 1 We have an announcement to make.

The Media people all go crazy, talking into their mobile phones. And the entire Chorus come on stage Right, acting as media people – cameras poised, notebooks at the ready etc.

CC 1 Thank you all for coming. And thank you (pointing at one of the reporters) for giving me that pamphlet about the Global Goals.

Becky It seems that our governments have already agreed to do most of the things that we want them to do.

CC 2 It’s just that they haven’t gotten around to doing them yet.

CC 5 So – because our schools don’t teach us about things like this, we’re going to take time off school to learn all about the Global Goals and how to make them happen.

Sami Because it’s our world too – and we’re going to want to live on it a whole lot more years than most of our leaders have left to them. So if they don’t make them happen, we’re just going to have to do it ourselves.

Reporter A So – you’re going on strike?

CC 8 Yeah – sort of!

Reporter B A Kids Strike

Reporter C How cute is that?

Reporter D And how many kids do you expect to join your strike?

Sami All of them! I want every child, everywhere, to learn about these goals their governments have signed up to – and rise up and make them happen. Stopping war – ending hunger –saving the planet’s environment: it’s all there! There’s NOTHING more important than making these goals happen – and I want every child, in every town, every village, every country, every continent to stop what they’re doing – stop going to school and learning all that history and maths and boring stuff – and stay home with your friends and learn about these goals and how to make them happen.

CC 6 Kids on Strike?

Sami If you like?!

CC 6 (leading the whole core cast in the chant) Kids on Strike!

ALL Kids on Strike! Kids on Strike! (Stamping their feet and shaking their fists) Kids on Strike! Kids on Strike!

Becky Wait! (silencing them) This isn’t who we are! We’re not angry revolutionaries. We just want a peaceful world to grow up in.

CC 3 That’s right!

Becky We want you to stop the war in Sami’s country – to be friends and love each other!

Sami We’re Peace Children!

Reporter – and you’re the Peace Child in chief?

Sami No – we’re all equal here.

Becky We’re a team! She knows about the Internet – twitter, Facebook and all that…

CC 4 – and he’s a great writer

Sami We’ll make this happen together – because we’re all really, really good friends!

Becky (to the reporters) – and you’re our friends too! We love you! (They hug the media people)

CC 2 & 3 Yes – come inside – out of the cold – have some coffee. Let’s talk about this some more…. EXIT Fade to Black

Scene NINE: 2050 – Storyteller Scene [contd.]

The Story-teller smiles:

ST It really was that simple! A bunch of kids in << – ?your town? – >> on a cold Thursday in January started the revolution that saved our human way of life….

Child How?

ST Social Media and smart phones were still quite a new thing at that time – and every one spent hours on them, often in pointless conversations. We got up to 20 million followers on Twitter in just 24 hours. Kids were on strike in a hundred countries within the week.

Child That was a classic GroupThink wasn’t it?

ST Yes – but we didn’t call it that back then. Remember – this was the time of Fake News and what came to be known as the ‘great unravelling’? A lot has changed in the last 30 years, but the two things that make a Peace Children haven’t. Do you remember what they are? What must every Peace Child do?

Child Tell the truth!

ST That’s one – what’s the other?

Child Urmmm Be kind to every one?

ST Nearly

Child Be unselfish!

ST Exactly! Honesty and Unselfishness – we hadn’t learned that yet. But we were getting there! Watch:

Scene TEN: Kids on Strike – NOW [contd.]

The Core Cast sit round on stage, reading the Sustainable Development Goals, and rubbing their heads. Some have fallen asleep as they try to read:

CC 9 What does this Goal NINE mean?? “Build resilient infrastructure…”

Becky Resilient means lasting, doesn’t it?

CC 9 But what’s “Infrastructure”

CC 4 Wait a minute (fiddles with mobile phone) – infrastructure means: “Basic physical buildings, roads, water and power supplies that support communities…”

Becky So – lasting buildings and water supplies. That’s pretty basic, isn’t it. Every one needs that

CC 5 Well – if you’re so clever, what’s this one mean: “de-couple economic growth from environmental degradation…” (she stumbles over the long words)

CC 2 De-couple is what you do to trains: you uncouple the coaches.

Sami Economic growth means making money

CC 1 And environmental degra –diddy – whatever – means destroying the world.

Sami So it means we have to separate making money from destroying the world! Geddit?

CC 5 No?

Becky Look – if there was this car that you really, really wanted to have but you were told you would have to blow up the world to get it, what would you do?

CC 5 Go without the car, I guess

Becky Exactly! No point in having a car if there’s no world to drive it about on. So we have to make sure that the way we make money to live, and eat, and move around, and take holidays and everything does not end up destroying the planet.

Sami Pretty obvious, I’d say. And any one who thinks they’re going to make money by making bombs to destroy our world has got to be decoupled from any kind of government!

CC 5 Yeah! Who are these guys who can write down great principles like this and then go off and do exactly the opposite the next day.

CC 8 Crazy people!

Sami Dangerous people.

Becky I really like this slogan: “Leave no one behind…”

CC 3 What’s it mean?

CC 6 It’s what we learned from that Global Banquet: don’t scoff your own food without making sure that everyone has at least something to eat.

CC 7 It’s about caring for others.

CC 3 Being unselfish – that’s what my mum always tells me to do

Sami Leave the world a better, cleaner, tidier place than you found it. That’s what my Dad says!

Becky And we want our leaders to be unselfish to make sure that they leave behind a world that the next generation can all enjoy and live happily in….

CC 1 Sounds like a plan!

Sami So how do we make it happen? These goals are great – but they’re impossible!!

Scene NINE: 2050 – Storyteller Scene [contd.]

The Story-teller challenges her group:

ST So – what would you have done??

Child To make the goals happen?

Child They got the governments to do them, didn’t they?

ST Yes – but how? In governments, they’re always so busy with a million things happening all at once – it’s very hard to make them stop and think whether they’re leaving the world a better place than they found it.

Child But if all the children of the world were on strike – they’d have to talk to them, wouldn’t they?

ST Well they didn’t. Not for a long time….

Child So what did the kids do?

ST Take a look. Sometimes good things just happen….

The Story-teller ushers her little group down into the audience as the House Lights come up.

Scene ELEVEN

Town Hall Meeting – Now

The Core Cast sit at a table on stage looking out at the Audience like speakers at a Town Hall Meeting. The media are there in force – filming the event, and taking notes and photographs. This scene requires audience participation – which can be as much staged, and as much improvised, as your cast are comfortable with. Some teachers / adults need to be planted in the audience (Plants 1, 2, 3 etc.) to start the conversation and –importantly – to end it. But within those borders – you should encourage an informed dialogue between children and their parents / adults. This is the essence of Peace Child.

A child dressed up as the Mayor – with a big chain – rises to introduce the Meeting:

Mayor Thank you all for coming. As you cannot have failed to notice – some children at this school have initiated a Global School strike. Several of you have called me asking to discuss it. So I have called this meeting to allow such discussion. Questions / Comments Please?!

Plant 1 Ok Kids! You’ve made your point. Now get back to school – and stop hanging about the house like it was the holidays. (The audience applaud enthusiastically: that’s what most of them came to the meeting to say.)

CC 2 With all due respect, sir – we’re not hanging about the house like it’s the holidays: we are learning about the Sustainable Development Goals that your government has agreed to CC 3 Goals that will save our lives.

CC 1 Goals that are absolutely vital to the survival of human life on earth

Plant 2 What are these goals anyway?

Becky Exactly! Do any of you have a clue what your governments have signed up to?? C’mon! Hands up!!?? (She looks hopefully!) None of you! And we didn’t either. That’s why we have to stay out on strike until we all learn about them –

CC 4 – and, more important, learn how to make our governments make them happen.

Plant 3 Look – I’m one of your teachers, and I really care about all of you. But how are you going to keep up with your school work and pass your exams if you drop out of school?

CC 5 We all feel that saving the planet is more important than passing exams.

Plant 4 What can you do to save the world?! You’re only kids!

Sami We’ve already done a lot! Millions of kids on strike around the world, millions of followers on twitter and facebook. Our generation is beginning to understand the challenges we shall face in our lifetimes. And that, not passing exams, has to be our priority!

Mayor Does any one have a questions for the students?

Drop-in FOUR – The Improvisation: Again – your choice: you can either have a series of scripted questions and answers between plants in the audience and the kids of your Core Cast or, if you are brave – you can open it up to random questions from the audience. You and your cast have to decide – but you should have some ideas for questions, in case the audience goes silent.(see below)

Plant 5 Governments and Diplomats have been working on these goals for years: how do you think you can do any better?

CC 1 They’ve done nothing. So of course we can do better!

Plant 6 Why is it any of your business?

CC 8 I think it’s our business for us to have a world fit to live in when we grow up.

Plant 1 Is that even a question that kids of your age should be thinking about?

Sami I think so – yes! If you’d been blown up by a bomb that was probably made in this country, you would want to think about how you stop people here making them.

Becky And you should start thinking about this too.

Plant 7 What do you mean?

Becky You should go on strike with us!

Core Cast (severally) – Yes! Of course you should. Go on! Do it!

Plant 1 Are you seriously suggesting that we should come out on strike to support you?

CC 4 If you care about having a world fit for your children to live in, of course you should!

Core Cast (severally) – I agree!! Yes! – Go for it!

Plant 2 You’re mad!

Plant 10 No! They’re right! We’d be mad not to! Mr Mayor: our children have shown considerably more leadership and courage than any of our diplomats or politicians. We should support them. As of now, I’m on strike!

The kids of the core cast clap in delight as many in the audience look on in horror.

Sami Thank you! We need you to do this –

Becky We’re kids – and we care about the future, but we have no power.

CC 2 – and no money.

Becky You have the power to tell us what to do, what to eat, where we live – everything.

Sami The power to bomb us and put us in uniform and ask us to kill people.

Becky Our only power is to refuse: and you have that same power too.

CC 3 So use it!

Sami Help us!

Core cast Help us!

Plant 7 They’re never going to get anywhere without us.

Plant 8 (Standing up) Let’s support our Children!

Plant 9 (Standing up) Yes

All the Plants: (Standing up – severally) Yes!

Samir Mr Mayor?

Mayor This is very irregular. I’m a political leader, not a trade unionist. I don’t call people out on strike.

Plant 10 You should.

Plant 8 You have to do this – right now, Mr Mayor.

Plant 5 For our children.

Mayor OK – Yes! I will…

Core Cast (Standing up – chanting) Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! YES! Black Out

Scene NINE: 2050 – Storyteller Scene [contd.]

The Story-teller reads from her story-book:

ST That’s how it began. The Global General Strike of 20??

Child Did all the mummies and daddies come out on strike?

ST Not all of them – but enough to get the governments attention. And – because it was Sami and Becky and their friends who started it all, they were in the Media every day. So it was them that the government leaders wanted to see.

Child Was that what got the kids got to meet the President??

ST It was.

Scene TWELVE In the Office of the President

challenges from of change, streets of inner cities. Writing song lyrics is not so hard if you know what you want to say. Lay the challenge on your cast – and see what they come up with:

Song NINE: Mr President

CC 4

CC 5

Becky

Chorus

Madam President, is it true what they say We are killing our world by the way we behave?

Madam President, can it be what it seems There will be no more children, no more love, no more dreams?

Madam President, is it true what I hear Because of our greed, we must all live in fear

Oh No! (oh no!) It’s plain to see (It’s plain to see!) But so hard to understand

CC 7

CC 8

CC 9

Chorus

Becky

Samir

Becky & Samir

That this world we all love

Is being eaten away and dying today

Oh No! (oh no) It’s not fair! (it’s not fair)

That mankind should have the right

For the sake of their greed

They can take this away

Without asking why! – Oh NO!

Madam President, is it true what I read All life could be dead, because of our deeds?

Madam President, can you answer me please: How can we survive if we kill all the seas?

Madam President, won’t you hear our small plea?

For the millions of children, let us all live in peace!

Oh No! (oh no!) It’s plain to see (It’s plain to see!)

But so hard to understand

That this world we all love

Is being eaten away and dying today

Oh No! (oh no) It’s not fair! (it’s not fair)

That mankind should have the right

For the sake of their greed

They can take this away

Without asking why! – Oh NO!

Madam President, it’s a time to be brave!

Announce to the world, this will be a Peace Day

The First Peace Day!

The President watches them intently throughout. When the song ends, she sits down and picks up some papers on her desk. She waits a long while after the applause for the song ends. Finally, looking up from the papers, she says:

President You make some good points in this Call to Action. But what you have to understand is that governments have to govern in the here and now. We don’t get many votes from unborn children and achieving vague Global Goals that only meet their needs years in the future

CC 2 So – you’re quite happy to kill our world?

CC 5 Our future?

President Of course not. I think about the long-term impact of my policies all the time. I have children.

Sami Specifically the Sustainable Development Goals?

President Not much, I admit. There are so many other important things going on.

Becky Things that are more important than saving the world for your children.

President No! – well, yes – it’s very difficult being President.

CC 3 Will you help us?

President I’d like to. What would you like me to do?

Becky You have this thing at the United Nations

Sami It’s called the “Security Council”

Becky We’d like to meet with them.

Sami Because what we’re talking about here – what we’re striking for – is our security.

CC 1 Our life!

CC 2 Now – and in the future.

Becky We want them all to consider our Call to Action! –

Sami – and work with us, and all children, to achieve the Global Goals.

Becky That’s what we want to talk about with the Security Council.

President I see. So – if I call a meeting of the UN Security Council to talk about your Call to Action, you will call off your strike?

Sami We will.

Core Cast (Nodding) We will.

President OK. (She extends her hand. Sami, then Becky, shake it) We have a deal! Let’s do it!

Scene THIRTEEN

The UN Security Council Chamber

As the President’s desk is moved to join up with four other tables to form the Horseshoe Table of the UN Security Council and a big UN Logo comes up on the screen, the children + the chorus sing:

Song TEN: We want this world to survive for ever

Chorus

Chorus

Becky & Samir

All the time through the day and through the night I think about my life in this world

So many times I’ve tried to find A way to live my life – a way to ease my mind

I know this world could die for ever And people are the reason why

Children and parents lovers and poets

They just can’t hear our planet cry –

We want this world to survive for ever And all the people join their hands together In a bond of love, kindness and friendship We can make peace with the earth

Too many people have died in wars And we want that no one else should suffer

Not again.

Half the world lives in despair

We’ve got to show them, show them that we care! We know our World is a wonderful place And we must help to keep it so I want to believe that this world will be

A peaceful place for all to grow!

We want this world to survive…. etc. (x 3)

Let’s join our hands together

Let’s make peace throughout our world!

Children dressed as diplomats take their places at the tables during the song. Chairs are set, and National Name Tags (USA, UK, Australia, Jordan, Pakistan, Ukraine, Colombia etc.) are put on the tables in front of each diplomat. A young girl is dressed in a smart suit to play the UN Secretary-General (UN S-G

UN S-G: Thank you, children: I think you set the context for this meeting very well – and we all share the feelings you express in your song. (Turning to the President) Excellency, you called this meeting: perhaps you would explain why?

President My government’s reasons for calling this meeting were both pragmatic – to get our children back to school! – and idealistic: I have read their Call to Action and, though naïve in parts, I consider it a document worthy of discussion at the highest level. So – please: join me in welcoming these young people! (Polite applause)

S G Thank you Excellency. Shall we now go through the Children’s Call to Action to see where we can find consensus?

Diplo 1 With respect, Secretary General, may I raise a Point of Information?

S G Of course

Diplo 1 Does this meeting today mean that any interest group can use a campaign of civil disobedience to get access to this chamber?

S G Absolutely not.

Diplo 2 Good. Can we have some kind of guarantee that their campaign will be called off?

President Excellencies, the campaign is already called off! That’s why we’re having this meeting.

Diplo 3 A further point of information, Chairman: my country has local, regional and national youth councils that allow the voice of youth to be heard in government. Are any of the views expressed in this Call to Action the result of discussions in those councils – or any process that would give them some democratic legitimacy?

S G Maybe the children themselves could answer that question.

The Core Cast children look at each other nervously. Finally, one of them answers:

CC 5 We e-mailed hundreds of youth councils but very few of them got back to us. We got a much better response from individual youth – and teachers – than Youth Councils.

Diplo 3

Thank you. As I suspected, Excellencies, this Call to Action has no democratic legitimacy. We are only discussing it because we’ve been forced to do so by civil disobedience.

Diplo 4 (Picking up paper) blah, Blah!! Blah blah-blah Blah. Blah?

Diplo 5 (Nodding vigorously) Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, Blah!! Blah –blah-blah Blah. Blah?

Diplo 6 (shaking his head) Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, Blah!! Blah – blahblah Blah. Blah?

Diplo 3 (pondering) Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, Blah!! Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah?

Diplo 7 (shooting the breeze) Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, Blah!! Blah –blah-blah Blah. Blah?

Diplo 4 (angrily) Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah, Blah!! Blah – blah-blah Blah. Blah?

S G Thank you, Excellencies, for those fascinating interventions. I suggest we take a coffee break now – and continue our deliberations in our second session. We resume in twenty minutes. Thank you! (she slaps the gavel – and they all EXIT)

The kids remain – looking at each other in disbelief

Becky What was that all about??

CC 5 They’re unbelievable!!

Samir (laughing) If these are the people we’re trusting to save the world – we’re finished!

CC 1 “Democratic Legitimacy”?!? We have a billion children out on strike!!

CC 2 Look at this: (going through the papers on one desk) “Instructions from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: “On No Account allow serious consideration of the Children’s Call to Action”

Becky I knew it! They never were going to take us seriously! What did I tell you?

Sami It was worth a try…

CC 5 They have betrayed us.

CC 7 It’s a joke!

CC 3 Why can’t we have a new government?

CC 4 Yeah right! We need new people to sit in these chairs!

CC 8 (grinning mischievously) Well look! – that sign says USA. Let’s pretend I’m the US diplomat at the United Nations. I know I can do a better job than that guy – with all his blah-blah…

Sami Let’s pretend I’m from Jordan – it’s close enough….

Becky And I’ll be from the UK –

CC 1 Et moi: je suis la moitié Francais!

CC 5 And I have a Russian Grand-father!

Slowly, they fill the chairs around the horseshoe table. The Boy and the Girl go to the SG’s chair

CC 3: Can I be the Secretary General?

CC 2 Why not?!

CC 6 Let the youngest person in the room be in charge.

Becky I love it!

CC 3 All those in favour? (All raise their hands) Agreed! (S/he slaps the gavel down on the table)

CC 7 (looking at the audience) But what do we do about them?

CC 9 Oh ( - turning to the audience) – you’re still here?! So all of you are now caught up in this with us…. If you’re not OK with that, you’d better leave the room NOW!

Sami So – are you staying? (no answer) – I’ll take that as a Yes! Just behave, right?

Drop-in THREE: The Children’s Call to ACTION: The Global Goals are – as we have seen – immensely complicated. Some children are comfortable with the language they are expressed in: most find it intensely foreign. So – we invite you to discuss this round-up of solutions on how to achieve the Global Goals with your cast, and decide how you are going to cluster them. Look at Lesson SEVEN in the Study Guide for other ideas and do the ‘Seek the Solution’ improvisations.

CC 3 (slapping the gavel) I call this meeting of the Children’s UN Security Council to order!

Samir First motion, please!

CC 1 I demand we “End Poverty in all its forms everywhere!”

CC 2 “End hunger with better food and farming, to ensure healthy lives for people of all ages!”

CC 4 How?

CC 5 By putting a Global Tax on rich people and rich countries to give poor people and poor countries enough food, enough homes, doctors, hospitals, schools – everything!

CC 3 All those in favour? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! Next?

Becky I ask that we “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.”

CC 5 How?

CC 6 We “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all”

CC 7 We educate all men and boys to respect women as equals

Becky – and we pass a law that makes everyone pay women the same as men for the same work!

CC 3 All those in favour? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! Next?

Sami I move the good old “Resilient Infrastructure: water and sanitation for all; cheap and reliable energy for all and full and productive decent jobs for all.”

CC 8 How we gonna do all that??

Sami It’s the challenge of our generation: nobody knows how we’re going to do that – with population rising and oil and gas running out. Our generation has to figure out how to do this. That’s why we must start by learning – really learning and understanding – the challenges NOW – while we’re still at school.

CC 9 So – who’s going to teach us?

Becky Well – I think we’ve done pretty well teaching ourselves but, in the future, we’ll have to teach our teachers to teach us, and set exams, on this stuff.

CC 3 All those in favour? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! Next?

CC 1 How much longer do you think we’ve got?

CC 2 (Checking her watch) Another 12 minutes. Come on – next?!

CC 5 I move we take “urgent action to stop Climate Change and Global Warming.”

CC 7 “Protect and restore the earth and all that lives upon it – the bugs, the animals, the birds.”

CC 8 “The forests, the deserts, the Oceans, the Seas and the fishes.”

Sami How?

CC 2 Educate everyone about how to do this – and create a Planet-wide exam to ensure that every one really, absolutely EVERYONE – really understands how to live a good life and protect the planet at the same time.

CC 3 The Lifestyle Contract?

CC 4 Exactly

CC 3 All those in favour of the Lifestyle Contract? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! Next?

CC 2 Isn’t that it?

Becky NO – there’s two more!

Sami The Sustainable Consumption one:

CC 5 Yes! – every one must eat and buy only as much as they need.

Becky No waste or bling!

CC 6 We can’t have that thing where the 100 richest people on the planet have more than the poorest billion.

CC 10 Let’s have a world that’s FAIR!!

CC 3 All those in favour? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! Next?

Sami Last one!?

CC 9 I demand that All Governments and all peoples “Promote peaceful and inclusive societies with human rights and justice for all….”

CC 10 How?

Becky R2P.

Sami Yes – the Right To Protection laws. Remember them?? They were passed in this very room several years ago – to protect every last person on this planet and let us all live in peace!

CC 2 “Leave No One Behind” – right?

Becky Exactly! We must remind all our governments that they made this promise – and demand that they keep it. So no more children have to suffer. Like Sami did.

CC 3 How?

CC4 Stop making bombs!

Sami Stop wasting money and metal making any weapons. Make wars illegal and unthinkable. Declare Peace Day!

CC 5 Let’s do it!

CC 3 All those in favour? (Hands shoot up! – slaps the gavel) Agreed! I declare the Children’s Call to Action passed!

The Children of the Core Cast clap and cheer and bang the tables – as the diplomats come back and find them in their chairs. They are furious!

UN S G What’s going on here??!!

Diplo 1 This is outrageous – they’ve been looking through our confidential briefings!

CC 1 Yeah! – embarrassing isn’t it? – to know you planned to do absolutely nothing about our Call to Action!

Diplo 3 Get these kids outta here! Call Security!!

Samir Wait a moment. No!! – we should call security on you!

Becky You are the threat to OUR security!

Diplo 4 Madam Secretary General: you must agree! This is a most shocking breach of UN security –you must allow us to eject these Children immediately.

UN S G A breach of protocol, certainly.

CC 5 All we’ve done is help things along a bit –

CC 10 – get done in your coffee break what might take you guys 40 years to do!

CC 9 By which time, you’ll all be dead and our world will be fried!

Diplo 1 Their insolence is insupportable.

UN S-G I think our young friends had better leave.

CC 2 And let you faff around and “blah-blah” for another 40 years!

CC 4 No Way.

Diplo 4 Out! Call Security!

Becky You had your whole lives before you – as we do now.

Samir Make us proud of your memory by working with us here today to see how – together – we can give us all, you included, a peaceful and happy future!

The diplomats are partially mollified. One by one, the children reach out their hands towards the individual diplomats. One by one, each diplomat takes them and the children lead them, somewhat reluctantly, to sit down beside them and start studying the Call to Action Paper. Music starts over this scene of elders and children, sitting together, as equal partners, plotting to secure their own, and the planet’s future.

Scene FOURTEEN

The Story-teller comes forward, leading the chorus and her little band of children, singing:

Song ELEVEN: Child for a Day (Reprise) SCORE VIDEO AUDIO

S T

Cast & Chorus

Men of Chorus

Cast & Chorus

CC 1

CC 2

CC 3

CC 4

S T

Cast & Chorus

INSTRUMENTAL

I was a child who ran full of laughter

I was a child who lived for a day

My eyes full of sunshine

My heart full of smiles

I was a child for a day.

We were the children who sang in the morning

We were the children who laughed at the sun

Who listened to those who spoke with their wisdom

We were the ones we would say

We are the men who worry of nothing

We are the men who fight without aim

Who listen to no one yet speak of our wisdom

We are the pawns in the game.

We’re getting older as time goes by A little older every day

We are the children of yesterday.

I was a child who ran full of laughter

I was a child who lived for today

My eyes full of sunshine

My heart full of smiles

I was a child for a day.

We’re getting older as time goes by

A little older every day

We were the children of yesterday.

They form a tableau around the Story-teller – and take a bow. The Story-teller turns to the Core Cast – and leads the chorus and her group of children in big applause for them – some cheering and slapping them on the back. They encourage the audience to clap louder – and the Core Cast take several curtain calls – pushing Sami and Becky out to take individual applause. As the applause dies down, the Story-teller takes her little group down-stage left.

Scene FIFTEEN

2050 – Peace Child Epilogue

The chorus and the core cast sit and listen to the Epilogue.

Child So – was that it?

Child No one Left Behind!?

Child All the Global Goals done and dusted in a 20-minute coffee break!!?

S T No! It took for ever! The rest of our lives, in fact. We kept coming back to that stifling room for years. After a few weeks, we realized what massive obstacles diplomats faced.

Child So – what did you do?

S T We became good friends with them! We laughed a lot – and we sang, and we compromised and we banged heads together: we refused to take ‘No!’ for an answer.

Child But what happened when, like my Mum says: ‘No means no!?’

S T We found another way. There’s always another way: it’s hard – but when you have a billion children breathing down your neck and demanding results around the clock, you can’t afford to give up. And we didn’t want to! Neither did they! For the first time in their lives, they were getting stuff done. They were enjoying themselves!

Child What happened to Becky and Samir?

S T I didn’t see Sami much after that. He went back to his country and became a great leader. I used to read about him in the papers. I see Becky a bit. She started a company – became very successful and is now is busy giving all her money away to charities.

Child They didn’t get married then?

S T No, no! It was never like that. They were just very, very good friends. We all were – we were all the Peace Child in chief!

Child Don’t you miss them?

S T Yes – and when I see kids around the world acting out our story – I miss them a whole lot. But you grow up, you make new friends. You get married, you have children – and then they become your best friends. But – you must remember: every one – every one you ever meet, every stranger that crosses your path in life is a friend you haven’t met yet. You will have so many friends – all of you, if you make yourself open to friendship. And that’s what you must do because making friends is the best thing that can happen to you in life! Open yourselves up to friendship, all of you, all the time – to everyone, no matter their colour, religion, nationality or age. Be friends with everyone. For when you are friends, miracles happen!

Song TWELVE: If you close your eyes

The song is sung by a quartet of singers from the Chorus – in close harmony.

Now if you close your eyes, you can be what you want, And if you close your mind, you can feel what you need –

Don’t you see, it’s your destiny –

Can’t you see, it was meant to be –

It’s happening everywhere!

People waking up!

Together facing a great new dawn –Reaching out for Love!

Do you believe in miracles?

– have faith in things unseen?

Take a good look around you now –

– no, no! It’s not a dream.

So open up your eyes – and fly beyond the sky! And open up your mind – you can feel beyond your dreams! Now open up your hands – you can touch the Universe!

Then put your hands in mine and behold: