Six different women from very different walks of life were at the Salt Lake Community College Women’s Day Event last Wednesday. Hosted by Deidre Tyler, the event was held in the Student Center in room 221-223 and featured speakers Santana Martinez, Sade Turner, Sabina Zunguze, Kris Marchini and Mojdeh Sakaki.
It may have been expected by some to have a mostly female audience – but this was not the case. The audience was very mixed and it was hard to tell whether or not there were more men or women in attendance.
The theme of the event was storytelling; be it literal story telling of ancient stories or just telling their life story of how they got to where they are now.
Considering the theme, it was appropriate that the event’s first speaker was Santana Martinez – a professional storyteller. Martinez told stories – very different stories, which had very different morals ranging from what women want to how important loyalty to family can be.
Sade Turner, another speaker, talked of her life and how she came from a small town to be a successful lawyer in Salt Lake City.
Another speaker had a completely different story to share; she told the story of her life. Her name is Sabina Zunguze and she successfully moved from Africa to become a businesswomen. She told how it is rare for women from her homeland to attain an education and how her education led her to America. Zunguze now owns a company called A Gift to Africa that helps African women become more educated in the business field, and teaches other skills such as sewing.
“Attitude not aptitude,” is what speaker Kris Marchini repeated several times. She talked of how she will be graduating from the University with a 4.0 GPA. She said it is not because she is smart, but simply because she knows she can. She works in human resources for Oakland Construction and talked about what it is like working with mostly men. She believes people can all achieve what they want if they have the right attitude.
Mojdeh Sakaki is a woman who chose a long time ago to make her life a happy one. Sakaki used to work as an accountant where she talked about how much money she was making, but she said that she was not happy. She decided that she would give up her job as an accountant and go into teaching about fashion.
Sakaki was born in Iran and left to come to America after things started changing in her homeland. She talked of how people used to be free in Iran, but that has changed. Her hardest battle, according to her, has been her one with cancer. Her perspective of life changed when she found out she had cancer. Sakaki is an instructor at SLCC, and it is clear to anyone who was at the event that she is passionate about what she does.
The event was wrapped up with speaker Sadie Tsosie, who also works for SLCC. She is an academic and career advisor, who works with students from the community and of SLCC, to help them plan out coursework goals. She works specifically with Native Americans as a multicultural advisor at South City Campus.