Day 1 and the tour gets off to a great start!

Monday morning and after a relaxing weekend for both our speakers, Christian & Juliana, we headed up as a team with Saoirse and I to York and our first stop on the Speaker Tour. Here we met our wonderful driver Suman who had made the short journey from her home in Bradford, picked up our state of the art Tour Bus (a Nissan Qashqai) and headed to the university!The team (minus Suman) in York!

After meeting and greeting with Ben, President of the newly-formed York SSAC, we set up for our first event on tour! With an attentive crowd listening to their every word, Juliana and Christian told their stories passionately and bravely like this was the 100th time of doing so, not their first. Lasting over an hour and a half, students attending the event asked our speakers questions on a wide range of issues, from issues of stigma and discrimination to their feelings on sharing their status with future partners.  The speakers in action!

With homemade dinner and a room to stay in provided by the hospitable President himself, Ben, we all went to bed and prepared for the next day at the rock ‘n’ roll time of 10pm! Next up tomorrow…. Manchester!

Thank you York!York Uni