Welcome Rita Ezenwa-Okoro as GPB's Executive Director

Cathy Salit • August 11, 2022

We've got big news!

Rita Ezenwa-Okoro has taken on the mantle of Executive Director for the Global Play Brigade.

Rita is a creative culturist, performance activist, and communications expert. She is a co-founder of the Global Play Brigade and she is the founder and lead visionary of Street Project Foundation Nigeria where she uses improv, play, and performance as tools for youth development, social mobilization, and cross-cultural dialogue. Rita is a recipient of President Barack Obama's Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders, the Lagos State Government Youth Development Award, the Extraordinary Women's Award in France, and the Next Generation Leaders Award.

We are growing in new and exciting ways, and Rita's leadership is right on time! Below is Rita's speech from our 2-Year Anniversary celebration at the end of July 2022.

Play it Forward!
Cathy Salit
Chief Organizer, Global Play Brigade

RITA'S SPEECH

 

I am truly honored by the opportunity to serve as Executive Director of this ballsy movement that dares to explore new ways humans can develop, connect, co-create, and grow across borders through play. Our world is fractured. Do we accept the cracks between our countries, tribe, ethnicities, and races as a design of imperfection? Or, do we see it as an opportunity to infiltrate old systems and strategically create awareness about new methods for challenging the status quo?

Who is responsible for the world as it is? Humans! Who is responsible for fixing the world. Humans. At the core of human development are relationships. A dear friend once told me that people are afraid of what they do not understand. In a world where the concept of play is misconstrued as childish, Global Play Brigade allows us to share creative nuggets through Playshops on how we can soften borders and barriers between us.

Cathy Salit, our Chief Organizer, once told me that what something "is" is not knowable when you're in the middle of it. So, we haven't tried to know what Global Play Brigade is. From it's inception – of which, I'm a proud founding member – we've been busy co-creating and discovering what Global Play Brigade is becoming. And now, we are two years old and I believe that we are beginning to see the role this movement can play in the world. From our social impact work in Brazil through the provision of support from Brigadiers in Chinaduring the COVID pandemic to the emotional support provided by Brigadiers across the world to young Nigerians on the front line of the EndSARS protests against police brutality. Or, our current partnership with Purpose Alliance to provide emotional support to Ukrainian refugees. The possibilities for social impact are enormous. Global Play Brigade evolved in response to a world crisis and we are still here. More than ever, we need each other.

Because you are, we are. Because you volunteer, GPB continues to exist. Let's spread out wings and make the world whole. My charge to everyone is to get people across borders to fall in love with the Global Play Brigade. This way, we allow people to explore how we can use play beyond ideologies, topple old constructs, and create new ways of doing, being, and becoming in a world that is a work-in-progress. Together, we are creating a revolutionary activity that is unknowable yet impact-driven.

Global Play Brigade, play it forward and let's change our world.

Yours,
Rita Ezenwa-Okoro
Executive Director, Global Play Brigade

CHANGEMAKERS PLAYFEST 2025: Creating Power Through Play

By Global Play Brigade • December 12, 2025
CHANGEMAKERS PLAYFEST 2025: Creating Power Through Play If there are two things that define Global Play Brigade, it’s this: First, we love to experiment. We breathe it, build with it, and follow through. GPB isn’t just curious; we are invested in the process and its lessons. Secondly, we love partnerships. Whenever we see an organization dreaming in the direction we dream, we run toward them joyfully, arms open, ready to build something bigger, wider, and wilder. These two parts of who we are collided beautifully at the Changemakers Playfest 2025. GPB featured on Day One of the Performing The World (PTW) 2025, titled: Meandering Through the Mess . It was a conference within a conference, a global playground nestled inside another. Woven into the PTW ecosystem, the energy was electric. GPB’s Executive Director, Rita Ezenwa-Okoro, opened the Changemakers Play Festival with words that set the tone. She spoke of faith and turning mess into message, how changemakers need to navigate complexities without succumbing to burnout, and how play offers a radical way to imagine new possibilities and create hope. Watch Rita’s speech here! One of the participants reflected: “Rita’s speech didn’t just inspire; it was tactile, lived, and actionable. Her words invited participants to sit with complexity without fear, to recognize that navigating mess isn’t chaos, it’s courage in motion.” One of the facilitators added: “Her remarks slowed everyone down, encouraging a collective meandering, turning abstract ideas into lived experience. The festival began not with instruction, but with invitation: to play, to explore, and to build together.” The Art of Connected Conversations playshop turned ordinary talk into bridges. Led by Cathy Salit (USA) and Kahlil Bagatsing (Philippines/USA), participants discovered that listening can be playful, bold, and transformative. “I never knew a conversation could feel like a bridge,” one participant reflected. Their conversations became a space for curiosity, care, and co-creation. Teamwork Makes the Dreamwork sparked laughter and delightful absurdity. Hikaru Hie (Japan), Yvette Alcott (Australia), and Toto Carandang (Philippines) invited participants into improvisational chaos. Everyone became experts at impossible tasks, discovering that teamwork thrives in trust, surprise, and shared play. Power Games in the Workplace / Los Juegos de Poder en Ambientes de Trabajo made invisible dynamics visible. Viviane Carrijo (Brazil), Jordan Hirsch (USA), and Carlos Gaviria (Colombia) guided participants through theater games exploring dominance, influence, and collaboration. One participant reflected, “I’ve been both the oppressor and the oppressed, and play can help us imagine new ways forward.” Power became something to explore, understand, and transform together. Connection and intimacy unfolded in unexpected ways. In one exercise, participants shared the (his)story of their names and responded to each other with curiosity and reflection. Strangers became collaborators within minutes. The festival showed that play isn’t just fun, it’s a strategy for building trust, creativity, and global community. Across continents and cultures, laughter, improvisation, and shared curiosity revealed our common humanity, while playful experimentation offered new ways to imagine, collaborate, and lead with care.

HEART & POWER: Bringing the World Closer to Wellness

By Global Play Brigade • December 12, 2025
HEART & POWER: Bringing the World Closer to Wellness In a world where over 1 billion people are living with mental-health disorders and only one in five get the help they need, Global Play Brigadiers converged this past August at our Heart and Power Playshop to explore the question: How can we bring the world closer to wellness through play? Our carefully curated playshops included: In Embodied Empathy , people didn’t just talk about feelings; they moved them. One participant described the moment they felt another person’s sadness through a simple hand gesture, saying, “It was like my body understood before my mind did.” Guided by Christopher Ellinger (USA) and Jacek Kulkuk (Poland), the Zoom room softened. People softened. Empathy became physical. In What Is Wellness? , a big shift happened. Someone said, “I always thought wellness was personal, but now I see it’s something we build together.” With Lambert Oigara (Kenya), Jeff Gordon (Israel), Jenn Bullock (USA), and Muneeb ur Rehman (Pakistan), wellness became communal, a shared construction site where everyone created new tools. Imagine watching someone’s story turn into choreography; a literal dance of lived experience. Led by Ruben Reyes (Spain), Zara Barryte (USA), Sally Oimbo (Kenya), and Prudence Omale (Nigeria), Story-o-graphy gave participants a chance to see their stories move through another person’s body. It wasn’t just creative. It was healing. Rainbows of Emotions gave us the full colour spectrum of human feelings, from joy to grief to curiosity to frustration. It finally made sense that emotions aren’t good or bad… they’re information, one participant reflected. Steered by Ishita Sanyal (India), Manisita Khastagir (India), Rick Horner (USA), and Medhavi Parmar (India), people painted emotional rainbows with movement, sound, and imagination. Heart & Power didn’t end when Zoom closed. It ignited a new awareness that wellness isn’t a luxury, but a shared responsibility. People walked away with softer hearts, deeper breaths, and a renewed sense of connection across borders, cultures, and personal histories. It reminded us that play can be a global mental-health intervention. It can be one that honours the emotional, cultural, spiritual, and embodied realities. To every participant who danced, moved, cried, laughed, breathed, and played with us, we say THANK YOU. To our brilliant Playcilitators, thank you for guiding the world with courage and creativity. To our hosts, Rita Ezenwa-Okoro (Nigeria), Charly Ford (USA), Murray Dabby (USA), and Medhavi Parmar (India), your presence set the tone on both days. And to our indispensable tech team, you made HEART AND POWER come to life! Click to listen to the insightful musings on Heart & Power by Rita, our Executive Director! Click here to read the collaborative poem created by Heart & Power participants!