Board of Directors

James PermanaChair - Chicago, Illinois, USA

Bio
James Permana lives in Houston, Texas, USA, and works as a healthcare data consultant. Friendship Force has been instrumental in shaping his love and appreciation of international friendship in high school when he participated in the first International Summer Institute (later renamed “Global Youth Institute”). James hosted international guests through Sisters Cities International and Youth For Understanding, and he was a pioneer member of the CouchSurfing community. James also volunteers as an ESL tutor, an income tax preparer, and worked at the information desk at O'Hare International Airport through Traveler’s Aid. James travels extensively domestically for work and internationally for fun. He has been all over Asia and Europe and looks forward to exploring new countries with FFI.

Marilyn PetersonVice Chair - Mid-Willamette Valley, Oregon, USA

Bio
Marilyn Peterson of Albany, Oregon, USA, has been a member of the Friendship Force of Oregon’s Mid-Willamette Valley since 2003. A native of Northern California, she received a bachelor’s degree in Classics (Latin) from the University of Oregon. She taught high school Latin and Public Speaking for a number of years before “retiring” to raise her daughter. She returned to the work force as a computer programmer at Oregon State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine. During her employment at Hewlett Packard Company, she held a number of positions in the Information Technology department. At the time of her retirement she was the manager of the operations side of the site telecommunications department in Corvallis, Oregon. Marilyn and her late husband enjoyed traveling the United States. Friendship Force has been an important part of her retirement. With the organization she has traveled to numerous countries including Cuba, Jordan, Japan, India, New Zealand, Romania, Taiwan and Indonesia. She is a former Friendship Force Field Representative for the Pacific Northwest/Northern Rockies Region (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana). Within her club she has hosted and day-hosted guests, been the Journey Coordinator several times including an outbound to Romania and the Moon Shadow Over Oregon inbound Journey for the 2017 total solar eclipse. Currently she is the webmaster and provides other forms of club communication materials. She is a volunteer at the Albany Public Library and member of AAUW (American Association of University Women, ARRL (Amateur Radio Relay League), BRAINet (outreach for Oregon Health Sciences University), Oregon Railroad Heritage Foundation and University of Oregon Alumni. Other interests include knitting, reading, astronomy and music.

Christiane BeaupréTreasurer - Montréal, Canada

Bio
Christiane Beaupré has been a member of FF Montréal since 2009, and she has held the positions of Secretary and President. Christiane and her husband Yves Thouin have also managed many Journeys. Christiane set up exchanges/Journeys between Canadian clubs to promote cooperation between clubs. She has just completed a three-year term as Regional Representative for Eastern Canada Clubs. She spearheaded annual club meetings and completed her term with the first Ontario and Quebec club leaders' conference. Christiane holds a bachelor's degree in Business Administration. She has had a career in the federal public service in Canada. She has served as Chair of many organizations and on the boards of organizations, including the Institute of Public Administration of Greater Montreal and the National Association of Federal Retirees in the Montreal area. Christiane continues her work as a management skills development coach in the Government of Canada. She is actively interested in developing leadership in Friendship Force clubs.

Atik WijayantiSecretary - Solo-Surakarta, Indonesia

Bio
Atik has been involved with Friendship Force as a member in FF Solo – Surakarta, Indonesia since 1996. She has served as President of her club in the early years after the club chartered in 1997 and also has been an Exchange Director for inbound and outbound exchanges/Journeys. Besides being a member of the Next Generation Council, she is also currently a Field Representative for Indonesia, and has been since 2015. Atik’s career is mainly in education and other hospitality business areas. She founded an international hospitality education institution that has been running well for the past 20 years, becoming a leading school in the region with a worldwide network. Developing general institutional strategic planning and international collaboration are some of her activities for the institution. She also involved as member in EUHOFA International (a leading association for hotel-school Directors) and served as President in Rotary Club Solo Raya (D3420 – Indonesia) and Business Council.

Krisztina BaloghSzékesfehérvár, Hungary

Bio
Krisztina has grown up with Friendship Force, as her family joined the organization in 1991 when she was only 21 years old. She is an English language teacher and a certified accountant, and she has lived in Székesfehérvár, Hungary, all of her life. Krisztina has had several positions in her club throughout the years, serving as president most recently. When she has some spare time, she is keen on watching films, reading, and meeting new people.

Chuck GoldfarbWashington DC, USA

Bio
Chuck Goldfarb is a second-generation Friendship Force member. His parents were active in the Los Angeles club and he has been active in the National Capital Area (Washington, DC) club since 2006. He has been exchange director (Journey Coordinator) for both inbound and outbound Journeys and club president. He helped create a Friendship Force presence in the Philippines. For 39 years Chuck was a public policy economist, working in both the public and private sectors, with a specialization in telecommunications and media. For more than 45 years Chuck has held leadership positions in non-profit organizations serving the LGBT community. For the past six years he has chaired the Rainbow History Project, whose mission is to collect, preserve, and promote the history, arts, and culture of DC’s diverse LGBT communities. For twenty years he was a board member of SMYAL, the support organization for LGBT youth, and he also was steering committee president of Black and White Men Together, which addressed racial discrimination in the LGBT community. Chuck and his husband, Bo Hong, live in an 1880s row house in DC.

Lyn HargreaveKalamazoo, Michigan, USA

Bio
Lyn Hargreave has been a member of FF of Western Michigan since 2005. She has served as President and Vice President of her club and has been the ED for numerous inbound and outbound exchangers. She is currently a Field Representative for the Great Lakes Region serving since 2011. She is a former TWA flight attendant and a registered nurse who at the time of her retirement was a Director of Ambulatory Care for Kalamazoo, Michigan’s Borgess Medical Center where she managed several physician office practices. She has organized excursions for field courses to Hawaii for Western Michigan University’s Environmental Studies program which her husband Dave taught. For eleven years she and her family traveled to the Yucatan of Mexico working in Mayan villages while staying with the Mayan families in their modest stick and dirt floor homes through the Intercambio Cultural Maya organization. She has also been involved in leadership positions with other organizations such as P.E.O. In addition to traveling, in her free time she enjoys reading, gardening, genealogy and of course her family and granddaughters.

Amber KelleherVienna, Virginia, USA

Bio
Amber is new to Friendship Force, but she has spent much of her life connecting people and cultures. She began her career working for an inbound high school homestay program and later led recruitment tours in Asia and the Middle East to bring together college admissions officers and international students. During the past 25 years, Amber has traveled to 30+ countries in various executive leadership roles for the nonprofit sector. She is the former managing director for the Association of Corporate Travel Executives; she founded an international charity focused on fitness and philanthropy; and she currently serves as president and CEO of UWRA, the United Way Retirees Association. Amber and her husband (whom she met during a study abroad program in England) live with their two teenage sons in the Washington, DC metro area.

Tracy MirembeKampala, Uganda

Bio
Tracy has been an active member of Friendship Force since 2016. Tracy holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration majoring in Procurement and Logistics and high diploma in counseling; special needs, and family/marriage counseling. Tracy’s career is mainly in charity and business development. Throughout her life, she has found herself in positions of leadership in her community and enjoys interacting with people of different cultures and background. Tracy travels a lot internationally and locally for both work and fun, and has also had the privilege of living in different countries. She enjoys reading, travelling, and spending time with her amazing big family. She hopes to help FFI growth plans in Africa and into the next generation

Bobbie MulhollandAdelaide, Australia

Bio
Bobbie has been a member of FF Adelaide, Australia since 1994, along with her husband, Robin. Having served as president of her club for three years, along with Exchange Director and club officer several other times, Bobbie is an active and involved member, having been awarded FFI’s Volunteer of the Year award in 2013. Bobbie has been integral in helping to launch several new clubs, including FF Athens, Greece and FF Perth, Australia before that. Now retired, the largest portion of her career was spent in public service, working for the Australian Telecommunications service. She has also worked as a marriage and relationship educator in the past as well. Bobbie is passionate about strengthening and supporting current Friendship Force clubs, the development of leadership, and assisting with the expansion of FFI’s program of exchanges.

Ingrid RussellMount Pleasant, South Carolina, USA

Bio
Ingrid Russell, PhD is a highly respected retired Chief Financial Officer. She has previously served as the Vice President of the Board of Wounded Nature-Working Veterans, an organization that provides environmental clean-up to coastal beaches. Dr. Russell has worked globally for Hewlett Packard and United Technology and has lived in England, Brazil, the Netherlands, Trinidad and Tobago, and now the United States. She brings a wealth of finance and accounting experience from a global perspective.

Bart Van de VelMiami, Florida, USA

Bio
Bart Van de Vel has extensive experience in sales, advertising, brand marketing, digital transformation, and customer service for global markets. He joined Facebook in 2013, and after spending four years at the international headquarters in Dublin, he moved to Dubai to lead Facebook's partner-building efforts in the Middle East & North Africa. He has currently gravitated towards making digital platforms more accessible in emerging markets via the newly launched Authorized Sales Partner program and leads sales enablement across company-wide strategic initiatives. When not glued to a mobile screen, Bart travels the world & the seven seas, learns about wine, and tries very hard not to be the worst volleyball player on the beach.

Birgit WagnerVarel, Germany

Bio
Birgit, born in 1971, grew up in Varel, Germany, where she still lives today. She has been a member of Friendship Force since 2006 and has served as the Vice President of FF Varel and as a member of the Next Generation Council. Birgit currently serves as the President of FF Varel. She has been married for twenty-one years, and works in human resources for a large international company, focusing on recruitment, health management, and work safety. Her hobbies include acting as a rescue dog handler in a fire brigade and spending time with her horse.

Khrystsina WillisFallbrook, California, USA

Bio
Khrystsina was born in Gomel, Belarus. Having traveled extensively in Europe, she gained an appreciation for cultural diversity, local cuisines, and languages. In Minsk, Belarus she studied English and Italian at the Linguistic University and is fluent in Belarusian and Russian. In 2006, she immigrated to the United States and pursued a career in healthcare. Outside of work, Khrystsina is passionate about being involved with the local community by volunteering for a local animal shelter. In her free time, Khrystsina enjoys hiking, photography and traveling.

Read more about our Board here:

James PermanaChair - Chicago, Illinois, USA

Marilyn PetersonVice Chair - Mid-Willamette Valley, Oregon, USA

Christiane BeaupréTreasurer - Montréal, Canada

Atik WijayantiSecretary - Solo-Surakarta, Indonesia

Krisztina BaloghSzékesfehérvár, Hungary

Chuck GoldfarbWashington DC, USA

Lyn HargreaveKalamazoo, Michigan, USA

Amber KelleherVienna, Virginia, USA

Tracy MirembeKampala, Uganda

Bobbie MulhollandAdelaide, Australia

Ingrid RussellMount Pleasant, South Carolina, USA

Bart Van de VelMiami, Florida, USA

Birgit WagnerVarel, Germany

Khrystsina WillisFallbrook, California, USA