Thursday, March 1, 2012

Note to Self: Life Really Is No Picnic

If you watched Rock Center with Brian Williams last night, you know what I'm talking about.

Crises in Sudan--There's an American guy risking his life to bring awareness to the struggle of the people of the Nuba Mountains in Sudan. He's married to a Nuba woman. The people are being subjected to ethnic cleansing, systematic rape, and just plain horrible living conditions--One older woman, during the coverage, was said to be taking care of around 12 orphans she didn't have the means to feed properly, not to mention, they're hiding in caves for safety. This is owed to border disputes waging in the country. They have no place to go because of this.

Ann Curry captured poignant photos during her assignment. They're pictures of the women and children hiding in the mountains for fear being bombarded. The men, Nuba rebels with equipment--tanks, weapons, artillery--they didn't own, but instead had to take from the government.

There's a link on the site with information about the organizations geared toward helping the Nuba people.

[I realize I didn't give you enough information on the situation, but to be honest, I'm no expert. Only found about this last night and it's been going on for years. I know, sad. But I'm young and shelter and can't be expected to know about every injustice, disaster, and problem in this world. I think that's part of the point of this post. I feel bad about not knowing, though, and not knowing what to do to stop it.... I just had a thought. I put it here.]

But...

Kid Leader--This guy is 24 and Mayor of a city. He came from fatherless, homelessness and now he's on a clear track to success with his government career. It's really amazing. And he's very humble and likable, too. What some people would call "down to earth", others might call it real. There's a part in the segment when a lady tells him that's not how a mayor should act. He says he couldn't do it without the people in his life that helped him. It's always great when people acknowledge the ones that gave them a hand up.

This was bitter sweet in a way that makes the dish taste pretty good cause it was mostly sweet since he made it out of poverty to do great things, like get accepted to, I think, Cornell University. Mostly on near perfect SAT scores...Yeah.

I hope he does have success in anything he sets his mind to do.





No comments:

Post a Comment