It must be heart-breaking to know that in this lifetime:
1. You will always have to worry about providing your children with basic education
2. Your children may never have the chance to be educated and have a better life than you
3. You may never sit in a car
4. Your longest travel trip will be to the water well some 10 miles away from your village, by foot
5. You will never see another city or country other than the one you live in
6. The Eiffel Tower, London Bridge, Great Wall of China and the Northern Lights are only pictures in a book
7. You may not even have books
8. Clean water is a resource you can never get enough of
9. You will never be affected by increasing oil prices because oil is something you don’t need, you use your hands and feet to toil everyday in the baking sun
10. Your fields are full of healthy crops but you are still short of half your rent due at the end of the week
11. Your landlord wants your daughter in lieu of your rent short-fall, probably to sell her into prostitution
12. You will never have enough food
13. You will see your children, wife and parents starve on a daily basis
14. You may even have to watch them die of starvation
15. Because of Aids & malaria, you may die before your children
16. Your children may be infected as well but you will never have enough money or time to save them
17. The burden of looking after your children when you pass on from disease may fall on your deaf and blind ageing parents
18. Coca-cola, the daily drink of the Westerners, is a luxury to you
19. You may have killed a child of yours just to prevent him/her from the suffering you face
20. You pray for help and assistance, but there just seems like there is no light at the end of the tunnel
21. You have absolutely no solution on how you can make things better; you’re just one person caught up in a system of how it has always been
22. People cry when they hear your stories, but you can’t cry for everything that you can never be and everything that you have lost
23. People take away the physical hardship with blankets and food and kind words but they can’t take away the scars life has carved out in your soul
24. This is your life, the way it started and the way it’s going to end, and this is all that it will ever be
Recently, I have been increasingly saddened by the various sufferings all over the world, particularly Africa. When I think of my overseas education, or when we’re driving home on a rainy night and I look out at the world behind my window of warmth and security, when I’m eating in a restaurant or I spend money on yet another meaningless trinket or outfit, I suddenly am plagued with a sense of regret and remorse at the luxuries I take for granted. How fortunate I am, how safe a haven is my country, how beautiful my life is; everything I have compared to everything they don’t.
In the past, whenever I watch these charity programs on TV or see an ad banner, I’d always feel a pang of sadness but the pang often gets replaced by something else pretty fast and I forget what I have just witnessed. I guess what really changed me was when I watched Idol Gives Back ‘08, the segment which hit me the most when Annie Lennox cried after spending time with the 4 siblings whose parents passed away from Aids. The eldest boy is only 15 years old and the burden on caring and providing for his brothers and sisters weigh solely on his shoulders. When I was 15, my biggest problems were boys and not getting grounded for staying out too late. I decided then that I wanted to give something too.
Call me unfair but as I was trawling through the various non-profit organization websites, I wasn’t touched by the underprivileged Americans at all. Firstly most of them looked pretty well-fed, if you get my drift and secondly, I honestly believe that there are enough rich Americans to take care of their own. I knew that I wanted to focus on the Africans, especially the children who had to grow up too quickly because of the environment they live in.
The stories I read broke my heart. The poverty, the anguish and the loss that these children suffer almost on a daily basis, and yet in every picture, a smile, so sweet so innocent so trusting so full of hope. And always so dignified, standing tall with their backs straight up as if to say “things can’t get any worse, we can make it through.” Little soldiers, forced to grow up way before their time.
I wanted to sponsor every single kid on every website I came across but I have my limitations as well. Anyway, I chose a little boy who lost his parents and is living on borrowed time with his relatives. His family’s income is only US$25/month (I can spend more than that on shoes in a week!!) and he needs all the help he can get. He looks like the cutest boy ever from his pictures and I hope that my donations put him through school so that one day we can communicate directly in English.
I may be helping King get a better future, but I believe that he will teach me how to live a better life. One of humility, dignity and strength.
To sponsor a kid, use the link below:
http://www.children.org/
To make a project donation, use the link below:
http://www.africaaid.org/donate.htm
Go ahead, man
Here, have a dollar
In fact no, brother man, here, have two
Two dollars means a snack for me
But it means a big deal to you
Be strong, serve God only
Know that if you do, beautiful heaven awaits
That's the poem I wrote for the first time
I saw a man with no clothes, no money, no plate
Mister Wendal, that's his name
No one ever knew his name 'cause he's a no one
Never thought twice about spending on an old bum
Until I had the chance to really get to know one
Now that I know him, to give him money isn't charity
He gives me some knowledge, I buy him some shoes
And to think blacks spend all that money on big colleges
Still most of y'all come out confused
Mister Wendal has freedom
A free that you and I think is dumb
Free to be without the worries of a quick to diss society
For Mister Wendal's a bum
His only worries are sickness and an occasional harassment
By the police and their chase
Uncivilized we call him
But I just saw him eat off the food we waste
Civilization, are we really civilized
Yes or no, who are we to judge
When thousands of innocent men could be brutally enslaved
And killed over a racist grudgeMister Wendal has tried to warn us about our ways
But we don't hear him talk
Is it his fault when we've gone too far
And we got too far 'cause on him we walk
Mister Wendal, a man, a human in flesh
But not by law
I feed you dignity to stand with pride
Realize that all in all you stand tall
Location: 14th floor of misery
Current Condition: bittersweet
Music: many rivers
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