In follow-up to my post in recogition of International Refugee Day, more thoughts:
I HOPE THEY WON'T KILL ME I HOPE NOBODY’S FOLLOWING ME I HOPE I DON’T STEP ON A LANDMINE I HOPE I FIND SOME WATER SOON I HOPE I DON’T DIE OUT HERE I HOPE SOMEONE WILL FIND ME I HOPE THE UNITED NATIONS CAN HELP ME I HOPE THEY’VE GOT FOOD AND SHELTER I HOPE THEY CAN HELP ME FIND MY FAMILY I HOPE WE’LL BE ABLE TO GO BACK ONE DAY I HOPE WE FIND A PLACE TO CALL HOME I HOPE WE LEARN TO FIT IN I HOPE WE CAN BUILD A FUTURE HERE.
- from a poster for the United Nations High Commission on Refugees: GIVING 19 MILLION REFUGEES REASON TO HOPE
All too often, medical care and relief aid is too slow to arrive. Children die of malnutrition; of disease; of curable illnesses easily treated in properly-stocked hospitals and clinics, IF the child gets help in time. The problem of course is that sheer logistics of employing relief to remote areas - particularly those overwhelmed by political and ethnic conflicts -can sometimes prove difficult. As is frequently the case in refugee crises around the world, children are usually the first victims.
"...If this were your country, your city, your town
would you wrench your eyes from their gaze at the ground?
If this were your child, so lonely and scared,
Would you act; could anyone say that you dared?
"Who will speak for that child, whose voice is now gone?
Will anyone protest, ‘He should have lived long!’
That promise, bright spirit, too quickly snuffed out
by hunger or a landmine that sweepers failed to rout."
from "A Stone's Throw Away" copyright 1998 Tara Bradford
Oh, Tara! Thank you for this poignant reminder - all too often it's easy to forget that so many people in the world do not have our infrastructure (flawed though it might be at times - at least there IS an infrastructure of sorts). It's especially tragic that any child should have to live (or die) under the circumstances that violence & poverty impose. Thank you for not letting us forget. We need to be reminded again and again.
Posted by: tinker | 22 June 2006 at 05:17
Wow. Just, wow...
:(
Posted by: a | 21 June 2006 at 17:53
Too many people just turn a blind eye to suffering of anykind. It even happens in our own backyard. Foster kids are very much like refugees. Is there anyway I can make a difference? I wish I knew how.
Posted by: Tammy | 21 June 2006 at 17:32
>"...If this were your country, your city, your town<
And the horror of this is, Tara, is that it DID happen here. HERE! of all places. How in God's name did New Orleans EVER happen? We mobilize faster for the world than we do for our own people. The government leaders were watching the same news programs we were. They could not have possibly NOT understood the scope of what was happening. Unforgivable.
Posted by: AnnieElf | 21 June 2006 at 16:21
care + logistics = hope fulfilled. sadly, this seems to be beyond our world.
it's a tragedy that's difficult to get my head around, and yet i still try. and i suppose that is the key to the whole thing: keep trying.
Posted by: ally bean | 21 June 2006 at 15:36