I hope many people went to hear El-Fadel Arbab speak last Tuesday about his experiences surviving the Darfur genocide. As for me, I was blown away. Having heard the stories and read the books, I thought I would be prepared. As it turns out, nothing can prepare you for the tears of a grown man reliving a nightmare before your eyes.
Walking away from the presentation, tightly clutching my Save Darfur T-shirt I was left with an insatiable desire to change the world, make a difference, simply do something, anything.
Well I'm not going to change the world over night, but I am going to keep thinking about what I can do. What I am going to do. I can write to President Obama to take action in Darfur, I can learn more about this, and other issues around the world, I can simply be appreciative of how truly lucky I am.
So what will you do? Let's start the conversation. Changing the world little by little, fulfilling our responsibilities as privileged people.
As my (first) contribution, here's a poem that reads the same left to right and top to bottom. The pink punctuation goes left to right and the green top to bottom.
Post your thoughts or reflections on El-Fedal, changing the world, being alive... Write anything because there are no rules here. Go for it.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Both far and near
ReplyDeleteare Death and Fear
why can't we hear
the silence
of their falling tears...
the world continues to turn,
but still,
we never turn our heads to see
what is happening to our people
our very own people.
we all come from somewhere,
we all are kin...
stop shying away and stop hiding your sins
take the chance,
hold out your hand-
and help each other get up again.