A Little Perspective

 

This is what a school in Port-au-Prince, Haiti looks like. Likely 100, 000 or more young minds enrich themselves daily in tarp shelters or partially collapsed buildings without complaint while relief agencies squabble with one another. The children care little about the UN and celebrity means nothing. All they desire is a bite to eat, a book, and maybe a soccer ball to share with their friends. These resourceful youngsters are the future for a country that desperately needs a change in how it is run. Aid needs to reach Haiti in the form of food, construction materials,and medical and agricultural equipment. if there is anything that the past 20 years has taught us, it's that the corrupt local authorities cannot be trusted with monetary instruments, having squandered 6.5 billion dollars and left most kids' parents with less than $2 a day for their families. But that is not to say we should stop giving and forget, but quite the opposite.

  We MUST assist these awesome kids in attaining education and medical care that will allow them to become the future for a working country. These children live the example daily, and when they do survive they will prevent oppressive regimes from destroying their communities. Just because your favourite actor stopped talking about this doesn't mean that Haitians spontaneously vanished en masse. The thing is that if we forget, over a million human beings could be swallowed up by the river of mud that is to come. And some of those will certainly be children like these.

   N matter how well your life may seem to be going, take a step back and a few breaths for the little guy. Live your dreams and never stomp on those of others and give from the SOUL. Have true gratitude for each of your blessings and do what you can to make a difference in the life of another. Your actions today can change the future for someone in need. The kid in the camp will be the surgeon in the future as long as he is guaranteed a tomorrow.

Photo courtesy of Kas Roussy and the CBC