NEWS

Syrian refugees have become a worldwide problem. The images shown daily on the television news show a very harsh reality on the Greek border. This issue causes me much grief and for this reason I wanted to choose a story about this.

The children who just want to go home

The war in Syria has claimed not only fatalities but victims alive with physical and psychological effects. Most of these are children. The writer talks about her meeting with Ibrahim, a Syrian child aged 12 who lives in an abandoned building in Jordania.

The children his leg in an aerial bombardment. He was the one who was luckier: his mother, two sisters and three brothers, also his uncle and three cousins died. He explained to the writer that he and his father were witting to go to Canada for asylum, but what he wanted was to return home and be a war reporter, because the outside world does not know what was happening in his country. 

Syrian adults fleeing from the war of their country but kids always want to go home. Rouaa, a five-year-old child, said that she will go home the following day if she could. Rouaa's little brother was briefly in hospital. Their home now is a refugee’s camp on Mount Lebanon. Her parents and five children lives one small tent. 

The writer also met a young boy who lost both legs, an eye and one of his hands in a landmine explosion. The following day he had prosthetic legs fitted and he did not stop to walk during the day.

Another victim of war was Mustafa, who also had to learn to walk again after a barrel bomb hit his family house on the outskirts of Aleppo. Both of his parents were killed and he spent a year in hospital. He had the hip damaged and he needs a replacement of it. But, unfortunately, Medecins Sans Frontieres have not the necessary resources to do that. When he arrived at the hospital, he couldn't stand, he was malnourished and so traumatised he couldn't eat. He'd scream whenever he saw anyone in a white coat. He left on his own two feet, a different boy. After a year, he was recovered but not entirely of his broken hip and he demonstrated his courage i strength with only 5 years old.

Vocabulary

• Fleeing
• Hip
• Fatalities

Personal Opinion

I find it shameful that the EU can remedy this major problem and stay out just because these people are not part of Europe. If Human Rights exist to preserve the dignity and welfare of any human, then if they ignore the Syrians is because the EU does not consider them as such. It is disgusting the selfish behaviour that shows both EU and other powers by failing to cooperate in this major global problem.

TED: How I stopped the Taliban from shutting down my school

Sakena Yacoobi: How I stopped the Taliban from shutting down my school

Sakena Yacoobi is a woman who was born in Afghanistan.She born into a middle class family but her country was extremely poor: she grew up watching women and girls living situations of extreme poverty. That made her decide to study medicine, but higher education in Afghanistan were reserved only for boys. So Sakena had to go to the United States to study medicine. While she was studying her degree at the university, Russia invaded Afghanistan. As soon as she ended her degree, she pulled out his family from war.

All stabilized: his family was with her in a safe country, she had a good job at the university as professor of medicine, a good salary... But she was not happy. What she wanted was to help girls and women of his country, which were suffering a difficult situation because of the war. So she gave up her life in the United States and she went to Afghanistan as a volunteer.  There she formed schools in refugee camps only for girls.

One day, when she was on the way to another refugee camp, an armed men stopped her car and they asked Sakena coming down from the car. As she came down, she had already clear that she was going to die. But those armed men just wanted to ask her if someday she would decide to help children and men, because they believed that not only the girls needed help in their country. Sakena accepted but on one condicion. So the armed men came with her to the mosque and, to make a long story short, she gave them teachers. And these men became the best teachers on the spot. These huge men have learned english, computers,  they lead the other teachers through the unknown areas and they protect them from the threat of the terrorists.

Sakena, with this example of the armed men, make us see the value of education in our society, how education can positively influence in our mentality and wind up with the war definitely. She also highlights the relevance of the education in men: it make them see the potenical of the women and learn gender equality. And she finish saying loud and clear that the only way to conqueer the world is using the love, the compassion, the trust and the honesty.