Half the Sky

I just finished reading a book called Half the Sky. The book was recommended to me by a friend and it focuses on issues/problems that affect women around the globe and ways to solve these issues. I've heard about some of these issues before, but this book was eye opening. I am very blessed to have been born in the United States of America, and not just because of the freedom that we have, but because of all the places in the world to be born female, this is one of the best. Sure, there are still some inequality issues in America, but when compared to the problems facing millions of women living in Africa and Asia and other third world nations I have nothing to worry about.
Truth be told, I don't really feel oppressed. I've been told my whole life that I can do anything, be anything that I want to be. I believed it then as I believe it now. No one and nothing can stop me but obstacles I put before me. But that is one of the greatest things about America: the American dream. Although some think that the American dream means getting rich, it is more than that. It means that if you work hard, you can "change your stars" (as the movie A Knight's Tale puts it). In other words, you don't have to be constrained by the circumstances of your birth. Sure, it is much easier to be successful if you are born in a wealthy, or even middle class family, but it is not impossible to escape poverty in America if you have the work ethic and intelligence/skill. In other countries, that is not always the case.
For example, some girls are at the top of their class, but because boys are seen as more important in some cultures/societies, if there is not enough money to send both sons and daughters to school, the girls are kept home.
Some of the other isues that are addressed in this book are truly horrific and mortifying: human trafficking and sexual slavery, rape, genital cutting, female infanticide, forced abortions, so-called "honor" killings, and acid burnings. In some nations of the world there is a significant disregard for the life of females, even by females themselves. In those countries/societies, mothers value sons over daughters, and so sons are fed while daughters starve.
After reading the book, the problem seems so large that it feels insurmountable, but very specific solutions are proposed. The key for each individual who feels moved to act, is to find one solution to support, and focus on that. We can't fix everything, but we can fix something, and together we can fix everything.
Here is a quote from the book that I found particularly moving:
“While the main motivation for joining this global movement is to help others, the result is often to help oneself. As Sir John Templeton said, ‘Self-improvement comes mainly from trying to help others.’ Social psychologists have learned a great deal about happiness in recent years, and one of the surprises is that the things we believe will make us happy won’t. People who win the lottery, for example, enjoy an initial spike of happiness but then adjust and a year later are not significantly happier than those who haven’t won. Our happiness levels seem to be mostly innate, and not markedly affected by what happens to us, good or bad. People in end-stage dialysis, for example, turn out to be no different in their moods throughout the day than a comparison group of healthy people. And while those who suffer a crippling disability are initially deeply unhappy, they adjust quickly. One study found that just a month after becoming paraplegics, accident victims were in fairly good moods a majority of the time. Other research found that within two years of suffering a moderate disability, life satisfaction fully recovers to the predisability level. So Jonathan Haidt, a psychologist at the University of Virginia who has studied happiness, advises that if you are hit by a truck and end up a paraplegic, or if you win the lottery, remember that a year from now, it won’t make much difference to your happiness level.
Yet Professer Haidt and others advise that there are a few factors that CAN affect our happiness levels in a sustained way."(Pg. 249) One of those is to become involved in something. Those of us who are religious understand that one way to help yourself is to serve others. And so, I would ask all of you to get involved in whatever way you can. Start small, and when you feel more able, increase what you give and what you do.
Half the Sky suggests 4 things you can do:
1. Go to www.globalgiving.org or www.kiva.org and open an account. Through these sites you are linked directly to a person overseas who is in need. You can also try www.givology.com.
2. Sponser a girl or a woman through Plan International, Women for Women International, World Vision, or American Jewish World Service.
3. Sign up for email updates on www.womensenews.org or www.worldpulse.com.
4. Join the CARE Action Network at www.can.care.org.

I would like to add, 1. check this book out from the library and read it, 2. Check out www.charitynavigator.org to find a charity you would like to donate to, 3. Look in your community for ways to donate time or money, and 4. When you see a need, fill it. After all, studies have shown that the more you give, the happier you become; the happier you become, the more productive you are; the more productive you are, the more successful you are; and the more successful you are, the more money you make (see a previous post of mine).

Well all, I hope that this doesn't come off as preachy, but I really do believe in the power of service!

Reunion, Breakfast, and Another's Memories

Yesterday was an interesting day. I got a lot done. That is always nice, to have a productive day. Later, though, I went to my mission reunion up in Salt Lake. It was nice to see some people, but not very many that I knew were actually there. Still, it was good since I may never be able to go to another mission reunion.
The picture here is of me with my "mom" and my "sister". From left to right: Valoree, me, Kalia. Valoree was my trainer and she also trained Kalia.
This morning Sara and I went to a friend's house for breakfast before the first session of general conference. It was really good, and a lot of fun. Then conference was really good, too. The new apostle was announced, Neil L Anderson. I'm not too familiar with him, but I'm sure that he will have a lot of good things to say.
Recently I've been reading a book called "In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer." I just read a part that was really touching. This is what it says: "I did not ask myself, Should I do this? but How will I do this? Every step of my childhood had brought me to this crossroad; I must take the right path, or I would no longer be myself.
You must understand that I did not become a resistance fighter, a smuggler of the Jews, a defier of the SS and the Nazis all at once. One's first steps are always small: I had begun by hiding food under a fence. Now I was making plans to get a dorozka, a wagon, from the farm where Helen lived, and to transport in secret the Morris brothers and their wives ten kilometers from Ternopol, to the back-shadowed forest of Janowka.
But even my first feeble efforts to help the Jews back in the Radom ghetto could have brought me a bullet in the head; I knew I could only be killed once, and as the saying went, I might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb. The Nazis did not distinguish between leaving food under a fence and smuggling four people in a dorozka, and so I did not, either. . . For four years I had been in the middle of war, and I had different hopes and expectations now. I only wanted not to die in too much pain, and to foil the Germans as much as I could before I went."
In my Russian Literature class, we've been reading Soviet Literature. One of the themes that we have continuously come across is the need to "howl" and not just remain silent. There are different ways to do that, of course. Not too long ago, we also talked about the importance of family, and keeping the family together. A student in my class said, well wouldn't it have been better to not "howl" but keep silent and protect their families? My first thought was, "How can you protect your family when you lose yourself?" For me, by not standing up for your beliefs, you lose yourself. And then what really is the point of protecting the family? Plus, physical safety isn't everything. Sometimes the safety that a family needs is to understand what is right and what is wrong and be willing to sacrifice for what is right. That's the essence for me of the passage above. She didn't think about whether or not she should do it, she just did it because she knew it was the right thing to do. If she died, that wasn't what really mattered. There are things in this world fighting for, and dieing for, and protecting innocent people is definitely one of those things. Now, this is not a justification of killing others for your beliefs, but only of being willing to stand up, and if necessary risk your life for the things that you believe in.

Three Cups of Tea

I just finished reading a book called Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. The story told between the cover is an incredible story of one man's life work to promote peace by educating children. It is a testimony that one person really can make a difference. Often people think, what can I do? I'm just one man or one woman. How can I make a difference? But here we see one man who didn't waste time asking those questions. Instead, he saw a need, and was determined to provide for it.
Greg Mortenson first became acquainted with Pakiston in 1993 when he attempted and failed to climb K2, a large mountain in the area. He almost died in the process, but was nursed to health in a rural Balti village. At that time, he saw how desperate the children were for an education, but their village could not afford to pay a teacher. Instead, they got together with another village to share a teacher who would teach three days in each village. Even without a teacher there, the children would get together to study, without a building to study in.
That began a long journey that started with 580 letters painstakingly typed (300 on a typewriter until he learned how to use a computer), in hope of acquiring the funds to build a single school. Unfortunately, it didn't yield many results. In fact, besides a little over $600 that was raised by Elementary school children and a single check for $100, success did not come until after the American Himalayan Foundation published an article in their newsletter about Mortenson's efforts. That resulted in a call from Jean Hoerni who became Mortenson's principle supporter. He provided the funds to build that single school, and kept supporting him, eventually establishing the Central Asia Institute (see www.ikat.org) with Mortenson as the director. Mortenson went on to build dozens of schools in other rural areas of Pakistan and eventually in Afghanistan as well, and he continues his endeavors. The CAI is particularly dedicated to bringing education to girls.
I would like to share one particular passage that I find very touching:
--Haji Ali spoke. "If you want to thrive in Balistan, you must respect our ways," Haji Ali said, blowing on his bowl. "The first time you share tea with a Balti, you are a stranger. The second time you take tea, you are an honored guest. The third time you share a cup of teach, you become family, and for our family, we are prepared to do anything, even die," he said laying his hand warmly on Mortenson's own. "Doctor Greg, you must take time to share three cups of tea. We may be uneducated. But we are not stupid. We have lived and survived here for a long time."
"That day, Haji Ali taught me the most important lesson I've ever learned in my life," Mortenson says. "We Americans think you have to accomplish everything quickly. We're the country of thirty-minute power lunches and two-minute football drills. Our leaders thought their 'shock and awe' campaign could end the war in Iraq before it even started. Haji Ali taught me to share three cups of tea, to slow down and make building relationships as important as building projects. He taught me that I had more to learn from the people I work with than I could ever hope to teach them."-- (pg. 150)
I really think that this is the key to peace in the world. We have to build bridges of trust. Terrorism's largest tools are propaganda and uneducation, or lack of a good education. Uneducated people do no feel that they have any options, educated ones know that they do. In that area of the world, sometimes the only education opportunity is at an extremist madrassa. With propaganda being taught to children, it is no wonder that they grow up to be terrorists. But if another opportunity is presented, they have a chance to escape that kind of education.
But, in my personal opinion, education is not enough. It is a start, and a necessary one, but education alone will not win the war on terrorism. This war is, or really should be, a war on propaganda. I've been doing a lot of reading about counterterrorism this semester since that has been the focus of my Russian senior paper. In reading about counterterrorism, I've also been reading about terrorism. One paper that I read put things into perspective (Rethinking Terrorsm and Counterterrism by Bruce Hoffman), "the weapons of modern terrorism critically are not only the guns and bombs that they have long been, but the mini-cam, videotape, television, and the Internet." In the same way that the media often portrays only one side of a story (usually the most interesting), terrorist organizations are able to use technology to portray things in a light that justifies their actions. This propaganda is used to recruit followers to their cause. Not only uneducated, backwards people become terrorists. There are highly educated terrorists, too. So why do they become terrorists? Some probably do it for money and power, but there are others who do it because they feel oppressed as a minority group. This is where the bridges of trust come in. We have to reach out to those groups and hear their complaints. We need to understand what is most frustrating for them so we can address those issues. I've talked about this a lot in regards to the Palestine-Israeli conflict. The Palestinians feel they have no other recourse but through violent acts. This is the only way their voice can be heard (or so they think). But I don't think this just characterizes that conflict. It characterizes many of the world's terrorists.
So there you have it. That is my solution to terrorism: education and listening to the complaints of people. Those are the only ways that I can see to effectively combat the propaganda of terrorist organizations.
I would highly recommend reading this book, if you can get your hands on it. Maybe it will inspire you to make a difference in the world.