Families Affected by Civil War

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Cover of the book "The Bite of the Mango" by Mariatu Kamara and Susan McClelland. Translucent hands holding a mango with a village background

Recently, I read the book 'The Bite of the Mango' by Mariatu Kamara. This book is about the civil war of Sierra Leone that happened from 1991-2002. The author, Mariatu Kamara writes about her own life and the experience of having her arms cut off, thinking her family is dead, and then she has a baby, then her baby dies. A sponsor brings her to Canada, where she learns english and graduates from school and college. Then a few years later, the president of Sierra Leone wants to meet her so she goes back, sees her family, meets the president, returns to Canada and writes this book. I had some questions after reading this book, so I went online to do some research and here is what I found:

1. What can everyday people do to help?

  • First, everyday people can’t exactly fly right to -- and just stop the war and pull everyone out, so there are organizations that are specifically for helping people in these situations. 
  • For example, UNICEF (The author of my book is a special representative for the armed conflicts). 
  • To help, we can donate to these organizations and spread awareness about these problems so that others will also donate and help.

 

2. What happens to the families separated by civil wars?

I searched for some organizations that help reunite families and here is what I found: 

 

3. Why do we have enough money for professional sports but not to help everyone suffering?

  • 410 billion dollars is donated to charities per year in the United States
  • After looking around for a while, I couldn’t find the exact number that professional sports cost, but from what I saw, around 150 billion I’d say?
  • So not that much is spent on sports compared to charity, but still. Imagine what that 150 billion dollars could do. (I’m not against sports, but do we really need to be using that much money?)
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