Why This Stuff is Important

I've been back in my own world for almost a week now, and I'd be lying if I said I don't enjoy every second of washing machine-dishwasher-hot shower-soft bed-smiling loved ones bliss. Even so, I still have dreams that I'm back in Ghana, and I still wake up a little confused about where I am on some mornings. Throughout the day, my thoughts still wander back to people and places that seem so distant from here, and secretly, my fear is not that they'll keep coming, it's that they'll go away.

I don't want to forget. I can't forget.

I have friends who are passionate about all kinds of things. I have watched the uncomfortable looks on others' faces when these friends start discussing their passions with an unwitting or unwilling audience. No one wants to hear about animal rights when they're buying steaks, and no one wants to hear about the environment when they're washing their SUV. Likewise, no one wants to hear about child slaves in Africa while they're busy living their own lives, working hard to put food  on the table and pay the mortgage.

So why should we care? 

On one of our last days of interviewing child slaves, we met a little girl named Peace. Peace was the third trafficked child brought to us out of 16 we interviewed that day. She was a pretty little girl with small earrings that accented her graceful features. A flowered purple dress hung from her malnourished frame, and, unlike so many of the kids, she had a smile in her eyes when she sat down on the plastic chair in front of me.

I asked Peace how old she was, and, like many of the other slave kids, she didn't know. I guessed her to be about eight years old. She had been with her master for as long as she could remember, and didn't know where she came from. She never knew her mother. She spent her days smoking fish, fetching heavy loads of firewood, cooking and washing bowls. Her master was a woman, and she told me she was afraid of her.

Why? I asked her.

She beats me when I am sick, Peace told me. I didn't know there was something hidden in that statement. I didn't know to ask her if she was sick on that day. I didn't know. I just didn't know.

Instead, she sat before me with her quiet grace and continued answering my questions, this tiny child with wide eyes and a big purple dress and the tiniest glimmer of hope on her face.

What do you want to do?  I asked her.

With a serious look, she answered, Go to school. I want to go to school.

If we could find a way for you to leave this place and go to school, what would you want to do someday? I asked.

Be a nurse, she'd answered. I want to take care of sick people.

Like all of the children, I told Peace we wanted to help her. I told her to be patient, though, because I needed to come back to America and get help from people here to build a place for her. I hugged her and sent her back to her difficult life knowing she had been heard, but not knowing if anyone would listen.

Less than two weeks later, Peace was dead. The village chief told me she had simply collapsed and died. There would be no big funeral; no mourning for the little girl who only dreamed of helping others.

It's easy for me to spout off a jillion reasons why I care because I've seen it. I've hugged some of these kids as they stood stiffly, not knowing what to do because they'd never been hugged before. I've watched their blank looks as they describe the horrors of their lives and the fears they live with every day. I've looked them in the eyes  and promised them that I would do everything I can to help.

So why should you care?

We are all humans spinning along on the same planet. We are only as strong as our weakest members. It is good and right to celebrate our own lives and do the best we can for our loved ones, but we can't limit our love to only people who look like us or share the same embossed passport cover. At some point, we have to look at the Peaces in our world and tell them, "I care," because if we don't, we are denying ourselves the greatest gift of human existence: the gift of compassion.

 If you would like to help, visit http://www.compassionatejourneys.com/Melor_Vinye_Wo.html to see what we are doing and how you can be involved.

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