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| “I wish I could have done more for her. Her life has been nothing but struggle. She hasn’t known many happy moments. She never had a chance to taste childhood. When we were getting on the plastic boat, I heard her say something that broke my heart. She saw her mother being crushed by the crowd, and she screamed: ‘Please don’t kill my mother! Kill me instead!’“ (Lesvos, Greece) |
This photo was taken by photographer Brandon Stanton, creator of the widely known and popular blog Humans of New York. Its purpose is to illustrate the diversity and uniqueness of every human by posting pictures of random people off of the streets of New York, captioned with a short story or quote from the photographed. Although he and the project started small, he now has over 8 million followers on various social media sites, and has had several successful projects, such as a published book that was #1 on the New York Time Bestsellers List.
Recently, there has been a common theme in many news reports and blogs: the fast-paced ever-growing refugee crises in the world today. There are more refugees now all over the world than there ever has been before, and it is instilling a sort of panic in resources such as the UNHCR and other establishments that have provided assistance to refugees in the past. This past September and October, Stanton posted photographs along with stories of refugees, a remarkable and profound way to create awareness about the magnitude of the problem, and providing the opportunity for us to learn more about their situations directly from them.
Easily the location of the current largest issue is Syria. Thousands and thousands of people are unjustly displaced and forced to make their way across Europe. 2,000 of them are settling in Greece each day, particularly the island of Lesvos. It is not a big island, so it is getting difficult for them to foster this many people coming in such large groups. One of the most popular ways of these people to get to the island is on plastic boats, not very big or very sturdy, but very crowded. Many people do not make it across the treacherous ocean on these trips, but those that do are considered lucky. The little girl in this picture along with the man were some who travelled on these boats. Because of the violence in her home before and the dangerous journey on which she was forced to embark, the man says that she "never had a chance to taste childhood." Then, when they finally arrived in Greece, she watched her mother be trampled by the crowd.
And then, she says something that takes courage, maturity, and completely selfless love.
"Please don't kill my mother! Kill me instead!"
The Syrian Conflict has turned free people into refugees, tourists into humanitarian workers, and popular vacation spots into crowded refugee camps, and caused a small child who should not have a care in the world to experience this horror, and say these words.
What can we do?
References Cited:
Stanton, Brandon. Humans of New York. 28 September 2015. Web. 5 November 2015. http://www.humansofnewyork.com/post/130088067056/i-wish-i-could-have-done-more-for-her-her-life
"Refugee Crisis in Greece." International Rescue Committee. 2 November 2015. Web. 5 November 2015. http://www.rescue.org/where/greece
Niarchos, Nicolas "An Island of Refugees." The New Yorker. 16 September 2015. Web. 5 November 2015. http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/an-island-of-refugees
Porter, Lizzie. "Refugee Crisis in Greece: What Can Tourists Do to Help?" Travel. 25 September 2015. Web. 5 November 2015. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/11889298/refugee-crisis-greece-what-can-tourists-do-to-help.html
