Finding a Voice for the DRC

 

Congo Week: Day Three

 

Guest Post from:

Patricia Sula

 

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This week – October 17 – 23 – Friends of the Congo is running its third Congo Week – Breaking the Silence – in a bid to raise awareness of the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo and help end the violence. All week I will be featuring blog posts related to the DRC from activists, academics and Congolese citizens.

Today – Congolese activist Patricia Sula talks about cross-generational hopes for positive change in the DRC. The views are her own. Global Citizen has done only mild editing for length and clarity.

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“Never forget the blood running through you is Congolese. Nothing else.” This is something I heard my mother say a thousand times. Nowadays when she starts saying it, I just finish her sentence; “Yes, Mom I know I know I’m Congolese.”

I grew up in the United States but was born in the heart of Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). I don’t remember Congo but I’ve been there a thousand times. As a child I would spend hours at my father’s feet. For bedtime stories he told tales of the life he lived in the DRC. He told me how rich our culture was and how beautiful the land was, “A paradise on earth” he would say. As an adult today, I clearly see the sadness in my father’s eyes reflect in my own, but his patriotism is still there every time we discuss our native land, a land that has known a war since 1996.

Continue reading Finding a Voice for the DRC

Courage for Change in the DRC

Congo Week: Day Two

Guest Post from:

Miss Congo Unity

 

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This week – October 17 – 23 – Friends of the Congo is running its third Congo Week – Breaking the Silence – in a bid to raise awareness of the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo and help end the violence. All week I will be featuring blog posts related to the DRC from activists, academics and Congolese citizens.

Today – Miss Congo Unity talks about courage and what inspires her to keep advocating for change in the DRC. The views are her own. Global Citizen has done only mild editing for length and clarity.

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My name is Kapinga Marie-Christelle Tshinanga. I am Congolese-American. To be specific: Congolese, as in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)…capital Kinshasa, not Brazzaville.

As a high-schooler, I was once asked which Congo I was from; I responded with a puzzled face. To help me, the inquirer threw in some multiple choices: “Kinshasa or Brazzaville?” and I replied quickly to hide the embarrassment: shouldn’t I have known there are two African countries dubbed “Congo”?

Continue reading Courage for Change in the DRC

Help Me Break the Silence

 

Congo Week: Day One

 

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What do you think of when you think of the Democratic Republic of Congo?

What’s that you say?!? You don’t think of the Democratic Republic of Congo? Hardly surprising.

Let’s be honest. Most people would be hard pressed to say what a Democratic Republic of Congo is, much less spend a lot of time thinking about it.

Well, we should.

And yes, of course, I am going to tell you why ….

Because each and every one of us can play a role –

without even leaving our chairs –

to stop one of the most horrific conflicts in the world.

 

The Democratic Republic of Congo, or DRC, is a country in Africa ravaged by a conflict driven by competing forces’ desire for control of the country’s vast resources of copper, tin, tungsten, tantalum, gold and cobalt. This conflict has been marked by some of the world’s most egregious cases of sexual violence perpetrated against civilian populations for the sole purpose of sowing fear and forcing submission. Armed combatants follow no acceptable rules of war – even the country’s army is regularly accused of participating in abusive practices and seeking control of funds generated by mining. Children and families are forced to work in inhumane conditions.  Death stalks the Congolese hour after hour, day after day, month after month ….

Like the “blood diamonds” of Sierra Leone, profits from the sale of DRC’s minerals are used to fund the conflict. Like the “blood diamonds” the appetite of global markets – via computers, cell phones and other electronics – is helping the trade.

This week – October 17 – 23 – Friends of the Congo is running its third Congo Week – Breaking the Silence – in a bid to raise awareness of the conflict in the DRC and help end the violence.

So what can you do?

 

EASY.

 

Keep reading. All this week, I will be featuring guest bloggers each with a unique voice and viewpoint on the DRC, the conflict, and what we can do to help stop it.

Spread the word. Help me break the silence by sharing the blog posts via Twitter, Facebook and any other way you like.

Get informed.  Learn about the DRC and our role in the ongoing conflict. Read things like this recent piece from actress Ashley Judd and the Enough Project’s Jon Prendergast on the DRC, minerals and cell phones.

Take action. Friends of the Congo, The Enough Project and others consistently champion efforts to improve the situation in the DRC that contain actions members of the public can take to get involved.

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The Great Movie Mystery

I love movies. Good movies, bad movies, funny movies, stupid movies. I have a (annoying?) tendency to see movies I love over and over. And I have a bizarre quirk of remembering actors and movies that most people have forgotten (usually for good reason).

I am particularly partial to horror movies (surprise, surprise) and pride myself on having seen some of the worst ever made. I bet you can see what’s coming ….

A couple days ago I had a conversation with friends about a movie they once saw, but cannot remember the name of … and I have not been able to identify it.

I will be immensely grateful if anyone out there can name this movie for me!

To sweeten the offer, the first person to figure it out will get some Halloween candy via post! (Only U.S.-based please, for custom reasons, but everyone is welcome to lend a hand if they want!) If you know the movie please leave a comment and tell me what it is!

Continue reading The Great Movie Mystery

Truth About Fortune

When I was a child my mother used to say:  “if you can’t say anything nice, better to say nothing at all” (or some variation of that). It seems, dear readers, that mamma knew exactly what she was talking about…. And I’d like to finish this opening with a shout out of thanks to the universe for knowing precisely when to shut its yap.

Let’s examine the evidence….

Continue reading Truth About Fortune

Two plus two equals …?

Now I’m no genius when it comes to math — in fact, during my junior year in high school, I actually needed extra help with the coursework (which is why my university major had NOTHING to do with math or science)  – but I’m no dummy either. Still I can’t quite seem to wrap my head around the math behind recent experiences with Budget Rent a Car (a.k.a. @BudgetRAC)

Continue reading Two plus two equals …?

Can Crisis Secure the Right to Water?

What comes to mind when you think about water?

Perhaps a swim in the pool on a hot day, ice cubes in your favorite drink or the relaxation of a long, hot shower after a tough day at work.

Well what if you could have none of those things? What if water – and the necessity of its use – translated into stomach cramps …diarrhea …malnutrition …death?

For 884 million people a source of safe drinking water is unavailable, according to UNICEF, and for 2.5 billion people there is no access to clean sanitation.

Over 3 million people a year die as a result of water-borne diseases. In the time it took me to type that sentence, a child died from lack of clean water.

Continue reading Can Crisis Secure the Right to Water?

Consensus emerges at World Water Week

Discussions at the Stockholm World Water Week continue to reveal broad consensus on many water-related issues and the immediate need to address them. This guest post from attendee Alex McIntosh, provides valuable insights in the the thinking of thought leaders on water ….

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Reporting real time on Day 4 of World Water Week:  Stockholm, Sweden (9/9/10)

 (posted by Alex McIntosh, founder, Ecomundi Ventures)

By Day Four of the 2,500-attendee conference, a few overarching themes have begun to emerge.  First, in the majority of the watersheds across the globe, we know too little about the amount of water available, the amount extracted in aggregate for human use, or the quality of the watershed.  For this reason, in the seminar On the Road the Corporate Water Reporting, panelists from Nature Conservancy, CERES, Quantis, PepsiCo, CH2M HILL, Unilever, Borealis and other organizations all agreed that the trend towards greater water reporting transparency would continue, primarily driven by businesses’ need to obtain and manage their supply chain water resources, and in response to consumer/customer/investor stakeholder pressure. 

Continue reading Consensus emerges at World Water Week

Work underway at World Water Week

The working sessions of the Stockholm World Water Week are underway … so what does this mean for you, me and everyone else around the globe? Read on to hear what our man on the scene has to say about new initiatives getting off the ground …

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“Day 2 of World Water Week:  Stockholm, Sweden (9/6/10)”

 

(guest post by Alex McIntosh, founder, Ecomundi Ventures)

 

The luminaries of the water field took the podium today.  Dr. Rita Colwell of the US was recognized as the 2010 Stockholm Water Prize winner (equivalent to the Nobel Prize for water) for her groundbreaking work on cholera.  And Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Environmental Program shared his agency’s Green Economy Initiative program focus–responding to one of the most pressing social needs today–on integrating water into the larger policy and market-based decisions made by officials at local, regional, national and global levels. 

Connecting the dots is important, as the science is often a few steps ahead of the social debate, and bad policy today will have profound implications for the 9 billion humans projected for earth in 2040–and for the corporations that depend on reliable water resources for their operations. 

Continue reading Work underway at World Water Week