So You Think You've Got Problems

Liberian SGI member Andy Ankrah found himself doing just that. For the past 14 years Liberia has been torn apart by tribal rivalries. The fighting has claimed more than 200,000 lives, displaced one million people and made the country famous for ethnic hatred, public executions and child soldiers.

 

 

Andy, who was born in Ghana, and his six-month pregnant partner, Mary, found themselves sought by death squads, intent on revenging an anti-rebel air attack by killing foreigners. The local villagers, terrified of retribution, refused to help or protect them.

Another SGI member, Morris Barry, was trapped in his village as rebels fought against peacekeeping forces. As mortar rockets rained down, 'I even went into my mother’s kitchen and, finding that she had abandoned her cooking, continued with the cooking,' he said.

'I felt that since the whole area was overrun with rebels, nowhere was safe. Safety could only be achieved by remaining calm and chanting.'

When the civil war broke out, SGI Ghana member Sonii David was doing field work in Liberia for his doctorate. He managed to leave with his mother and sisters but his father, a diplomat, was left behind.

Here are their stories.
 

 

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TODAY'S QUOTATION
The teacher knows the fundamental symptoms and the obvious remedies - the theory, in fact, of treatment, and then it is she who does the rest. The good doctor, like the good teacher, is an individual, not merely a machine for administering medicine or applying educational methods. Details must be left to the judgment of the teacher who is taking her first steps on the new path, as for instance whether general disorder is best quelled by raising the voice, or whether it is best to whisper to a few of the children so as to rouse the curiosity of others and make them quiet. | Maria Montessori

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