Suma
is a young girl from Bardiya, Nepal. At the age of 6 Suma was sold by her
parents to be a kamlari, a worker bonded to a family in order to live. She
worked as a forced laborer; cooking, cleaning, tending animals, watching
children, going into the forest to get wood, whatever was necessary to the
family. With some families, she was treated ok, in others, she was forced to
live with the goats and eat scraps off of the plates of her masters. Through
the years Suma wanted nothing more than to go to school and return home to her
family. Poetry and song were the only things that got her through her life as a
kamlari. At age 11, Suma arrived at her third masters where the work was long
and hard, but the masters were nicer. At this house lived a schoolteacher that convinced
Suma's masters to enroll her in a night class where she was able to learn to
read and write. The school was run in the attic of her master's house and was
taught be social workers and other kamlaris. It was then that Suma learned that
being a kamlari was equal to being a slave. Her teachers went house to house of
kamlari owning girls and told that masters that keeping a kamlari was illegal.
Suma's master refused to release her from her bond at first, but eventually the
social workers freed Suma and returned her to her parents. Suma was the last
bonded worker in her family and now uses her freedom and power to help set
other kamlari girls free and give them a chance at a life and an education.
Down
in Freetown, Sierra Leone lies Mariama. Mariama leads a relatively normal life
listening to Rihanna, brushes her teeth, gets dressed from a choice of
clothing, listens to the radio, texts...Mariama's dad died when she was young
so her mother married her dad's brother, who also got married to a woman named
Halla. Mariama is the first person in her family to go to school and she loves
science and thinks Isaac Newton is pretty cool. She was lucky enough to land a
job at the local radio where she hosts her own show and gives advice to girls
all around the country. She enjoys helping young girls solve their problems and
she also tries to educate them and encourage them to go to school. Mariama has
large dreams, like being the first African in space and having her own TV show
where she can help people with their problems. At one point, Mariama's dad was
being harassed by the neighbors for letting her host at the radio station and
hang out with her friends after her show and in turn he forbade her from
working at the radio. For a while, Mariama wasn't allowed to host the show
until she went to her mom Halla and had her talk to him. Halla told him how good
the show was and how it was teaching young girls everywhere. Her dad agreed to
let her go back to hosting her radio show and now calls herself "the lucky
one."
Suma
and Mariama come from two very different places and cultures. Suma lives in a
more rural, rugged, and closer to nature way of life while Mariama lives a very
modernized industrial way. Mariama has been privileged to live in a loving,
though unique, family, while Suma has been taken from her birth family and
forced to live with people that didn't care if she lived or died. These girls
are worlds apart, but both use their education to help girls. Suma uses her
education to free other kamlaris and Mariama uses her education to help young
girls around the country solve their problems. While Suma has lead a presumably
harder life than Mariama, she hasn't let that stop her from achieving her goals
and doing something important in life. Both these girls have lofty goals that
revolve around helping other young girls make their lives better, especially by
telling them to get an education.
All
the girls in Girl Rising contradict
everything I've known about education. Going to school has been a chore for me
pretty much ever since I left pre-school. But, for these girls, education is a
dream, an urging desire so powerful that they would literally die for an
education. The little girl from Afghanistan has such incredible perseverance and motivation for education and change in her
country that she won't let anyone stand in her way, even if it means death by
one of her country men. She spent her days learning to read and write on a
small chalkboard against a wall while her and her classmates sit outside, a
sharp contrast to the beautifully constructed classrooms we've become used to.
For the majority of American girls, education is a chore and a requirement. We
sit in class, often miserable, thinking about literally anything other than
learning. We often fail to realize our privilege, especially when it comes to
higher education and college. We have these opportunities that people would
literally die for and we take them for granted every single day. It's truly eye
opening to see the perseverance of a young girl surrounded by death and ruble
of her old home in Port au Prince, Haiti learning and loving every second of
it. Girls all around the world are incredibly motivated and their love and
desire to learn is truly inspiring.
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