8.06.2009

Feeling Grateful for America




Some books are no fun to read; but they are significant, nonetheless. They teach us the evils of war and dictatorship. Such is the case with the two books pictured here.
Each of these true stories is told by a person who lived through unimaginable horrors and systematic slaughtering of a peoples in their native countries. In each book, I was left aghast at the evil that one man and his followers can inflict.
LEFT TO TELL : is the story of the short-lived (thankfully) Rwandan genocide
Beginning on April 6, 1994, and for the next hundred days, up to 800,000 Tutsis were killed by Hutu militia using clubs and machetes, with as many as 10,000 killed each day.
FIRST THEY KILLED MY FATHER: is the story of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge advocates in Cambodia:
About 1.5 million Cambodians are estimated to have died in waves of murder, torture, and starvation, aimed particularly at the educated and intellectual elite.
After reading these two books, I was overwhlemingly grateful for America; in spite of its problems and its politics. I know we face very very tough times ahead, and that we have corrupt officials, but I cannot foresee a tragedy of the magnitude in each of these books.
I was also overwhelmingly grateful for FOOD! Both of these women describe hunger that constantly gnaws at them.
I'm glad I read these, but now, it's time for some light summer reading...how does Amelia Bedelia sound?

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