Me To We: Finding Meaning in a Material World
A New York Times best-seller!
Some people's lives are transformed gradually. Others' are changed in an instant.
My own moment of truth happened over a bowl of cereal one morning when I was twelve years old. Sitting at our kitchen table munching away, I was about to dive into the daily newspaper in search of my favorite comics - Doonesbury, Calvin and Hobbes, Wizard of Id. The cartoons were my morning ritual. But on this particular day, April 10, 1995, I didn't get past the front page. There was one headline that was impossible to miss: BATTLED CHILD LABOR, BOY, 12, MURDERED.
I read on.
ISALMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - When Iqbal Masih was 4 years old, his parents sold him into slavery for less than $16. For the next six years, he remained shackled to a carpet-weaving loom most of the time, tying tiny knots hour after hour. By the age of 12, he was free and traveling the world in his crusade against the horrors of child labor. On Sunday, Iqbal was shot dead while he and his two friends were riding outside the eastern city of Lahore. Some believe his murder was carried out by angry members of the carpet industry who had made repeated threats to silence the young activist.
...Riding the bus to school, I would un-crumple the newspaper article and look at Iqbal's picture - he was wearing a bright red vest, his hand in the air. In class, I asked my teacher if I could speak to my peers. Although I was generally outgoing, public speaking was definitely not my favorite activity. I can still remember how nervous I felt standing up at the front of my classroom and how quiet everyone became as I shared what I knew about Iqbal and the plight of other child laborers. I showed them the newspaper article and shared the alarming statistics I had found. I wasn't sure what would happen when I asked for volunteers to help me fight for children's rights.
Eleven hands shot up, and Free The Children was born.
-Craig Kielburger, founder of Free The Children, Nobel Peace Prize Nominee and co-author of New York Times best-seller, Me to We: Finding Meaning in a Material World
http://www.metowe.org