A New Perspective
My July journey around the world
I spend my mornings the way most 20-something millennials probably do: with a smartphone in one hand and cup of coffee in the other. I check emails, I text my friends and I send goofy pictures, sometimes all before the sun is completely up. With just a touch, I have access to the entire world around me. But still I wonder, what does life really look like around the world?
For many, life is completely different. Mornings are spent traveling dozens of miles to find electricity to charge a cell phone with access to a network much slower than mine — if a network exists at all. For others, mornings are spent struggling to find clean water and healthy food.
All of these different lives came before me in USAID’s #SummerSeries Film Festival, where we shared a new story every day during the month of July.
With each film, I was transported to villages I’ve never seen, people I’ve never met, and stories I’ve only heard about on the news.
From Côte d’Ivoire to Tanzania and beyond, I met people like Ako and Elizabeth, both resilient individuals facing very different obstacles. The USAID Summer Series Film Festival inspired me and thousands of others on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to share in the human experience.
“Ako’s Radio,” took me on a journey to Côte d’Ivoire in the wake of a 2010 election that left 3,000 dead and hundreds of thousands displaced. In October 2015, during the first presidential election since the uprising, Ako took it upon himself to make a difference by advocating powerful messages of peace as the managing director of Radio Arc-en-ciel, a local radio station that received a USAID grant.
In fact, USAID works with more than 70 countries including Côte d’Ivoire to improve governance, transparency and citizen engagement, all parts of efforts to ensure that every citizen’s voice is heard just like Ako’s.
Ako’s voice helped me appreciate mine.
Sometimes we take for granted the difference we can make in the world. What life may look like for me isn’t necessarily what life looks like for everyone, an important lesson Ako taught me in his story and an important lesson I keep in mind as we strive for good governance here and around the world.
Opportunity is the only difference
Because of technology and access to the internet, making my voice heard is easy. I can tweet at my elected representatives, make suggestions on company Facebook pages and write about any topic I want.
Life for nine out of 10 rural Tanzanians doesn’t look anything like mine. They’re off the grid. Without electricity, students can’t study after dark, doctors can’t refrigerate vaccines, and businesses can’t operate once the sun has set. However, with help from USAID and the Power Africa initiative, we are illuminating Africa.
Did you know the Power Africa initiative has leveraged $43 billion to bring energy to African families and businesses? Power Africa is expected to help get energy access for nearly 10 million people!
This access is bringing new opportunity to girls like Elizabeth in the video “Elizabeth Turns on the Light.” With new found access to energy, Elizabeth can power up for the first time, and in her new found power, she turns to education. Her story is a reminder that something as simple as energy can stop us from learning, growing and being the best we can be. When we support girls like Elizabeth in overcoming hurdles, we inspire girls everywhere to believe they can overcome anything that comes their way.
Helping girls helps us all
During the film series, we highlighted the stories of incredible girls who are beating the odds to gain an education in STEM thanks to programs like Let Girls Learn.
One story, “Today’s Students, Tomorrow’s Leaders,” follows Nada, Azza and Nourhan as they complete their journey following acceptance into the Maadi STEM School in Cairo. These girls will inspire girls just like them to pursue their dreams to become engineers, scientists, whatever they wish. These girls inspire me to work harder and to never stop learning because having access to education isn’t something everyone around the world is so fortunate to have. In fact, 62 million girls worldwide are not in school.
Did you know: USAID invests $1 billion annually in education programs like Let Girls Learn to make access to education possible.
When we share stories, we become more motivated to impact global development. There’s hope even in tough situations and we all have something to gain from global development. Development means access to democratic rights, to energy, to education and to so much more.
I want to inspire others to have the courage to do more and make their voices heard. The USAID Summer Series Film Festival was an opportunity to not only motivate me, but to motivate those around me.
I know that each individual has the power to make a difference and I didn’t have to travel thousands of miles to realize that our shared humanity makes anything possible. Let’s make a change and keep sharing our progress!
