Equality? Heck Yes!

It’s your girl Afifah, back with another post! Lately, we have been watching TED talk videos and those videos introduce people that are passionate about a certain topic that has made them come alive. Some of the people reading this blog might be thinking about why I said “alive”, I don’t actually mean bring you to life. I used alive as a metaphor and in simple terms it means that you’re so passionate about a certain topic that it becomes part of you, at least, that's what it means for me. So as I was saying before, we were watching TED talk videos of peopling telling us about what makes them alive and out of all the ones I watched, one of them stood out to me, the video I watched really made me start thinking.

                                                  Photo by: MEME TN  

A TED talk video that stuck to me was introduced by Caroline Paul and she talked about females being just as equal as men. While she was talking, I could see the passion in her eyes and I could see how it reallyIdDMBWb2Z_s affected her. Caroline started by talking about how she first time she joined the firefighting squad, People would always question why a women would join something “manly” but she proved them wrong by showing she was just as great as the men in the department and if not, better. During the the talk, Caroline was encouraging parents with daughters to let them be adventurous in order to gain bravery, in order to be just as “brave as boys.” Every single word Caroline said made me feel strongly about equality and I thought, why not do a project on gender equality?

Photo By: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I never really put my mind to equality when I was younger, I always thought that everyone was treated the same, until now. Now I always pay attention to the little things men do for women because they think they can’t handle the pressure. Some of the little things that annoy me is men carrying “heavy” bags for women because they think women wouldn’t be able to handle the weight and to paying for the foods in restaurants because it isn’t manly for a man to let a women pay. I know these reasons are stupid but they always seem to make me mad. As nice as everything is, I’m pretty sure us females are strong enough to handle ourselves.

                                           Photo By: MEME TN

Now, I know I sound biased because I’m a women but I feel strongly about all gender stereotypes. I just can’t seem to get them, it’s 2017 and yet, we still have to follow all these rules about how a person should be. These stereotypes are inaccurate about an individual person and sometimes it can be offending. If we are not what society wants us to be than we are looked down upon, which is extremely saddening because it basically says that a person can not be who they truly are. Maybe doing a project about gender stereotypes won’t change some of the people’s views or thoughts about a person should be but at least I’ll know that I tried my very best and that’s enough to make me happy.

Photo By: MEME TN

#1 Media Lit Blog Post

My name is Afifah Ali and I’m a 14 year old girl from TAISM. Lately, in Media Lit class we have started a project. For this project we can wish to do whatever we want as long as it is appropriate, of course, and helps other people. For the project we have be be passionate about what we do, not interested and I know what the people that are reading this blog post are thinking, What’s the difference between Passion and Interest? Well there’s a big difference and maybe doing this project will help me learn the difference.

Currently, I have no clue what to do with my project but I like the freedom to do as we like as long as we help people. Having your own freedom to do something makes it more fun because you get to explore more about certain topics about and it affects people in a good way, well hopefully it does. For this project we need to be passionate about the topic, I may have an interest in many things but not a passion and hopefully while doing this project I might learn something about myself and maybe keep doing it in the future. There might be challenges about discovering what my passion is and that makes me excited and nervous about this project.

I’m excited about this project because I get to learn so much about myself and maybe I will overcome challenges and be comfortable with things I wasn’t comfortable with before. Along the way I will also learn about other fascinating new topics that may spark my interest. But as much as I am excited, I am also a little nervous because I have no clue what to do. I’m not really a creative person and I don’t come up with original ideas but that’s a challenge I am willing to face. As long as I’m doing what I love, I’m positive all do good because as Steve Job once said, “The only way to do a great work, is to do what you love.”

                                          Photo by: CC0 Public Domain

Child Soldiers Letter

Dear UNICEF,

My name is Afifah and I'm a student in 'The American International School Of Muscat.'  Lately we have been learning about child soldiers and from the beginning I knew that I was against it. The first time I heard the world solider in class all I could think about was war and blood and imagining a child, about my age or younger going through all of that doesn't sound right. it all seems wrong because here i am living a good life with a family and waking up, having everything there for me and these children have no choice but to fight for their family or fight because they need to be taken care of, they're fighting for another day. I can't imagines living in their shoes but if i do i would want it all to stop and i would live with the guilt of the people that i had hurt. And so here I am, a regular girl, writing a letter on my thoughts of child soldiers. I hope whomever reads this letter would try their best to help these kids.

Child soldiers are soldiers under the age of 18. Thousands of children are recruited into an army, most of them don't have a choice but to join. Kids forced to join the army either by abduction or beaten until they agree to join, children are recruited for people's selfish needs of winning, they're a pawn in their little game. Some choose to join in order to escape poverty, to help their society, or they want revenge for something that had happened in their past. Both girls and boys are recruited in the army and are assigned to play different roles in the army.

Children usually fight in the war but sometimes they have different roles to play. Some kids act as lookouts, spies, messengers, cooks, etc. Most girls, who are vulnerable at such a young age, unfortunately,  play the role of sex slaves, which is disgusting and horrible. It’s disgusting that the right of being a child is taken away from them. They’re a victim of abuse and most these kids witness death, and face sexual violence because they’re too young to protect themselves. Yet all little kids are handed AK-47’s with no experience and one word in their mind, survival, but most of them end up die in the war just because they couldn’t leave.

The kids serving the army are mostly forced into joining and can’t leave, they have no say in it. If one were to try to escape, he better of hoped he doesn’t get caught. I have read many stories about child soldiers  trying to escape but the one that stuck to me to was about a boy. This young boy had tried to escape but, sadly, he was caught. The rebels had tied his hands and they made the new recruits kill him with a stick. If no one tried to kill him then they would die along aside the boy. After the boy had died they had smeared his bloods on every hand of the new recruits. It’s sad that this boy did not get to die happily, he didn’t get to die being a child but instead he was tortured.

There is no childhood for child soldiers, there’s only endless chaos. But going through your website has given me hope that these kids can have a normal life. These kids don’t need to go to the army for food if the UNICEF organization keeps funding them. The UNICEF organization has given these kids education, which can teach kids the actual right way of living their life. I know you’re passionate about kids living a normal life, so I send this letter to you, hoping you can try your best into saving these young kids lives. Your organization can save the future of most kids around the world.

Sincerely,

Afifah Ali  

Child Soldiers draft

My name is Afifah and I'm a student in 'The American International School Of Muscat.'  Lately we have been learning about child soldiers and from the beginning I knew that I was against it. The first time I heard the world solider in class all I could think about was war and blood and imagining a child, about my age or younger going through all of that doesn't sound right. it all seems wrong because here i am living a good life with a family and waking up, having everything there for me and these children have no choice but to fight for their family or fight because they need to be taken care of, they're fighting for another day. I can't imagines living in their shoes but if i do i would want it all to stop and i would live with the guilt of the people that i had hurt. And so here I am, a regular girl, writing a letter on my thoughts of child soldiers.

Child soldiers are soldiers under the age of 18. Thousands of children are recruited into an army, most of them don't have a choice but to join. Kids forced to join the army either by abduction or beaten until they agree to join, children are recruited for people's selfish needs of winning, they're a pawn in their little game. Some choose to join in order to escape poverty, to help their society, or they want revenge for something that had happened in their past. Both girls and boys are recruited in the army and are assigned to play different roles in the army.

Children usually fight in the war but sometimes they have different roles to play. Some kids act as lookouts, spies, messengers, cooks, etc. Most girls, who are vulnerable at such a young age are, unfortunately,  play the role of sex slaves, which is disgusting and a horrible thing to do. It’s disgusting that right of being a child is taken away from them. They’re a victim of abuse and most these kids witness death, and face sexual violence because they’re too young to protect themselves. Yet all little kids are handed AK-47’s with no experience and one word in their mind, survival, but most of them end up die in the war just because they couldn’t leave.

The kids serving the army are mostly forced into joining and can’t leave, they have no say in it. If one were to try to escape, he better of hoped he doesn’t get caught. I have read many stories about child soldiers  trying to escape but the one that stuck to me to was about a boy. This young boy had tried to escape but, sadly, he was caught. The rebels had tied his hands and they made the new recruits kill him with a stick. If no one tried to kill him then they would die along aside the boy. After the boy had died they had smeared his bloods on every hand of the new recruits. It’s sad that this boy did not get to die happily, he didn’t get to die being a child but instead he was tortured.

There is no childhood for child soldiers, there’s only endless chaos. But that can all change, there can be no more/less child soldiers if we spread awareness and so here I am, sending a message and hoping that you can help or at try your best. Please help take care of these kids.