Link: article by Michelle Goldberg reviewing Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl Wudunn.
Excerpt:
I was particularly haunted by the story of an Ethiopian woman named Mahabouba Muhammad, who, as a young teenager, was sold to an old man named Jiad to become his second wife. Beaten by her husband and his first wife, she tried to run away several times, finally escaping when she was seven months pregnant. Unable to afford a midwife, she gave birth alone in a hut near an uncle's house, and because she was still just 14, her pelvis wasn't big enough to accommodate the baby's head. After a week of obstructed labor, the baby was dead, and Mahabouba was suffering from a fistula and nerve damage that left her unable to walk and constantly leaking waste. Residents of her uncle's village, believing she was cursed, put her in a hut at the settlement's edge and removed the door so hyenas would devour her.
Mahabouba stayed up all night fighting off the animals with a stick and then crawled to a nearby village, where she met a Western missionary who brought her to the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital. Although she couldn't be completely repaired, she had a colostomy and physical therapy to get her back on her feet and eventually went to work at the hospital and learned to read and write. "Today, if you were to visit the hospital, you might well see Mahabouba walking around -- in her nurse's uniform," write Kristof and WuDunn. "She has been promoted to the position of senior nurse's aide."
Were you able to read that without getting chills?
Excerpt:
I was particularly haunted by the story of an Ethiopian woman named Mahabouba Muhammad, who, as a young teenager, was sold to an old man named Jiad to become his second wife. Beaten by her husband and his first wife, she tried to run away several times, finally escaping when she was seven months pregnant. Unable to afford a midwife, she gave birth alone in a hut near an uncle's house, and because she was still just 14, her pelvis wasn't big enough to accommodate the baby's head. After a week of obstructed labor, the baby was dead, and Mahabouba was suffering from a fistula and nerve damage that left her unable to walk and constantly leaking waste. Residents of her uncle's village, believing she was cursed, put her in a hut at the settlement's edge and removed the door so hyenas would devour her.
Mahabouba stayed up all night fighting off the animals with a stick and then crawled to a nearby village, where she met a Western missionary who brought her to the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital. Although she couldn't be completely repaired, she had a colostomy and physical therapy to get her back on her feet and eventually went to work at the hospital and learned to read and write. "Today, if you were to visit the hospital, you might well see Mahabouba walking around -- in her nurse's uniform," write Kristof and WuDunn. "She has been promoted to the position of senior nurse's aide."
Were you able to read that without getting chills?
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