Linh

Period 1 and 2

Mrs Peters

17th/Oct/2012

Mayra The Key of Freedom

“About 25,000 people die every day of hunger or hunger-related causes, according to the United Nations” (poverty.com). Provided that in the world that we are living, over 3 billion of people live on less than $2.50 a day. At the same time, “1/3 of Brazilians live in extreme poverty, for whom drug trafficking and crime seems to be the most financially and socially rewarding option. This has created an unofficial civil war between the state and its poor” (Global Giving).  Mayra is the only one girl who lives in one of the most violent place call favela’s in Rio, to fight against the violence she leads protests to stop the violence between the police and the drug cartels and give thousands of children a chance to be educated.

At 15 years old, Mayra gathered hundreds of children  protesting against the police and the drugs cartels to stop fighting while school hours. Mayra was born in a place where there is civil war happening between the police and the gangs. “Unlike the other town, The neighbourhood was cut off and became virtually inaccessible to medical and teaching staff. As a result, schools and clinics were closed”.(Winner of children peace prize) As the favela was close off by civil war between the police and the drug cartels, school also got closed because teacher could not reach them. Therefore Mayra and other students in Favela were force to stop school. But this did not stop Mayra from going to school. She refuse to accept this situation and chose another school outside Favela to study. For this reason, Mayra gather and march and “their direct demand was that the police should stop patrolling around schools during the times that children walk to and from school”(Mayra Avellar Neves). Mayra is a very idealistic and selfless girl, she gather all the student to take a major march to fight back against the police and the drug cartels to get their school back and children would have a chance to get back to study and have a better future.

Mayra did not became a bystander but instead she stood up and gave chances for students to be educated. She gather people from Favela to a protest which demand the police for children to go to school. “Do something instead of nothing.”(video)Mayra is a very persistence girl, she put her heart and her soul into the hopes of giving back the freedom and peace so children in Favela could go to school. By that, instead of doing nothing, she mobilised more than 300 people to protest against the police. As the result, the police accepted her demands and Mayra and other children got their chance of going to school again. Alongside, peace should be for everyone and everyone have to work for it. Instead of just standing there and see what happen, Mayra take in action as an upstander. She create a march and make people understand that children also need their education, in order for them to make a difference for the world. Mayra also believe that peace is not a privilege, peace should be for everyone and everyone have to work for it.(video) That's mean that without supporting and hard working of people in Favela to have a protest. She herself could not bring the peace back together and student in Favela would not have a chance to go back to school.

Through her hard work and never gave up even once, Mayra is still working to help every children from Favela to go to school and keeping peace between the police and the Cartels. "These children and their parents know that getting an education is not only their right, but a passport to a better future - for the children and for the country." Harry Belafonte. By doing this she could give more hopes and chances to younger student, so that one day they could help the other children whose having the same life as them to go to school just like what Mayra has done. For this reason, I think we also should start a new way of thinking of how to help people in the world who had a hard life so that they could have a chance to study and able to earn money to live. With the effort and courageous, Mayra is worthy undertakings the Children International Peace Prize of 2008.