We Must Strive To Be

I Grew Up In Sierra Leone, In A Small Village Where As A Boy My Imagination Was Sparked By The Oral Tradition Of Storytelling. At A Very Young Age I Learned The Importance Of Telling Stories - I Saw That Stories Are The Most Potent Way Of Seeing Anything We Encounter In Our Lives, And How We Can Deal With Living.

I Had A Very Simple, Unremarkable And Happy Life. And I Grew Up In A Very Small Town. And So My Life Was Made Up Of, You Know, In The Morning Going To The River To Fetch Water - No Tap Water, And No Electricity - And, You Know, Bathing In The River, And Then Going To School, And Playing Soccer Afterwards.

Whenever I Speak At The United Nations, Unicef Or Elsewhere To Raise Awareness Of The Continual And Rampant Recruitment Of Children In Wars Around The World, I Come To Realize That I Still Do Not Fully Understand How I Could Have Possibly Survived The Civil War In My Country, Sierra Leone.

As A Kid In Africa, You Were So Connected To Nature Itself Because You Went Farming, Watched The Moon Out At Night, Observed How The Sky Was Different, And How The Birds Chanted Different Songs In The Evening And The Morning.

My Squad Is My Family, My Gun Is My Provider, And Protector, And My Rule Is To Kill Or Be Killed.