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Only seven years
by Thanos Kalamidas
2011-12-20 09:13:29 |
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It is a whole week that I’m trying to find the right words for Ovi magazine’s seventh birthday and I have gone through all kinds of clichés but …nothing really works. Seventh birthday, the lucky seven; seven the muses, seven the wanders, seven the continents, seven the seas and seven the sins; seven years itch and seven the dwarfs. Still nothing really works. And again this morning browsing the news I was forcefully stopped in a Greek site that had a story told by a woman who works for an orphanage in Athens. Coming out of the building she saw near the fence a young woman talking to a little girl around five years old and trying to explain to her that she loves her but the situation was so bad that she had to let her for a period in an orphanage and promising that soon she would come back to take her. I felt numb and for long times I didn’t know what to think or what to say. My mind was full of the little girl’s eyes, a little girl I had never seen and it was just a story in an internet site. And this was not the first similar story I’m reading the last few months, neither is the worst I hear from Greece.
And then it is not Greece only; just look around. Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, Zimbabwe; and I’m not prejudice to England and USA. Yes, in the centre of the over-consuming world, the capitals of fast-food kids there are children in the corners begging for bread. There are homeless families, there are homeless people. All around the world, from Tokyo to Washington DC and from Cape Town to Helsinki. 30,000 kids die every single day. Hundreds of thousands kids every single day are victims of poverty, violence, war, trafficking, drugs. 50,000 people die every single day in poverty related reasons. Hundreds of thousands suffer every single moment in every single corner of this globe. And things instead of getting better, they are getting worst. And is not only the plate of rise or the glass of water that is missing. It is democracy that is missing. But not democracy as a governing system we all admire, but DEMOCRASY AS A WAY OF LIFE.
If democracy was not just an immaterial and theoretical prime but a life principal, a conscious act that we all understand and embrace then the kid in Zimbabwe would have clean water, the kid in North Korea would have a plate of rise and the kid in Athens would have never lost her mother. And this is what Ovi magazine is fighting for, for democracy. For democracy as a way of life, a way of thinking and a way of expressing. For seven years day after day.
That’s the way this family fights, Ovi magazine’s family, with a pen and a keyboard. We fight prejudice, unfairness, racism; we fight dictators, fascists and ignorance. Sometimes through controversy, sometimes through long arguments but we do fight day after day. And yes we all had to deal with our personal problems and issues but we never let our stand unguarded, day after day. And we never felt alone. Tens of thousands of hits daily represent human souls just like us who understand and battle exactly the same things, for the same ideals and principals.
Ovi magazine is a family connected with ideals and principals and yes it is Asa, John and I but it is also Emanuel, Kenny, Amanda, Jack, Tony, Leah, David, Gerry, Melissa, Jane, Abigail, Dan, Mike, Binoy, Dimitra, Linda, Mahmoud, Bouke, Christos, Edna, Eero, David, Maippi, Patrick, Rene, Fiona, Emine and many others I missed this minute since I’m trying to add names by memory of people I never actually met but I have so much in common with – friendship through democracy – and it is the thousands readers, people who might have never add even one comment but mentioned Ovi and what represents in their blogs, their social media. Most importantly there are thousands of people who share what we stand for.
A big big thank you all! And let’s just continue fighting for democracy hoping that we can help to save some kids. A big big thank you to all the Ovi family, sometimes the little encouraging notes you add to your mails (Leah, Emanuel, David, Patrick) with your contributions is the best award. A big thank you to all our partners, organizations, sites, blogs for all the help and the network you offer. And well …Happy 7th Birthday Ovi Magazine!
Thanos
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