The Real Starvation Learn English through story level 2

in today’s world there are photographs

everywhere

web pages on the internet

magazines full of fashion and film stars

newspapers full of photos of wall and

sport

places and people from other lands

they say a picture is worth a thousand

words

and maybe it is

but what is the picture telling us

sometimes we only see what we want to

see

[Music]

[Music]

make a picture in your mind

a girl with thin cheeks

and tired eyes

her arms and legs are as thin as sticks

she is only skin and bone

clouds of dust circle above her head as

the food trucks drive away

their wheels leave marks on the dry

ground

and soon only the marks show that the

food trucks came to the village

and left

the sun is at its hottest

the african sky is unending and cruel

even the white men with cameras

busily taking photographs of the usual

fighting over the food are now getting

ready to leave

they pack away their cameras

jump into their cars

and drive quickly away to cool modern

hotels in a city miles away

they are photo journalists

one of them

sunburned and hot

dressed in a shirt and jeans kneels down

on the dusty ground to take some

photographs of the girl before he leaves

in the pocket of his shirt is a protein

bar

soft from the sun uneaten

untouched

forgotten

he doesn’t stop to think about the

uneaten bar in his pocket and the

starving girl

he is only one man

what can one man do in a world where

life is cruel

and governments cannot or will not help

their people

and who wants to stay in a place like

this

with its dirt

and its terrible smells

if they can drive away from it

the girl caught the photographer’s eye

she was in the middle of a group of boys

fighting just as strongly as they were

when the food trucks arrived

but she was pushed down and fell under

the boy’s feet

the boys stepped all over her

and when she could move again

the bags of rice were all gone

she stayed there

red eyed

moving her fingers slowly over the dusty

ground

the journalist takes his last photo

returns to america with his bag full of

films

one of his photographs of the girl sells

and is placed on the front cover of a

news magazine

you’ve caught the face of hunger in

africa

the news editor tells him

he wants to tell the editor that this

photograph is just one face

in one village

in a country full of hungry faces

but he does not say it

the photograph is good for him

more people admire his work and want to

buy his photographs for their magazines

and newspapers

the photograph is in most new stores by

the end of the month

even in those bookstores where people go

only to read the magazines and not to

buy

they look at the face of the african

girl

and quickly turn away to enjoy the rest

of their shopping trip

but the girl’s picture stays in their

minds

a teenager has just finished looking at

the clothes in vogue

an expensive fashion magazine

she sees the photograph under the

heading

starving africa

her parents are from africa

she herself was born and schooled in

america

watching american tv

american films

and has never traveled out of america

she is uncomfortable with photographs

like these

she remembers her classmates in school

who joke about starving africans

she isn’t african in that kind of way

but she isn’t truly american either

when she was younger

cinderella snow white

and all the other girls and princesses

in the disney films didn’t look like her

when she was older and became interested

in fashion

the models on the magazine covers didn’t

look like her either

then the magazines found out that africa

had beautiful women

a nigerian model is in the latest copy

of vogue

dressed in blue and thin

so thin

the teenager feels the fat at the top of

her legs

she wants to be thin like the model

she wants to wear jeans that i like a

second skin

she wants a photograph of herself with

cool unsmiling eyes like the nigerian

model

she is careful about what she eats

and if she eats too much

she puts her finger down her throat to

make herself sick

why does our world have people who

starve

and people who decide to starve

themselves

it doesn’t matter why

the hunger inside this teenager is real

so she stares at the girl in the

photograph

does not think about the dry

dusty hungry land behind her

and admires her cheekbones

[Music]

[Music]

you