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"I am a silver fish swimming in the stream. Last
night I had such a horrible dream.
I dreamt I was laying on a silver
dish.
But mummy quickly came along and said, 'Wake up fish"
~Helen, 10
The children's quotes excerpted from the book, "Dear World - 'How I'd Put
the World Right'"
by the Children of Over 50 Nations, Edited by Richard &
Helen Exley
Spelling (and grammar) corrected in some excerpts for ease of reading
* * * |
"The world is just a great big onion, there is time for tears,
but yet no time for peace. and the only way to break free, from this
big onion, is to Love, Love, Love, you and me. People, listen to what
I am saying. Don't you know we must be free? Can't you see the
penalty we're paying. Don't you know what its got to be? If we
put this big onion into a cooking pot, and season it with peace and love,
let me tell you what we've got; we've got love and unity; we've
got friendly togetherness; we've got lots of happiness. For the
world is just a great big onion, waiting just waiting to be free"
~Cheryl
Worrell, 17, Barbados |
"The thing to do is to crush the
clocks, melt the coins and then make life and love synonyms.
'What is this life, if full of care, we
have not time to stand and stare.' Don't you think that this just fits
us? Yes, it at least fits me.
Today, we have become slaves of time. Life just competes between two
poles, time and money. All are so busy that they can't even meet their
dearest ones. Life has become flat and uninteresting. There is
no spiritual happiness, no peace of mind.
When I was a small boy I had heard
people saying that life is a race. I found out that yesterday it was a
race to achieve love and happiness while today it is a race to achieve money
and power.
Money has become a magnet and man, an iron piece. Don't you think so?
We are entangled in this web of time and money. Let's fuse to break
it"
~Sanjiv
M Mehta, 15, India
"If you look around you can hear a sound of a great
big chorus's song. It is not of sadness, it is not of badness, it's of
love, and it's never wrong. Every mouth sings it loud. Every man
is very proud. He is singing in the chorus of the world. All the
nations sing together. All the people now are gathered to sing the
song about a nation of the world"
~Anat Blum,
Israel
"We have crushed the ideals of humanity under scientific achievements.
I believe that machines are not sufficient to compensate the deficiency of
love and happiness"
~Sanjiv M Mehta, 15, India
"I would give a free holiday for everyone. I would make good people
very famous indeed. I would give out factories to people who wanted
them. I would let everyone go to a pantomime free. I think films
that are long should be made shorter. I would make wages go up to
2,000 pounds a week. Bikes should never have a puncture.
Everything should be low price. I would ban carol singing outside.
I would stop flowers dying. I would have prisons pulled down. I
would make a machine to do school work for children. I would make
everything new and bright. I would make the year be so much longer,
but I would still let there be a Christmas. I would make maths easy.
I would give children a baby to play with. I would make beds nice and
warm. I would make mothers and fathers love their children" |
~Amanda Warner, 8, United
Kingdom
"If the
world was a picture I would take a painter's brush and I would
turn the wars into festivals, the thorny wire nettings into rosy
wire nettings, I would turn darkness into light and hate into
love"
~Hadjissava
Elena, 14, Cyprus
"Let's magnify
our feelings and let's stretch our love. Let's love
honestly without any deceit. Let's love now without any
reservation and change the earth from a battle-field into an
abode of love"
~Sanjiv
M Mehta, 15, India
"I dream of a world, where men live in
freedom's peace, a beautiful world. I dream of a world, where flowers
grow unchoked, beasts naturally. I dream of a world, where everyone
has time; time for you and me"
~ Sonia
Gill, 13, Barbados
"War is the concentration of all human crimes. It turns man into
a beast of prey"
~ Edna Daley,
16, Jamaica
"No-one really likes war, only kids playing soldiers on the floor.
But they don't know what it's like, playing aeroplanes on their bikes.
War is a game of strength, surviving for months in a trench. I don't
see why men fight, because they mostly pay with their life"
~Terry
Glanfield, 11, United Kingdom
"I would stop bull fighting because a man could be killed and we don't know
if the bull wants to die"
~Lynda Coke, 8, Great Britain
Animals are just as important as man, and should live. The world
was given to man and animal, not just man"
~Karen Shaw, 12
"If I ruled the world I would stop people keeping wild animals. I would stop
bull fighting and fox hunting. I would stop lions in circuses.
I'd make a law about that if anybody broke that law I would send a police
man to ask why you did it"
~Christine Adaway, 7
"Chickens give eggs for us to eat and
all we do is feed them. I think this is real generosity and nobody
ever thanks them. The same goes for other animals who are killed
without being thanked!
~N. Gibson, 12
"If I ruled the world war would never start and peace would never end"
~Brett Hayde, 11, New Zealand
"If I ruled the world I would
stop all the wars by putting children in the middle of them"
~Gary Sheehan,
9
"I think that all laws must be
rewritten from the beginning. This is what I would do if I ruled the
world for a while. I would start everything from the beginning"
(just
like the American Founders!)
~ Margarita Lianopoulou, 8, Greece
"I would say, 'I don't want pollution, no factories should throw their
litter into the rivers and kill the plants, and living things. And if
that was true I would jump and scream 'World you did what I said, I love you
World'"
~Ana Mari Woehr, 9, Spain
"I would send a letter to all the
countries I could. And tell them some of the rules what they should
do. I would tell them not wreck everything. And not to break
everything, or steal everything. And try to stop the volcanoes
erupting"
~James, 7, United Kingdom
"If I were the Queen and I ruled the world, I would put things right and
help the starving with food, and make everything that is wrong right, and
things that are right already, I'd leave alone"
~Bryony Eedy, 7, United Kingdom
"Dictators would be tickled to death
(because of the absence of weapons)"
~Andrew Dunford, 12, United Kingdom
"The only way to fix everything is to find a solution"
~Joanne McLauchlan, Iran
"Politicians make promises and there are too many promises"
~Julie Page, 12, United Kingdom
"The greatest difficulty with the world
at present is not its inability to produce but its unwillingness to share"
~Opal Bernard, 16, Jamaica
"Lots of rich people would tell me to
'get out', if I asked them to help the poor. Lots of people are too
well fed and they throw lots of food away without even knowing about
starving people. Some people die of eating too much in places like
U.S.A., NZ, UK, Australia"
~Tavake Afeaki, 10, Tonga
"First I would have a sort of election, where the people could vote whether
all the bad people went to the moon and all the good ones stayed on earth or
the other way round. I would have a panel of good people to go with
them and if any bad people turned good, they would tell me and I would send
a rocket to collect them. For people who smoked I would use Venus"
~Liesla Eldridge, 10, United Kingdom
"The yellow sun shines on the yellow daffodils and the yellow crocuses which
bloom in the meadow. Yellow is the bright happy color of spring"
~Andrew, 10, United Kingdom
"The world was once a beautiful place. But now it stands a monument of
disgrace. Fear everywhere, crime in the air and sorrow yet to come.
Mother nature looked with pitiful eyes and then began to realize, that
trees, meadows and hills, and beautiful daffodils would be the solution to
man's problem. But man began to destroy nature, and one day nature
repelled man's need. Leaving him with all his greed she flew with
mighty wings and took back all those beautiful things"
~Paul Thompson, 14, Jamaica
"The Earth is a planet which revolves around the sun and it's very important
to everyone. But to people who gaze from outer space, it's a dirty,
horrible, ugly place. Industries belch out polluting smoke not worried
about people who might even choke. They're not interested in spoiling
the land so sunny all the want is money, money, money"
~Jane Baker, 14, United Kingdom
"From the wilderness man built this world, carved paths and harnessed forces
that were thought forever wild; made reality from dreams, and dreamed anew.
With toil and ingenuity with hope and sweat and pain man civilized this
earth; he made all that he is, and all he will be, to make a better
world
–
man has progressed. Now, who will civilize man?"
~Irene Sandyord, Barbados
"The world has changed from ancient to modern. The men themselves have
changed. Here we are in this new world with its new things leading us
no where"
~Leonard Mwangi, 13, Kenya
"I, a prospective medical student, would rather amputate hatred, than cure
cancer; for what is the use of having healthy people, if they hate each
other?"
~Laila Risgalllah, 19, Egypt
"If your friend is hungry or thirsty, give him your share. If you
friend is in want of love love him. If your friend is in want of home
and clothes, give him a cottage and clothes. If your friend is lonely,
keep him company. If your friend is lying, silence him. If your
friend calls to you, listen to him. If your friend is laughing, laugh
with him. If your friend is crying, cry with him. If your friend
is ill, fetch help. If your friend dies, don't forget him"
~Paula Lagerstam, 15, Finland
Excerpt:
"The world has become a merry-go-round, around which mankind is turning in
circles. This has been created by man's stupidity and will eventually
lead to his own destruction. There is still enough time to save
humanity. Men must try and stop all that is threatening their
existence: pollution, violence and the unclose-ness of human beings:
their mistrusting each other and their isolation. World energy may be
used to bring the health that does not come from pills and injections, but
from a freedom of mind of inner happiness. Technology can be used, but
only to a certain extent. It may provide food, shelter, physical
health to people, but it can never nourish their souls. This is why
all mental problems of today are created. Human beings can nourish
their souls only through relationships with others, love and inner
enlightenment. If this cannot be accepted with technology, then the
latter must be abolished. For man should not risk and give up
his own existence for the sake of that of technology. The younger
generations must be helped to trust others, to regain their lost hopes for a
better future" |
~Atoosha Pezeshgpour, 16, Iran
Excerpt:
"We the youth can't stay out of this.
I'm conscious that the best or the brightest ability is worthless if those
who have it are incapable of integrating it in a general action. We
must gather our forces and cultivate the taste for love and freedom, to
fight with all the power on an intellectual front to win the peace, because
what we have now is a threat to our nights of rest and days of work.
Like real dockers, who work in the port where the ideas arrive, we should
refuse the unloading of the war-cry!"
~Radulescu Cristina, 18, Romania
"I hope year two thousand will give us an Earth no longer squeaking and
groaning under a planetful of arms. I hope for the day when Dad and
Mum will take baby by the hand, lead him to the War Museum there to
contemplate and shudder at the last weapon on Earth -- the man-made,
man-eating monster gnawing ineffectually at the cage made of the timelessly
strong alloy of PEACE & BROTHERHOOD OF MAN"
~Capra Victor, 15, Romania
End
Neither Capitalism Nor
Communism as The Spiritual
United Nations Would Be, But Human
Severn Suzuki, 13, Vancouver, Canada
Hurt of the Earth
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