GIRLS FIGHTING CHILD MARRIAGE AND WINNING PART 2!

Since I did my first blog post about Girls fighting child marriage and winning, I've been reading so many more stories about girls fighting back against this and winning. The first story is about a girl in Mozambique:

"Beatriz's aunt and other family members as well as the man she was supposed to marry were called for hearing. A decision was taken. Beatriz was released from child marriage, otherwise if the family insisted, they would face justice.

"I felt like I had awakened from the worst nightmare. If I had married, this time probably I would be pregnant and out of school, just like what happens to a lot of girls in our community."

Beatriz is glad for not being one more victim to add to the bad statistics of child marriage. She escaped for child abuse and she can keep living and playing like a child she is. Most of all, she is keeping alive her vision to become a teacher."

http://wvi.org/mozambique/article/world-vision-club-saves-girl-child-marriage

This next article also talks about an issue that we, at least in the U.S., don't usually hear about in regards to child marriages. This is about girls who are from countries that don't usually practice child marriage, being taken back to the country their parents immigrated from in order for them to be married.

"Teenage girls who fear they are being taken abroad to enter into a forced marriage are using a simple trick to escape: hiding a spoon or any other metal object in their underwear to set off the metal detector at the airport and avoid the flight at the last minute.

A charity has said it knows of many girls who have escaped what they fear awaits them in their family's old homeland, by using the ruse to be separated from their parents."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/girls-escape-forced-marriage-by-concealing-spoons-in-clothing-to-set-off-metal-detectors-at-the-airport-8764404.html

This last story is about a woman who not only escaped child marriage, but ended up returning to her village after obtaining her PhD in the U.S. She then decided to start a school for girls in her community and as a result has helped many girls stay in school and avoid child marriage. I would definitely recommend reading the success stories which can be found under the 'Our Results' tab. She is also currently one of the top ten contenders for the CNN Hero of the Year award!

"Life for Kakenya Ntaiya was supposed to follow the traditional path. Engaged at age 5, she was to be circumcised by the time she was a teenager, an event that would mark the end of her education and the beginning of her preparations for marriage. But Kakenya had a different plan. First, she negotiated with her father: she would be circumcised only if she could also finish high school. He agreed. Then she negotiated with the village elders to do what no girl had ever done: leave her Maasai village of Enoosaen in south Kenya to go to college in the United States. She promised that she would use her education to benefit Enoosaen. The entire village collected money to pay for her journey...

As an undergraduate, she became the first youth advisor to the United Nations Population Fund. In that capacity, she traveled around the world as a passionate advocate for girls' education, which she sees as a crucial tool for fighting the practices of female genital mutilation and child marriage."

http://www.kakenyasdream.org/about-us/kakenyas-story/