By David Halperin
Miami Dade Community College, Kendall Campus
USA
21 June 2002
I became aware of the landmine issue when, along with my parents, I had the opportunity to visit Ankor Wat in Siem Reap, Cambodia this past summer. During our trip we brought medical supplies and visited a pitiful and dirty provencial hospital located in the downtown area. I have traveled to many parts of the world and have seen poverty and people living under governments that deny what we in the states believe to be basic civil rights but until my visit to Cambodia, I had never before witnessed the sight of young people without limbs that were caused by indescriminate explosive devises. I also visited a very small independently run land mine museum in the outskirts of Siem Reap. At this museum I saw all sorts of landmines and very graphic pictures of landmine injuries. When I started college this past fall I was assigned a service learning project in my Biology class. It was at that point that I decided to spend my time on land mine awareness education. Since there were no resources or groups that I knew of in the Miami area that dealt with this issue, I got permission to create my own project and worked independently instead of working for a local service agency on some more common cause, which most of my fellow students did. The Internet provided me with many resources. I faxed, wrote and called many agencies to obtain information and promotional material. The United Nations, Israeli Defense Forces, US Defense Department, James Mason University, CAMEO etc, etc. Each organization I contacted were very helpful and would give me the information they could and then direct me to other organization. Finally I was directed to the United States Campaign to Ban Landmines and the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. This is were I obtained most of my materials. I also
purchased a Youth Kit which was very helpful. I also collected donations of $125.00 in change for mine awareness education and sent this off to Physicians for Human Rights.
Ultimately, I obtained signatures on many letters and petitions at my school and in my community at South Beach and Coconut Grove. These signatures were sent off to leaders who could have influence over mine use decisions. The thing that I find most interesting is that of the over 20 personalized and individual letters I sent off to politicians, the President and Sec.of State, which I identified myself as a student, I have only received one acknowledgment back. I met many interesting people and fellow students with all sorts of views while working my booth. I realized that most people sitting in the United States who do not deal with the issue of landmines on a daily basis, do not really understand the issue along with the fear and destruction that mines cause to the fabric of a society. My project took many hours of both research and preparation, but this is an important issue and I intend to continue to commit my time to pursuing the ban on mines. I now have another science course that deals with the physical sciences and I am going to continue my research and project by studying how mine clearing is affected by the physical geography and chemical make up of the land in the varying nations affected by mine use. I will also hold additional land mine education booths through out this summer and into the fall.
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