Diane Latiker

"There are people here that do care, and i'm one of them"


In south side Chicago, in Roseland, one of Chicagos most dangerous neighbourhoods, There is a woman that is doing the best she can to stop the gang violence on the streets. Diane Latiker, a grandmother in the neighbourhood opened up her home to gang members from the street to try to influence them to get onto the right path. She said "They say I'm a nut because I let kids into my home who I didn't even know," said Diane Latiker, 54. "But I know (the kids) now. And I'll know the new generation." She feels that opening up her home and heart to the children might end up steering them into the right path and get them off the streets.

Latiker told them her house was open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They could come over for food, or homework help, or just to talk about their hopes, dreams and fears kids of the block was born. She then moved into a building on one of the neighbourhood streets and now the kids have a variety of resources available to them to help them for the future.

Latiker is a mother of eight and a grandmother of 13. She has lived in Roseland for 22 years. She said she was once "young and dumb," dropping out of high school and having seven children by age 25. But she said that by 36, she had turned her life around: She got remarried and earned her GED.



Susan Burton

"I just wanted my life to count towards something good"

Susan knows how difficult life can be. Her 5-year-old son was accidentally killed 30 years ago. After that happened she began doing drugs. She ended up in prison six different times. She got clean in 1997 and never looked back.

She now runs a reentry program for female ex-offenders in South Los Angeles named "A New Way of Life". She has helped over 500 women get on the right path to productive lives. She tries to give these women everything they need to get back on their feet and not succumb to their old ways. She says  "I know now that without the resources and support, it's next to impossible. ... If you don't have a new door to walk through, the only thing is the old door."

She is provided these women with a new door. A fresh start.



Evans Wadongo

"It just gives me the satisfaction knowing that im lifting people out of poverty, i just feel that its right"

Evans is a young man that grew up in a small village in the western part of Kenya. He invented a solar powered LED lantern. When villagers see him coming down the road, men, women and children start singing and dancing.

He says that villagers only soource of heat comes from kerosene and wood. Villagers spend so much on kerosene that they cant afford food. He also has dreams of inventing something so drastic that it will change the way villagers live and give them more opportunities for children to go to improve their education. 

With a lack of good light to study by -- Wadongo often had to share one lantern with his siblings and other family members -- he remembers the frustration of unfinished homework and poor exam performance. So at the top of his list is to help children do well in school.

He says that children are forced to leave school because of the poverty and then the cycle continues because they lose out on the opportunities that school can provide.



Guadalupe Arizpe De La Vega

"Our hospital has not been touched. Our doctors have not been kidnapped. This is a miracle of God, believe me,"

Guadalupe is a 74 year old woman that lives in El Paso, Texas but originally from Saltillo. She started a health center over 30 years ago in Juarez, Mexico. Juarez in the past few years has become one of the most dangerous cities in the world as violent battles between drug cartels have taken control of the city.

She describes the health centre that she opened, Hospital de la Familia, as a sancuary for healing in a city where there is so much pain. In one weekend she recalls Juarez has over 51 homicides. Still, she insists on visiting Juarez at least 5 times a week to visit people in the hospital.

She notes that no one as of yet has tried to kidknapp any of her doctors or harm her patients. Juarenses know that Hospital de la Familia is a sanctuary of the city and a place where people can heal in peace.

Martin Luther King Jr.

"All I'm saying is simply this, that all life is interrelated, that somehow we're caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. For some strange reason, I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. You can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality."

Here in North America, their are very few of us that don't know who Martin Luther King Jr. was and how instrumental he was in the equal rights movement.



For those that don't know him, Martin Luther King Jr. was an American Clergyman, activist, and prominent leader. He is best known for his involvement in the advancement of civil rights in the United States, using non-violence methods following the teachings of Mahatma Ghandi.



He was born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1929 to Martin Luther King Sr. who was a reverend and Alberta Williams King. He skipped the ninth and twelfthed grade and entered college at the age of 15. He graduated with Bachelor of Arts Degree in Sociology.

He started organizing marches across the United States and spoke at all these events inspiring change and giving his people hope. Among his most successful was March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. The made specific demands: an end to racial segregation in public schools; meaningful civil rights legislation, including a law prohibiting racial discrimination in employment; protection of civil rights workers from police brutality; a $2 minimum wage for all workers; and self-government for Washington, D.C., then governed by congressional committee. Despite tensions, the march was a resounding success. More than a quarter million people of diverse ethnicities attended the event, sprawling from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial onto the National Mall and around the reflecting pool.

On April 3, 1968, King said  "Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." 

A next day he was shot and killed in the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. His spirit and words of inspiration will never be forgotten.

Ernesto "Che" Guevara

"Man truly achieves his full human condition when he produces without being compelled by the physical necessity of selling himself as a commodity."

If any of you have seen The Motorcycle Diaries, a movie depicting the travels of Che Guevara as a young man through Latin America. You would know his quirky travel companion and friend through that trip, Alberto Granado. Just two days ago, Alberto Granado died at 88 years old, his recent death and the revolutions happening in the Middle East inspired me to write this post.

For those of you that don’t know Che, he was a revolutionary, physician, author, intellectual, guerilla leader, diplomat and military theorist. He was Fidel Castro's right hand man in the historic Cuban revolution. He left his home in Buenos Aires, Argentina at 23 traveling through Chile all the way to Mexico where he met Fidel. The two went on from there to over-take the Batista regime. Throughout his travels he saw the struggles and injustices going on in Latin America and it inspired him to devote his life to helping people and stand up to corrupt governments that were causing a lot of the issues.

He is described as being as being driven by moral rather than material incentives. Even after taking over Cuba where he could have stayed and enjoyed the good life with Fidel having anything he could possibly dream. He left and went out to help other peoples and army’s in revolutions. He went on to Congo to assist in their armed revolution and then Bolivia where he then was captured by American Forces and executed.



Efren Geronimo Penaflorida Junior

“You are the change that you dream”

Efren Geronimo Penaflorida Junior is a teacher and social worker in the Philippines. In 2000 he graduated from San Sebastian College with a computer technology degree, with the highest honors. He is the founder of Dynamic Teen Company, which is geared towards averting teen boys from being the victims of gangs and drugs, to education. As a result of his hard work towards charity, he was nominated for the CNN heroes in 2009 and won first place among the top ten CNN Heroes nominees.

Efren Penaflorida grew up near an urban slum in Cavity City in Philippines; where the children play near the city’s open dumpster and polluted water. At this early age was among thousands of World Vision’s sponsored children. Later, a youth group called Club 8586 helped him financially to complete elementary and high school.

In 1997 at age 16, he started a youth group within his high school by gathering 20 student members, aiming to divert the attention of young teens that are vulnerable to gangs and drugs by turning their attention to books, studies, and other activities; and later named their organization Dynamic Teen Company. He provides kids in the slum with all the utensils that their families can’t afford, such as pens, pencils, books and other school supplies.

Now, he works as a teacher at a private school to support his family and does volunteer work on the side. He and his members bring push cart with books every Saturday bringing the class room to the slum and getting kids to read and write. He works with Club 8586 and other various charity organizations in the region to help teens and young children to build their lives with a solid foundation.
Efren says his dream is to build a school to for these children.

Video Link: http://bit.ly/1NRjdT