CNN's 10 Heroes.

Last Saturday night, I sat and watched the CNN's fourth annual recognition of the top10 heroes of the world. Out of the 10, 000 nominations from more than 100 hundred countries, these heroes were selected  by the viewers in an online poll that ran for eight weeksto on CNN.com.

In order to get more people watch the event,the executive producer of CNN had made it a star studded program with celebrities like Hallie Berry, Renee Zeilweger, Demi Moore to present the awards and Grammy Award-winners Bon Jovi, John Legend and Sugarland to perform on the stage.  However, in the eyes of the audience at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, CA and of those who watched the program from their homes, the stars who glittered brighter and outshined the sheen of the celebrities on that night were the ten heroes who walked up the stage to get the awards.

Here the 74 -year old Guadalup De La Vega founded a hospital in Mexico that treated freely about 900 patients daily.  Despite the violence in the city, the 74-year old Dr.Guadalup De La Vegathe travels several times a week to attend to her patients at the hospital she founded in Mexico. Her hospital gives free treatment to about 900 patients daily.

After her son's tragic death, Susan Burton got into drugs and other problems that led her to spend years in prison. When she left the prison gate, the guard there told her that she'll be back soon like most inmates. Determined to not to return to prison, Susan sought the support of those who refused to give up on her and turned her life around. Through her fitness and nutrition program, Linda Fondren has helped the obese people in her hometown in Mississipi lose nearlyr 15,000 Mississippi hometown's battle with obesity.Today, her nonprofit A New Way of Life Reentry Project provides a home and support for the women released from prison. Here women are given opportunity  to get trained and  prepared to find jobs.

Narayanan Krishnan provides hot meals and dignity to homeless and destitute in his hometown Madurai in South India. He drives his van through out the city looking for the desperately poor and abandoned people, feed them, and if needed he even gives them a haircut and a bath. In his kindness, the poor and outcasts find hope and dignity. Narayanan gave up his dream of going abroad and pursuing his catering career and chose to serve the poor and destitute instead. Since 2002, he had provided 1.2 million hot meals.

Since 1997, Harman Parker has helped build 45 footbridges for people in Kenya so that they didn't need to walk across the perilous crocodile infested rivers.  The footbridges he helped to build helped the children go to school safely and for the people to go to the markets to buy or sell easily.
Aki Rai, a former child soldier helps to clear landmines in his country Cambodia. Since 1993, he and his Cambodian Self Help Demining  had helped to clear about 50,000 mine.

Evan Wadongo, aged 23 saw the need to invent something to bring light to his darkened village. With the cost of kerosine high rocketting and eyes of children getting damaged by reading under smoky kerosine lampspoor and dim light, Wadonga decided to do something to help out. So he invented solar lanterns using solar power and distributed them freely to rural families. Through his Use Solar, Save Lives program, he's distributed 10,000 free solar lanterns.

Since, 2005, Dan Wallrath, a Texas home builder had built veteran homes and given morgage free to injured Iraq and Afghanistan soldiers.

These people, once unknown and unrecognized in their own village or town have done extraordinary things for people in need. That's what set them apart from all the others in their communities as well as in that auditorium that night.

These were everyday people who performed extraordinary things when they saw a need in their communities.  They could have easily walked away as others do or could have left the need to be attended by the government or a charitable organization. But they didn't.to solve. Instead,when they saw the need, they stepped in to help in whatever way they could.

Out of the chosen top ten heros,Anuradha Koirala from Nepal was named as the 2010 CNN Hero of the year. Since 1993, through her organization Maiti Nepal, Koirala has rescued more than 12,000 women and provided shelter homes for them. Along with shelter, these homes provide hope, healing and  skills to find jobs.

 Barely five-footed Anuradha Koirala,draped in a colorful Indian silk sari stood next to Demi Moore with her face beaming with joy, and received her award on the stage for $100,000 to continue her work, she pleaded with the audience to join hands with her to end the heinous crime called human trafficking. " Demi Moore, who introduced Koirala on the stage had  founded  DNA foundation along with her husband to eliminate child sex slavery worldwide. It's so appropriate that CNN chose Moore to introduce Koira on that gala night.

Human trafficking, I've read about it and  seen some documentaries on television, but never gave much thought to it. And, two nights back I saw the movie Trade which dealt with sex slavery and that truly caught my dire attention. The movie is about two young girls, one of them barely thirteen and was happily biking in her neighborhood when she was pulled into a car and kidnapped by two men, and the other was a young woman who comes to America from Russia to join a modelling agency. Whoever had produced the movie had a great job to let the world know what a heinous crime this human traffiking is. The beating, the drugging, the raping and animal like treatment these young girls, some barely 10-12 yrs old  undergo is heartwrenching.

I live in a city  close to Mexican border where drug and humantrafficking continues even with heavy border patrols and strict government reguations. Innocent children are being kidnapped on their way to school, work or even from their homes and driven across the border and across states and sold for sex at high price. Yes, police and some organizations are working hand in hand to eliminate this atrocious crime. But that doesn't seem to be enough. Unless more and more Koiralas  rise up to do something, this is going to be an unending battle.

So what can you and I do? We can support a trustworthy organization that help to eliminate such traffiking; volunteer in shelters to bring hope and love to the victims; and Pray. Yes, pray on a regular basis for this cause. Prayer does has power, and God does hear heartfelt prayers. If one of those girls kidnapped is our own, won't we cry out to God? So, lets cry out to God together so that no son or daughter of any mother need to go through such horrendous suffering any longer.. If a simple, ordinary woman like Anuradha Koirala from Nepal could rescue 12000 women, can't we in North America be instrumental in helping at least one child from sex slavery by our prayers, financial support or volunteering to help in some ways? Sure we can.***