War Kids Relief project ramps up

For Xmas, I sent one of my sons the book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah. I’d seen Beah on The Daily Show a while ago so when I saw the book at Monkey See Monkey Reads while doing my xmas shopping on xmas eve eve, I bought it.

I had already read Bonnie Obremski’s RepJ article a month earlier (Nationwide project soliciting participation from Northfield youth) describing War Kids Relief, a project being run by Northfield/Dennison-based Children’s Culture Connection (CCC). And I’d seen all the photos of the Iraqi kids on the walls of the Hideaway Coffeehouse and Winebar.

But I never mentally made the connection between the child soldiering of Beah’s book and CCC’s War Kids Relief project until I attended a fundraiser for the project at College City Beverage’s cool new conference room (above right) at their new HQ in Dundas on Friday night.

That’s where I heard presentations by (center) Iraqi war veteran Gunnar Swanson and Charles London, author of One Day the Soldiers Came: Voices of Children in War, who both now work with War Kids Relief.

Swanson (related to many Northfield-area Swansons) and London appeared on The Wayne Eddy Affair radio show on Friday morning on KYMN 1080.  New owner Jeff Johnson gave me permission to put up the audio here. (Full disclosure: KYMN is a client of mine.)

Click play to listen. 2 hrs, 21 min.