By Katrina Custardo
Love Army for Somalia is a movement to bring relief to Somalia, which is currently going through a massive famine. It was originally created by Jérôme Jarre on March 17, and it has exponentially gained recognition. The idea was to persuade Turkish Airlines, the only airlines flying to Somalia right now, to let one of its airplanes be filled with 60 tons of food and fly it to Somalia. “One shipment, providing immediate relief for immediate need,” as stated on their GoFundMe page.
Turkish Airlines responded to Jarre with a tweet saying, “We [heart] Somalia. We got the call for this meaningful flight.” Turkish Airlines officials also said they will keep donating a plane to be filled with food until the end of the famine.
This blows my mind. The fact that one little idea, a tiny snowball rolling down a hill, gained so much speed and support to become an avalanche is breathtaking. We need some good in this world right now, and this is where it starts.
The plane will fly in on March 27, and the fundraising goal was $1 million to fill the plane with 60 tons of food, mainly rice, vegetable cooking oil, nutritional biscuits, flour, sugar, and porridge. For the first flight, food is being bought in Istanbul, Turkey, “as a thank you to our Turkish friends.” But for later flights, the movement is hopefully going to buy food from local businesses in Somalia to support the Somalian economy. They are also sending in water trucks.
Full transparency is important to this movement, which is why all of this information and more can be found on their GoFundMe page, and why Ben Stiller is letting this movement use his charity, Stiller Foundation, to receive and manage the funds donated.
The goal was to reach $1 million in 10 days. I am so happy to say that as of March 20, more than $1.8 million has been raised by more than 67,000 people. The amount of money raised in such a short time by so many people takes my breath away.
We have been dealing with a lot of negativity recently as a country and a world, it seems as if the news only reports the bad things that are going on in the world, so I think this movement is exactly what is needed. What’s especially amazing is that it started off as an idea that snowballed into planes full of food sent to a part of the world that desperately needs it. The fact that so many people saw this and said, “I can help,” shows that there is still so much good in this world.
If you would like to donate, please go to Love Army for Somalia on GoFundMe. All of this information and more can also be found on the GoFundMe page. There is still work to be done, and any little bit helps. We can help end this horrid famine with nothing more than an idea, rice, and 1 million voices.