#HHNominate – Teodora would like to nominate Cosmin Albu, Harsh Chauhan and Weronika Pleskot. For more information about #HHNominate and how to get involved visit our #HHNominate page.
By Teodora Busurca
Scrolling through the titles of the top marketing campaigns of 2014, I found this amazing advert launched by ‘Save the Children’, entitled ‘If London Were Syria’. The video hit more than 43 million views on YouTube, managing to create a shocking fact-based illustration of the Syrian crisis: ‘Just because it isn’t happening here, doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.’
Although it is sad to admit that what does not affect us directly, hardly catches our attention, it is true. As long as we can go on with our lives, why would we think about others’ sufferings? Why would we ever stop from what we are doing and wonder if people of our age, sex or education, have the chance to enjoy the same liberty? The answer would be deeply hidden in our hearts, because we are humans, defined by our capacity of empathising; once aware of the dreadful calamity happening overseas, one cannot ignore it anymore. One cannot close the eyes to the fact that this war condemns children to death, brutally denying their right to life and forces people to witness the transformation of their homes into ghost cities, dust and ashes. Another answer would be our choice of saying ‘no’ to ignorance, to the most powerful devil we could face. Choosing not be ignorant to the realities of the world we live in, we choose to care, to hear those cries for help, to see those mean-spirited people who wreak havoc on the entire nation of Syria, to feel the fright and the goose bumps this war generates.
Returning to the advert I first introduced, a touching aspect of the campaign lies in its perspective, through the eyes of a little girl, we experience the devastating changes that war produces in people’s lives. The video begins in a cheerful atmosphere, on the girl’s birthday, illustrating how London is surrounded by happiness, joyful noises and sparkling laughs. People engage in fruitful mundane activities, walk safely on the streets, breathing the fresh air of freedom and peace. Day by day, however, the girl’s life takes a turn for the worse. Her family are forced to leave their home, as it is no longer secure, and the child and her mother are separated from her father. The tough scenario also illustrates how electricity, food and medicines become scarcer with now terror taking over any other feeling. The ending of the advert parallels with its beginning, with the girl’s birthday, but this time in a gloomy context, which can easily draw the picture of the current Syrians’ world. A world in which people are surrounded by fearful clamours, feeling nothing but escalating anxiety, seeing nothing but disharmony, frustration and shades, and losing their dreams into the dust of this endless bloody war.
#HHNominate – Teodora would like to nominate Cosmin Albu, Harsh Chauhan and Weronika Pleskot. For more information about #HHNominate and how to get involved visit our #HHNominate page.
Teodora is in her second year studying Sports Management.
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