The Worst Place on Earth to be a Woman

Helene Cooper wrote an op-ed piece in yesterday’s NY Times titled “Waiting for their Moment in the Worst Place on Earth to be a Woman.” She discussed the recent election of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf in her native Liberia, Africa’s first woman president, and she contrasted that country with another miserable place, Bukavu, Congo.

“I’ve been unable to get one image from Bukavu out of my mind. It is of an old woman, in her ’30s. I saw her walking up the hill out of the city as I drove in. She carried so many logs that her chest seemed to touch the ground, so stooped was her back. Her husband was walking just in front of her. He carried nothing. Nothing in his hand, nothing on his shoulder, nothing on his back. He kept looking at her, telling her to hurry up.

I want to go back to Bakavu to find that woman, and to tell her what just happened in Liberia. I want to tell her her this: Your time will come, too.”