Undergraduate / Cmn. app: international issue and its importance to me: Bangladesh Poverty [2]

Hi, thanks in advance for reading this! Please critique harshly!

prompt: Choose an issue of local, national, or international concern and discuss its importance to you. ( it's supposed to be 500-700 words)

I had been removed from the serenity of my home and situated in an unfamiliar territory. I was standing in the middle of a dirt road with the blazing sun beating on my back, trying to orient myself to this peculiar environment, and then I saw them. Children that appeared to be my age were limping in filthy clothes on the dirt road, panhandling for basic essentials. I had not realized I was staring until they began to approach me. As they inched towards me, the scars that shaped their faces and the ragged clothes that were draped upon their emaciated frames became more striking. They pleaded that I give them something, anything to ensure their lives for just a day more. Before I offered them anything, I asked them where I was. They glanced at each other and laughed briefly before telling me I was in Dhaka, Bangladesh. After their momentary chuckles and giggles, they gazed into my eyes and began to surround me, begging for my help. I was so distraught with the situation at hand that I woke up to find myself fighting for breath. My eyes then wandered towards my nightstand only to find the alarm clock pulsing 4 AM in bright red. Although I was weary with sleep, the only thing I could think about were the young tormented faces and their sunken eyes.

Though this is just a nightmare I have had repeatedly, poverty is a wretched reality that plagues Bangladesh to this day. Despite the UN's campaign to halve Bangladesh's poverty by 2015, natural calamity, overpopulation, and political corruption have left forty-five percent of the country living on the streets. The roads of Dhaka, Khulna, Rajshahi, Sylhet, and Chittigong that had once thrived are now filled with the malnourished, illiterate, and wholly impoverished. This international issue could potentially be solved because of innovative local people like Dr. Muhammad Yunus, who founded Grameen Bank. This bank loans small amounts of money to the forty-five percent of Bangladesh below poverty lines, allowing predominantly the poorest women in Bangladesh to become successful entrepreneurs.

This international concern is tremendously important to me because my parents were born and raised in Bangladesh. For decades they were a part of the corruption, destitution, and natural calamities that takes place in Bangladesh. With these first hand accounts, my parents had described to me at a young age the ruthlessness of a third world country and the millions of people that suffer because of it. They went so far as to tell me that I still have family in Bangladesh, facing the adversity of some of the country's darkest days. They spared none of the heart-wrenching and stomach-churning details that would make anybody cringe.

At first I was stung by surges of sympathy, but that was quickly eclipsed by my urge to help. I had asked my parents for someone who was truly helping in Bangladesh and the only name they mustered was Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the creator of Grameen Bank. I had no idea that it took only one individual to start such a successful campaign that changed millions of lives in Bangladesh; little did I know that my life was one of them.

Dr. Yunus had once said," Each individual is very important. Each person has tremendous potential. She or he alone can influence the lives of others within the communities, nations, within and beyond her or his own time." Every other week I tutor younger students at my school, volunteer to help with sports camps, and work at food kitchens, trying to help anyone I can in my community. Though I truly wish to do more than that with my greatest ambition: bringing Bangladesh out of poverty with my passion for that country and justice.