News | Ripple's Web

U.S. pointing a gun at democracy

May 19th, 2013 cnn No comments

Editor’s note: Donna Brazile, a CNN contributor and a Democratic strategist, is vice chairwoman for voter registration and participation at the Democratic National Committee. She is a nationally syndicated columnist, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University and author of “Cooking with Grease: Stirring the Pot in America.” She was manager for the Gore-Lieberman presidential campaign in 2000.

(CNN) — Our democracy is endangered. Not by the Russians, North Korea, the Iran regime, or even terrorists. To quote Pogo: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

Inside the beltway, the fingers point and the media tuts and struts in glee, and we, the American public, respond by becoming more rigid and divided ourselves. No more “truth springing from argument amongst friends,” as David Hume said. A recent nonpartisan Pew Research Poll finds our knee-jerk partisanship has increased dramatically.

This road we’re on will lead us step-by-step to an extreme: either an autocratic government that functions, or a dysfunctional anarchy. The petty squabbles, bilge in the name of party or principle, will dissolve our self-government.

Abraham Lincoln felt no foreign power could ever defeat the United States. He said, “From whence shall we expect the approach of danger? Shall some trans-Atlantic military giant step the earth and crush us at a blow? Never…No, if destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men we will live forever or die by suicide.”

We’re pointing a pistol at our heads. A government of, by, and for the people requires that people talk to people, that we can agree to disagree but do so in civility. If we let the politicians and those who report dictate our discourse, then our course will be dictated.

Why am I alarmed? Because two “scandals” — the IRS tax-exempt inquiries and the Department of Justice’s tapping of reporters’ phones — have become lynch parties. And the congressional investigation of Benghazi may become a scandal in itself.

The IRS scandal has sparked bipartisan outrage that should require a bipartisan solution. The director who oversaw this was a Bush appointee who was confirmed by a Democratic Congress. Even Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein says he doubts very much that Obama was involved

We, the people, need to stay focused on facts, causes and solutions. Let’s begin with the findings of the Treasury’s inspector general who uncovered it: That it was bureaucratic mismanagement, but that there was no evidence of any political motivation or influence from outside the IRS.

Lawmakers grill ousted IRS boss

Holder: Most serious leaks I’ve ever seen

Abrams: That’s not America at its best

And that, according to acting Commissioner Steven Miller, who just resigned, the problem started because the Supreme Court’s Citizens’ United decision created a surge of requests by political groups for tax-exempt status.

Democrats and Republicans agree there’s a problem. Maybe they should focus on solutions.

Let’s demand an end to partisan sideshows or media witch hunts: It turns out that the leaked White House Benghazi e-mails which allegedly show a coverup of a terrorist attack were themselves altered. Those e-mails are, in a word, bogus

Next up on the playbill: The Department of Justice secretly obtained dozens of reporters’ phone records because of a serious security leak. The double contradictory shell game we’re supposed to believe: Obama is not in charge and he has his finger in every pot.

This bamboozling of the American people obscures the main point: How do we safeguard American lives and respect our freedoms at the same time? Maybe working together — Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals — the Media Shield Law, a solution to the problem, can be passed.

Both the Democrats and Republicans have run roughshod over our separation of powers. Both parties have misused and abused their constitutional powers. Democrats blocked, again and again, President Bush’s nominees for federal judges. Today, Republicans aren’t just blocking Obama’s judicial nominees, they’re blocking the Senate from considering laws and blocking Cabinet appointees necessary for the federal government to run.

Why should we allow any political party or personality to render our government unable to govern?

On 9/11 terrorists attacked the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and tried to attack the U.S. Capitol building in order to destroy our institutions, our economic strength, our military and our democratic Congress where “the people rule.”

But in our partisan self-righteousness, we’re destroying our foundations of government more effectively than al Qaeda ever could. Whether it’s the media or the politicians, the churning of partisan passion into anger, indeed hate, has an ulterior purpose: If Obama’s administration is constantly engaged in fighting for its existence, the governing comes to a halt, and his agenda will go nowhere.

Aiming for that and little if nothing else weakens and harms our democratic institutions, both Congress and the presidency. Remember, Obama was elected by a bigger margin than George W. Bush. He deserves to have his appointees, and he deserves to have votes on the issues, to have the government function, and to fight for the policies on which he was elected. By allowing problems to become scandals and scandals to become demagoguery, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot.

If it keeps up, we will all be complicit in weakening our democracy.

Follow us on Twitter @CNNOpinion.

Join us on Facebook/CNNOpinion.

The opinions in this commentary are solely those of Donna Brazile.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/18/opinion/brazile-democracy-in-danger/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: ard, cnn, com, Earth, National, Obama, today, top stories, world

War-scarred refugees earn degrees

May 19th, 2013 cnn No comments

Rome, Georgia (CNN) — Mireille Kibibi’s march to the graduation stage at Berry College was tough — laden with the burdens of war.

As a little girl, she fled civil war in Burundi and escaped to neighboring Rwanda in 1994, the year of the genocide. In the chaos, she was separated from her mother, whom she has never seen again. Her father died a few years later.

Kibibi made it to the United States with her grandmother in 2005 and resumed school after missing fourth, fifth and eighth grades.

Now she was about to receive a bachelor’s degree in accounting.

She felt all those things a college graduate feels: the relief that exams are over. The excitement of starting life in the real world. The joy of making your family proud.

But Kibibi’s graduation was also filled with longing.

On this humid Saturday morning, as dark clouds delivered drizzle over North Georgia, Kibibi, 23, sat nervously among 377 classmates.

The rows and rows of folding chairs had been arranged on the south lawn days in advance. She wished her father and especially her grandmother could see her now, resplendent in the knee-length red dress she’d ordered on eBay. Her grandmother, who raised her, had died a while back.

“She’s watching you,” her friend Fatima Bostan-Ali reassured her.

“She’s proud,” said another friend, Lima Naseri.

Kibibi cherishes the support. She knows her friends understand. They are from Afghanistan and also have traveled uneasy paths to graduation day.

The women were part of a group of seven refugee students who came to Berry in 2009. The gaps in their education, their lack of English skills and the emotional scars in their lives had set them back. They didn’t all meet the academic criteria to make it into Berry.

But Berry took a risk and opened its doors. Even the head of the university doubted whether all seven would make it through four years of college.

“It was our big gamble to give them a chance,” Berry President Steve Briggs said.

On Saturday, Berry’s gamble paid off.

Taking a risk

At the start of the 20th century, Martha Berry founded Berry Schools on Christian principles, aiming to help academically able but poor children of the rural South. The schools encouraged students to study hard and work to pay for their education. Berry’s schools eventually grew into the eponymous college in the Georgia city of Rome.

Among Berry’s many fans were President Theodore Roosevelt and auto magnate Henry Ford, who built a castle-like dormitory on the campus.

Berry sits on 26,000 acres of lush landscape; it’s not unusual to see deer walk right up to the buildings. And yet it is small, with only about 2,000 students, and classified as residential because most students live on campus. Many work at the college to help pay their $30,000 annual tuition.

It was the community atmosphere that first attracted Naing Oo, the son of political dissidents from Myanmar, also known as Burma. The family fled political persecution in their junta-ruled homeland when Oo was in the fifth grade.

Oo learned about Berry at a college fair. Atlantan Barbara Thompson, who knew Oo through a school she founded for refugee kids, championed his cause.

She knew about his past.

Oo’s father was part of Myanmar’s pro-democracy movement. His mother often used duct tape to attach pots and pans to her husband’s chest to protect him when soldiers opened fire on demonstrators.

Oo’s father, a marine engineer, escaped the country and landed in New York, where he found work at a Laundromat in Chinatown. He made only $4 an hour but saved enough to hire a lawyer so he could bring his family over.

When it was time for everyone to leave Myanmar, Oo’s mother told authorities she and her children were going on a shopping trip to Singapore. The flight attendants on the plane couldn’t understand why she was crying.

Later, Oo, 22, discovered that the family’s documents, including asylum papers for the United States, were hidden in his bag. Authorities were less careful in checking children’s luggage.

Even now, he says, he gets chills when he thinks about how he carried his family’s future.

Oo’s decision to go to Berry spread among other students connected through Thompson’s school for refugees. In the end, seven of them from four countries — Burundi, Myanmar, Afghanistan and Liberia — were admitted to Berry.

Thompson knew that they did not have the SAT scores or the money to make it to a college like Berry, but she was moved by their determination to make it in America, a land that Oo said was as different from their homelands as Earth is from sky.

Thompson kept thinking of what one student’s mother had told her: She’d dreamed of education for her girls in Afghanistan but then the Taliban came.

Thompson’s dream was to see these students, who had survived extraordinarily challenging circumstances, succeed.

She believed Berry would provide the perfect environment. It was small and intimate. The students would be able to regain a sense of community lost in their process of resettlement.

She reached out to Briggs and other Berry officials and shared her hopes for the refugee students.

Berry, a predominantly white Protestant college, had not had students like these before.

But admitting them was in line with the same kind of calculated investments that Martha Berry had made in students in her day, giving boys and girls trapped in poverty an opportunity to better their lives.

Briggs, the college president, knew that it would take an enormous amount of resolve and resiliency on the part of the refugee students. It would be an experiment.

Berry had just started a program that let students work their way through college with the hope they would graduate debt-free. Why not extend such a chance to the refugee students?

University administrators understood that these kids wanted education as much as a drowning person needs air. They also understood that the refugees were going to be treated like any other Berry student.

“The only reason we took a look at them was because of their remarkable backgrounds,” Briggs said. “But they were not given a free ride. It wasn’t going to help to coddle them.”

In the summer of 2009, the seven students arrived in Rome. They arrived early so they could get settled before classes in the fall. They were immediately put to work with the grounds crew.

“That first summer, it was just us,” Oo recalled.

Naseri, 21, whose family fled Afghanistan, said the students all knew of one another mainly through the refugee school. Once at Berry, they became a tight-knit group.

“It felt good knowing we weren’t alone,” she said. “We inspired each other.”

They knew that no one else around them could possibly understand what it’s like to leave a homeland for good or to live through genocide.

But quickly, their tree of friends branched out.

“I looked at this opportunity to not just get an education but educate others,” Oo said.

Big-name commencement speakers for 2013

Gaining back what was lost

On her first day at Berry, Fakhria Hussain’s brother drowned in a swimming pool in Atlanta. She’d already lost her father; he was killed in Afghanistan.

Hussain had felt she was flying high when she came to Berry. The news of her brother punctured her.

“I felt I was dropping from the sky,” she said.

After her father’s death, her mother and six siblings escaped from Afghanistan to Pakistan. On that bus ride out, another one of her brothers was abducted. It would be 10 years before he was reunited with the family.

She pauses even to answer a simple question like: How old are you?

“I think I am 22.”

All she knows is that she finished only first grade. The next time she went to school was in Atlanta. She was placed in seventh grade.

Far behind in every subject and in her English skills, Hussain struggled to gain back what she had lost. In high school, she asked for a transfer from a predominantly refugee school to one that boasted more academic prowess. She wanted to be the first person in her family to make it to college.

It was difficult to understand the teacher. She sat for hours with homework, translating line by line.

Because of her brother’s death, Hussain missed school in her first semester at Berry and will be graduating in December. She is working this summer as an intern at the local chapter of the International Rescue Committee, which helps refugee families start anew in America.

For the other students, the first semester proved hard.

Jeffrey Lidke thought they might not pass his rigorous world religions class. Several failed the first exam on indigenous religions.

One of the questions asked, “What is the symbolism of the Sacred Hoop of Black Elk?”

“It’s not an easy course by any standard,” Lidke said. “I did not baby them in any way.”

He now thinks of that class as one of the most rewarding he’s ever taught. Part of it was that he had students from other faiths and cultures who added to the discussion.

“My other students were able to see Muslims in a different light,” he said.

Last year, several of the students launched the Berry Muslim Heritage Group. Hussain is the current president.

“I knew college would be difficult for them,” Lidke said.

But he was not surprised four years later to see them don cap and gown.

‘A great day‘

Certain childhood moments burn bright in Mireille Kibibi’s memory: the Hutus bombing her neighbors, bodies everywhere and the last time she saw her mother. She’s had to grow up not knowing where her mother is. Is she even alive?

“It is in the past,” Kibibi said. She has to put it aside in order to make her future.

But it creeps up sometimes when she doesn’t expect it. She said her friends at Berry had no way of understanding.

It was most difficult when her friends complained about their parents.

“Stop being a baby,” Kibibi would say.

They should feel lucky to have parents, Kibibi thought. But her friends thought her rude.

“I let my emotions get to me,” Kibibi said.

Now that she has her degree, she wants to pursue a master’s in accounting or business administration. On campus, she blossomed as a library student supervisor, and university officials said Kibibi was well on her way into a professional life.

After the graduation ceremony, Kibibi posted pictures of herself on Facebook.

“Today was a great day,” she wrote. “I graduated from Berry College and made my family proud, especially my grandmother (RIP) and father (RIP). Thanks to the friends who celebrated with me. Special thanks to my favorite uncles Nicholas Songa and Jean Pierre Ngoga for the gifts. … To my other family in Australia and Rwanda who could not be with me today, I love you all.”

Her family stood as she walked up to the podium to collect her diploma and shake the college president’s hand.

By then, the rain had stopped falling.

Follow CNN’s Moni Basu on Twitter

Article source: http://rss.cnn.com/~r/rss/edition_business/~3/o-vyt2v_A2U/index.html

Categories: World Business Tags: ard, Child, cnn, com, Earth, girls, National, Plain, scar, today, world, world business

Saved: The seamstress in the rubble

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

Dhaka, Bangladesh (CNN) — “Save me!” a man’s voice cries out in the darkness. “Please save me!”

“I can’t see you,” she replies. “I don’t know where you are.”

“Save me! Please save me!” the voice pleads again.

“I want to,” she says. “But I can’t move either.”

She loses consciousness.

When she wakes, the voice is gone.

In that cramped, dark grave under 700 tons of concrete and steel, she is all alone.

****

The concept of purgatory isn’t familiar to most Bangladeshis.

Last Bangladesh collapse survivor speaks

Bangladesh survivor remains in hospital

Factory survivor ‘out of danger’

Bangladesh recovery efforts end

But the way Reshma describes her 17 harrowing days — buried underground in pitch-black darkness as the voices around her faded away, as sweltering days bled into humid nights, as she questioned whether she was in this world or the next — it’s an apt one.

“I’d crawl, tire and sleep. I would wake up and crawl again,” Reshma recounted, her voice barely audible, as she spoke to CNN on Tuesday.

It was one of her first extended one-on-one interviews since rescuers pulled her out alive last week from the rubble of a collapsed building.

“I told God, ‘Take me, if that’s your will. If not, then save me.

” ‘But don’t leave me here like this.’ “

How did she survive?

****

The youngest in the family is often the most rebellious.

And Reshma, the fifth child of her mother, Zubaida, always had an independent streak.

When she was little, she preferred rolling a tire down the street with the boys to dressing up dolls with the girls.

As a teen, she surprised her family by marrying a man several years her elder.

She was in love, she told them, and love has no boundaries.

“We accepted him,” Zubaida said. “But he wasn’t good to her.”

He’d tell her that her family hadn’t paid enough in dowry. He’d taunt her that he’d take another wife. And, said her mother, he “tortured her.”

“We gave as much as we could,” she said. “But it wasn’t enough.”

In June 2010, the couple moved from Dinjapur to Dhaka, the go-to destination for the destitute looking to change their fortunes.

A garment worker himself, the husband persuaded Reshma to join the trade.

The money was good. And he snickered that it’d make up for what her parents weren’t paying him, Zubaida said.

In January, he disappeared.

Unable to afford rent on her own, Reshma moved to a tiny room in a house next to the Savar Bazaar bus stop.

Rescue workers carry Reshma Begum, 19, to safety on Friday, May 10, a day after her discovery alive amid the wreckage of a building that had entombed her since it collapsed on April 24, in Dhaka, Bangladesh. At least 1,127 people have been confirmed dead from the garment factory building collapse.

Begum, a young female garment worker at the Rana Plaza building before the disaster, addresses the media at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Savar area of Dhaka on Monday, May 13.

Throngs of reporters crowd around Begum as she speaks publicly for the first time on May 13 about her ordeal in Dhaka.

Begum is surrounded by media and members of the Bangladeshi military at the hospital where she is recovering in Dhaka on May 13.

A nurse helps Begum through a door as she attends a media conference at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on May 13.

Begum rests in her hospital bed as members of the Bangladeshi military stand beside her at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on Saturday, May 11.

Begum was found in the factory’s basement in a pool of water, according to rescue official Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain.

Bangladeshi army workers supervise the continued rescue operation using heavy equipment to sift through the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Rescuers workers administer first aid as they carry Begum from the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Begum is pulled alive from the rubble by the rescue workers on May 10, after being buried for 16 days.

Begum recalled that when the collapse of the nine-story building began, she was working on the third floor. She was found in the factory’s basement.

The 19-year-old mother vowed to never again work in the country’s garment industry, where she was earning the equivalent of $60 a month.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Reshma, a story of survival

Members of the Bangladesh army pray at the site of the collapsed Rana Plaza in Savar near Dhaka on Tuesday, May 14. The army-led effort to search for bodies has ended nearly three weeks after the nine-story building collapsed. The final death toll stands at 1,127.

Relatives of missing garment workers offer prayers in front of the rubble on May 14 in Savar.

A white board at the recovery command center near the disaster is used to track the death toll on Monday, May 13.

Heavy equipment sifts through the rubble of the garment factory building collapse on Sunday, May 12.

A woman cries holds a portrait of a missing relative believed to be trapped in the rubble of the Rana Plaza building on Saturday, May 11.

Bangladeshi garment worker Reshma Begum, a seamstress who survived 16 days trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building, rests in Savar Cantonment Hospital on the outskirts of Dhaka on May 11.

Relatives search through a long line of covered decomposing bodies to try to identify their family members on May 11.

Rescue workers retrieve Reshma from the rubble in Savar, Bangladesh, on Friday, May 10. She got rescue workers’ attention by waving an iron rod. She was found in a pool of water, which allowed her to stay alive.

An injured worker who survived the building collapse is carried by her husband to collect her wages in Savar near Dhaka, Bangladesh, on Wednesday, May 8.

Garment workers who survived the building collapse line up to collect their salaries in Savar on May 8.

Workers continue rescue and recovery operations on Tuesday, May 7, nearly two weeks after the Rana Plaza building’s collapse outside Dhaka.

Rescue workers recover a body from the rubble on May 7.

Relatives place a body in the back of a truck on May 7.

A woman attempts to identify one of the bodies kept in a schoolyard on May 7.

Members of the Bangladeshi army and firefighters carry the body of a garment worker from the scene of the building collapse in Savar, outside Dhaka, on Sunday, May 5.

A woman holds a portrait of her missing relative as she sleeps on Saturday, May 4.

Relatives attempt to identify the bodies of loved ones on May 4.

Rescue workers dig out debris from the Rana Plaza building as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation using heavy equipment on Friday, May 3.

A woman reacts on May 3 after identifying a body found in the rubble.

A man stands amid the destruction as rescue and army personnel continue recovery operations on May 3.

A woman holds up a picture of a missing person believed to be trapped in the rubble on May 3.

A garment worker rescued from the wreckage of the Rana Plaza building lies in a hospital in Dhaka on Thursday, May 2.

A woman weeps after identifying her daughter’s body in the rubble in Savar on May 2.

Rescue workers move debris as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation at the site of the collapsed building in Savar on May 2.

A woman mourns before a mass burial in Dhaka on Wednesday, May 1.

Unidentified bodies from the rubble lie on the ground as people gather for a mass burial in Dhaka on May 1.

Workers dig graves during a mass burial of unidentified garment workers on May 1.

Sohel Rana, owner of the collapsed Rana Plaza building, wears police-issued body armor and a helmet while being escorted to court in Dhaka on Tuesday, April 30. Rana was arrested near the Indian border, and protesters called for him to be hanged.

Bangladeshi troops carry the body of a garment worker out of the rubble of the collapsed Rana Plaza building in Savar on April 30.

Clothing with Joe Fresh labels lies in the debris on April 30.

Cranes operated by Bangladeshi army personnel work on Monday, April 29.

Firefighters try to control a blaze that started while they were trying to rescue a woman with heavy equipment on April 29.

Bangladeshi army personnel begin the second phase of the rescue operation using heavy equipment on April 29.

Rescuers look for survivors on Sunday, April 28. The Bangladesh Red Crescent Society says the chances of finding anyone alive in the rubble at this date are remote.

A woman mourns on April 28 at the site of the building collapse in Savar.

Rescue workers search for survivors on April 28.

Volunteers sleep before they begin more rescue operations on April 28.

Rescue workers carry a victim’s body recovered from the rubble on April 28.

Clothes lie in the rubble on Saturday, April 27.

An arrested owner of a garment factory is escorted to an appearance at the court in Dhaka on April 27. Four people were arrested and four others are being questioned by police.

Relatives hold photos of missing and dead workers outside the factory April 27.

Two Bangladeshi women look at a board with notices posted of missing and dead workers on April 27.

Bangladeshi relatives and workers load a body onto a truck on April 27.

An excavator operated by the Bangladeshi Army removes debris on April 26.

Volunteers and rescue workers conduct rescue operations on April 26.

Rescue workers use textile as a slide to move bodies out of the rubble on April 26.

Rescue workers look for trapped garment workers on April 26.

Rescue workers stand on the rubble of the collapsed building on April 26.

Rescue workers search the rubble for victims and survivors on April 26.

A rescue worker looks for trapped workers on April 26.

Bangladeshi army personnel recover a survivor from rubble on April 26, 48 hours after the collapse.

Volunteers and rescue workers assist in rescue operations on April 26.

A physician assists a survivor after he was recovered from the rubble on April 26.

Two bodies clutch each other in the rubble on Thursday, April 25.

People rescue garment workers on April 25.

A Bangladeshi woman shows a picture of her missing daughter-in-law she believes is trapped in the collapsed building on April 25.

Bangladeshi firefighters cut a hole through concrete during rescue operations on April 25 in Savar, a suburb of Dhaka.

Volunteers and rescue workers work at the scene on April 25.

A woman appears devastated on April 25 after identifying the body of her husband killed in the building collapse.

Bangladeshi garment workers help evacuate a survivor by using a roll of fabric on April 24.

People rescue garment workers on Wednesday, April 24, after the building caved in, leaving a chaotic mass of broken concrete and twisted metal.

Relatives who lost a brother mourn outside a hospital on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured garment worker to escape from the Rana Plaza building on the outskirts of Dhaka on April 24.

Civilians help an injured garment worker on April 24. Work was proceeding slowly to avoid causing further collapse, an official said.

Rescue workers search for trapped garment workers in the Rana Plaza building on April 24.

An injured Bangladeshi lies on the hospital floor on April 24.

The injured receive treatment at a hospital on April 24.

An injured person rests in a hospital bed on April 24.

People wait anxiously on April 24 while rescuers search for survivors.

Rescuers help an injured person out of the seventh floor on April 24.

Civilians help out in rescue efforts at the collapsed building on April 24.

Hundreds watch the rescue operations on April 24.

People search for garment workers trapped under the debris on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured worker on April 24.

A body is trapped under the damaged building on April 24.

A woman is carried away from the building on April 24.

A rescue worker carries a worker to an ambulance on April 24.

Crowds gather around the collapsed building on April 24.

Rescuers bring out an injured garment worker from the building’s sixth floor.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

76

77

78

79

80

Photos: Building collapses in Bangladesh

Seventeen days after a building collapsed in Savar, Bangladesh, rescuers pull Reshma Begum from the rubble on May 10. More than 1,000 people have died since the nine-story garment factory building fell on April 24.

An officer of the Italian cruise line Costa Concordia, Manrico Giampedroni, is found 36 hours after the ship ran aground off the Mediterranean island of Giglio on January 13, 2012. He broke his leg as the liner rolled was was found in a half-flooded dining room, suffering from hypothermia.

A baby, her mother and her grandmother are rescued in eastern Turkey on October 25, 2011, two days after a 7.2-magnitude earthquake killed more than 600 people. Dramatic video showed 2-week-old Arza Karaduman being carried from the debris of a multiple-story building.

More than 9 miles out at sea, a 60-year-old Japanese man is found clinging to the swept-away remnants of his home on March 13, 2011. Hiromitsu Shinkawa was drifting alone for more than two days after a massive Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

Anne Vos, 57, is rescued 24 hours after a five-story building where she worked collapsed during an earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, on February 22, 2011. She said she thought she was going to die and had called family and friends to say goodbye. She talked to international media while trapped.

After 69 harrowing days underground and a rescue mission costing up to $20 million, 33 Chilean miners are rescued on October 13, 2010. The mine collapsed on August 5, leaving the workers trapped 2,300 feet beneath the Earth’s surface.

Digging through the mud, Chinese soldiers rescue Liu Ma Shendeng from the second story of an apartment building on August 10, 2010. The 52-year-old man was trapped for 60 hours after massive mudslides buried homes and ripped others apart in China’s Gansu province. The death toll climbed to more than 1,400.

Nine-year-old Ruben van Assouw is the sole survivor of a plane crash in Tripoli, Libya, on May 14, 2010. His parents and brother are among the 103 people killed.

A man identified as Evan Muncie, 28, is found in the ruins of a marketplace, his family tells CNN, nearly a month after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti on January 12, 2010. He suffered from extreme dehydration and malnutrition, but did not appear to have significant crushing injuries, doctors said.

A 13-year-old girl is found in the Indian Ocean clinging to plane debris after the Yemenia Airways Airbus A310 from France crashed on June 1, 2009. Bahia Bakari was the sole survivor of the crash. She had been flying with her mother.

Naqsha Bibi, 40, is recovered alive from the debris of her collapsed home in Kashmir on December 12, 2005. She reportedly survived on rainwater and rotting food for more than 60 days after an earthquake struck the region on October 8.

Rashida Farooq, a 45-year-old mother of three, is rescued from her home 105 hours after it collapsed in Muzaffarabad, Pakistan, on October 12, 2005. The 7.6-magnitude earthquake that hit the country killed 80,000 people.

A man identified as Jalil, 57, is rescued 13 days after an earthquake in Bam, Iran, on December 26, 2003. He was trapped under a closet and must have had access to water, an Iranian doctor told Reuters.

After being trapped for more than three days, nine miners are rescued from the Quecreek coal mine in Somerset, Pennsylvania, on July 28, 2002. They were caught in a 4-foot-high chamber 240 feet underground after breaching a wall separating their mine from an older, flooded shaft on July 24.

Genelle Guzman-McMillan is rescued from the debris of the World Trade Center 26 hours after the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001. She worked on the 64th floor of the north tower and was walking down a stairwell when the building collapsed. Her body was protected in an air pocket.

Shiran Franco, a 9-year-old Israeli girl, is rescued on August 21,1999, around 100 hours after a building collapsed on her during an earthquake in Cinarcik, Turkey. Her family had been on vacation. Shiran’s twin brother, father and grandparents were found dead, but her mother survived after pulling herself from the building after 30 hours.

Three infants are pulled alive from the crumbled Benito Juarez Hospital seven days after a powerful earthquake hit the Mexican capital on September 19, 1985. With more than 10,000 people killed, the newborns became known as the “miracle babies” of Mexico City.

Sixteen people are rescued 72 days after a Uruguayan Air Force plane crashed in the Andes Mountains on October 13, 1972. They endured frigid temperatures and forced themselves to eat the flesh of dead friends to sustain themselves. A dozen of the 45 passengers on board died in the crash. Others later succumbed to their injuries.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

Survivors: Stories of hope amid disaster

Marching Bangladeshis hold up portraits of relatives missing in the Rana Plaza building collapse on Tuesday, May 14. They’re demanding wages for the missing garment workers and the death sentence for the building owner. Rana Plaza collapsed on April 24 in Savar outside Dhaka; the final death toll stands at 1,127.

Family members of missing workers march on May 14. The Bangladeshi army has wrapped up its search for bodies.

Bangladeshi property tycoon Sohel Rana, center, is escorted to the High Court in Dhaka wearing police-issued body armor as protests calling for his prosecution continue, Tuesday, April 30.

Bangladeshis march on April 30, demanding capital punishment for Rana in Savar, Bangladesh, outside the capital, Dhaka.

Garment workers block a street during a protest Monday, April 29.

Bangladeshi garment workers protest in Savar on Saturday, April 27. Four people were arrested and four others are being questioned by police. The building owner has gone into hiding.

Bangladeshi army personnel and police from villagers on Friday, April 26, after protests broke out at the site of a building collapse 48 hours earlier in Savar, outside Dhaka.

Garment workers block a street in Savar, demanding the arrest of the owner of the Rana Plaza building.

Bangladeshi police fire tear gas at protesters amid the rubble of the building.

Garment workers block a street as they march to demand the arrest of the owner of the Rana Plaza building.

Plainclothes Bangladeshi police brandish sticks as they attempt to break up protests.

Firefighters work after protesters set fire to a spinning mill in Gazipur.

A man cleans up a restaurant after protesters broke its windows.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

Photos: Bangladeshis protest building collapse

Savar, once an undeveloped agricultural patch of land just outside Dhaka, has grown into a chaotic, potholed boomtown, home to a disproportionate number of the country’s 4,500 garment factories.

And Reshma quickly found a job at Rana Plaza, a gargantuan, nine-story, city-block-sized structure that housed shops, a bank and five garment workshops.

The $60 she earned a month was twice the average for garment workers in Bangladesh.

Still, the loss of her husband’s additional earnings meant she barely squeaked by.

***

“I have to find a way to chop this off,” Reshma thinks.

Her long dark hair is caught under a slab of concrete. Every time she tries to move, large chunks of hair are pulled out of her head.

She feels around in the darkness to see what she can find.

A pair of scissors.

She grabs a handful of hair.

Snip.

She is now free to explore on her hands and knees this dust-choked cocoon.

***

When the first cracks appeared in the exterior walls of Rana Plaza, the news spread among the workers in quick murmurs.

The building was built without the right permits on land that used to be a pond, officials now say. The weak foundation was threatened even further when the owner added four floors to what was once a five-story structure.

Generators hummed on the fourth floor, sometimes so loudly that workers said they could feel the structure vibrate.

But all this was revealed after the fact. After Rana Plaza pancaked on April 24. After it claimed more than 1,100 lives.

On April 23, the owner, Sohel Rana, called in an engineer to inspect the building and appease worker concerns.

The engineer, officials later said, took one look at support pillars on the third floor and was horrified. The fissures were deep — and many.

The building is unsound, he said. No one should be inside.

Rana dismissed those concerns.

“This building will stand a hundred years,” he boasted that day.

The factory owners were relieved. Political unrest in the country has meant frequent general strikes and a backlog of orders for them. They couldn’t afford a work stoppage if they intended to keep their foreign clients happy.

The industry generates more than $20 billion a year, making the country the second largest exporter of clothing after China.

So they gave the workers an ultimatum: Miss work, miss pay.

The next morning at work, Reshma and others checked out the cracks. They looked ominous.

“The managers said, ‘That’s just water damage. Go back to work,’ ” she said.

She did, taking her spot among the long rows of sewing machines at New Wave Bottoms.

An hour later, the power failed. Then came a loud rumble.

Pillars crashed. Support beams punched through windows. Dust and debris clogged the air.

The ceiling raced toward Reshma. And the floors gave way.

“I fell. And I fell,” Reshma said.

Then she blacked out.

***

Reshma crawls across the rubble with the little strength she can muster.

“Water,” she tells herself. “I have to find water.”

She’d found a little in a bottle soon after the fall.

But how long ago was that?

Hours? Days? Weeks? In this darkness, she can’t tell.

The anguished cries around her stopped a long time ago.

The man who’d begged her for help was the last voice.

Darkness. Silence. Desperation.

She drags through the detritus, her clothing ripping to shreds.

She pokes bricks with a rod. One tiny space leads to another. Each an air pocket within the sandwiched structure.

She scavenges for food. The four crackers she’d found in the ruins and rationed carefully are gone.

What she really needs is water.

She eventually finds it.

With cupped palms, she pours it down her parched throat.

“I didn’t know if it was rainwater or dirty water or what type of water,” she later says. “It didn’t matter.”

She doesn’t know it, but she’s in the flooded basement of Rana Plaza.

***

It’s 170 miles from Dinajpur to Dhaka, a trek along congested roads that can take up to 10 hours.

Reshma’s mother heard of the collapse on TV. But there was no way for her to reach her daughter.

Reshma had sold her mobile phone three days earlier to help pay rent.

Scrounging up what little change she had lying around, Zubeida boarded a bus to the capital.

She checked the morgue and the hospitals.

She showed a picture of Reshma to every rescuer she met. No one had seen her.

For the first few days, she steadfastly held on to hope. Rescuers had been pulling out survivors from the rubble by the dozens each day. More than 2,000 of them in all.

But as the days passed, the number dwindled. And with it died Zubeida’s hopes.

She wandered aimlessly around the disaster site.

Strangers brought her rice, offered her an umbrella, consoled her.

“I wanted my daughter’s body,” she said. “I wanted a leg or an arm or anything that I could take home and bury.”

Surviving the disaster

***

Three minutes without air. Three days without water. Three weeks without food.

That’s the survival rule of thumb.

In Reshma’s case, circumstances conspired to keep her alive:

The air that seeped into the crevices. The crackers she found. The water she drank.

The complete darkness may have helped too, doctors say.

Without knowing day from night, she couldn’t keep track of time. She didn’t know officials had determined there was little chance someone could survive past a week under that mountainous pile. She was unaware that the rescue mission had long given way to an operation to recover the dead.

And sometimes, the not knowing keeps one going.

***

“Allahu akbar. Allahu akbar.”

What was that? Reshma wonders. She strains to hear.

“Allahu akbar. Allahu akbar.”

There it is again, the mellifluous tones of the Muslim call to prayer.

And then … voices.

She hears voices. Many voices.

“Where’s the sound coming from? Where’s the sound coming from?” she keeps asking herself.

With a new urgency, she bangs on the walls of mangled metal and cement around her.

Then she sees a sliver of light.

“Bachao! Bachao!” she calls out. Save me! Save me!

But no one hears her.

She takes another rod. With all her might, she jams it through an opening above her.

“Allah,” she keeps saying. “Allah, save me.”

***

It wasn’t lost on Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain that the mood at the disaster site was changing.

Determination was slowly giving way to dejection.

The pungent stench of death permeated the air.

Rescue workers covered their faces with T-shirts to escape the smell of decaying flesh.

It seeped into their clothes, crawled inside their skin and lungs.

Each body they pulled out took an emotional toll as well.

The number of volunteers had thinned.

By Friday, rescuers had finished scouring the rubble and were drilling their way to the building’s basement.

The recovery operation was almost over. They hadn’t found a survivor in almost a week.

Then, someone noticed a rod jutting out from an opening, waving wildly.

They heard a woman’s frail pleas: “Bachao, bachao.”

Slackjawed with disbelief, elated with wonder, they rushed to the spot.

Someone was down there, alive!

“She kept saying, ‘Save me, save me,’ ” Hossain said. “We told her we weren’t going anywhere.”

A roar went through the crowds that had gathered at the sight. Television channels immediately switched to live coverage.

“Almighty God, you make anything possible,” said a man on a loudspeaker as he urged others to pray. “Please help us save her.”

For 45 minutes, workers used hand drills and light hammers to remove concrete blocks.

They repeated their assurance:

“Wait, wait, we’re coming for you.”

****

Minutes from rescue, Reshma finds herself facing a very ordinary dilemma.

“How am I going to come out in front of all these people with no clothes?” she thinks. “I’m a lady.” Hers had ripped to shreds from all the crawling.

A rescuer tosses her a flashlight, and she looks around.

Piles of clothes are everywhere, spilling out of crushed boxes.

She picks a purple shalwar kameez and wraps a bright pink scarf around her neck and chest.

Her face is covered with dirt, but she looks fine, she thinks.

Then she waits to emerge from the Earth.

***

Lt. Col. Sharif Ahmed is the commanding officer of the Combined Military Hospital in Savar where Reshma is recovering. He marvels at how rapid her readjustment has been.

Reshma, whose age is listed in hospital papers as “22 ( +/- 2),” is gaining strength every day.

“When she came here, she’d startle to the touch,” he said. “She’d have flashbacks if she tried to sleep.

“All normal, considering what she went through.”

Now she’s smiling, sitting up. And she’s inseparable from her mother. The two hadn’t always gotten along.

“My heart is bursting with joy,” Zubeida said. “I begged God, and he returned her.”

Sohel Rana is in jail, nabbed by police as he tried to flee to India. The owners of the factories in Rana Plaza are also in detention.

On Tuesday, after 21 days, the rescue and recovery efforts formally ended.

The disaster has spurred the government and foreign retailers to take a long, hard, critical look at factory safety standards and their roles in policing it.

As for Reshma, she doesn’t know what her future holds.

But she knows she’s not going back to the garment business.

She ended our interview with a simple request: “Everybody please pray for me.”

With the joy she brought to a nation in mourning, many already are.

Follow Saeed Ahmed on Twitter

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/15/world/asia/seamstress-rubble-bangladesh/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: ard, Child, cnn, com, dark hair, dow, Earth, girls, israel, Israeli, japan, marketplace, National, Page, Plain, Rank, scar, signi, site, skirt, strike, top stories, world

Olympics to Oscars: Great gatecrashers

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

.cnn_html_media_utility::before{color:red;content:’>>’;font-size:9px;line-height:12px;padding-right:1px}
.cnnstrylccimg640{margin:0 27px 14px 0}
.captionText{filter:alpha(opacity=100);opacity:1}
.cnn_html_slideshow_media_caption a,.cnn_html_slideshow_media_caption a:visited,.cnn_html_slideshow_media_caption a:link,.captionText a,.captionText a:visited,.captiontext a:link{color:outline:medium none}
.cnnVerticalGalleryPhoto{margin:0 auto;padding-right:68px;width:270px}
]]>

In 2003, self-described “comedy terrorist” Aaron Barschak gatecrashed Prince Harry’s 21st birthday party at royal residence Windsor Castle, in southern England, wearing a pink ball gown and fake Osama bin Laden turban and beard.

Alan Conway — who impersonated the secretive filmmaker Stanley Kubrick — gained access to London’s exclusive clubs and a number of celebrities’ ears. He is played by John Malkovich in the drama “Color Me Kubrick.”

Karl Power, a Manchester United supporter, became an instant legend when he managed to sneak into Manchester United’s pre-game team photo.

At the 1974 Academy Awards, streaker Robert Opel raced across the stage, prompting presenter and movie star David Niven to quip: “Isn’t it fascinating to think that probably the only laugh that man will ever get in his life is for stripping off and showing his shortcomings.”

Ralph Napierski — a fake bishop — poses with Cardinal Sergio Sebiastiana as the cardinal arrives for talks ahead of a conclave to elect a new pope on March 4, 2013 at the Vatican.

The Indian Olympic team’s moment of glory at the 2012 London Games’ Opening Ceremony was shared by a mystery woman in a red shirt and blue trousers who waved to the crowd as the delegation marched round the stadium. The woman was later revealed as Madhura Nagendra.

In November 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama hosted his first state dinner and reality television stars Tareq and Michaele Salahi made their way into the White House despite not having a physical invitation.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

(CNN) — European soccer body UEFA has issued a statement after an 11-year-old boy managed to invade the pitch and pose as a member of Chelsea Football Club’s entourage following this week’s Europa League Final. He follows a (dis)honorable line of other gatecrashers who between them have blagged their way past security at the White House, the Olympics, the Oscars and even royal parties.

At the 1974 Academy Awards, streaker Robert Opel raced across the stage, prompting presenter and movie star David Niven to quip: “Isn’t it fascinating to think that probably the only laugh that man will ever get in his life is for stripping off and showing his shortcomings.”

Watch YouTube footage of the incident

Moon explosion

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

(CNN) — A meteoroid struck the surface of the moon recently, causing an explosion that was visible on Earth without the aid of a telescope, NASA reported Friday. But don’t be alarmed if you didn’t see it; it only lasted about a second.

“It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we’ve ever seen before,” said Bill Cooke, of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office.

NASA astronomers have been monitoring the moon for the past eight years, looking for explosions caused by meteoroids hitting the lunar surface. It’s part of a program to find new fields of space debris that could hit Earth. NASA says it sees hundreds of detectable lunar meteoroid impacts a year.

None however can match the size of the explosion they say they saw March 17. NASA says the meteoroid was about 40 kilograms and less than a meter wide, and it hit the moon’s surface at 56,000 mph. It glowed like a 4th magnitude star, NASA says, thanks to an explosion equivalent to 5 tons of TNT.

“It jumped right out at me, it was so bright,” said Ron Suggs of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

Cooke says Earth was pelted by meteoroids at about the same time, but they hit the moon because it has no atmosphere to protect it.

“We’ll be keeping an eye out for signs of a repeat performance next year when the Earth-moon system passes through the same region of space,” Cooke said.

If you’re wondering how there can be an explosion on the moon, without oxygen, NASA has the answer for you. It says the flash of light comes not from any type of combustion — as we typically think of explosions — but rather by the glowing molten rock at the impact site.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/18/tech/moon-explosion/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: cnn, com, Earth, site, top stories

Moon explosion

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

(CNN) — A meteoroid struck the surface of the moon recently, causing an explosion that was visible on Earth without the aid of a telescope, NASA reported Friday. But don’t be alarmed if you didn’t see it; it only lasted about a second.

“It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we’ve ever seen before,” said Bill Cooke, of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office.

NASA astronomers have been monitoring the moon for the past eight years, looking for explosions caused by meteoroids hitting the lunar surface. It’s part of a program to find new fields of space debris that could hit Earth. NASA says it sees hundreds of detectable lunar meteoroid impacts a year.

None however can match the size of the explosion they say they saw March 17. NASA says the meteoroid was about 40 kilograms and less than a meter wide, and it hit the moon’s surface at 56,000 mph. It glowed like a 4th magnitude star, NASA says, thanks to an explosion equivalent to 5 tons of TNT.

“It jumped right out at me, it was so bright,” said Ron Suggs of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

Cooke says Earth was pelted by meteoroids at about the same time, but they hit the moon because it has no atmosphere to protect it.

“We’ll be keeping an eye out for signs of a repeat performance next year when the Earth-moon system passes through the same region of space,” Cooke said.

If you’re wondering how there can be an explosion on the moon, without oxygen, NASA has the answer for you. It says the flash of light comes not from any type of combustion — as we typically think of explosions — but rather by the glowing molten rock at the impact site.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/18/tech/moon-explosion/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: cnn, com, Earth, site, top stories

Massive moon blast seen from Earth

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

(CNN) — A meteoroid struck the surface of the moon recently, causing an explosion that was visible on Earth without the aid of a telescope, NASA reported Friday. But don’t be alarmed if you didn’t see it; it only lasted about a second.

“It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we’ve ever seen before,” said Bill Cooke, of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office.

NASA astronomers have been monitoring the moon for the past eight years, looking for explosions caused by meteoroids hitting the lunar surface. It’s part of a program to find new fields of space debris that could hit Earth. NASA says it sees hundreds of detectable lunar meteoroid impacts a year.

None however can match the size of the explosion they say they saw March 17. NASA says the meteoroid was about 40 kilograms and less than a meter wide, and it hit the moon’s surface at 56,000 mph. It glowed like a 4th magnitude star, NASA says, thanks to an explosion equivalent to 5 tons of TNT.

“It jumped right out at me, it was so bright,” said Ron Suggs of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

Cooke says Earth was pelted by meteoroids at about the same time, but they hit the moon because it has no atmosphere to protect it.

“We’ll be keeping an eye out for signs of a repeat performance next year when the Earth-moon system passes through the same region of space,” Cooke said.

If you’re wondering how there can be an explosion on the moon, without oxygen, NASA has the answer for you. It says the flash of light comes not from any type of combustion — as we typically think of explosions — but rather by the glowing molten rock at the impact site.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/18/tech/moon-explosion/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: cnn, com, Earth, site, top stories

Massive moon blast seen from Earth

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

(CNN) — A meteoroid struck the surface of the moon recently, causing an explosion that was visible on Earth without the aid of a telescope, NASA reported Friday. But don’t be alarmed if you didn’t see it; it only lasted about a second.

“It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we’ve ever seen before,” said Bill Cooke, of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office.

NASA astronomers have been monitoring the moon for the past eight years, looking for explosions caused by meteoroids hitting the lunar surface. It’s part of a program to find new fields of space debris that could hit Earth. NASA says it sees hundreds of detectable lunar meteoroid impacts a year.

None however can match the size of the explosion they say they saw March 17. NASA says the meteoroid was about 40 kilograms and less than a meter wide, and it hit the moon’s surface at 56,000 mph. It glowed like a 4th magnitude star, NASA says, thanks to an explosion equivalent to 5 tons of TNT.

“It jumped right out at me, it was so bright,” said Ron Suggs of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

Cooke says Earth was pelted by meteoroids at about the same time, but they hit the moon because it has no atmosphere to protect it.

“We’ll be keeping an eye out for signs of a repeat performance next year when the Earth-moon system passes through the same region of space,” Cooke said.

If you’re wondering how there can be an explosion on the moon, without oxygen, NASA has the answer for you. It says the flash of light comes not from any type of combustion — as we typically think of explosions — but rather by the glowing molten rock at the impact site.

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/18/tech/moon-explosion/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: cnn, com, Earth, site, top stories

What it’s like to be buried alive

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

Dhaka, Bangladesh (CNN) — “Save me!” a man’s voice cries out in the darkness. “Please save me!”

“I can’t see you,” she replies. “I don’t know where you are.”

“Save me! Please save me!” the voice pleads again.

“I want to,” she says. “But I can’t move either.”

She loses consciousness.

When she wakes, the voice is gone.

In that cramped, dark grave under 700 tons of concrete and steel, she is all alone.

****

The concept of purgatory isn’t familiar to most Bangladeshis.

Last Bangladesh collapse survivor speaks

Bangladesh survivor remains in hospital

Factory survivor ‘out of danger’

Bangladesh recovery efforts end

But the way Reshma describes her 17 harrowing days — buried underground in pitch-black darkness as the voices around her faded away, as sweltering days bled into humid nights, as she questioned whether she was in this world or the next — it’s an apt one.

“I’d crawl, tire and sleep. I would wake up and crawl again,” Reshma recounted, her voice barely audible, as she spoke to CNN on Tuesday.

It was one of her first extended one-on-one interviews since rescuers pulled her out alive last week from the rubble of a collapsed building.

“I told God, ‘Take me, if that’s your will. If not, then save me.

” ‘But don’t leave me here like this.’ “

How did she survive?

****

The youngest in the family is often the most rebellious.

And Reshma, the fifth child of her mother, Zubaida, always had an independent streak.

When she was little, she preferred rolling a tire down the street with the boys to dressing up dolls with the girls.

As a teen, she surprised her family by marrying a man several years her elder.

She was in love, she told them, and love has no boundaries.

“We accepted him,” Zubaida said. “But he wasn’t good to her.”

He’d tell her that her family hadn’t paid enough in dowry. He’d taunt her that he’d take another wife. And, said her mother, he “tortured her.”

“We gave as much as we could,” she said. “But it wasn’t enough.”

In June 2010, the couple moved from Dinjapur to Dhaka, the go-to destination for the destitute looking to change their fortunes.

A garment worker himself, the husband persuaded Reshma to join the trade.

The money was good. And he snickered that it’d make up for what her parents weren’t paying him, Zubaida said.

In January, he disappeared.

Unable to afford rent on her own, Reshma moved to a tiny room in a house next to the Savar Bazaar bus stop.

Rescue workers carry Reshma Begum, 19, to safety on Friday, May 10, a day after her discovery alive amid the wreckage of a building that had entombed her since it collapsed on April 24, in Dhaka, Bangladesh. At least 1,127 people have been confirmed dead from the garment factory building collapse.

Begum, a young female garment worker at the Rana Plaza building before the disaster, addresses the media at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Savar area of Dhaka on Monday, May 13.

Throngs of reporters crowd around Begum as she speaks publicly for the first time on May 13 about her ordeal in Dhaka.

Begum is surrounded by media and members of the Bangladeshi military at the hospital where she is recovering in Dhaka on May 13.

A nurse helps Begum through a door as she attends a media conference at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on May 13.

Begum rests in her hospital bed as members of the Bangladeshi military stand beside her at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on Saturday, May 11.

Begum was found in the factory’s basement in a pool of water, according to rescue official Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain.

Bangladeshi army workers supervise the continued rescue operation using heavy equipment to sift through the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Rescuers workers administer first aid as they carry Begum from the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Begum is pulled alive from the rubble by the rescue workers on May 10, after being buried for 16 days.

Begum recalled that when the collapse of the nine-story building began, she was working on the third floor. She was found in the factory’s basement.

The 19-year-old mother vowed to never again work in the country’s garment industry, where she was earning the equivalent of $60 a month.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Reshma, a story of survival

Members of the Bangladesh army pray at the site of the collapsed Rana Plaza in Savar near Dhaka on Tuesday, May 14. The army-led effort to search for bodies has ended nearly three weeks after the nine-story building collapsed. The final death toll stands at 1,127.

Relatives of missing garment workers offer prayers in front of the rubble on May 14 in Savar.

A white board at the recovery command center near the disaster is used to track the death toll on Monday, May 13.

Heavy equipment sifts through the rubble of the garment factory building collapse on Sunday, May 12.

A woman cries holds a portrait of a missing relative believed to be trapped in the rubble of the Rana Plaza building on Saturday, May 11.

Bangladeshi garment worker Reshma Begum, a seamstress who survived 16 days trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building, rests in Savar Cantonment Hospital on the outskirts of Dhaka on May 11.

Relatives search through a long line of covered decomposing bodies to try to identify their family members on May 11.

Rescue workers retrieve Reshma from the rubble in Savar, Bangladesh, on Friday, May 10. She got rescue workers’ attention by waving an iron rod. She was found in a pool of water, which allowed her to stay alive.

An injured worker who survived the building collapse is carried by her husband to collect her wages in Savar near Dhaka, Bangladesh, on Wednesday, May 8.

Garment workers who survived the building collapse line up to collect their salaries in Savar on May 8.

Workers continue rescue and recovery operations on Tuesday, May 7, nearly two weeks after the Rana Plaza building’s collapse outside Dhaka.

Rescue workers recover a body from the rubble on May 7.

Relatives place a body in the back of a truck on May 7.

A woman attempts to identify one of the bodies kept in a schoolyard on May 7.

Members of the Bangladeshi army and firefighters carry the body of a garment worker from the scene of the building collapse in Savar, outside Dhaka, on Sunday, May 5.

A woman holds a portrait of her missing relative as she sleeps on Saturday, May 4.

Relatives attempt to identify the bodies of loved ones on May 4.

Rescue workers dig out debris from the Rana Plaza building as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation using heavy equipment on Friday, May 3.

A woman reacts on May 3 after identifying a body found in the rubble.

A man stands amid the destruction as rescue and army personnel continue recovery operations on May 3.

A woman holds up a picture of a missing person believed to be trapped in the rubble on May 3.

A garment worker rescued from the wreckage of the Rana Plaza building lies in a hospital in Dhaka on Thursday, May 2.

A woman weeps after identifying her daughter’s body in the rubble in Savar on May 2.

Rescue workers move debris as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation at the site of the collapsed building in Savar on May 2.

A woman mourns before a mass burial in Dhaka on Wednesday, May 1.

Unidentified bodies from the rubble lie on the ground as people gather for a mass burial in Dhaka on May 1.

Workers dig graves during a mass burial of unidentified garment workers on May 1.

Sohel Rana, owner of the collapsed Rana Plaza building, wears police-issued body armor and a helmet while being escorted to court in Dhaka on Tuesday, April 30. Rana was arrested near the Indian border, and protesters called for him to be hanged.

Bangladeshi troops carry the body of a garment worker out of the rubble of the collapsed Rana Plaza building in Savar on April 30.

Clothing with Joe Fresh labels lies in the debris on April 30.

Cranes operated by Bangladeshi army personnel work on Monday, April 29.

Firefighters try to control a blaze that started while they were trying to rescue a woman with heavy equipment on April 29.

Bangladeshi army personnel begin the second phase of the rescue operation using heavy equipment on April 29.

Rescuers look for survivors on Sunday, April 28. The Bangladesh Red Crescent Society says the chances of finding anyone alive in the rubble at this date are remote.

A woman mourns on April 28 at the site of the building collapse in Savar.

Rescue workers search for survivors on April 28.

Volunteers sleep before they begin more rescue operations on April 28.

Rescue workers carry a victim’s body recovered from the rubble on April 28.

Clothes lie in the rubble on Saturday, April 27.

An arrested owner of a garment factory is escorted to an appearance at the court in Dhaka on April 27. Four people were arrested and four others are being questioned by police.

Relatives hold photos of missing and dead workers outside the factory April 27.

Two Bangladeshi women look at a board with notices posted of missing and dead workers on April 27.

Bangladeshi relatives and workers load a body onto a truck on April 27.

An excavator operated by the Bangladeshi Army removes debris on April 26.

Volunteers and rescue workers conduct rescue operations on April 26.

Rescue workers use textile as a slide to move bodies out of the rubble on April 26.

Rescue workers look for trapped garment workers on April 26.

Rescue workers stand on the rubble of the collapsed building on April 26.

Rescue workers search the rubble for victims and survivors on April 26.

A rescue worker looks for trapped workers on April 26.

Bangladeshi army personnel recover a survivor from rubble on April 26, 48 hours after the collapse.

Volunteers and rescue workers assist in rescue operations on April 26.

A physician assists a survivor after he was recovered from the rubble on April 26.

Two bodies clutch each other in the rubble on Thursday, April 25.

People rescue garment workers on April 25.

A Bangladeshi woman shows a picture of her missing daughter-in-law she believes is trapped in the collapsed building on April 25.

Bangladeshi firefighters cut a hole through concrete during rescue operations on April 25 in Savar, a suburb of Dhaka.

Volunteers and rescue workers work at the scene on April 25.

A woman appears devastated on April 25 after identifying the body of her husband killed in the building collapse.

Bangladeshi garment workers help evacuate a survivor by using a roll of fabric on April 24.

People rescue garment workers on Wednesday, April 24, after the building caved in, leaving a chaotic mass of broken concrete and twisted metal.

Relatives who lost a brother mourn outside a hospital on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured garment worker to escape from the Rana Plaza building on the outskirts of Dhaka on April 24.

Civilians help an injured garment worker on April 24. Work was proceeding slowly to avoid causing further collapse, an official said.

Rescue workers search for trapped garment workers in the Rana Plaza building on April 24.

An injured Bangladeshi lies on the hospital floor on April 24.

The injured receive treatment at a hospital on April 24.

An injured person rests in a hospital bed on April 24.

People wait anxiously on April 24 while rescuers search for survivors.

Rescuers help an injured person out of the seventh floor on April 24.

Civilians help out in rescue efforts at the collapsed building on April 24.

Hundreds watch the rescue operations on April 24.

People search for garment workers trapped under the debris on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured worker on April 24.

A body is trapped under the damaged building on April 24.

A woman is carried away from the building on April 24.

A rescue worker carries a worker to an ambulance on April 24.

Crowds gather around the collapsed building on April 24.

Rescuers bring out an injured garment worker from the building’s sixth floor.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

76

77

78

79

80

Photos: Building collapses in Bangladesh

Seventeen days after a building collapsed in Savar, Bangladesh, rescuers pull Reshma Begum from the rubble on May 10. More than 1,000 people have died since the nine-story garment factory building fell on April 24.

An officer of the Italian cruise line Costa Concordia, Manrico Giampedroni, is found 36 hours after the ship ran aground off the Mediterranean island of Giglio on January 13, 2012. He broke his leg as the liner rolled was was found in a half-flooded dining room, suffering from hypothermia.

A baby, her mother and her grandmother are rescued in eastern Turkey on October 25, 2011, two days after a 7.2-magnitude earthquake killed more than 600 people. Dramatic video showed 2-week-old Arza Karaduman being carried from the debris of a multiple-story building.

More than 9 miles out at sea, a 60-year-old Japanese man is found clinging to the swept-away remnants of his home on March 13, 2011. Hiromitsu Shinkawa was drifting alone for more than two days after a massive Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

Anne Vos, 57, is rescued 24 hours after a five-story building where she worked collapsed during an earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, on February 22, 2011. She said she thought she was going to die and had called family and friends to say goodbye. She talked to international media while trapped.

After 69 harrowing days underground and a rescue mission costing up to $20 million, 33 Chilean miners are rescued on October 13, 2010. The mine collapsed on August 5, leaving the workers trapped 2,300 feet beneath the Earth’s surface.

Digging through the mud, Chinese soldiers rescue Liu Ma Shendeng from the second story of an apartment building on August 10, 2010. The 52-year-old man was trapped for 60 hours after massive mudslides buried homes and ripped others apart in China’s Gansu province. The death toll climbed to more than 1,400.

Nine-year-old Ruben van Assouw is the sole survivor of a plane crash in Tripoli, Libya, on May 14, 2010. His parents and brother are among the 103 people killed.

A man identified as Evan Muncie, 28, is found in the ruins of a marketplace, his family tells CNN, nearly a month after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti on January 12, 2010. He suffered from extreme dehydration and malnutrition, but did not appear to have significant crushing injuries, doctors said.

A 13-year-old girl is found in the Indian Ocean clinging to plane debris after the Yemenia Airways Airbus A310 from France crashed on June 1, 2009. Bahia Bakari was the sole survivor of the crash. She had been flying with her mother.

Naqsha Bibi, 40, is recovered alive from the debris of her collapsed home in Kashmir on December 12, 2005. She reportedly survived on rainwater and rotting food for more than 60 days after an earthquake struck the region on October 8.

Rashida Farooq, a 45-year-old mother of three, is rescued from her home 105 hours after it collapsed in Muzaffarabad, Pakistan, on October 12, 2005. The 7.6-magnitude earthquake that hit the country killed 80,000 people.

A man identified as Jalil, 57, is rescued 13 days after an earthquake in Bam, Iran, on December 26, 2003. He was trapped under a closet and must have had access to water, an Iranian doctor told Reuters.

After being trapped for more than three days, nine miners are rescued from the Quecreek coal mine in Somerset, Pennsylvania, on July 28, 2002. They were caught in a 4-foot-high chamber 240 feet underground after breaching a wall separating their mine from an older, flooded shaft on July 24.

Genelle Guzman-McMillan is rescued from the debris of the World Trade Center 26 hours after the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001. She worked on the 64th floor of the north tower and was walking down a stairwell when the building collapsed. Her body was protected in an air pocket.

Shiran Franco, a 9-year-old Israeli girl, is rescued on August 21,1999, around 100 hours after a building collapsed on her during an earthquake in Cinarcik, Turkey. Her family had been on vacation. Shiran’s twin brother, father and grandparents were found dead, but her mother survived after pulling herself from the building after 30 hours.

Three infants are pulled alive from the crumbled Benito Juarez Hospital seven days after a powerful earthquake hit the Mexican capital on September 19, 1985. With more than 10,000 people killed, the newborns became known as the “miracle babies” of Mexico City.

Sixteen people are rescued 72 days after a Uruguayan Air Force plane crashed in the Andes Mountains on October 13, 1972. They endured frigid temperatures and forced themselves to eat the flesh of dead friends to sustain themselves. A dozen of the 45 passengers on board died in the crash. Others later succumbed to their injuries.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

Survivors: Stories of hope amid disaster

Marching Bangladeshis hold up portraits of relatives missing in the Rana Plaza building collapse on Tuesday, May 14. They’re demanding wages for the missing garment workers and the death sentence for the building owner. Rana Plaza collapsed on April 24 in Savar outside Dhaka; the final death toll stands at 1,127.

Family members of missing workers march on May 14. The Bangladeshi army has wrapped up its search for bodies.

Bangladeshi property tycoon Sohel Rana, center, is escorted to the High Court in Dhaka wearing police-issued body armor as protests calling for his prosecution continue, Tuesday, April 30.

Bangladeshis march on April 30, demanding capital punishment for Rana in Savar, Bangladesh, outside the capital, Dhaka.

Garment workers block a street during a protest Monday, April 29.

Bangladeshi garment workers protest in Savar on Saturday, April 27. Four people were arrested and four others are being questioned by police. The building owner has gone into hiding.

Bangladeshi army personnel and police from villagers on Friday, April 26, after protests broke out at the site of a building collapse 48 hours earlier in Savar, outside Dhaka.

Garment workers block a street in Savar, demanding the arrest of the owner of the Rana Plaza building.

Bangladeshi police fire tear gas at protesters amid the rubble of the building.

Garment workers block a street as they march to demand the arrest of the owner of the Rana Plaza building.

Plainclothes Bangladeshi police brandish sticks as they attempt to break up protests.

Firefighters work after protesters set fire to a spinning mill in Gazipur.

A man cleans up a restaurant after protesters broke its windows.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

Photos: Bangladeshis protest building collapse

Savar, once an undeveloped agricultural patch of land just outside Dhaka, has grown into a chaotic, potholed boomtown, home to a disproportionate number of the country’s 4,500 garment factories.

And Reshma quickly found a job at Rana Plaza, a gargantuan, nine-story, city-block-sized structure that housed shops, a bank and five garment workshops.

The $60 she earned a month was twice the average for garment workers in Bangladesh.

Still, the loss of her husband’s additional earnings meant she barely squeaked by.

***

“I have to find a way to chop this off,” Reshma thinks.

Her long dark hair is caught under a slab of concrete. Every time she tries to move, large chunks of hair are pulled out of her head.

She feels around in the darkness to see what she can find.

A pair of scissors.

She grabs a handful of hair.

Snip.

She is now free to explore on her hands and knees this dust-choked cocoon.

***

When the first cracks appeared in the exterior walls of Rana Plaza, the news spread among the workers in quick murmurs.

The building was built without the right permits on land that used to be a pond, officials now say. The weak foundation was threatened even further when the owner added four floors to what was once a five-story structure.

Generators hummed on the fourth floor, sometimes so loudly that workers said they could feel the structure vibrate.

But all this was revealed after the fact. After Rana Plaza pancaked on April 24. After it claimed more than 1,100 lives.

On April 23, the owner, Sohel Rana, called in an engineer to inspect the building and appease worker concerns.

The engineer, officials later said, took one look at support pillars on the third floor and was horrified. The fissures were deep — and many.

The building is unsound, he said. No one should be inside.

Rana dismissed those concerns.

“This building will stand a hundred years,” he boasted that day.

The factory owners were relieved. Political unrest in the country has meant frequent general strikes and a backlog of orders for them. They couldn’t afford a work stoppage if they intended to keep their foreign clients happy.

The industry generates more than $20 billion a year, making the country the second largest exporter of clothing after China.

So they gave the workers an ultimatum: Miss work, miss pay.

The next morning at work, Reshma and others checked out the cracks. They looked ominous.

“The managers said, ‘That’s just water damage. Go back to work,’ ” she said.

She did, taking her spot among the long rows of sewing machines at New Wave Bottoms.

An hour later, the power failed. Then came a loud rumble.

Pillars crashed. Support beams punched through windows. Dust and debris clogged the air.

The ceiling raced toward Reshma. And the floors gave way.

“I fell. And I fell,” Reshma said.

Then she blacked out.

***

Reshma crawls across the rubble with the little strength she can muster.

“Water,” she tells herself. “I have to find water.”

She’d found a little in a bottle soon after the fall.

But how long ago was that?

Hours? Days? Weeks? In this darkness, she can’t tell.

The anguished cries around her stopped a long time ago.

The man who’d begged her for help was the last voice.

Darkness. Silence. Desperation.

She drags through the detritus, her clothing ripping to shreds.

She pokes bricks with a rod. One tiny space leads to another. Each an air pocket within the sandwiched structure.

She scavenges for food. The four crackers she’d found in the ruins and rationed carefully are gone.

What she really needs is water.

She eventually finds it.

With cupped palms, she pours it down her parched throat.

“I didn’t know if it was rainwater or dirty water or what type of water,” she later says. “It didn’t matter.”

She doesn’t know it, but she’s in the flooded basement of Rana Plaza.

***

It’s 170 miles from Dinajpur to Dhaka, a trek along congested roads that can take up to 10 hours.

Reshma’s mother heard of the collapse on TV. But there was no way for her to reach her daughter.

Reshma had sold her mobile phone three days earlier to help pay rent.

Scrounging up what little change she had lying around, Zubeida boarded a bus to the capital.

She checked the morgue and the hospitals.

She showed a picture of Reshma to every rescuer she met. No one had seen her.

For the first few days, she steadfastly held on to hope. Rescuers had been pulling out survivors from the rubble by the dozens each day. More than 2,000 of them in all.

But as the days passed, the number dwindled. And with it died Zubeida’s hopes.

She wandered aimlessly around the disaster site.

Strangers brought her rice, offered her an umbrella, consoled her.

“I wanted my daughter’s body,” she said. “I wanted a leg or an arm or anything that I could take home and bury.”

Surviving the disaster

***

Three minutes without air. Three days without water. Three weeks without food.

That’s the survival rule of thumb.

In Reshma’s case, circumstances conspired to keep her alive:

The air that seeped into the crevices. The crackers she found. The water she drank.

The complete darkness may have helped too, doctors say.

Without knowing day from night, she couldn’t keep track of time. She didn’t know officials had determined there was little chance someone could survive past a week under that mountainous pile. She was unaware that the rescue mission had long given way to an operation to recover the dead.

And sometimes, the not knowing keeps one going.

***

“Allahu akbar. Allahu akbar.”

What was that? Reshma wonders. She strains to hear.

“Allahu akbar. Allahu akbar.”

There it is again, the mellifluous tones of the Muslim call to prayer.

And then … voices.

She hears voices. Many voices.

“Where’s the sound coming from? Where’s the sound coming from?” she keeps asking herself.

With a new urgency, she bangs on the walls of mangled metal and cement around her.

Then she sees a sliver of light.

“Bachao! Bachao!” she calls out. Save me! Save me!

But no one hears her.

She takes another rod. With all her might, she jams it through an opening above her.

“Allah,” she keeps saying. “Allah, save me.”

***

It wasn’t lost on Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain that the mood at the disaster site was changing.

Determination was slowly giving way to dejection.

The pungent stench of death permeated the air.

Rescue workers covered their faces with T-shirts to escape the smell of decaying flesh.

It seeped into their clothes, crawled inside their skin and lungs.

Each body they pulled out took an emotional toll as well.

The number of volunteers had thinned.

By Friday, rescuers had finished scouring the rubble and were drilling their way to the building’s basement.

The recovery operation was almost over. They hadn’t found a survivor in almost a week.

Then, someone noticed a rod jutting out from an opening, waving wildly.

They heard a woman’s frail pleas: “Bachao, bachao.”

Slackjawed with disbelief, elated with wonder, they rushed to the spot.

Someone was down there, alive!

“She kept saying, ‘Save me, save me,’ ” Hossain said. “We told her we weren’t going anywhere.”

A roar went through the crowds that had gathered at the sight. Television channels immediately switched to live coverage.

“Almighty God, you make anything possible,” said a man on a loudspeaker as he urged others to pray. “Please help us save her.”

For 45 minutes, workers used hand drills and light hammers to remove concrete blocks.

They repeated their assurance:

“Wait, wait, we’re coming for you.”

****

Minutes from rescue, Reshma finds herself facing a very ordinary dilemma.

“How am I going to come out in front of all these people with no clothes?” she thinks. “I’m a lady.” Hers had ripped to shreds from all the crawling.

A rescuer tosses her a flashlight, and she looks around.

Piles of clothes are everywhere, spilling out of crushed boxes.

She picks a purple shalwar kameez and wraps a bright pink scarf around her neck and chest.

Her face is covered with dirt, but she looks fine, she thinks.

Then she waits to emerge from the Earth.

***

Lt. Col. Sharif Ahmed is the commanding officer of the Combined Military Hospital in Savar where Reshma is recovering. He marvels at how rapid her readjustment has been.

Reshma, whose age is listed in hospital papers as “22 ( +/- 2),” is gaining strength every day.

“When she came here, she’d startle to the touch,” he said. “She’d have flashbacks if she tried to sleep.

“All normal, considering what she went through.”

Now she’s smiling, sitting up. And she’s inseparable from her mother. The two hadn’t always gotten along.

“My heart is bursting with joy,” Zubeida said. “I begged God, and he returned her.”

Sohel Rana is in jail, nabbed by police as he tried to flee to India. The owners of the factories in Rana Plaza are also in detention.

On Tuesday, after 21 days, the rescue and recovery efforts formally ended.

The disaster has spurred the government and foreign retailers to take a long, hard, critical look at factory safety standards and their roles in policing it.

As for Reshma, she doesn’t know what her future holds.

But she knows she’s not going back to the garment business.

She ended our interview with a simple request: “Everybody please pray for me.”

With the joy she brought to a nation in mourning, many already are.

Follow Saeed Ahmed on Twitter

Article source: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/05/15/world/asia/seamstress-rubble-bangladesh/index.html?eref=edition

Categories: Top Stories Tags: ard, Child, cnn, com, dark hair, dow, Earth, girls, israel, Israeli, japan, marketplace, National, Page, Plain, Rank, scar, signi, site, skirt, strike, top stories, world

What it’s like to be buried alive

May 18th, 2013 cnn No comments

Dhaka, Bangladesh (CNN) — “Save me!” a man’s voice cries out in the darkness. “Please save me!”

“I can’t see you,” she replies. “I don’t know where you are.”

“Save me! Please save me!” the voice pleads again.

“I want to,” she says. “But I can’t move either.”

She loses consciousness.

When she wakes, the voice is gone.

In that cramped, dark grave under 700 tons of concrete and steel, she is all alone.

****

The concept of purgatory isn’t familiar to most Bangladeshis.

Last Bangladesh collapse survivor speaks

Bangladesh survivor remains in hospital

Factory survivor ‘out of danger’

Bangladesh recovery efforts end

But the way Reshma describes her 17 harrowing days — buried underground in pitch-black darkness as the voices around her faded away, as sweltering days bled into humid nights, as she questioned whether she was in this world or the next — it’s an apt one.

“I’d crawl, tire and sleep. I would wake up and crawl again,” Reshma recounted, her voice barely audible, as she spoke to CNN on Tuesday.

It was one of her first extended one-on-one interviews since rescuers pulled her out alive last week from the rubble of a collapsed building.

“I told God, ‘Take me, if that’s your will. If not, then save me.

” ‘But don’t leave me here like this.’ “

How did she survive?

****

The youngest in the family is often the most rebellious.

And Reshma, the fifth child of her mother, Zubaida, always had an independent streak.

When she was little, she preferred rolling a tire down the street with the boys to dressing up dolls with the girls.

As a teen, she surprised her family by marrying a man several years her elder.

She was in love, she told them, and love has no boundaries.

“We accepted him,” Zubaida said. “But he wasn’t good to her.”

He’d tell her that her family hadn’t paid enough in dowry. He’d taunt her that he’d take another wife. And, said her mother, he “tortured her.”

“We gave as much as we could,” she said. “But it wasn’t enough.”

In June 2010, the couple moved from Dinjapur to Dhaka, the go-to destination for the destitute looking to change their fortunes.

A garment worker himself, the husband persuaded Reshma to join the trade.

The money was good. And he snickered that it’d make up for what her parents weren’t paying him, Zubaida said.

In January, he disappeared.

Unable to afford rent on her own, Reshma moved to a tiny room in a house next to the Savar Bazaar bus stop.

Rescue workers carry Reshma Begum, 19, to safety on Friday, May 10, a day after her discovery alive amid the wreckage of a building that had entombed her since it collapsed on April 24, in Dhaka, Bangladesh. At least 1,127 people have been confirmed dead from the garment factory building collapse.

Begum, a young female garment worker at the Rana Plaza building before the disaster, addresses the media at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Savar area of Dhaka on Monday, May 13.

Throngs of reporters crowd around Begum as she speaks publicly for the first time on May 13 about her ordeal in Dhaka.

Begum is surrounded by media and members of the Bangladeshi military at the hospital where she is recovering in Dhaka on May 13.

A nurse helps Begum through a door as she attends a media conference at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on May 13.

Begum rests in her hospital bed as members of the Bangladeshi military stand beside her at the Savar Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on Saturday, May 11.

Begum was found in the factory’s basement in a pool of water, according to rescue official Lt. Col. Moazzem Hossain.

Bangladeshi army workers supervise the continued rescue operation using heavy equipment to sift through the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Rescuers workers administer first aid as they carry Begum from the rubble on May 10 in Dhaka.

Begum is pulled alive from the rubble by the rescue workers on May 10, after being buried for 16 days.

Begum recalled that when the collapse of the nine-story building began, she was working on the third floor. She was found in the factory’s basement.

The 19-year-old mother vowed to never again work in the country’s garment industry, where she was earning the equivalent of $60 a month.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Reshma, a story of survival

Members of the Bangladesh army pray at the site of the collapsed Rana Plaza in Savar near Dhaka on Tuesday, May 14. The army-led effort to search for bodies has ended nearly three weeks after the nine-story building collapsed. The final death toll stands at 1,127.

Relatives of missing garment workers offer prayers in front of the rubble on May 14 in Savar.

A white board at the recovery command center near the disaster is used to track the death toll on Monday, May 13.

Heavy equipment sifts through the rubble of the garment factory building collapse on Sunday, May 12.

A woman cries holds a portrait of a missing relative believed to be trapped in the rubble of the Rana Plaza building on Saturday, May 11.

Bangladeshi garment worker Reshma Begum, a seamstress who survived 16 days trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building, rests in Savar Cantonment Hospital on the outskirts of Dhaka on May 11.

Relatives search through a long line of covered decomposing bodies to try to identify their family members on May 11.

Rescue workers retrieve Reshma from the rubble in Savar, Bangladesh, on Friday, May 10. She got rescue workers’ attention by waving an iron rod. She was found in a pool of water, which allowed her to stay alive.

An injured worker who survived the building collapse is carried by her husband to collect her wages in Savar near Dhaka, Bangladesh, on Wednesday, May 8.

Garment workers who survived the building collapse line up to collect their salaries in Savar on May 8.

Workers continue rescue and recovery operations on Tuesday, May 7, nearly two weeks after the Rana Plaza building’s collapse outside Dhaka.

Rescue workers recover a body from the rubble on May 7.

Relatives place a body in the back of a truck on May 7.

A woman attempts to identify one of the bodies kept in a schoolyard on May 7.

Members of the Bangladeshi army and firefighters carry the body of a garment worker from the scene of the building collapse in Savar, outside Dhaka, on Sunday, May 5.

A woman holds a portrait of her missing relative as she sleeps on Saturday, May 4.

Relatives attempt to identify the bodies of loved ones on May 4.

Rescue workers dig out debris from the Rana Plaza building as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation using heavy equipment on Friday, May 3.

A woman reacts on May 3 after identifying a body found in the rubble.

A man stands amid the destruction as rescue and army personnel continue recovery operations on May 3.

A woman holds up a picture of a missing person believed to be trapped in the rubble on May 3.

A garment worker rescued from the wreckage of the Rana Plaza building lies in a hospital in Dhaka on Thursday, May 2.

A woman weeps after identifying her daughter’s body in the rubble in Savar on May 2.

Rescue workers move debris as Bangladeshi army personnel continue the second phase of a rescue operation at the site of the collapsed building in Savar on May 2.

A woman mourns before a mass burial in Dhaka on Wednesday, May 1.

Unidentified bodies from the rubble lie on the ground as people gather for a mass burial in Dhaka on May 1.

Workers dig graves during a mass burial of unidentified garment workers on May 1.

Sohel Rana, owner of the collapsed Rana Plaza building, wears police-issued body armor and a helmet while being escorted to court in Dhaka on Tuesday, April 30. Rana was arrested near the Indian border, and protesters called for him to be hanged.

Bangladeshi troops carry the body of a garment worker out of the rubble of the collapsed Rana Plaza building in Savar on April 30.

Clothing with Joe Fresh labels lies in the debris on April 30.

Cranes operated by Bangladeshi army personnel work on Monday, April 29.

Firefighters try to control a blaze that started while they were trying to rescue a woman with heavy equipment on April 29.

Bangladeshi army personnel begin the second phase of the rescue operation using heavy equipment on April 29.

Rescuers look for survivors on Sunday, April 28. The Bangladesh Red Crescent Society says the chances of finding anyone alive in the rubble at this date are remote.

A woman mourns on April 28 at the site of the building collapse in Savar.

Rescue workers search for survivors on April 28.

Volunteers sleep before they begin more rescue operations on April 28.

Rescue workers carry a victim’s body recovered from the rubble on April 28.

Clothes lie in the rubble on Saturday, April 27.

An arrested owner of a garment factory is escorted to an appearance at the court in Dhaka on April 27. Four people were arrested and four others are being questioned by police.

Relatives hold photos of missing and dead workers outside the factory April 27.

Two Bangladeshi women look at a board with notices posted of missing and dead workers on April 27.

Bangladeshi relatives and workers load a body onto a truck on April 27.

An excavator operated by the Bangladeshi Army removes debris on April 26.

Volunteers and rescue workers conduct rescue operations on April 26.

Rescue workers use textile as a slide to move bodies out of the rubble on April 26.

Rescue workers look for trapped garment workers on April 26.

Rescue workers stand on the rubble of the collapsed building on April 26.

Rescue workers search the rubble for victims and survivors on April 26.

A rescue worker looks for trapped workers on April 26.

Bangladeshi army personnel recover a survivor from rubble on April 26, 48 hours after the collapse.

Volunteers and rescue workers assist in rescue operations on April 26.

A physician assists a survivor after he was recovered from the rubble on April 26.

Two bodies clutch each other in the rubble on Thursday, April 25.

People rescue garment workers on April 25.

A Bangladeshi woman shows a picture of her missing daughter-in-law she believes is trapped in the collapsed building on April 25.

Bangladeshi firefighters cut a hole through concrete during rescue operations on April 25 in Savar, a suburb of Dhaka.

Volunteers and rescue workers work at the scene on April 25.

A woman appears devastated on April 25 after identifying the body of her husband killed in the building collapse.

Bangladeshi garment workers help evacuate a survivor by using a roll of fabric on April 24.

People rescue garment workers on Wednesday, April 24, after the building caved in, leaving a chaotic mass of broken concrete and twisted metal.

Relatives who lost a brother mourn outside a hospital on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured garment worker to escape from the Rana Plaza building on the outskirts of Dhaka on April 24.

Civilians help an injured garment worker on April 24. Work was proceeding slowly to avoid causing further collapse, an official said.

Rescue workers search for trapped garment workers in the Rana Plaza building on April 24.

An injured Bangladeshi lies on the hospital floor on April 24.

The injured receive treatment at a hospital on April 24.

An injured person rests in a hospital bed on April 24.

People wait anxiously on April 24 while rescuers search for survivors.

Rescuers help an injured person out of the seventh floor on April 24.

Civilians help out in rescue efforts at the collapsed building on April 24.

Hundreds watch the rescue operations on April 24.

People search for garment workers trapped under the debris on April 24.

Rescuers help an injured worker on April 24.

A body is trapped under the damaged building on April 24.

A woman is carried away from the building on April 24.

A rescue worker carries a worker to an ambulance on April 24.

Crowds gather around the collapsed building on April 24.

Rescuers bring out an injured garment worker from the building’s sixth floor.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

76

77

78

79

80

Photos: Building collapses in Bangladesh

Seventeen days after a building collapsed in Savar, Bangladesh, rescuers pull Reshma Begum from the rubble on May 10. More than 1,000 people have died since the nine-story garment factory building fell on April 24.

An officer of the Italian cruise line Costa Concordia, Manrico Giampedroni, is found 36 hours after the ship ran aground off the Mediterranean island of Giglio on January 13, 2012. He broke his leg as the liner rolled was was found in a half-flooded dining room, suffering from hypothermia.