【1048-1050】安哥拉缺乏清洁水导致运输服务&在越南的性别平等制度中，男性仍有优势&这些妇女后悔加入伊斯兰国，想回家
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AS IT IS
Lack of Clean Water in Angola Leads to Delivery Services
April 27, 2019
In recent years, Angola has become one of the richest countries in Africa. One reason is money earned by Angola’s oil industry. In 2017, business advisory service Mercer named the capital, Luanda, the most costly city for foreigners to live in.
But, many Luandans do not have access to even basic needs.
Luanda is surrounded on three sides by water: the Bengo and Cuanza Rivers and the Atlantic Ocean. Yet only half of its eight million people have access to clean, running water.
Many people in and around Angola’s capital must use untreated water for everyday activities – and even for work.
Car washers like Herminio Chitembo, for example, use untreated sewage water to earn a living.
Chitembo says he and other car washers do this kind of work for survival. They are unemployed — that is why they are here.
The United Nations Children’s Agency reports that nationwide, forty-four percent of Angolans still do not have access to clean water.
Agency representative Patricia Portela De Sousa says a lack of access to safe drinking water, sanitation systems and hygiene are the main causes of infectious diseases. She said this “means that many people are in danger.” Not having safe water, she added, equals a high chance of getting diseases and even dying.
Angolan officials are working to improve access. But the lack of clean water is a business opportunity for hundreds of young men. They bring drinking water to buyers across the city.
Eliseu André Paulo says people need this water because, in the neighborhood where they sell it, there is no water at all. There are water taps, but the taps have never had running water.
The United States Agency for International Development found that Angola has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in water and sanitation infrastructure in recent years. But continuous access to improved water and sanitation remains an issue.
The Public Water Company of Luanda, known as EPAL, admits there is a serious water shortage.
EPAL representative Vladimir Bernardo says Luanda’s water company has an average production level of 540,000 cubic meters of water per day. But the daily need is over a million cubic meters.
Luanda’s water company says financial issues have slowed progress, but its current infrastructure projects will soon improve access to clean water.
For now, Angolans do their best to survive, using the dirty water they have or the clean water they can sell.
I’m Alice Bryant.
Elizabete Casimiro reported this story for VOA News from Luanda. Alice Bryant adapted it for Learning English with additional information from USAID and other sources. George Grow was the editor.
________________________________________________________________
Words in This Story
access – n. a way of being able to use or get something
sewage – n. waste material that is carried away from homes and other buildings in a system of pipes
sanitation – n. the process of keeping places free from dirt, infection and disease by removing waste and garbage
hygiene – n. the things that you do to keep yourself and your surroundings clean in order to maintain good health
opportunity – n. a chance to do something
tap – n. a device for controlling the flow of a liquid or gas from a pipe or container
infrastructure – n. the basic equipment and structures (such as roads and bridges) that are needed for a country or place to function properly
AS IT IS
Men Still Have an Edge in Vietnam’s Gender-Equal System
April 27, 2019
Women in Vietnam are expected to balance, on one hand, traditional standards of beauty and etiquette, and on the other, a strong work ethic and sacrifice. (Ha Nguyen/VOA)
If a basic value of communism is equality, then men and women in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam would appear to have reached it.
Women is this country of 100 million people run big companies, lead government ministries and fill jobs usually held by men around the world, like building industry laborers or police officers.
A great deal of data shows that Vietnam is ahead of most other countries in gender equality. But in reality men still have a lot of advantages.
An employment services business, Adecco Vietnam, says the average income of women in the country is $224 a month. It says that represents 81% of the average income of men.
But women also do unpaid labor. When the workday ends, Vietnamese women have an average of five hours of work at home. They clean or take care of sick relatives.
“Every day has just 24 hours, to be divided among work, family, and oneself,” said Nguyen Hong Phuong. She is the director of finance at Adecco Vietnam. “It will not always be divided evenly.”
Men’s advantages begin at birth. Most parents want a boy and not a girl. During childhood, boys are not expected to help with housework. This continues when they become men. Mothers are replaced by wives where housework is concerned. Men still rule the home.
Women sell vegetables at a market in Hanoi, Vietnam January 31, 2018. (REUTERS/Kham) Adecco Vietnam says 73.9 percent of men have employment with foreign-invested companies, but only 67.7 percent of women. It says that during job interviews, women are often asked about their plans to have children and if they would leave work for family. A recent study from the United States Agency for International Development says a major goal of working women in Vietnam is to find an employer that has a reasonable parental leave policy.
As in so many countries, women in Vietnam experience poverty and the repercussions of natural disasters. The Vietnamese government has established programs to help women, such as Technologies for Equality. It is a competition run by the Women’s Initiative for Startups and Entrepreneurship supported by Australia and Ireland, among others.
The competition seeks inventions that can improve the lives of women in the countryside. Winning entries can receive up to $7,000.
The mobile app Safe Journey is among the inventions in the competition. The app helps migrant workers, mostly women, find jobs and housing in Vietnam’s cities. Another entry is for a processing center where ethnic minority tea farmers can process their crops for higher value-added products.
The winners will be announced later this month.
At an event to launch the competition, the Vietnamese Vice Minister of Science and Technology said the goal was to get women and girls from the countryside to do well in the employment market.
Vietnam has had a lot of success with gender equality. Almost 71 percent of women work. Women make up 25 percent of company leaders. Rates of sex-based violence are very low.
However, as good as it is, Vietnam still has work to do to reach complete gender equality.
I’m Susan Shand.
VOA’s Ha Nguyen reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for VOA Learning English. Caty Weaver was the editor.
Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.
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Words in This Story
data – n. facts or information used usually to calculate, analyze, or plan something
gender – n. the state of being male or female
advantage – n. a good or desirable quality or feature
app – n. a computer program that performs a special function
AS IT IS
These Women Regret Joining Islamic State, Want to Come Home
April 27, 2019
In this March 14, 2019, file photo, Women and their children who left the besieged Islamic State-held village of Baghouz, Syria, scramble over a rocky hillside to be checked by U.S-backed Syrian Democratic Forces. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo, File)
Many women who were part of the Islamic State (IS) remain loyal to the group, even after it fell this year. But a few say they regret joining it.
The Associated Press spoke with four women from foreign countries who came to Syria to be part of the so-called caliphate. They said they joined IS for different reasons. But all four now believe they made a mistake and want to go back to their home countries.
Today, they live in a camp in northern Syria with tens of thousands of other IS family members. The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces – or SDF – controls the camp.
Their situation shows the difficult question of what do with the men and women who traveled from other countries to join the IS. In general, their home governments do not want to take them back. The SDF complains that it is forced to deal with them.
And to many, the women’s regret is not believable or not important. They all willingly joined a group that was well-known to be extremely violent.
But here is what they told Western reporters.
Aliya
Aliya is a 24-year-old Indonesian. She says she grew up in a conservative Muslim family, but she did not follow the religion. Then, one day she decided to change her behavior sharply. She joined IS to “make up” for her past. She believed that if she moved to the caliphate, her sins would be cleared.
In 2015, Aliya married an Algerian man who was also thinking about joining IS. They settled in Raqqa, Syria, the city that IS used as its capital. The couple soon had a son.
But Aliya said the situation was not what she expected. IS took the couple’s passports. They did not permit the couple to communicate privately. She said her husband was sent to jail because he refused to become a fighter.
In 2017 IS militants gave Aliya and her son permission to leave. Her parents are trying to convince Indonesian officials to permit her to come home.
“I was young,” Aliya said. “Some people still love IS. Me, because I’ve lived there, I see how they are, so I’m done with them.”
In this March 26, 2019, photo, Aliya, a 24 year-old Indonesian national, poses for a portrait with her son, Yahya, at Camp Roj in north Syria. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo) Lawson
Gailon Lawson is from Trinidad and Tobago. She is 45 years old. She became Muslim only a few years ago. Shortly after she accepted the new religion, she married a man in Trinidad who followed IS teaching. Lawson became the man’s second wife. She said she followed him to Syria in 2014, along with her then 12 year old son.
Lawson said she knew immediately she had made a mistake. Not long after they arrived in Syria, the couple divorced.
Lawson said her main concern quickly became keeping her son from being enlisted as a fighter. To get him out of Baghouz this year, she dressed him as a woman in robes and a veil. The two escaped the city, but then Kurdish security forces detained the young man. Lawson says she has not heard from him in weeks.
In this March 31, 2019, photo, Gailon Lawson, from Trinidad and Tobago, poses for a portrait at Al-Hol camp in Hassakeh province, Syria. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo) Samira
Samira is a 31-year-old Belgian woman. She said that when she was younger and lived in Europe, she drank alcohol and went dancing at clubs. Then, she said, “I wanted to change my life. I found Islam.”
She said she accepted IS messages that Europe would never accept Muslims. She believed she could be truly Muslim only if she was part of the so-called caliphate.
“It was very stupid, I know,” she said.
When she reached Syria, IS militants permitted her to choose a husband. Samira chose a French citizen.
In 2016 the couple had a son. That year they also hired a smuggler to help them escape. But the smuggler took their money and reported them to IS instead.
Finally, in 2018 the family surrendered themselves to forces that opposed IS.
Samira says she is now trying to get home and become part of Belgian culture again. She says she hates IS.
“They sold us a dream, but it was an open prison. They kill innocent people. All that they do, these things, it’s not from Islam.”
In this March 27, 2019, photo, Samira from Belgium walks with her son at Camp Roj in north Syria. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo) Polman
Kimberly Polman is a 46-year-old Canadian woman. She came to Syria to join her new husband, a man she knew only from online. But she says he became abusive, and they soon divorced.
She married again and worked in a hospital. Polman treated children who had been wounded in the fighting.
“I saw an incredible number of children die,” she said. Polman came to blame the militants for the suffering she saw.
Early this year, she and her husband surrendered to the SDF. She wants to return to Canada. She says she is not safe in the camp because she has spoken out against IS.
“I feel so badly that I think I don’t deserve a future,” she said. “I shouldn’t have trusted.”
In this Wednesday, April 3, 2019, photo, Kimberly Gwen Polman, a Canadian national, reads a letter at camp Roj in Syria. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo) I’m Kelly Jean Kelly.
And I’m Anna Mateo.
Kelly Jean Kelly adapted this story for Learning English based on a report from the Associated Press. Hai Do was the editor.
_______________________________________________________________
Words in This Story
caliphate - n. an area controlled by an important Muslim political and religious leader
incredible - adj. difficult or impossible to believe
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