Amanda Lindhout
Amanda Lindhout
Amanda Lindhout is a Canadian humanitarian, public speaker and journalist. On August 23, 2008, she and members of her entourage were kidnapped by Islamist insurgents in southern Somalia. She was released 15 months later on November 25, 2009, and has since embarked on a philanthropic career. In 2013, she released the New York Times bestseller A House in the Sky: A Memoir, in which she recounts her early life, travels as a young adult, and hostage experience. In 2014, the...
NationalityCanadian
ProfessionJournalist
Date of Birth12 June 1981
CountryCanada
I made a vow to myself while I was a hostage that if I were lucky enough to live and to get out of Somalia, I would do something meaningful with my life - and specifically something that would be meaningful in the country where I'd lost my freedom.
Sometimes, you have to make the choice to forgive 10 times a day when you have these pockets of anger come up. That's a lot of work, but to me it's worthwhile.
I have a general sense of excitement about the future, and I don't know what that looks like yet. But it will be whatever I make it.
When you see a 14-year-old boy who has never known what peace looks like for a day in his life, there's part of you as a human being that feels some degree, you can say, compassion for the fact that these boys have known war, famine, violence and death from the day they were born.
The greatest gift you have been given is the gift of your imagination - what do you dream of wanting to do?
I must thank my good friend Nigel Brennan. His strength of character in the midst of extreme hardship inspired me during the darkest days. Despite our separation, he always managed to find small ways to remind me that there are gentlemen in the world, even when I was surrounded by just the opposite.
Going into Somalia, I didn't anticipate how many people's lives would be affected by it. In hindsight, I certainly wish I had taken more time to think about that, but I can't change it.
You have a responsibility to move your dreams forward, no matter what.
It was a slow understanding that the lack of education in a country like Somalia creates these huge social problems.
The book is called 'A House in the Sky' because during the very, very darkest times, that was how I survived. I had to find a safe place to go in my mind where there was no violence being done to my body and where I could reflect on the life I had lived and the life that I still wanted to live.
I went through an extremely trying ordeal, but I never forgot the world outside was a beautiful place.
Hamdi Ulukaya and Chobani have made the decision to feed 250,000 victims of the Somali famine. Their compassion speaks for itself, and is a shining example of how the business community can have an enormous positive impact on the world.
Accompanied by an Australian photographer named Nigel Brennan, I'd gone to Somalia to work as a freelance journalist, on a trip that was meant to last only ten days.
I must try desperately to absorb all information I can about the Middle East. I want to excel. I want to speak articulately about the politics of the Middle East and its religion.