32 Quotes by Deborah Ellis

While the war in Iraq was raging, I spent some time in neighbouring Jordan, meeting with Iraqi refugees who fled their country to try to find some place of safety. I interviewed many families about what had happened to them and what they did as a result.

You have to see the human being in the enemy. If there is potential for change, there is still hope.

As a woman in Canada, I get to do whatever I want to do, and I'm used to that. I'm used to not having my government tell me my life is going to be restricted because I'm female.

There's a big thing in Canada that parents need to talk to their children about drugs and sex. I don't think talking to your kids about war is any less important than that.

In refugee camps around the world, I met people who were gone. They were still walking around but had lost so much that they were unable to claim any sort of identity. Others I met found who they truly were, and they generally found it through service to others. They became teachers when there was no school, books or pencils.

In 'Off to War, Voices of Soldier's Children,' kids from Canada and the United States talk about what it is like when their mother or father goes off to war - and comes home again.

I didn’t create this world,” she said to herself. “I only have to live in it.

Like it or not, you need to know how to do this. Your future depends on it. You give up on this, you will give up on the next difficult thing, and you are too smart and too strong to start giving up.

A lazy brain does no one any good.