In 2009, a young man changed the lives of thousands of people by telling the world his story of hardship, survival and innovation. The book “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind” by William Kamkwamba reveals in great detail the complete blindness our Western society possesses to the truth of life on the African continent. As citizens of the Western world we have a tendency to only see the statistics and politics of wars, famines and disasters occurring in developing countries, without even taking into consideration the human beings affected by them. In this detachment we judge the entire nation as a whole, forgetting the millions of people who do more in a single day with the little they have than we do with our abundance in a lifetime. Much more often it is the discordant few who illiberally command the lives of the many poor. It is in this oversight that we often lose the stories of survival and heroism of the African people that are as rampant as prosperity is scarce. With his incredible story, William Kamkwamba guides us in light of this fact. The setting of Williams' story was one of the worst hunger crises ever known in the small country of Malawi in south-central Africa. The devastating famine of 2002 was caused by circumstances both due to the country's capricious climate and its own highly corrupt government. According to Newsweek's Joshua Hammer, Malawi's food reserves were sold to the highest bidder and the payment to replace the reserves was used in the construction of a grand hotel immediately before a mass drought followed by floods. This directly led to famine with no means of survival for thousands of penniless Malawian citizens (28). Will... in the center of the card... dren like William around the world. This is why I am here in this university, on this planet; to help others build their own windmills, realize their wildest hopes, their greatest dreams. This is life, this is higher education. Works Cited “A Perfect Famine: Malawi.” By Steve Bradshaw. Journeyman Pictures: Distributor of Documentaries, Documentaries on Demand, DVDs, Educational, Films: Journeyman Pictures. Journeyman Picture, March 23, 2003. Web. March 9, 2012Martello, Joshua. "Freedom is not enough." Hunger in the world. Bronx, New York: H. W. Wilson, 2007. 27-29. Print.Kamkwamba, William and Bryan Mealer. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: Creating Currents of Electricity and Hope. New York, NY: William Morrow, 2009. Print.Wines, Michael. “Drought worsens poverty, causing more Africans to starve.” The New York Times. The New York Times, November 2, 2005. Web. March 9. 2012.