Marine creates opportunity to help tsunami victims
CAMP COURTNEY, Okinawa — Lance Cpl. Yamile Brito is proving the truth of former President John F. Kennedy’s statement that “One person can make a difference, and everyone should try.”Brito, a Marine with Headquarters Battalion, 3rd Marine Division, III Marine Expeditionary Force, is the driving force behind a food drive at the Camp Courtney commissary for victims of the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami which struck mainland Japan March 11.
Following the disaster, Brito said she knew she needed to help.
Reading the news reports of the devastation in mainland Japan affected her deeply, said Brito. One article she saw hit her particularly hard, she added. The article detailed the experience of a Japanese man who had been in the water for four days and saw his wife die in the tsunami.
“It made me feel horrible, terrible,” she said, admitting she’s come close to tears several times reading some of the articles and seeing the images of destruction.
The news stories and photographs burned into her memory also created in her a strong desire to provide some kind of aid to those in need, she said.
“Half the platoon left that weekend, and I was really frustrated because I wanted to go with them,” she said. “I kept thinking that there has to be something I can do, there has to be something I can do.”
Brito told her fiancé Lance Cpl. Cameron Perry, also with Headquarters Bn., 3rd MarDiv., that she was disappointed at being on Okinawa and unable to help.
“He suggested I do a canned food drive,” said Brito, from New York City....
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