Somy Ali on the work her NGO does: The survivors have helped me change my perspective and my outlook on thanksgiving!
Somy Ali has been tirelessly working to save and rehabilitate domestic abuse and rape survivors in the US, through her NGO No More Tears. The actress says that being with these people and seeing their journey has made her change her outlook towards Thanksgiving.
“Thanksgiving is an extremely significant day for me and the survivors under our care and for the past 16 years it is they who have given me a meaning to the day to me. Prior to that I not did celebrate the day because I don’t celebrate any day which you know by now and more so this occasion which entails us taking land away from Native American Indians and killing them for it. But the survivors have brought a different meaning to it for me and the meaning is about being together when you are alone and loving one another,” she says.
She adds, “We have food from every culture by each of them, and to say we have a feast, is an understatement. So, every year I enjoy a feast with the people I have rescued who won’t be there the year after and yet again the year after yet again there will be another feast with new faces and new love to share with new ethnic dishes. The significance lies in the togetherness and the perpetual love each year. The survivors have helped me change my perspective and my outlook on thanksgiving and I am thankful to them for that. They have given me a new meaning to the occasion which I did not and refused to see before No More Tears.”
