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    {"id":6576,"date":"2014-10-19T18:32:36","date_gmt":"2014-10-20T00:32:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.orijinculture.com\/community\/?p=6576"},"modified":"2014-10-19T20:26:51","modified_gmt":"2014-10-20T02:26:51","slug":"child-devil-wears-ballerina-shoes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/child-devil-wears-ballerina-shoes\/","title":{"rendered":"The &#8220;devil&#8217;s child&#8221; wears Ballerina Shoes | Michaela"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"stag-section stag-video\"><iframe title=\"Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina | Book Trailer\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/bfh2AtBhZDM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<h3>&#8220;If you have a passion for something go for it.<br \/>\nNever let anybody tell you that you can&#8217;t do something.&#8221;<\/h3>\n<p>Once an orphan in Sierra Leone, West Africa, and considered the least favorite to be adopted by any family, I could only imagine the type of treatment Michaela DePrince received at a tender age of four, at the orphanage where she once lived. I tried to put myself in her shoes, seeing life the same way she saw it; Seeing life take a sudden turn after the passing of both parents, and people whom I grew up seeing us my &#8220;close family&#8221;(Uncle), rejecting me and putting me in an orphanage.\u00a0 I could only imagine, but can never walk a mile in her shoes. My heart aches anytime I see that picture of her sitting\u00a0 alone with a smile, but her eyes says it all&#8211; &#8216;I am Lost within&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Derided as a &#8220;child of the devil&#8221; because of vitiligo (A skin condition causing a white patches of the skin due to loss of pigmentation), she was constantly maltreated, and a times starved,\u00a0 but <strong><em>who God blesses no man curses<\/em><\/strong>. If a photo of a Ballerina on the cover of a magazine she found one day would bring life back to her and a reason to live then there is hope for so many of us who find no hope. Today the &#8220;child of the devil&#8221; wears Ballerina Shoes. Wait, allow me to correct the statement,\u00a0 &#8220;The God&#8217;s Chosen,\u00a0 Wears Ballerina Shoes&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Thanks to her American mother, Elaine DePrince who adopted Michaela and brought her to the US as her child, encouraging her steps into the shoes of the Ballerina photo Michaela found her inspiration to become who she is to day. What is fascinating about this story is not just the journey of Michaela&#8211;&#8216;the rejected stone who has become the corner stone&#8217;&#8211; but also the beautiful family bonding between her (being Black) and her mother(being White); a living testimony that the color of our skin has no boundaries, but the nature of our souls and character. Hey , I am not a pastor but I think I might have just preached a sermon to the congregation today. Can I get an AMEN !!!. Stay blessed and spread the love.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_6577\" style=\"width: 1210px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-content\/uploads\/teen-ballerina-00.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-6577\" class=\"wp-image-6577 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-content\/uploads\/teen-ballerina-00.jpg\" alt=\"teen-ballerina-00\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-6577\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Courtesy of Teen Vogue<\/p><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-content\/uploads\/706x410q70f93696869fccdf8a33335c2b24b13edf.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-6579\" src=\"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-content\/uploads\/706x410q70f93696869fccdf8a33335c2b24b13edf.jpg\" alt=\"Michaela DePince\" width=\"706\" height=\"410\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Inspired by Bob Marley\u2019s philosophy \u201cNone but ourselves can free our mind\u201d, Orijin is a unique \u201cCulture Brand\u201d connecting all African descendants together through it\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/ORIJINSTORE.COM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Fashion brand<\/a> and thought provoking magazine to influence our lifestyles world wide\u2026.Don\u2019t just WEAR Culture, SHARE Culture.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;If you have a passion for something go for it. Never let anybody tell you that you can&#8217;t do something.&#8221; Once an orphan in Sierra<br><a class=\"moretag signature-animation\" href=\"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/child-devil-wears-ballerina-shoes\/\">CONTINUE READING<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6580,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-roots-and-culture"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-content\/uploads\/Ballerina4.jpg?wsr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6576"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6581,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6576\/revisions\/6581"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orijinculture.com\/community\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}