The Delightful Non Profit Work Of Angelina Jolie

October 17, 2010
By Amana Perry

Angelina Jolie, partner to Mr Brad Pitt, is the star of quite a few blockbuster movies. Among them are Girl Interrupted and Mr. and Mrs. Smith, coincidentally where she met Pitt. But perhaps her renowned portrayal was playing buxom Lara Croft, in the Tomb Raider films. During the shooting of the first film, much of which was shot on location in Cambodia, Jolie began to witness the gorgeous environment, engaging culture, and rampant poverty from the nation. This, she says, opened her eyes and was her stepping stone into humanitarian work.

After Cambodia, Angelina Jolie took vacation to Sierra Leone and Tanzania in 2001, also it was there that she first became actively involved with humanitarian causes. The purpose of that fateful trip ended up being to discover first hand the conditions that refugees must suffer. Angelina was so shocked that shortly after, in August 2001, she was appointed Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, otherwise known as UNHCR.

The UNHCR assists over 20 million refugees in 120 countries all over the world. They were designed to protect and safeguard the well-being and rights of refugees. They feel that refugees possess a right to seek asylum internationally and can actively seek to engage nations to integrate and support those refugees. So far, in only 5 decades, they have helped 50 plus million people on the planet.

Without a doubt, Angelina's contribution has greatly aided in producing more wide-spread attention to this deserving cause. As a goodwill ambassador, her role would be to communicate to, and provide an emphasis on refugees by generating mass-media attention. Though in Jolie's case this is not merely superficial. She actually spends much of her own time and is genuinely concerned with their misery. On her travels to Ecuador, Jolie wrote of the suffering, "People's lives are truly at risk - not just in the sense that you feel your town is unsafe - their life is actually being threatened and their houses are now being burnt down."

To help increase awareness, Jolie has released several personal journals of her experiences during field visits. More info are available at UNHCR dot org. As well as the hard physical work that Jolie contributes, her foundation with partner Mr Brad Pitt, called the Jolie-Pitt Foundation recently donated USD $1 million to groups working in Darfur. Darfur is a region in war ravaged Sudan, which Jolie has visited 3 times already.

Jolie now intends to spend the majority of her time in humanitarian efforts, revealing that she splits her actress income three ways; a third for savings, a third for bills and a third for charity. Considering she commands a high pay packet for movies, in addition to product endorsements, that equates to a large amount donated.

Jolie has two adopted children, and it is currently considering a third. Maddox, a Cambodian refugee boy she adopted in 2002, and Zahara, an Ethiopian refugee girl. She also offers a child with Brad Pitt, named Shiloh along with twins, a boy and a girl, Knox and Vivienne, also with Brad Pitt. As well as Pitt, Jolie has expressed that she will continue to promote and actively engage in humanitarian causes, in addition to pursuing her acting ambitions.

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