Lulu Mitshabu tells us to close our eyes. 'Imagine your brothers, sisters, your mothers, your nieces, your nephews, your children, everybody that makes you smile, the good time you're having,' she says.
'Open your eyes. The time that you took closing your eyes and thinking of your people, imagine now everybody you thought of disappeared from the face of this earth just in that minute. That's my life in the DRC.'
There is stunned silence. It's lunchtime in Sydney and we are sitting in the shadow of the beautiful Harbour Bridge, a symbol of wealth, progress and equal access for all. In Lulu's homeland, the ironically-named Democratic Republic of Congo, it is not yet dawn; soon the cockerels will begin crowing and the women will rise to start their work for the day, stoking fires, collecting water, tending crops, dodging the men — soldiers and militia and civilians — who will almost certainly threaten to rape and abuse them.
Northwest of there, in Nigeria, parents of around 300 girls abducted in the past month by Islamist group Boko Haram will have in all likelihood spent the night sleepless, wondering in the agonisingly slow pre-dawn hours how it is that evil is allowed to reign in a world as powerful and learned as ours.
It's a stark contrast and one that can no longer be used as an excuse by westerners who turn a blind eye to the evils that millions of people — girls and women in particular — endure in countries far removed from our own. It is also a reminder of our willingness to be led by the media when deciding which events and atrocities to solemnise, rather than speaking out about all issues — and brainstorming responses to them — even when they're not trending on social media or being glamorised by celebrities.
Weeks after the schoolgirls' mass abduction (which was preceded by the even more horrific, and far less well-publicised massacre of Nigerian schoolboys by Boko Haram), the incident has become an overnight cause célèbre, with people like Michelle Obama, Ellen DeGeneres and Angelina Jolie calling for their release.
But there's a danger that this Johnny-come-lately style of advocacy does more harm than good to the cause of subjugated women: by elevating media-determined 'worthy' causes (which will be dropped as soon as the next fad comes around), slapping ourselves on the wrist for our initial tardiness and then patting ourselves on the