Just a few rooms of the house still stood, the rest destroyed by bombing that rocked the Gaza Strip six months earlier.

The rooms were barely more than rubble themselves – all the windows had been shattered in the blast, there were no doors and the floors were full of holes – but to the family whose 15-year-old son had been killed in an earlier Israeli bombing, it was home.

As Sarah Marois spoke to the woman in broken Hebrew, she learned the family’s story, learned they had nowhere else to go except a tent camp for refugees, a notion they couldn’t fathom.

Marois couldn’t help but cry, as she had cried many times before since arriving in the Middle East in 2006.

Despite all this mother had been through, all the sorrow and hardship, her first thought was to comfort Marois. She offered a glass of water and told her not to cry, that “it’s OK.”

It was exactly what Marois wished she could say to the woman herself, but knew the words would sound hollow.

Months later, sitting in her Cairo apartment, the memory remains clear, and the question that constantly nags comes to mind once again: what difference could Marois, one person who grew up on the other side of the world with everything she ever needed, possibly make to a population living with such daily suffering?

“It’s just this horrible feeling,” said Marois, 24. “But you have to do something, you have to start somewhere.”

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MAROIS was born in Vancouver and spent her childhood years in White Rock, attending first White Rock Elementary, then Semiahmoo Secondary.

She played softball, travelled with her parents and older sister, was a member of the student council and worked at the uptown McDonald’s.

She wasn’t outspoken, and “not at all” an activist.

She believed she’d grow up to be a veterinarian or a teacher; perhaps even study volcanos.

Like many, Marois also believed childhood tales, such as those recounted in Bible school, depicting Israel as a sacred place; and, television images that portrayed Muslim women there as down-trodden and disrespected.

She also thought the Hamas soldiers who patrolled the Gaza Strip – a 360-square-kilometre stretch of land that sits on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, at the northeastern tip of Egypt – were to be feared.

But things aren’t always as they seem, Marois has learned since arriving in the Middle East.

You can’t always believe what you hear or read. Sometimes, to get the real story, you have to see it firsthand, live it. And sometimes, that’s not easy either.

“I had all these ideas about what Israel was,” said Marois, speaking in the evening ‘chill’ of Cairo’s 29-degree heat, her two adopted Egyptian cats lounging nearby.

“From the time you’re young... it’s always, like, revered, this sacred place. There’s just this whole kind of rose-shade glasses of what Israel stands for.

“From the moment I got off the plane, I just knew there was something really wrong with this image.”

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Marois travelled to Israel to learn more about the history of the Middle East.

It was an interest piqued in her Grade 12 year at Semi, in the aftermath of the September 2001 terrorist attacks on New York’s twin towers. She wanted to learn more about the situation in the Middle East; to understand.

The trip followed three years of classes at UBC, where she studied India, Pakistan and Afghanistan; and a month-long stay in the United Arab Emirates.

Being a Christian, Marois held no reservations about pursuing her studies in Israel for two years. She believed she’d be accepted.

“I really thought that I was going to fit in there. Instead, I was discriminated against.”

Marois described incessant interrogations at the airport, being told she shouldn’t wear her cross and to convert.

“It just is horrible to be treated that way. All of a sudden, you’re not equal because of your religion,” she said. “It just really changed my whole view of the Middle East.”

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Despite her experience in Israel, Marois is determined to effect change, a mindset strengthened by recent ventures to Gaza Strip.

In March, Marois travelled to the Hamas-ruled land with Code Pink, an American-based women’s group working for peace and social justice.

So moved was she by the International Women’s Day trip, she and four others quickly mobilized a return. They wanted more people to see what they saw, and learn what they learned.

“I think that the media is not covering the full story.

“I pictured chaos, because that’s what you see on TV. But when you go there, you see this human side of Hamas, you get to hear what they have to say, you really see where they’re coming from.”

During the week-long trip, after navigating relentless efforts by Egyptian security to prevent the mission – the group had to pretend they were going for fun in the sun to cross the border – the 40 students met with officials and toured damaged sites, including United Nations buildings, hospitals and schools. They planted trees to replace those destroyed in the attacks, and met university students who told of classes cancelled due to bombings.

While out with fishermen, who are not allowed further than two or three miles from the Gaza shore, Marois could hear gunfire as Israeli ships fired at those venturing beyond the limits.

The delegation delivered $1,500 worth of medical aid to the Palestinian Ministry of Health and $3,000 to refugees at the Salah Al-Din camp in north Gaza.

Next up, Marois will return to Gaza this month with Viva Palestina USA, an aid convoy from New York City. The group hopes to raise $10 million for aid.

For Marois, it’s one more way “to start somewhere.”

Marois dreams of influencing foreign policy in the Middle East, perhaps through work with the United Nations. She knows she has found her life’s work.

“I really don’t want to go back to Canada unless I know I can do something there that I know can help the people.

“I’m never going to be able to stop fighting for these people.

“I didn’t really plan to become so involved, and become so passionate about it. But it happened, and I can’t just walk away.”