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“Education is the most powerful tool you can use to change the world”- Nelson Mandela.
You see, I am glad you have found my blog. I am assuming that you are reading this blog because you are literate. right? But wait, close your eyes and imagine for a moment what your life would be like if you couldn’t read or write? IF you could not fathom a thing about letters, numbers or the alphabet. Let your imagination run wild and wonder what kind of a person you would be today. Imagine where you would be now and with who and doing what? What contribution would you make to your family, to your community, to your country, to the entire planet. Would you be an asset or a liability? Now assume all your brothers and sisters were just like you. Illiterate. Well I do not know about you, but this thought horrifies me to the last fibre of my being. Im pretty sure the world would not be a real fun place to be. Now imagine,your parents have only a third grade education. And then again the most educated person in your village made it only up to high school and his potential hit a hard wall. Imagine that your family lives on less than two dollars a day. Perhaps worse still, both your parents died when you were 11 yrs of age; you are left to cater for your six other little siblings. There are no children shelters, food stamps, welfare programs or public assistance.
Despite your tender age you have this humongous dream of becoming a great biotech scientists to teach your villagers how to grow productive crops and be an advocate against hunger. Now then, calculate your odds and possible probability of achieving this dream. Oh, God, what to do? what to dooooo?
This is not fiction; it is a typical life story of hundreds of thousands of kids in Africa stuck in this cycle of poverty. I believe that education is the only capital with which to buy one a ticket to self reliance. It is not always easy, but investing in quality education and pooling sources to assist these children is a good beginning. While growing up in a small village in Central Kenya, I experienced first hand the pain, the joy, the suffering, the adventures of rural life, as well as the paradoxical beauty of growing up in a Kenyan Village. My life is the story of connectedness, and what happens when people join in to share resources. It is the story of many children who have to mature faster than time, a story about children that understand the intricate issues of participating in adult chores, those that understand labor and wages as early as 8yrs of age and becoming workers, mothers, fathers and bread winners at the tender age of 13 years. It was clear to me that my childhood was about survival, one day at a time. A childhood punctuated with extreme patience, back-bending tolerance and flexibility, tenaciousness beyond reason, inventiveness in coping, and a rock solid belief in community pool sourcing. We were children. I was one of them. This village was to be forever my home and somewhere in between I grew up.
I write this blog to share with you my story. I belief we all have a story.I believe we should share our stories to exchange knowledge and transform ourselves mentally, physically and spiritually in dialogue with new places, new people, as well as create new traditions new cultures, that will change how we live our lives.
I write so you can follow me through my journey of survival, great odds, the miracles and wonders of childhood in an african jungle, meet the villagers I call my people, follow me to Kenya and see for yourself why I want to give back, Let me share with you my story. A story as paradoxical as my life. I want to tell you about my childhood punctuated with joys, and yet fear of hunger, fear of being left out and yet made it. I write to chronicle the intriguing golden opportunities on my path, chances given, and like everyone else, I have my share of opportunities wasted and foolishly missed, mistakes made and regrets thereof, self redemption, fissures and gaps mended, successes, battles of emotional and physical survival and what I nowadays refer to as the self in “Alice in wonderland” Planet.
I hope you will read my story, get to know me and my people, have interest and want to visit my village in Kenya, and understand the power of connection, the need for one-ness, the necessity of interaction, the close relative in all of us and the power you have, right now, to change the world one little bit at a time, one single person at a time.
