I'm happy to share with you one #RAK experience of my own. I was born to two parents in from different tribes in a small village in Uganda called Kashayo! My father was a mukiga man and my mother a muganda lady. I don't really know how they met so I can't really explain that. Two months after I had been born, my father passed on, the cause of his death was AIDS! My mother had to raise me single handedly, being a muganda she ddnt know the local language in kashayo village so she wouldn't easily communicate with everyone. Luckily enough my grandfather knew a lot of luganda, having been a teacher in a Buganda territory school. People in my village hates my mother for being a foreigner in their land, we had little or nothing to eat, we had no garden from which we would get something for survival, because my father had been sick for way too long, and mother was taking care of him all this time! When my grandfather was not around we couldn't eat anything. I was now 2 years old but I looked like a six months baby! If only I could share with you the pictures that I myself saw and cried bitterly. My mother decided to leave home for Masaka, because she was tired of being despised, and she knew my grandfather would take good care of me. I stayed at my grandfathers place for a very long time, during that time, I was attending a local school about 8 miles away. I would wake up in the morning to walk there, without any food to eat. Luckily enough I was a brilliant kid, I would answer almost every question posed by teachers in class and they would give me some shs 50 as thank you. I would not use any of this money! I would wait for later in the afternoon to give it to my grandfather, although I would be starving to the borne! My grandfather would be very happy with me for being responsible with money at for showing him that I valued money.
When I was 4 and a half years old, my mother passed on too! I wasn't able to travel to masaka to bury her because I had no means. My grand father didn't go either, and I don't know why to this day.
Life became had for me at that time, being almost 5 years I knew I couldn't live long either, I decided to stay calm but I was afraid that I would die soon too because all my parents had passed on.
In the neighboring village, there was a man called Kaguri whose son had had a chance to study in Colorado in the US under scholarship. He had come to visit with his friends from Colorado and I think they were not amazed by the way of life of children in the village. Many kids my age were already gracing cattle and sheep, not attending to school, girls of 15 years were being married off and people actually thought it was okay. This is where the #RAK started. Henry, together with his friends started gathering kids in one place, to teach them basic stuff like names of food, names of animals, how to read, how to write, very basic stuff generally. Fortunately enough, I was among the chosen kids, although my grandfather was very hesitant at first, saying that the 'white' men had nothing good to offer us! That they just wanted to find away of taking their land!
I had to escape every morning to rush to the center to study! The main reason of my going there wasn't really studying though, it was the breakfast, the lunch and afternoon tea that they provided to us. At that time we were only 8 kids from the entire village, so I think giving us most of the necessities wasn't so expensive. We ate like kings of the village, this made us very interested in school though, none of us would miss!!
A few days later we received some purple tshirts and black shorts for boys and purple dresses for the three girls, this was supposed to be our uniform. They gave each of two pairs of shoes, a dozen pens, pencils, two dozen crayons, a towel and some clothes plus open shoes.
Before we knew it, a school was started! The school was called NYAKA AIDS ORPHANAGE SCHOOL! It was a school for the children whose parents had scumbed to AIDS! Ofcourse at that time we didn't know. All we loved was the good life at school. Mr Henry and his friends went back to Colorado for quite sometime, but before they had left, they had appointed two female teachers and one male teacher. These were now our parents! They used to teach us all day long and feed us at the same time. We were only 8 kids in the whole village putting on shoes while going to school and with a good uniform. Many children admired us and this made us proud, although more and more Childers by were being admitted to the school. We were using Mr Henry's house as our classroom.
On the piece of land opposite Mr Henry's house, a few building were already being put up. They were quite close to each other and one would think it was an industrial park. little did we know that our school was being taken to another level, within a year , the construction had been completed and we were moving in to our new classrooms. We had 5 classrooms, a rest room and a staff room. The numbers had now increased rock about 30 kids!! The officials opening of the school was massive!! A lot of 'white' people turned up along with Mr Henry and the school was officially opened by professor Mondo Kayongera, the then vice Chancellor of Makerere University.
Being in the presence of 'white' people meant so much to the local people. These local people soon referred to us as adopted kids of the rich! But that was not the case, these guys were struggling so hard to see that our lives improved. They did all they could to create employment in the society!
Our year was the pioneer year in 2008 when we graduated from primary Seven. primary seven is the first achievement of education at the lower level before one advances to secondary education!
By 2008, the school enerolment was close to 200 pupils, with over 30 teachers and 25 support staff! Oh o forgot to mention, we were not paying a single coin to access all these things, absolutely nothing!!
I ddnt know how to write a single letter before I joined this school, I could hardly speak or express myself in English, I had never put on shoes to go to school, or even church! I had never in my entire life tasted cake until the official opening of NAOS. I'm very greatfil that I was chosen to be part of this #RAK story and I will forever tell it. Although I ddnt progress to the NYAKA AIDS Secondary school, it was established and it runs right from S1-S6!
Today, the school enrollment is over 500 students both at primary and secondary level.
These guys have done so much! I don't know how much blessings they will ever receive but their #RAK are beyond humankindness!
