Faces of IC Update: Lillian
Above: Lillian!
Ajok Lillian
21-years-old
The Uganda Institute of Information and Communications Technology
*****
“Today it’s a dot com world,” she said definitively.
It caught me off guard. Had we not been in Gulu, had she not been raised in a mud hut with no electricity and no computer, the comment wouldn’t have been surprising in the least. But we were. And she had. And when Lilian went on to explain how she wanted to major in Information Technology at a university down in Kampala, how she sat alone after classes and taught herself to type on her high school’s few dusty computers simply because she ‘loved typing’, and how she managed to pay rent on her own apartment while supporting her siblings, I began to realize something: Lillian is not your average 21-year-old Ugandan.
Faces of IC Update: Innocent
Innocent
19-years-old
Busoga College, Jinja
The younger kids were too small to jump across the ravine. Afternoon rains had turned it into a turbulent moat separating them from their destination: a large building that would provide shelter to hundreds of children for the night. Innocent, barely 12-years-old at the time, said he did what anyone would do-he leant his hand.
One by one, children crossed the stream with his help. When time came to distribute blankets and organize kids for the night, he and some of the other older boys helped orchestrate things. Months rolled by, and night after night Innocent helped tired kids get settled in for sleep. The one adult overseeing the place eventually decided that electing a head boy from the scores of night commuting kids would help things run more smoothly. One night, he ordered seven or eight boys to stand in front of the rest; Innocent was called forward.
“The man told all of the children to stand behind the boy they wanted to represent them as head boy,” Innocent recounted.
In small groups, kids stood and slowly made their way over to Innocent. Seconds later, a long line of children snaked away from him, raising the hair on the back of his neck in disbelief. This single event, this response from hundreds of kids Innocent barely knew, pushed him down a new life path, one lined with opportunity.
Faces of IC Update: Emmy
Emmy, now 18 years old, is entering his second semester of high school
**This is the first of a series of updates on beneficiaries featured in IC media**
Emmy
Kako Secondary School
18 years old
Emmy has just entered his second term of secondary school, and with it came a drastic change in career aspirations.
“Most people who asked I’ve told that I want to become a teacher,” he said with a smile. “But things have changed. I want to become an engineer now – a civil engineer.”
At 18, Emmy has morphed from the young boy who told us his story in 2006: His voice is deeper, he is much taller, and he’s now in high school.