By Christine Sabdio Roba
I am from a rural part of Kenya in a small village situated in Chalbi desert. My community members are nomadic livestock keepers and few of our girls get the opportunity to learn. I was born in a very humble background with a disabled father who struggled every moment of his life for my five siblings and I. My father didn’t have any resources including livestock but he just stood by my side to learn even when he should have taken the easy way out of giving me out for marriage. Through a lot of struggles, hard work, and support from well-wishers I managed to study up to university level after which I decided to work, support my dad and sponsor my brothers in their education.
I learned about YALI three years ago, its association with three great minds; Nelson Mandela, Barack Obama and Michelle Obama made me so excited to try it out. I applied this year and got selected. My dad was really overwhelmed with happiness. He had my passport hidden in his ‘special’ box to prevent someone from stealing it! He still doesn’t understand what I am doing here but he thinks I will have a meeting with Michelle Obama! Yes, that is how prestigious America and YALI is in my village. They think you can get anything and meet whoever you want to meet in the U.S. He knows I love listening to her speeches and that her talks are really behind my courage and confidence to stand up for girls’ education and wellbeing in a community where girls rarely come before elders to ask for anything. I currently work with 1500 adolescent girls and mentored 3000 so far. My journey from the village was long, I had hours travel to the capital of Kenya before taking my Flight to Atlanta through Amsterdam. It was my first time on an international flight which started with America, so you can Imagine all the confusions! I got lost everywhere in the airport and kept on misplacing every document, the village girl started her jet lag even before landing! The past two weeks have been fantastic. I met great young African minds, future leaders and wonderful change makers in Georgia. We had multiple opportunities for social engagement, excellent networking with great individuals who have dedicated themselves to service to humanity and intentional program that has had me question, reanalyze and develop my community projects. I have learned more about purpose led leadership and the importance of value-based work. One of my takeaways for the week is “making a better world is possible if all of us come together for positive change and be strategic, intentional and responsive in our community deliverable.” I hope this and many more will have great impacts on my girls lives.
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