“The value of one’s life is determined by the height of one’s selfless ambitions. Of course the individual is important but living just for oneself is terribly lonely”
Mr Tamai
Willington and Joshua were orphaned at a very young age, faced extreme poverty, hunger, lacked all the basic need (school fees, clothing, health care & parental love)
Somehow at each point in our lives by God’s grace someone cared. Our relatives and neighbours fed us, our communities taught us morals, checked on us & loved us, contributed money to pay our school fees. Our places of worship prayed for us, showed us mercy and kindness, our teachers gave us additional support in schools because we always lacked.
We share a testimony that without someone getting out of their way to support, our story would be very different and our existence today would not have even been possible.
But because someone paid our school fees, someone gave us food, someone covered our nakedness, someone treated us with kindness & love, someone shielded us from getting lost into immorality, someone inspired & encourage us when we were weak & vulnerable, we survived getting lost.
Our experience has taught us that anything invested, however little in a young, vulnerable person’s life can have a lasting and catalytic impact in their lives. It could be a word of encouragement, it could be an inspiring story from another person, it could be school fees, or other scholastic materials, or just believing in somebody.
We therefore came together under Ubuntu Youth leadership in honour Mr Tamai Yoshiomi, who gave his entire life to provide education to orphaned children including one of us who is an alumnus. We were inspired by Mr Tamai’s philosophy that “The value of one’s life is determined by the height of one’s selfless ambitions. Of course the individual is important but living just for oneself is terribly lonely”
"We therefore aspire to make that small contribution in the lives young, vulnerable people to enable them with some level of capacity to lead productive lives, and contribute to uplifting their families and communities. In additional to providing school fees to the most vulnerable & needy children, our leadership program has been designed to empower young people with leadership skills particularly inculcating them with the values of honesty, integrity, trust, hard work, and grit and the importance of keeping such values and principles as well as building their self-esteem, confidence and positive self-image"