Wobulenzi  Stories

- five stories from five students at WTA telling us about life at school and why school matters to them

Story 3. Sarah's Story

Sarah is in S6 and will leave WTA in November after her A' levels. Her aim is to become the first woman President of Uganda! She reasons that if Idi Amin could become President having stopped schooling in P2 (aged about 8) then she has a good chance ! You never know.

Sarah lives in an orphanage about 3 miles from school and is a day student. Technically, she is not an orphan as she  both parents are alive, but for some reason they abandoned her with a distant relative  - she has no idea why.  But they don't want anything to do with her, as far as we know. Sadly, it is not that unusual. But she came to the orphanage, as the owner came across her and recognised she had some academic potential. He pays for her schooling at WTA, so she stays there and comes to school as a day scholar.

Wobulenzi  Stories

- five stories from five students at WTA telling us about life at school and why school matters to them

Story 5. Samson's Story   "From Our Own Correspondent.....?"

"I am Samson, aged 18 years and in S4 - I am taking my O' levels this October. Since the death of my father in 2003, (due to the insurgency in the north),  I have been responsible enough to see a way forward to help my mother. I grew up with determination to study and am the first boy in our family to join secondary school - this is only possible because of WTA being there.  My mother is so much interested in visiting the school and I pray that this will happen one day.

"I have the objective of doing a course in mass communication and journalism  - if I complete secondary level. With hard work, consistence, discipline and trust in God, I will make it."

Wobulenzi  Stories

- five stories from five students at WTA telling us about life at school and why school matters to them

Story 2. The audacity of Hope - as I shall call her...    

...is 17, and from a village in Pader district, northern Uganda.  (Born the same year as Jesse.)

In 2003, when  she was 8, she was abducted by LRA rebels who came through the village - her parents had to choose to be killed with their daughter - or let her go with them and stay alive themselves and hope that she would stay alive

She and many other children were taken as 'mules' to carry the commodities (oil, rice, sugar, fuel) to keep the rebels on the move

Other children would be killed on the spot if they 'asked for a rest'.  Her older brother was butchered  in front of her - she was not allowed to react - a means of desensitising them and  'initiating' them into the rebel 'family', thus making it very difficult to return to the village and home area

Wobulenzi  Stories

- five stories from five students at WTA telling us about life at school and why school matters to them

Story 1. My Holidays (or "Mini-break in the Congo")

'My Holidays' is a classic and unimaginative essay title often set by teachers at the start of term. However, I was so astonished by what Bosco had achieved in 3 weeks away from school, that I asked him to write it down...   - Elspeth 

"It was a three week programme. On the first Monday I set off to the west to my village. I took the little capital I had saved and thought much about how to multiply it within the shortest period of time. A friend told me about the business opportunities to be exploited in the DRC (Congo).

"So I bought as much as I could afford, and I crossed the border into the Congo. I re-sold the goods, making some relatively good profits. I bought some other goods - rice and groundnuts - from the DRC  and brought them to Uganda where they were in high demand. After I made the journey there and back three times, unfortunately war and bad fighting broke out again in Congo and I couldn't continue to risk losing my money, the little money I had raised.