WHERE IS THE GAMBIA?
WHERE IS THE GAMBIA?
MEET THE COLLEGE-BOUND STARLING STUDENTS
PENDA JALLOW, 23
Nursing
Binta, a schoolmate of mine, died when we were in grade eight. She was complaining of a bad headache during math class so they sent her home and she never came back. We learned later that it was malaria, an illness easily cured with medicine that few of our families could afford.
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Death from malaria is common in our villages in the Gambia but what makes losses like Binta’s difficult is the way our villages work. In my country your family and your village are the same thing: you love and care for your neighbors the same way you do for your own family members. We have a phrase in Mandinka, my native language, to describe this, “dunya munoy maccoro” which means “the world is about helping one another.” So when we lose someone close to us, the village mourns that loss together.
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“Dunya munoy maccoro.” I was raised with this phrase constantly echoing in my head. When one of our elderly neighbors hurt her foot, I went over to her compound everyday to bring her water since she could not fetch it from the village pump herself. When wild dogs killed some of our neighbor’s chickens a few families in the village gave her some of their own chickens. When Binta died the people came by her mother’s compound for weeks to pray with her, to talk to her and help her with daily chores.
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“Dunya munoy maccoro,” describes the kind of person I was raised to be and is the reason I want to go to college in America. We have so many illnesses and deaths in my country that could be prevented if the country had access to the right medicine and better health services. I want to study business or health in college so that I can come back to the Gambia and help not only my village but the rest of the country. I want to establish better ways of getting health services out to rural villages like my own. I want to help build more health facilities, find a way to provide more medicine and create a fleet of travelling health buses that can drive through the villages in the countryside and provide healthcare services wherever they stop.
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In our village they say that when you die it is because Allah wanted it to happen. In some cases I think this may be true but I don’t believe that this is the case when people like Binta die from preventable illnesses. Malaria is so common in our country and if more people could afford the medicine we wouldn’t have so many children dying from it. The Starling Sponsorship Program helped me to achieve my dreams of graduating high school and, hopefully, going to college in America. In return, I will bring my college education back to the Gambia to make sure that other children like Binta can survive childhood illnesses and grow up to be successful adults who can also help our country. In the Gambia, “dunya munyo maccoro” is about being a good person and I want to do my best to help the same neighbors who have helped me.
AWA JARJU, 23
Business
There is one particular conversation I had with my grandmother before she died that I will always remember. After a typical Sunday of helping my stepmother hand-wash the family’s clothes, feeding our six chickens and goat, picking wood for the cooking fire and helping prepare dinner, I was sitting quietly next to the dwindling fire with my grandmother as she braided my hair in tight rows. We had been talking about my schooling when she asked me, “And what do you plan to do after you finish high school?”
I decided then to share with her my secret dream of going to college in America and becoming a successful business woman who owned a grand hotel chain in the Gambia, our home country. But when I finished telling her she laughed and said, “Awa, this ambition of yours is only meant for men. You don’t need such a high education as a girl. Pray, instead, that you find a husband who will own these hotels.” These words are seared into my memory. Though I would hear her say this to me many times after this, the first time hurt me the most. I felt lonely and disappointed. I had wanted her support and motivation; I had wanted her to be proud of my plans.
Looking back now, and knowing the culture of my country, I do not blame my grandmother for what she said to me. She was born in a time where women had even less rights then they do now. Today, education for girls is still considered a second priority. While I was very lucky to have parents that allowed me to finish my schooling, many of my friends were not as lucky. The Gambia is very poor and all of the people we know struggle to make enough money to take care of their families. This means that when finances are particularly thin the families pull their daughters out of school so they can help around the house and save the money that would go to their tuition. In some cases, the daughters are married to older family friends to lower the family's living expenses.
Over the years I have watched this happen to my female friends and this is what sparked my plan. If I could build a successful hotel chain in the Gambia, I would be able to employ hundreds of Gambians to work at my hotels and I would pay them well. This would mean that they would not have to struggle so much to care for their families but, most importantly, more girls in my country would be able to finish their schooling. As a woman, this is important to me because I want to see the women in my country have their own place among the men.
It was only recently that I understood that my grandmother’s harsh words were an attempt to protect me. She knew how difficult a journey it would be for me to accomplish my plans. She thought if I only wanted to be a wife and a mother than I couldn’t be disappointed. I have been determined to show her that my dreams are possible. I worked hard in school and whenever I received an award for my good work I would run home to show her first. Though she passed away before I finished high school I hope that she is still watching over me. I want to show her- and the rest of the Gambian women- that women can be so much more than just wives and mothers: they can help change our country.
ADAMA JARJU, 23
Computer Science
During the long walk to and from my school I would daydream about being Walter O’Brien, the main character from a TV show called Scorpion. When I would lose myself in these thoughts I would no longer be walking along a dusty dirt road in the Gambia but inside a lab furiously typing lines of code into my Apple computer. When I would pick firewood with my siblings for my step-mother’s cooking fire I would imagine that I was working with my fellow Scorpion teammates on complex mathematical problems that would help save the world.
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Part of the reason I couldn’t stop thinking about the show was that watching TV was a new experience for me. The village in the Gambia where I grew up did not have electricity so it wasn’t until grade nine- when I moved to a different village for high school- that I experienced TV for the first time. Watching TV fascinated me, as did working on the computers at school.
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So when my uncle showed me an episode of Scorpion, everything clicked into place. The show is about a computer science genius, and his team called Scorpion, who use their intelligence to save the world from destruction. After watching one episode, I looked at the TV and computers that had already fascinated me and saw so many possibilities. From that moment on, what I wanted more than anything else was to study this world of technology at a great university in America. I understand that the show is fictional and that Walter O’Brien is not actually a cyber superhero who saves the world every day but the show did introduce me to the concept that internet and technology are powerful tools, especially for my country.
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Most of the people in the Gambia live in poverty. They do not have access to basic things like running water and electricity and they most certainly have never touched a TV or accessed the internet through a computer. I think if Gambians were able to access information through technology it would also help them rise out of extreme poverty. I want to study math and computer science because I personally find it interesting but I also want to study it because if I become very good at it I can also help my country.
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My dream is to obtain an American college degree and then return to the Gambia where I will build sophisticated computer science labs. These labs will provide computer classes to everyone which will help to decrease the rate of unemployment and poverty. I would also want to bring better computer education to the police forces, armed forces and civil service in the hope that this will eradicate at least some of the corruption in our country. Lastly, I want to bring better cellular companies like Qcell, Gmcell and Africall to the Gambia. In order to do this, I want to work with companies like Facebook who are thinking of creative ways to provide internet connection to the most remote places in the world.
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Walter O’Brien may not really be a cyber superhero that saves the world every day but I want to dedicate my studies at school so that I can become a cyber superhero for the Gambia. I may not be able to save the world but I can try to help families like my own rise above poverty and make better lives for themselves.
