Young Boy Under 15
Hello my name is Ato. I’m 16 years old and
live in the village. I was born in Ghana and lived in a village 2 hours away
from here we moved here because there was better access to water my family only
had to walk 1 hour away to get it instead of 2 hours each way at the last
village. I have lived in this village since I was 8. I live with my Mother,
Father and my older brother.
I go to school in the village and I’m getting really good at
reading and writing, I am the top of my class. I have big hopes and dreams for
my future I hope one day to be able to travel to the city to live and to work
so I can get lots of money for my family to make their lives better. I really
enjoy school the class I am in has 15 other students only one of them is a
girl, not many girls seam to carry on with education past their younger years
as they are needed to collect water for their families so are too tired or
don’t have time to come to school. A lot of them got so behind in the learning
with all the missed school too that it was too hard for them to continue so
they had to leave. I am very lucky my mother collects the water for our family
and my dad and brother either help her or work on our little patch of land
farming to grow food for us and extra to sell on to get money to provide us
with other things we need. My younger classes were much bigger than the one I
am in now a lot of the boys dropped out too as they were needed on their family’s
lands to grow food or to be sent off to work to provide for their families, in
my family my brother and father work extra hard to do all of the work
themselves so I can stay in school and hopefully one day be clever enough for a
job in the city. This means we scrape by day to day always a little bit hungry
but one day I will repay them for their sacrifice.
My family have always been good to me. They have made many
sacrifices. When I was 7 I was very ill. I was being sick all of the time and I
was running a very high temperature. I couldn’t keep any food down and as I was
already quite thin I was skin and bone, they said I nearly died. The doctor in
the village said it looked to be cholera or dysentery and that I must’ve drank
some bad water, which is hardly surprising because it was always brown and had
bits in it. They said I needed some form of tablets, antibiotics I think he
said, my brother walked for 24 hours total to the nearby villages all over
looking for somewhere that had some. I got lucky. Since then I’ve been grateful
for every day I am in school and healthy. As I’ve said I will get a good job
and pay them back. I have had some friends that weren’t so lucky in the past
they didn’t make it.
Up until now there hasn’t been any problems in this new
village with the water although it still tastes a bit funny, it comes from a
bore hole so It’s a little bit cleaner than the stagnant puddle we used to use.
We just have to hope there is no more illness really….
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