I don´t want to paint her black

Chinemu

Chinemu's Journal

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• 2011 VOF Week 3

Having moved from a decent comfortable home following the death my parents, I lived life the bitter way.
Though shelter was provided in my uncles one roomed house, No one guided me as a child, I had to skip my childhood and I had to take full control of life like an adult.
My uncle was loving but rarely had time for me. He worked at night as a security guard and during the day I too would be in school.
My aunty who had the responsibility of ensuring I had all necessities ignored my needs.
I don´t want to paint her black, I understood her, she was a bitter woman.
My uncle cheated on her several times, she suffered verbal abuse but could not leave her matrimonial home because she had no means of survival.
Her situation strengthened me, even when I would go hungry for two days, my mission was to be educated. Though the temptation to fall off the right path sometimes was great, thanks to my guardian angel, I pulled through.
As a growing lady I felt I had a responsibility of ensuring girls acquired education to be liberated from any form of male abuse, I decided to use the poor of a pen to achieve this.
But my campaign has never been easy, most uneducated women still believe a girl does not need to more educated than a man because she becomes disrespectful to men.
The economic situation has also forced families to concentrate more on the male children than females, believing that a girl child has hindrances in her education career such as teenage pregnancy while others believe that women should be educated by their spouses and their spouses believe the opposite.
In overcoming the educational challenges faced by girls in my community, I have continued writing, highlighting solutions to the girls and women education, through writing some girls have managed to find funding for their education , the most missing part of their education.
Sensitization on the dangers of early marriages, pregnancies and HIV/AIDS are part of my writing to ensure girls are empowered with knowledge, they say knowledge is power!
With PulseWire, it has given me a wider platform to share the experiences of other girls and women in worse situations and I share it with others who may feel their situation have no remedy.
Mere communication online has helped me create more opportunities for desperate girls out there, most people would tell me about their organisation in a more detailed way and without realizing that the information will help some women out their, I´m their voice!