It is many times that we are depressed about a nose not small enough, legs a notch tinny, a skin not light enough, a size too big for campus and so on that sometimes we lose focus on the things that should really matter. Kelvin Katumwa, however, was not about to focus on what he doesn’t have but rather on the ability to make the impossible possible. Born deaf, Kelvin knew his way around the world would be to work much harder to attain what is taken for granted by others.
Going through Wakiso Secondary School for the deaf for both O’ and A’ level, Kelvin was able to attain a government scholarship to pursue a bachelor’s degree in Quantitative Surveying at the biggest pubic university in Uganda, Makerere. This was a bitter-sweet feeling for deaf Kelvin whose excitement was often interrupted by the anxiety of being in a talking people community who could not understand his language(sign language).
Living with a strange government allocated translator that had to hope with him from class to class was not going to be any easier but the greater good was what really mattered to Kelvin.
Kelvin was allocated a room in Mitchell hall where he lives with his government translator, Christopher. Their normal routine is to go to class every day with the translator interpreting for him whatever the lecturer says to the class. He has also been able to build a social life with some of the students with whom texts are the major means of communication.
“Hindrance does not make anything impossible” Kelvin signed as I left, leaving me to stare helplessly at his translator for help.
You must be logged in to post a comment.