New Year’s Resolutions

January is a month when people tend to make resolutions—to stop smoking, lose weight, get in shape, and learn a new skill or language. A new year offers the chance to start over and work on self-improvement. But for those who have to struggle to make ends meet and support families, self-improvement is often a strategy for survival.

When we were living in Tanzania, most of the young people around us were working hard to improve their lot. The full-time day guard at our residence read constantly even though he’d dropped out of secondary school after failing to pass the national exams. [Children had to take national exams before being admitted to secondary school; and to pass the exams, they had to be proficient in English.] In addition to working eight-hour days, Wilfred was taking evening classes with the aim of earning his electrician’s license someday.

Our part-time gardener was another ambitious young man who wanted to get his driver’s license so he could work as a chauffeur someday. After he got the license, he wasn’t able to find work as a driver and started studying for a career in hotel management instead. He took evening classes for a year, but when we left Tanzania to return to the U.S., he moved to South Africa where he hoped to find a higher-paying job.

I saw Wilfred a few years after we moved away, and he was still studying and hoping to make a career change someday. He was optimistic as always even though he was still living with his parents and his prospects didn’t seem promising. Perhaps his dogged efforts to improve his lot—mostly through education—would have ripple effects and inspire his younger siblings to stay in school and study hard.

Kids on the Pitch

Leaving Dar