As a boy, Lemosolai wondered about school. He’d passed the acacia tree where a white lady was writing lessons on a chalkboard. His father thought that school was unless. He needed his four sons to herd the cattle. A law new was passed that every family must send one child to school. So his father picked on his youngest son, Lemosolai, only six to go.
He was discouraged from using Maa the Masai language. But very quickly he learnt English writing on sand with a stick; he learnt to count using stacks of sticks.
He won a scholarship to a high school in the US. He was very impressed with what he saw. But his fellow students also were impressed with Lemosolai. He made them feel proud of the little that he had.
On one occasion, he asked his fellow students, ‘What is civilization?’ They were puzzled. Then he said, ‘Are people who live in big mansions more civilized than my mother who lives in a cow-dung hut?’
While he learnt to speak, read and write English his classmates learnt many useful values. A students whose mother refused to buy him spikes for running thought of Lemosolai’s values. While I want a pair of spikes there there are many people who can’t afford shoes.
