The staff, students and teachers at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate, Kitchener, Ont., had the privilege to welcome Jacob Deng, one of the “Lost Boys of Sudan,” to speak to us in chapel and in class this fall.
He spoke about his work to help people in South Sudan through Wadeng Wings of Hope. He said that the difference between his small nongovernmental organization and the big ones is that Wadeng works among the people in the rural areas, and is committed to staying for the long-term.
“Wadeng” means to strive toward a brighter future, and it became the motto of the young Sudanese man who learned early in his life that hope for a better future can be the key to survival when he had to flee his village during an attack which killed every member of his family but one nephew. He fled first to Ethiopia and then to Kenya, where, after a long period of time in a refugee camp, he got the chance to come to Canada.
He could escape from the suffering and the hard life into a new life, which he described as “a dream which became true.” In his new life with lots of new possibilities, he never lost his focus on the people in his village, who are still suffering. His foundation is raising money for the people in South Sudan and Deng has travelled there to help direct the building of a vocational school, the drilling of a well and other projects.
For me, personally, it is just incredible how this man never forgets the people in South Sudan, which means he has to deal with his painful past every day. I am not the only person impressed by him and the evidence is visible at school already, through different fundraising events.
It was a great opportunity to have him at Rockway twice and we all learned from him how you can be optimistic in life, even in bad situations, and that we should never forget people who don’t have it as easy as we do.
Being compassionate and responsible are two of the main “pillars” of our learning and acting at Rockway, every day, and he shows both of those characteristics.
Finn Klebe is a Grade 11 student from Germany studying at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate, Kitchener, Ont.
--Posted Dec 24, 2013
Finn Klebe, a Grade 11 student from Germany studying at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate, is pictured with Jacob Deng of Wadeng Wings of Hope, an organization committed to helping the rural people of South Sudan.
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