Elisha, 19, is from a remote, rural village within the Kibondo district of the Kigoma region of western Tanzania. Elisha is the fifth of 10 children (now ages 9 to 27) born to George John Kachila and Justina Braiton Rulanduye, both peasant farmers who cultivate maize, beans, and cassava to support their large family.
When he was just 18 months old, Elisha started losing his sight. George and Justina didn’t have the money to take him to a doctor, so it wasn’t until it became clear that Elisha could not see at all that they collected donations from fellow church members, relatives, and neighbors to make the two-day journey to see a specialist in Dar es Salaam. When they arrived at the Muhimbili Hospital in Dar, doctors diagnosed Elisha with eye cancer (retinoblastoma) and said that he needed surgery immediately to prevent the cancer from invading Elisha’s brain. The surgery was far too expensive for George and Justina to even consider, so – miraculously – the doctors themselves pooled their own funds and paid for it as well as for Elisha’s subsequent care.
After spending two months in hospital, two-year-old Elisha returned home. In his family’s village, community members told his parents that blind children are not meant to go to school and that they should turn Elisha into a “street beggar” to earn money for the family. Thankfully George and Justina chose to ignore this prevailing prejudice (it is still a common practice in rural areas for children living with disabilities to be discriminated against, abused, and forced to beg), and instead they followed the advice of the doctors at Muhimbili who said not to be ashamed of their son, not to hide him, and not to be afraid of what other people think or say.
When Elisha first came home from hospital, his parents put fake plastic eyes into his sockets to make him appear more “normal.” The plastic eyes were uncomfortable for Elisha so they soon stopped using them.
In 2010, at the age of 7, George and Justina sent Elisha to a special primary school for children living with disabilities in the Kasulu district – a six-hour journey from his village. It was the first time Elisha had ever been away from his loving family, and Elisha reports that this was the most difficult period of his life. His parents had always helped him do everything, including personal hygiene. At school, he was expected to take care of himself — from taking a shower to washing his own clothes. Elisha says that he was miserable and lonely, always dirty, and without friends. Eventually, Elisha was able to connect with other children who were also living with disabilities and from them he learned how to care for himself. After this, Elisha reports, “life started to change slowly, and things started to make sense.” It was during these years that Elisha also learned to read and write using braille.
When Elisha was in 4th grade, he was transferred from to a school closer to his home, which was a relief to Elisha as his parents were able to visit him. After completing primary school Elisha was chosen to attend the Tabora Boys government secondary school for his O-levels (lower secondary school). Tabora Boys is a competitive government school and one of the few schools in Tanzania that receives students who are blind or living with disabilities.
At Tabora, Elisha first had to rely on classmates to hold his hand to guide him around the school. After three months, he could move on his own as he had memorized the campus. Mr. Dedan Esrom Runoba is a special ed teacher at Tabora who worked closely with Elisha. Dedan realized early on that Elisha was a very special and bright student. Dedan helped support Elisha in many ways: he insisted that Elisha was always placed in the front of his classes to help him hear and engage in conversation; he told all the teachers and fellow students to use their names when speaking to Elisha (e.g. Hello Elisha, this is Anne. I sit to your right in English class.) so that he could identify who was who and start to develop relationships; and he reminded teachers and classmates to explain where things were in space rather than just saying “here” or “there.” Additionally, Dedan created — and did his best to enforce — the motto that "disability is not inability" to help prevent Elisha, and others, from being discriminated against.
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“Elisha is a kind person who loves music. He sings to remove bad feelings and to put himself in a good mood. He is also very smart. He is curious to know about a lot of things, and he does well in his classes because he asks a lot of questions. For sure he is a person with incredible abilities.“
—Elisha’s brother Enosi John George (age 24)
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Elisha worked extremely hard throughout his lower-secondary school years and achieved extraordinary remarks. (He graduated scoring Division 1.8 on his leaving exam and earned a certificate of recognition for his “high performance in academics despite his disability”). Elisha would stay after his classes to talk to his teachers to make sure he understood the materials, and he relied on peers to share notes about what was written on the blackboard. As Elisha listened to their voices, he would type the information into a braille machine that would then translate the information into braille form, which Elisha could then read later using his fingers. (Elisha tells us time and time again how extremely thankful to all his classmates who shared their notes. Students who volunteered to help Elisha were exempted from such school chores as cleaning the classrooms and dormitories and doing outdoor manual labor.)
During Elisha’s third year at Tabora Boys, a new history teacher named Mr. Sanga joined the school. Mr Sanga is also blind. Mr. Sanga uses a special notepad for his work, which is a more advanced, portable tool that stores large amounts of data and displays it in braille format. Whenever Mr. Sanga could, he would lend the machine to Elisha to assist him with his studies.
Elisha’s life at school was not without challenges. Elisha reports that he had a difficult time making good friends and that he was often subject to bullying. (That said, Elisha did make one good, loyal friend at Tabora Boys, Sajo Mathais, and Sajo is now a Unite Scholar as well.) Additionally, due to his family’s extreme poverty, Elisha was always running out of such essentials items as soaps, toothpaste, uniforms, and bus fare to get home over school holidays.
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“Elisha is a talented poet and public speaker and a great singer and songwriter. At our graduation ceremony, Elisha sang a song, and everyone was so impressed by his performance that they stood for him.”
—Sajo Mathias, a friend to Elisha and a fellow Unite Scholar
As a Unite Scholar, Elisha will attend a quality higher secondary government school for Forms 5 & 6 (11th &12th grades). We are currently awaiting school assignments from the Tanzanian government. Elisha is also receiving one-to-one mentor support as well as trainings in critical life skills and the soft skills of professionalism necessary for success. Unite is committed to doing everything possible to help Elisha to achieve his dream of becoming a journalist for such news outlets as BBC, CNN, and Voice of America, and launching a mass education campaign about the “rights and talents of disabled people in Africa.”
We are now seeking additional support for Elisha
Of the required $2,000 a year for Elisha’s comprehensive Unite Scholar/Mentorship Program A-level sponsorship, Unite has raised $1,000 to date. We are now seeking a sponsor to cover the balance of these fees ($1,000 a year for two years). Additionally, we are looking to raise $2,500 to purchase essential supplies for Elisha, including:
The LyriQ Assistive Text-to-Speech Reader
A foldable walking cane
A number of books in braille recommended by Elisha’s former teachers
A voice recorder