A Day in the Life of seeing a Pygmy in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Patrick Newton Bondo
Email: patrick.bondo2008@gmail.com

A Day in the Life of seeing a Pygmy in the Democratic Republic of Congo

I will never forget the day that I saw a Pygmy in my class, where I was doing some volunteer work, facilitating life skills and livelihoods development in one of the community secondary school in November 2009, in the city of Manono: is a town and territory in Katanga Province, Democratic Republic of Congo.

I was so impressed the courage and determination of this young pygmy amount the other local learners. I was so interested to learn more about this young pygmy, how did end up in the city of Manono which is more than 300 kms from their location. In the deep forest I was inspired by the story he told me that he was the only one in the all location could be able to speak a bit Swahili language and few word of French, then He was selected and sponsored by a local business person who had farming in the area.

Educationally he was doing a bit well as he was still facing some language challenge and stigmatized by the local learners as he was so short by height but the body was a bit build, he was having challenge was wearing shoes and walking properly as in their location, they don’t wear shoes.

I was able through my life skills activities to explain to the entire classes about the importance of acceptance, languages, culture, love and the differences we have as human being and we are created differently. This is making a great diversity in our community and society.

By end of my volunteer term, the young Pygmy was confident, empowered and reaches his full potential to take his studies and life to the next level. The other young people were able to accept him and make him part of their team and fully support him to positively integrate into the school life.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: A pygmy is a member of an ethnic group whose average height is unusually short; many anthropologists define pygmy as a member of any group where adult men are on average less than 150 cm (4 feet 11 inches) tall.

http://www.irinnews.org/in-depth/58647/9/ : When it comes to human rights, pygmy peoples are frequently deprived of the legal protection to which other citizens are entitled. These legal gaps have their roots in a historical tradition of discrimination against pygmies, not only by Africans, but also by European colonists.