"Living with granny with no steady earnings, often sleeping hungry, i turned to the street for survival".

My name is Justine, 8 years old living in Te-obia with my grandmother. As i grew up, I got to know that my mother left me when I was six months and nobody knows her whereabouts since then.

Being the only son to my father, joining hands with my grandmother, they took care of me – enrolling me to nursery school which I completed. Unfortunately, on joining Primary school, my father passed on in an accident in 2015 leading to my dropping out in Primary two since my grandmother could not afford fees payment in addition to getting food for us.

The only way granniy could get food is by helping and digging in people’s gardens who give her money that she then used.
Life at home became so difficult because sometimes we hardly had any food to eat and that situation forced me to go on the street to look for survival. I would collect metal scrap for sale so as to get money for food and some I would give my grandmother.

One day my friend who knew about CRO told me to go with him to CRO Centre and on reaching, we were asked by the teacher why we were not staying at home. I narrated my story and the teacher wrote my name in a book. He asked me to continue coming to the Centre so that he could speak with me again.

I love the CRO class because we learn English and Mathematics. We also play after class with my friends and at least I eat porridge and food at CRO. Sometimes I go back home and I do not find food but when I eat at CRO I just don’t mind. I am also happy that I made many friends at CRO which was not the case at home because during school time, I hardly have anyone to play with since most of the children around go to school.

If God helps me and I study in future, I want to become a driver and drive carefully to protect the lives of the people. I want to be very productive and help my grandmother.