Don’s snide remark set Monica firmly on her career path

The primary and secondary schools were separated by a fence; to go through the fence, pupils in the first school had to pass the Certificate of Primary Education.

But there was something else about that fence. The pupils who did not obtain a “pass” to cross over had to leave the special education institution and face the difficult world outside.

But little Monica Mbaru, a lower primary pupil at Thika School for the Blind, was not prepared to accept those conditions.

Unlike many of her schoolmates, she did have a home to return to, but the drudgery of life in Mukurwe wa Kihumbi-ini village in Gatanga division was not a very bright prospect. So she threw her herself into studying to pass that exam.

Changed dramatically

Monica was born with sight, but her life changed dramatically when an incident during her childhood left her visually impaired.

She was playing with other children when one of playmates flung a splinter of wood which injured her left eye, leaving her almost blind.

Concerned that her chances for a decent life were seriously compromised, her parents took her to the special school when she was five.

“It is a tough world when you have a disability like mine. You had to be hard and mean -- and literally fight,” she said at her office at the African chapter of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ). “It is the only way to get somewhere in a world where doors slam bang in your face just because of your disability.”

Her story is unfold in her office at the International Commission of Jurists, African chapter in Kileleshwa.

A graduate of the University of Nairobi, the University of Pretoria and the American University in Cairo, Ms Mbaru Monica is the epitome of sheer determination and hard work; but along the way, she had fight the ‘‘blind girl’ tag.

“When I was younger I hadn’t realised I was different from other children. However, when I went home for holidays, I noticed everybody in the family went out their way to be nice to me,” she said.

At school she was in familiar territory, and most of her schoolmates were totally blind. “In this environment, nobody stood out because we were basically the same.”

However, this same environment provided little or no exposure to or interaction with the outside world, something that she says greatly limited their experience. Looking back, she thinks an integrated system of education is best for children with disabilities.

Eventually she passed through the fence to the secondary school.

“All this time, we were learning using Braille and had little contact with people who could read and write in the conventional way. Our world revolved around the Braille. “
She enjoyed secondary school but got a shock after completing Form Four.

“I don’t know how it had happened. Somebody had decided that all we could do after completing secondary school was to settle for a career as telephone operators,” she said.
“I rejected this prospect outright. I couldn’t accept that I couldn’t hope for something better than that,” she said.

At the time the only option was to pass O levels and proceed to A levels, so she got to work and had a Division One (the highest one got in the Form Four exams to proceed to form five) to show for her efforts.