Manyima Njie

My name is Manyima (Nyima) Njie. I was born in little village called Japineh but spent most of my life in an orphanage called SOS Children’s Village in Bakoteh. My birth mother passed away six months after I was born. I grew up thinking I lost the connection to the person who gave me life but everything has a reason in this world. This is because I now have many brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers than I could have ever imagined in this lifetime. Family for me no longer means biological relations but the sincere affection one receives from another without any hidden motives. I was taught to care and treat every human being as special regardless of where they came from. Being adopted was the best thing that happened to me. It made me escape from the tradition of early school dropout, teenage marriage, and most importantly, being unable to voice out my opinions and views as a female. I am the first female in my biological family to finish high school and head straight to college to pursue higher education in a foreign country. Through SOS, I was able to follow my passion for sports while simultaneously feeding my curiosity for education — as in my culture, female athleticism and intelligence were not celebrated but frowned upon. I was called a boy, laughed at, bullied, but those are what made me into the woman I am today. All the good and bad experiences, emotional break downs and lost identity made me realize life is what you make of it — I chose to smile and brighten people’s life.