Welcome

My name is Gereson Yongo. I am a native of Kenya, born in Agok
village of Nyanza province, a small community of about 4000 people
found in western Kenya. The son of Jenipher and Washington Yongo,
my father is a pastor at a local church in the village.
I am the second born of eight.

I was raised in the village of Agok at the shore of Lake Victoria.
Due to poor infrastructure or lack thereof, this village is inaccessible
during rainy season. It is a village with neither hospital nor electricity,
the nearest health facility being 20-miles away. This is where I
attended elementary school before joining Nyabondo High School in
Kisumu district and subsequently Kenya Utalli College in Nairobi, Kenya.

As any other local kid I had a rough time growing-up: going without
food, walking in bare feet, suffering from malnutrition-related
diseases, running 5-miles to and from school, balancing life between
herding cows and goats, attending school, taking care of my siblings
while my mother went to the city to sell dried fish. It took a village to
raise me. From my grandmother, uncles, nephews, and church
members to the next-door neighbor, everyone chipped in to help
send me to school.

After schooling I found myself with no option but to move to
Korogocho slums, Nairobi. I lived there for five-years, in a single
mud-wall 10 x 10foot room, with neither a bathroom nor running
water - not to mention electricity. The only good view I had every
morning was of running raw sewage in front of the house. It is in
the slums of Korogocho that I met the love of my life Susan Atieno.
As of May this year we have been married for twenty-years and
are blessed with five children. My eldest (who was born in the slums)
will be attending college this fall in Georgia, USA.

It is through hard work and dedication that I made my way out of the
slums, and I owe it to God's hands. I have worked with various
reputable hospitality organizations spanning three continents. With the
most interesting work life (in my opinion) being in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,
where I lived for three-and-a-half years. I moved to the United States
five-years ago with my wife and five children.

I have participated in building churches and houses for the widows
in my village, and am currently supporting needy children through
educational funds. I have been a guest speaker in several churches
in Brunswick, Georgia and am presently working as an Outlets
Manager at a prestigious 80-year-old hotel in the coastal region of
Georgia, USA.

I believe all human beings irrespective of gender, race or religious
affiliation have latent qualities that can be tapped and molded into
whatever they want, and that poverty can be eradicated from the
face of the earth given the right tools to unlock that potential. The
key lies in education - both formal and informal.