Gents,

If someone gives you an opportunity; Take it.

Yes, you are afraid; Take it.

However small; Take it.

Whatever you don't like about it;

You can correct inside the job;

Not outside as a spectator;

Take it!

Let me tell share my old man's story:

My father was raised in a rice farm. He would farm to pay his school fees as his father was an inveterate drunkard. He ultimately failed his EAACE exams, had Division 4. No campus for him. He saw a beautiful tall woman by the river. Married her. Life was done.

But my mother was not one to live in filth. She wanted more; So did he. So one day he called his father (my grandfather), told him he was leaving for another country. No money. No connections. Just a man, faith & his young family. He set out for a neighboring country.

On arriving, he joined a church & social community and was soon identified by the pastor. Given a scholarship to study certificate in theology in a seminary. But he had to fend for himself and his family. My old man figured it was better than nothing.

On the 2nd day at the seminary, pops & my mother rushed to the students' department, requested for any job available. They were given slashers. Both of them. Told to slash around the campus. Now, they had an income. One problem solved. Time for studies now.

Pops finished certificate level, now it was mom's turn. She joined the certificate level. Library studies. Pops had been promoted. He was the supervisor. Mom could concentrate on studies. We had been registered in a public school. Life was going on.

1 day while supervising fellow students' work at the seminary farm, white administrators came. They asked if there was anyone who could operate a telephone. Everybody went quiet. My father raised his arm. He had never even seen a telephone in his life.

They took him to an office, showed him his working space told him he'd be a phone operator. The moment they turned their backs, he ran to a black colleague, begged him to teach him how to operate the telephone. That's how he started life in the office.

He would go all the way to being the campus registrar when it had morphed into a university, earn a Master's scholarship to the US, and his wife (my mother) would be the campus library supervisor. Daring takes you where hope will not. Don't ever say no to opportunity. Take It!