Essay: Vida Opoku’s journey from Ghanian refugee to Loyola graduate

Here I am, having graduated in May from the prestigious Loyola University in Chicago. The girl that traveled across nine countries by foot, on horses, by wooden boats with a loose-fitting life jacket before getting to the United States in 2016.

Giving up has never been an option for me in my life. Nine countries saw me pass through, and I made the journey with no relatives, friends, or money to support me. I faced homelessness, discrimination, isolation, and helplessness. I would wake up on the street facing horrible personal violence. I never thought I could survive it.

My childhood is unforgettable. I was born and raised in a small village surrounded by a large forest in Ghana, West Africa. In the village, we all knew one another and treated people as one family.  We had no electricity, so our parents and grandparents would come together every night to tell a story. We played hide-and-seek in the dark until our parents came to look for us. Technology was not part of our lives.

When I came to America, I had culture shock. In America, people were reading books, watching movies, using computers, exploring the world in different ways than I was used to. I started school under mango trees and used my hands to write and draw in the sand—this is how I learned to read and write. I started working on people’s farms to support my family at the age of 7.

I was forced to get married while I was a newly turned teenager, just a young girl unknowing and very naive, because of a family medical debt. Abuse resulted in a pregnancy, and I had my son a few years after. My “husband” and his wives were violent with me day after day. I was rescued by my aunt, and she helped me flee my abusive home, with no time to say goodbye to my son.

Without a visa, there was only one option she could think of: Ecuador. I arrived in a country where I did not speak the language. Emotional and distraught, a stranger suggested that I should make my way to the U.S. When I got to the U.S.–Mexico border, I was arrested, charged with illegal entry, and processed to jail. I was only 17, about to turn 18. After four months of prison, they released me.

It was then that I met Jajah Wuh, a child advocate who saw the light in me and helped enroll me in school. In Chicago I lived in many different homeless shelters while attending school with the aim of gaining my GED and going beyond high school education, reaching and dreaming for college. Sometimes, I had to move more than three times a year to the various shelter programs in Chicago. One day I found myself no longer dreaming.

After completing community college I was facing acceptance into a dream, something so far beyond my Ghanaian village and the life I knew: Loyola University. Even with everything else I had accomplished, my proudest moment was when I was accepted into Loyola. Even with this extraordinary opportunity to be a student at Loyola, I was facing many challenges.

Due to my different cultural background and unique lack of education until I arrived in the U.S., I was struggling. Despite all the challenges, I vowed never to give up on my education. I was working full-time to support myself and taking 16 credit hours or more each semester when someone introduced me to Letitia Zwickert, a Loyola University alum and the founder and CEO of MENTEE, a nonprofit organization that offers global mentorship and knowledge sharing to those marginalized around the world.

Letitia has Loyola’s spirit of giving and helping the world; I feel it deeply from her, as I do from Loyola. Along the journey, I have met many great people and leaders who have been more than friends—they have been mentors and support systems to me. In May, I graduated with a political science degree and minors in health administration and criminal justice. I dedicate this degree to each one of you who has been there to support me throughout and saw something in me that I could not see.