And talking about Ntare School, in Uganda, cannot be complete without talking about the man who ‘fathered’ it: Mr. William Chritchton.
Mr. Chritchton was a truly distinguished man. He died in England on 10.02.1999, at the ripe age of 90. Quite a good number of our compatriots passed through his able and caring hands as young boys during their secondary education, when he was Headmaster at Ntare School, from 1956 until his retirement in 1971.
Of course, the earliest of our young men could not have been many in Ntare before 1959, when the first group of Rwandese went into exile. But the sixties and subsequent years saw a moderately heavy traffic of determined young Rwandese pass through the gates of Ntare, thanks mainly to Chrichton.
He went out personally to the different schools well before the primary seven, or eight before that, final examinations to scout for talent. That he included refugee schools in this exercise was a venture no one else would have been enthusiastic about.
Many headmasters not only despised these refugee schools but actually hated anybody answering to the name Rwandese. A number of them would have done anything to hamper the advancement of these children. It is for this that we shall always remember Matu, as we fondly called our headmaster. We had given him the nickname due to his large ears!
Personally, I had the privilege of meeting Mr. Chrichton in 1969, when a number of us young Rwandese joined Senior 1 from the different parts of Uganda: within refugee camps in Ankole, Bunyoro and Toro, as well as without.
He was 60 years old then, but as robust and strong as if he was in his early forties. My first, direct encounter with his Scottish accent left me puzzled until I met other teachers from Great Britain.
It was then that I realised that all of them did not speak English the same way. I had been told that it was not difficult to extract some money out of the grand old man, if you could talk convincingly in English. Now, telling a fib or two has never been difficult to any of us, but remember, we were speaking English for the first time. So, how could I ask our headmaster anything in that language?
What threw you into a panic, especially, was being in the same class as Indian boys and other town kids who spoke the language as if it was their mother tongue! Anyway, I needed socks and a pair of long trousers, so I was ready to commit suicide! One time, then, with my heart pounding, I entered his office and in a quivering voice shrieked: “Good morning, please, sir! Thank you, sir!”
From his desk he slowly raised his bushy eyebrows and pursed his lips: “Yesh, shmall boy. How old are you?” I ventured an answer to that unexpected question: “I am twenty-one years old, sir. Please, thank you, sir!” You can laugh today, but back then maybe even articulating that ‘please’ only once would have been next to impossible for you! In our primary school we had been taught by teachers fresh from Rwanda, whose smattering of the English language consisted of little vocabulary, mainly ‘preeze’, ‘sankyu’, ‘actuare’, ‘by do way’, etc.
For politeness, they insisted, you had to use the word ‘please’ with every sentence you uttered. Mind you, those days I looked like one of those humanoids from the moon that you see in children’s horror films, with a big head and tiny limbs. When Mr. Chrichton looked at a small boy with a big head, he must have wondered what a P.4 brat was doing in his office. It was no wonder then that he countered: “Come on, shmall boy, you have revershed the numbersh. I know your parentsh have never gone to shchool. You are twelve, OK? One, two.”
To date, I have never reclaimed those 10 years! I said a few ‘sirs’ and ‘pleases’ and made to go, since I had completely forgotten my mission, but he stopped me. “Sho, shmall boy, what wash it you wanted?” I remembered and haltingly explained that I had come to ask for money to buy soap and ivalizi, since I did not know the word ‘suitcase’. You had no chance if you asked for non-essentials like socks and trousers!
After many gestures to show what I meant by ‘ivalizi’, and that I did not mean ‘soup’ but ‘soap’, he gave me a note to take to the school bursar to pick the money. That is only one example of how fatherly our headmaster was.
Mr. William Chrichton, however, was especially remarkable for his liberal approach to the running of the school. When he started Ntare School, it was the only secular one in the area at the time. Apart from the rigidity of the religious schools, he did away with the traditional routines, as they were known then. From the first year, the boys were encouraged to take their lives in their own hands, to develop independent minds and grow into responsible gentlemen.
So, nothing was compulsory in Ntare, except attending class and prep. Yet no one strayed, so much was the pride of excelling: as an individual, or as a community. Competition was thus stiff: in academics, sports or even socially.
When our headmaster raised the collar of his UGIL shirt and walked on to the sports field, our team could not afford to lose. When he raised the collar and stretched a long step to open a dance with a nun from Mary Hill high school, even members of NAPA, the peeping association, cheered themselves hoarse!
Mr. William Chrichton, May God rest your soul in eternal peace!
