Next Monday, January 18, a young Ethiopian man I have been aiding, Zemenu Yohannes Fetene, is to become a medical doctor. His life dream comes true.

From being a homeless orphan with no future to becoming a doctor is much longer than one can even begin to imagine. It is a long way indeed.

As one can imagine, Zemenu is not the type who loses heart so easily. He cannot. For he has seen too much.

His childhood friends, his relatives, even hisown mother, all died young due to a lack of medical assistance.

Alone, impoverished and forlorn he lived in an abandoned hospital until he met a community of Capuchin friars. He would have certainly died almost a child, like so many others, had it not been for them.

When I met him back in 2008 and discovered his heartrending story, and also his dream of becoming a doctor to serve his people, I could not remain unmoved. Despite my limitations, I decided to give a future to at least this one person who could help others.

Now the great day has finally arrived. As he wrote to me this week: “I am going to be the happiest graduate ever.” But he told his benefactors this too: “You believed in me when no one did, you believed in this when no one could, for six long years you believed in me to share what you have and to support me. Now a whole lot of needy patients and their families are going to believe in me for their life.

“You will be part of every smile I am going to put in needy children, in every smile I am going to put on mothers, for every smile I am going to put on elders. You will be there in every pain I am going to heal for the rest of my career, for the rest of my life.”

I write in gratitude to God and in appreciation to the many who, during the last six years (some of whom through the Times of Malta), sent me money to steadily aid Zemenu make this dream come true.