Bira's Story

Mr Najunda Rao is a landlord.  He owns the Senior Boys Hostel for Gospel School for the Deaf. Mr. Rao is also the owner of design grafix in Fiji. Last April, Mr Rao offered to take Bira, one of the deaf students who had completed his program at Gospel School for the Deaf, as an intern at his company. In eight months, Bira has missed only one day because he was sick. He is always on time, and is an excellent worker. Employees have only the best things to say about him.  Bira has even taught some sign language to his co-workers.  Mr. Rao would like to hire Bira, but he will be returning to his family in Kiribati at the end of the year.

​We visited Bira at his work place this past week, to see him in action.  It was amazing to see the variety of jobs for which Bira has been trained: making posters, banners, and all types of signs; painting lettering on vehicles; making and polishing foam letters; soldering frames for billboards; using a jig saw for cutting letters out of wood; and operating machines used in cleaning businesses.  Mr. Rao has even offered to donate machines for Bira to take back to Kiribati, so he can start his own business there. 

​Here, Bira points to Kiribati on a large map that he helped put together at work.  
 
Bira came to Fiji from Kiribati when he was 13 years old, and is now 20.  He came to Fiji to attend The Gospel School for the Deaf.  After he completed his program at the school, Bira went on to a two year program at Suva Vocational School.  Bira will now return home with an education, a sign language communication system, many new skills learned at design grafix, lifetime friendships, good memories, and a deep faith and love for God, that grew as he studied Bible at GSD.