Eric is 25 years old and lives in Kisumu. Him and his younger sister are orphans. Before Make Me Smile made contact with him he had dropped out of school to sell popcorn in order to pay for his younger sister school fees. After the deaths of their parents Eric and his sister went to live with their grandparents who were at the time able to cover the costs of their education. However, Eric’s grandfather fell ill and passed away soon after, and it was left to Eric to support his family.
One Evening, as luck would have it, Eric sold some popcorn to Maximilian Ullrich. They began to talk, and what started out as a friendly chat turned into new possibilities and most of all hope. Make Me Smile was able to pay for Eric’s apprenticeship to become a mason, as well as supporting him financially to cover his rent.
By now Eric completed his studies successfully and already obtained a contract for construction. He is still highly motivated and even wants to find his own building contractor to sustain his sister and grandmother. Eric knows that it is still al long way to get there. Therefore in the mean time Make Me Smile has helped him to start a small DVD-business. So even if he doesn’t have any contracts he can still earns some money. He wants to pay his rent by himself and one day he even wants to start a masterdiploma.
Eric is standing on his own feet and is grateful for what Make Me Smile has done for him.

„I want to spread the help Make Me Smile has given to me to other people“ (Eric Ochieng, 27.11.2012)

Eric Ochieng wrote a short paragraph about his life:
Eric Ochieng wrote a short paragraph about his life:
1997 when my father died, I did not even started school yet but I was still with my mother. In our family we are only two children, me and my sister. But what I can say about my story is that I have been passing into difficulties but God helped me and protected me. When my father and my mother passed away I used to live with my grandparents. But all in all I was not in a good situation. But once you were created by God, be ready for anything in this world.
When I started school, I was doing well until I finished class eight. When I entered in form one, I started to have difficulties. My grandfather, who has taken me to secondary school, became ill and he passed away when I was in form one. The way I finished form four was trough my God.
One day in the evening at a place called Mega Plaza, when I was selling Popcorn, I met Max an I told him more about my life history. But through God Max understood my problems and he told me to meet soon. What I told him was: “Max please help me, the kind of job I am doing now will not help me in the feature“. Max asked me: “How do you want me to help?“ I told him: “Please, if you can pay for me school fee, I will go to college.“ Max told me that he will pay college fee for me. By then I did not even know, when or how I will go to college. But through God it happened. So I have my sister who need to be helped, to finish her forth form. Let God bless you brother Max towards it’s assistance on me. Whatever he did to me, God will reward him so much. Thank you very much Max.