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SALT LAKE CITY — Have you ever heard of an Olympic snowboarder representing the country of Uganda? Probably not.
However, that's what Westminster College pre-med student Brolin Mawejje is trying to do. He recently returned to Uganda and spoke with government officials about representing Uganda in the 2018 winter games.
"It had blown their mind because no one thinks any African country could be able to do a winter [sport] at the highest level," he said.
Mawejje's story caught the eye of documentary producers. He left Uganda when he was 12 years old and moved in with his mother, whom he had never met before. But Mawejje said she wasn't ready to care for a young boy who was almost a teenager, so he was forced to leave that home, too. He was eventually taken in by friends when he had nowhere else to go.
That's when he fell in love with snowboarding. He said it, and education, have become major focuses of his life. When it came time to pick a college, there was a big reason why he decided on Westminster.
Source: Far From Home
"I applied to a lot of colleges, [including] a lot of high-end Ivy League colleges. But it always came back to being around the mountains," he said.
If Mawejje can get a spot in the 2018 games, he feels it will be a good way to expose winter sports to a lot of people all over Africa.
"There are a lot of countries, like South Africa, that have snow that people can get to. It would be a great way to open people's eyes to the other side of the Olympics," he said.
Producer Phil Hessler has been friends with Mawejje for eight years. Hessler said he has been inspired to tell his friend's story, considering all of the hardships Mawejje had to go through to get out of Uganda. The documentary Hessler is making is called, "Far From Home: Uganda to the Tetons."
"He's one of the most hard-working people I have ever met, so I completely believe in him," Hessler said.
He hopes the movie will be part of the Sundance Film Festival in 2015.
