The video of Eunice Alison Nyang’or's commencement speech at Harvard University, Boston, has gone viral.
Picked as one among the three keynote speakers during the globally acclaimed university's graduation day, Eunice, who is also known as Mwabe, was eloquent, witty and humorous in her delivery.
She touched on various topics including her happy upbringing in Nairobi, Kenya as well her fascination with what lied beyond the horizon in addition to old American movies.
“I watched old '60s movies on school nights when I was supposed to be asleep. And [sic] I read a lot of books. I mean, a lot of books. So it was no surprise everything I knew about America, I knew from media,” she remarked.
Mwabe was fearless as she addressed the estimated 32,000 people who had assembled for Harvard University's oldest and most cherished traditions.
Laughter filled the gigantic hall as she laced her point, about the need for humans to view each other without prejudice, that was filled with lighthearted humour.
The Alliance Girls High school alumnus is no stranger to making headlines, having captured the country's attention in 2008 when she emerged as the top student in Nairobi, with 449 marks in the KCPE examination.
She has now attained a Bachelor's Degree in Anthropology at the prestigious university, with a minor in Romance Languages, focusing on French.
Mwabe wrote her first play, Gunned Down – about police brutality and extrajudicial killings in Kenya – in 2011, while she was still in high school.
Getting chosen as one of the select orators is considered among the highest honours that can be bestowed on a student at Harvard.
It involves a panel of judges who sift through the top cadre of students until they identify a student who they deem capable of delivering an address from memory, to the thousands of guests.
