Let’s go back to the early 2000s in Malawi. A country many of us probably can’t point out on a map without zooming in a few times. But that’s where a 14-year-old boy named William Kamkwamba decided he was tired of watching his village starve… so he built a windmill.
Wait. What?
Yes. A windmill. Out of scrap. With no money. No internet. Just one library book, some wire, a busted bicycle, and more determination than most of us have before our morning coffee.
The Book That Changed Everything
William had just dropped out of school. Not because he wanted to, but because there was a famine, and his family couldn’t afford the fees. He was hungry, broke, and bored (which, let’s be honest, is either a recipe for disaster or genius). He started going to a small local library and found a science textbook called Using Energy.
Inside, he saw diagrams of windmills. That’s when he had what I like to call a “Wait, what if…” moment. The kind that hits developers at 2 AM when you’re knee-deep in code, and suddenly you realize you’ve been solving the wrong problem. Yeah. That one.
Except, for him, it wasn’t about fixing a broken website. It was about powering his village.
DIY Engineering, African Edition
Let me paint the picture: No YouTube tutorials. No Home Depot. Just scrapyards and vibes.
William scavenged spare parts, including:
- A tractor fan blade
- Bicycle parts
- PVC pipes
- Blue gum trees (because why not)
He didn’t speak English well, but he understood diagrams. That’s such a developer thing, by the way, “I can’t explain it in words, but here’s a flowchart.”
After multiple failed attempts, he got the blades to spin. Then they generated electricity. Then he powered a lightbulb. Then a radio. Then… a water pump for irrigation.
One teenage boy, one windmill, and a community that now had light and water.
Why This Story Still Blows Me Away
William didn’t have an engineering degree. He didn’t have Wi-Fi. He didn’t even have formal schooling at the time. But he had intention. He had imagination. He had a reason to get up every day and try again, even when everyone laughed at him.
You know what that reminds me of? Every underdog story in tech. Every developer who’s been told “that’s not realistic,” only to prove everyone wrong. Every Black woman who walked into a server room, or a boardroom, or a lab, and changed the rules.
Sometimes, we wait for the perfect time. The perfect degree. The perfect budget. But William reminds us: Start with what you have. Let purpose power your creativity.
And honestly? If a 14-year-old from rural Malawi can change his village with literal trash and a library card, we can definitely show up for that side project, that dream, that idea we keep postponing.
We don’t need to be perfect. We just need to begin.
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