From Congo to the World

DE LA ROSE was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo — a country of staggering beauty and deep complexity, where the Congo River carves through rainforest and the eastern highlands rise toward Rwanda and Uganda.

From the earliest years, two things were clear: he could draw, and he could feel music. Primary School Bora. EP Rutoboko. Institut Tupendane. Each school a new chapter, each chapter a new discovery. His teachers noticed the hand — the way it moved with unusual certainty, capturing what the eye barely registered.

Music came the same way. Not learned so much as recognized — as if it had always been there, waiting to be named.

Winning the UNHCR competition did more than bring recognition — it opened a door to formal education. Through the generosity of an individual sponsor, DE LA ROSE received a school sponsorship that made it possible to enroll at St. Leo's College / Kyegobe in Fort Portal. Senior 1, 2, and 3. Three years in the western highlands of Uganda, in the shadow of the Rwenzori Mountains.

That opportunity did not arrive by chance. The funds were carefully managed by Wendle Trust Uganda, ensuring that the sponsorship was properly administered and that the support reached its purpose — a young man's education — without interruption. It was an act of trust, and it was honored.

Fort Portal is a quiet town, green and cool, far from the noise of Kampala. It was here that something shifted. The music deepened. The drawing continued. And for the first time, there was space — real space — to think about who he was becoming and what he wanted to build.

These were years of formation — not just academic, but artistic and human. The boy from Goma was becoming an artist. And the experience of receiving that chance, of having someone believe in his future enough to invest in it, never left him. It became the foundation of his own commitment to creating opportunities for others.