Tribute to the Fallen Don, Dr. Samson Wasara

Dr Wasara’s life story was and is classically inspirational. He was born in Yambio to parents who had served in military services. His father valued nothing more than education but could not afford to finish his own. He had worked as a soldier in the British guided military! This enabled him to feed his family, swearing that he would ensure his children were fully educated. He did. And the fruit of that self-made promise is seen in Dr. Wasara, a brilliant child, who graduated with PhD from the University of Paris.

 Dr. Wasara’s leadership of any committee or commissions that examined the work of the National Economic developments since the birth of South Sudan has led to a major reorganization of the national’s research structure.

 He declined to play active role in politics but chose to educate, to study, to explore and to research! He expected greatness; he demanded independence, creativity and critical thinking. And, above all, he wanted to see or hear something that was new and exciting.

 In other words, Dr. Wasara’s library was a training ground for the real world of science of life and creativity, we each aspired to conquer.

 I was fortunate to have been a student of Dr. Wasara's in the early 90s, a period of great ferment in national catastrophes due to civil wars! It was a transition period in the field, as we moved from the rigor and elegance.

 He was one of a kind, a singular, dominant intellect in our state, as well as South Sudan!

 As my own career developed, I've come to understand and appreciate the enormous influence he has had on my me. His standards weren't just high; they were nearly unattainable.

 Dr. Wasara was brilliant, intuitive and often impossibly inscrutable, and for all those reasons he was a towering figure in my life and my career. He was also generous and gracious to those who worked with him, treating us as colleagues and even as members of an extended family.

 Being a ‘Zinder kinder, as he called his students, was more than being a student; it was a life-long bond with Norton and Marilyn.

 I'm afraid I took that bond a bit too literally, when, a few years after I had returned to New York to start my own lab, I found myself living down the hall from Norton and Marilyn. One evening, realizing that I needed to return to the lab to complete an experiment, I availed myself of that family bond with Norton. I left my son, then a few months old, in his care, promising to return in “just a bit.” A few hours later, I returned to find Norton, pacing up and back with a crying infant in his arms. “He cried from the minute you left. None of my children ever did that.” And while we spent the next 30 years talking about science, Rockefeller and life, we never spoke of that evening again.

 And when my career eventually led me back to Rockefeller, where I took my place alongside Norton as a colleague at the university, I had the distinct sense that I was closer to understanding who Norton was and what made him inseparable from the institution where he had spent his entire career. While my research interests may have moved into immunology and away from bacterial genetics, I still enjoyed walking into Norton's office to show him some data in the hope that maybe he'd be impressed and find what I was doing interesting.

 For, in the end, impressing Dr. Wasara was what it was all about for many of us who asked him for any channels of knowledge! He knew the names of so many rivers and streams. And while I will miss him as a mentor and friend, I'm comforted by the knowledge that his accomplishments, his students and his intellect are enduring and will continue to exemplify the very best.

 One of the best gifts we can honor Dr. Wasara is researches, education, peace and hard work!

 I promise prayers for you, the children and the needy and whole nation!

 We will try keep time and report timely!

 God bless you and blessed New Years

 Salve tutti