Bill opens the Gates to his wealth

All of us have heroes, but they keep changing. In school, it was my geography teacher. He was captivatingly anecdotal and a fantastic orator. When he spoke about the mountains, the rivers, the forests, it was as if we were being taken on a conducted tour of the world of nature.

My other hero in school was my class teacher. He was a rare mix of authority and humility. He didn’t believe in the power of spanking and allowed his smiles to rescue a tense moment. My last hero was our very popular football coach. He saw the lover of the game in me and encouraged me to play the game with passion.

Then came college and with it new heroes. Even before I had reached the 100th page of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s mind-blowing tale, Crime and Punishment, the Russian genius had become my new hero.

Then pulsating youth fell for Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights. Bronte almost took the place of Dostoevsky.

The situation forced me toadmire those who worked toreduce the bitterness

I felt the same after I read Albert Camus’s The Outsider, D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles.

Well, one morning I woke up to discover that it was high time fiction made way for reality to take over. And in days, I realised that it was going to be bitter.

The bitterness came in the form of lack of water, food scarcity, homelessness. Shockingly, one set of human beings enjoyed glittering dwellings, heavenly cuisines and aerated water. Another set was hit by killer droughts, unending starvation and roofless homes.

The situation forced me to admire those who worked to reduce the bitterness. The fight against life’s inconsiderate ways threw up Mother Teresa, Abdul Sattar Edhi and Ratan Tata. They became my heroes.

But I was tempted to rethink my list when I heard that Bill had decided to open the Gates to his wealth to make life somewhat less bitter for some.

Bill Gates pledged he would donate 99% of his tech fortune to the Gates Foundation, which will now close in 2045, earlier than previously planned.

Gates pledged to give away almost his entire personal wealth in the next two decades and said the world’s poorest would receive some $200 billion via his foundation at a time when governments worldwide are slashing international aid.

The pledge is among the largest philanthropic gifts ever — outpacing the historic contributions of industrialists like John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie when adjusted for inflation. Only Berkshire Hathaway investor Warren Buffett’s pledge to donate his fortune — currently estimated by Forbes at $160 billion — may be larger depending on stock market fluctuations.

“It’s kind of thrilling to have that much to be able to put into these causes,” Gates said in an interview.

Therefore, they who, almost all, stopped me from drinking Coca-Cola (Coke Zero) were not fully right because Buffett inspired Bill. They are trying to can the bitterness.