|
Simsbury Girl Donates Hair to Locks of Love
 | | Feeling light as a feather, Ania beams with her hairdresser, Heidi Morgester of Batik Salon. |
|
Nearly every Saturday for eight years, 13-year-old Ania Wójtowicz attended Polish language school, Szkola Jezyka Polskiego Im. Jana Pawla II in New Britain, so that she would be able to read and write, as well as speak, Polish. Her father, chemical engineer Dr. Marek Wójtowicz, is a native of Kraków, Poland, and they speak Polish together at home. Ania is a citizen of both Poland and the United States.
Going to school on Saturdays had become such a part of her regular routine that when she graduated from the school on June 8, Ania decided to do something special to commemorate the occasion. Ania, who has always worn her hair very long, decided to cut it short to symbolize a new beginning, and also to donate her hair to Locks of Love, an organization that makes wigs for children who have lost their hair due to illness.
Ania has attended Central Elementary and Henry James Memorial School, both public schools in Simsbury. She was a voice finalist in the 2002 Symphony in Simsbury competition, and her artwork won first place in the local, regional, and state 2002 Lions Club Peace Poster Contest. In the fall, Ania will be a freshman at Simsbury High School as well as a theater major at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts magnet school in Hartford's Learning Corridor. Ania lives in Simsbury with her parents and too many guppies.
 | | Ania's first-place poster contains international symbols (flags, the planet earth), peace symbols (doves carrying olive branches, the peace sign), and a bright light that illuminates the planet. The theme of the contest was "Lighting the Path to World Peace." |
|
|
|
|
)
)