My humbling experience at Kakuma refugee camp

Curiosity. Apprehension. Excitement. These were all the feelings tugging at me as we took off from Nairobi’s Wilson Airport at 7am on a cold Monday morning in May.

Curiosity because I had never been close to let alone inside a refugee camp. Apprehension because my trip would be partly by road through the Turkana-Pokot border that is currently making headlines in Kenyan newspapers because of conflict between the two communities.

Fortunately there was no incident on the morning that I travelled.

Excitement because I would be meeting with people from rich cultural backgrounds all located in one place with a lot to share about where they come from.

The Kakuma Refugee camp is located in a remote area of northern Kenya called Turkana, an estimated 800kms from Nairobi.

There are two direct flights to Kakuma every week operated by the UN Humanitarian Air Service. The flight usually takes approximately 1½ hours.

Another option is to use indirect commercial flights such as Safari Link to travel to Lodwar (1½ hours) then connect to Kakuma by road which takes 4 hours because of the dilapidated state of the road.

Conflicts between the Pokot and Turkana communities often interfere with transportation on that road but most of the time it is relatively safe.

The refugee community is composed of people from South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Burundi, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Uganda who fled from their home countries due to war, political persecution, famine, drought, genocide as well as religious and ethnic conflicts.

THE HEAT
The first thing you experience when you reach Kakuma is the heat. In the morning, temperatures can be as low as 21 degrees but in the afternoon, it goes up to 35 degrees but feels more like Dubai’s 40 because there is no humidity.

Most visitors, like me, stay at the UNHCR compound. Rooms are 3,000 a day, but you have to book way in advance as they get really full.

In Kakuma IV, the youngest camp, the majority of the refugees are South Sudanese because of the latest influx of new arrivals escaping from recent conflicts in Juba and the surrounding areas.

They live in mud thatched huts similar to those in other rural areas such as Kisumu, where my grandparents used to live.

The beauty of the huts stands out with seamless thatching and roofing. And while the men construct the huts, the women sit with the younger girls teaching them how to cook maize and beans as well as grind Kob (a South Sudanese staple made from maize flour and prepared with butter then eaten with meat or dry fish).

Refugees in Kakuma speak several languages, including English, French, Kiswahili, Arabic, Luganda, Lingala, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi and Somali and this may insinuate a communication barrier but surprisingly, they have found simple ways of communicating: learning basic English, Kiswahili and Sheng, which turns out to be the most popular language with the youth.

MARKETS
There are markets that sell fish, vegetables and charcoal while shops sell hardware items, clothing, beddings, foodstuffs, movies and even mobile phones.

Constant supply of electricity is a myth at the camp so each camp will either use a generator dependent on availability of fuel or solar panels to charge their phones or light up their businesses.

During the rainy season, there is very little usage of mobile phones. Homesteads are typically thrust into darkness at night time, but I was unable to see this as visitors are not allowed in the camps past 5pm.

M-Pesa (mobile money transfer service offered by Safaricom) outlets are also widely distributed across the camp and refugees use this service to pay for products or services as well as send or receive money from customers, friends or relatives.

Organisations working with refugees in Kakuma include the UNHCR, Refugees United (REFUNITE), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Danish Refugee Council (DRC), among others.

Travelling to Kakuma was an eye-opening and humbling experience as there is so much to learn from the different communities about culture, technology and most of all, the resilient human spirit epitomised by one woman who, 30 years on, is still waiting for her daughter to come home.