I’m writing from Kakuma Refugee Camp, in the far northwest of Kenya, where the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Kenya/Sudan program (Sarah’s employer) plays many roles in the management of the camp, which is home to more than 60,000 people these days. I’m here because I’m producing this LWF program’s annual report for 2007 and am visiting most of the project areas in Kenya and southern Sudan to gather information and photos for the report.
This morning I was up very early, before sunrise, to see a group of Sudanese refugees leave the camp and return home. The war in their country is over, a peace agreement is signed, and these refugees are slowly leaving and going back home to start rebuilding their lives and their country, most of them starting from nothing.
We went to watch the final steps of the departure process this morning at the reception/departure center. We woke them up when we arrived while it was still dark so they could be fed a hot meal by LWF and loaded on buses. Some were already awake, however. They were checked out a final time by UNHCR on registration sheets, and each submitted a final “signature” – a thumbprint – on their identity papers.
All the families and individuals had piled up the entirety of their worldly possessions in the open areas between the sleeping shelters and then moved them over to the bus-loading area after eating breakfast. They had apparently loaded some of their other materials and possessions from their homes onto larger cargo trucks – the corrugated iron sheets that had been the roof of their houses and perhaps their sleeping mattresses.
I’m not sure how emotional the departure from the camp was for the several hundred who left this morning, but it was emotional for me to witness. I spoke to one young woman, 20 years old, who has been living in the camp since 1994. She doesn’t really remember anything about Sudan, where she was born. As I watched these people return to their home country, people who have been refugees, individuals without a home or a country, I was feeling a lot of things for/with them – they must have felt some excitement to return to their country, their familiar home areas, but anxiety as well, not to mention some sadness, perhaps, at leaving a place where many have lived for several years or more.
As I watched families scramble and try to keep small children together and round up luggage, I thought of myself and how I’ve moved long distances in my life, doing the same. As I watched these people load onto five buses, I remembered how I boarded a Greyhound bus in Boston at the end of the summer after my senior year of college to move to Chicago, which really was the beginning of my adult life. I recalled how scary that was. I knew Chicago a little from having visited a couple times, but I was going to a new home far from the one I had known for several years to establish myself, basically from scratch.
And I recalled moves I had made to new countries. Indeed, these were voluntary and not forced moves, but there are some similarities between me and my moves and the return of these people to a different country, and there are differences as well, of course. I recalled my feelings of both anxiety and excitement (felt simultaneously) about moving to a new place and country as I began my journey. Of course, when I’ve moved overseas, it has been away from home, so mine has been the opposite situation. The refugees carried the entirety of their worldly possessions with them, and what was important to them – clothing in suitcases, and, for some people, a large wooden cross carried in their hands, or a small radio-tape player, and, for many families, plastic dishes and cups and water cans. One man even had a live chicken bound by its feet by a cord and hanging upside down from his waist. When I’ve moved, I’ve had my luxuries – my extras – shipped ahead – my piano music and favorite pillow and kitchen implements – while my most valuable possessions, what I hold most dear and important, are the laptop computer, my iPod and digital camera. What a world of difference!
What an amazing time to experience with these people this morning, with all the symbolism and practical significance it carries. I felt a connection with them because of the life I’ve lived in the past several years – moving and living in two countries outside my home country and knowing what it feels like emotionally (and some of the practical challenges too!) to leave a place and start new in another country. But I also felt quite distant from them because of the differences between our moves – they as people who left their homes and country by force, and me by choice, and how difficult it is for them to go back, but how much help I’ve had from others to make my move easier. But there we were this morning, sharing that moment together, me with my memories of the past, and them experiencing those same emotions in the present.
This morning I was up very early, before sunrise, to see a group of Sudanese refugees leave the camp and return home. The war in their country is over, a peace agreement is signed, and these refugees are slowly leaving and going back home to start rebuilding their lives and their country, most of them starting from nothing.We went to watch the final steps of the departure process this morning at the reception/departure center. We woke them up when we arrived while it was still dark so they could be fed a hot meal by LWF and loaded on buses. Some were already awake, however. They were checked out a final time by UNHCR on registration sheets, and each submitted a final “signature” – a thumbprint – on their identity papers.
All the families and individuals had piled up the entirety of their worldly possessions in the open areas between the sleeping shelters and then moved them over to the bus-loading area after eating breakfast. They had apparently loaded some of their other materials and possessions from their homes onto larger cargo trucks – the corrugated iron sheets that had been the roof of their houses and perhaps their sleeping mattresses.
I’m not sure how emotional the departure from the camp was for the several hundred who left this morning, but it was emotional for me to witness. I spoke to one young woman, 20 years old, who has been living in the camp since 1994. She doesn’t really remember anything about Sudan, where she was born. As I watched these people return to their home country, people who have been refugees, individuals without a home or a country, I was feeling a lot of things for/with them – they must have felt some excitement to return to their country, their familiar home areas, but anxiety as well, not to mention some sadness, perhaps, at leaving a place where many have lived for several years or more.
As I watched families scramble and try to keep small children together and round up luggage, I thought of myself and how I’ve moved long distances in my life, doing the same. As I watched these people load onto five buses, I remembered how I boarded a Greyhound bus in Boston at the end of the summer after my senior year of college to move to Chicago, which really was the beginning of my adult life. I recalled how scary that was. I knew Chicago a little from having visited a couple times, but I was going to a new home far from the one I had known for several years to establish myself, basically from scratch.
And I recalled moves I had made to new countries. Indeed, these were voluntary and not forced moves, but there are some similarities between me and my moves and the return of these people to a different country, and there are differences as well, of course. I recalled my feelings of both anxiety and excitement (felt simultaneously) about moving to a new place and country as I began my journey. Of course, when I’ve moved overseas, it has been away from home, so mine has been the opposite situation. The refugees carried the entirety of their worldly possessions with them, and what was important to them – clothing in suitcases, and, for some people, a large wooden cross carried in their hands, or a small radio-tape player, and, for many families, plastic dishes and cups and water cans. One man even had a live chicken bound by its feet by a cord and hanging upside down from his waist. When I’ve moved, I’ve had my luxuries – my extras – shipped ahead – my piano music and favorite pillow and kitchen implements – while my most valuable possessions, what I hold most dear and important, are the laptop computer, my iPod and digital camera. What a world of difference!What an amazing time to experience with these people this morning, with all the symbolism and practical significance it carries. I felt a connection with them because of the life I’ve lived in the past several years – moving and living in two countries outside my home country and knowing what it feels like emotionally (and some of the practical challenges too!) to leave a place and start new in another country. But I also felt quite distant from them because of the differences between our moves – they as people who left their homes and country by force, and me by choice, and how difficult it is for them to go back, but how much help I’ve had from others to make my move easier. But there we were this morning, sharing that moment together, me with my memories of the past, and them experiencing those same emotions in the present.
No comments:
Post a Comment