Broomsticks

Each morning I wake up and anxiously check my email to find what progress I've made in my seemingly endless effort to break into Kakuma. I had been instructed by the Senior Protection Officer at the Kenyan Department of Refugee Affairs to make travel arrangements to get up to the camp pending final approval, so all of my logistics had been tidily squared away this past week. Today I awoke to a cryptic email instructing me to get approval from the Ministry of Higher Education, ostensibly because I'm doing research. This email comes two days before I leave, and doesn't include a contact or a means of obtaining approval. I have been wrangling with him for weeks and have obtained full approval from UNHCR, who administer the camp. I am speechless.

Now I assume this is cultural and that nothing comes easily, right? But I also must assume that this man does not want me to go to this refugee camp. He has sent me to get the broomstick of the Wicked Witch of the West. I sent emails to every contact I could find at the Ministry of Education. It turns out there isn't exactly a Ministry of Higher Education, per se. He's directed me to a nonexistent agency, which has absolutely no discernible governance over the refugee sector. I will continue with the full press. There's nothing else I can do - this has become my mission in life. I am feeling a huge weight though, and a creeping desire to cry.

The same batch of email brought an acceptance for my research proposal on 'Educating the Most Vulnerable: The Experience of Unaccompanied Minors in Kenya’s Kakuma Refugee Camp,' which I had submitted to the Nonprofit Academic Centers Council annual conference committee. So, I am really excited to have the opportunity to present my paper next spring at that conference- I've never done anything remotely like that. But it will not be possible without visiting Kakuma. It's all hingeing on the one thing. No pressure, no pressure at all.