If You Knew

If you knew what my life has been like, you wouldn’t look at me this way when I ask you for a thousand more shillings, call you three times to see if you got my email, take up half an hour of your time outside your hotel even though I wasn’t on the list of “accepted students” you posted outside the office. With the note saying how hard it was to choose, how you wished us all well with our pursuit of education.

If you knew I only eat a meal a day, and that’s why I called you to ask for more money, after you’d already made a check out to my school to pay my fees, you wouldn’t lose your patience with me.

If you knew my only motivator growing up was fear, maybe you would understand why I didn’t tell you in the interview I had an outstanding balance at my school.

If you knew this scholarship means I’ll finally be able to go to boarding school and get out of my uncle’s house where I work all day to earn my keep, with no time to study, maybe you’d pick me even though I get C’s and D’s.

If you knew I could get 3 masters degrees for the price of your 1, maybe you’d see it’s worth it to put me through medical school.

If you knew I have no idea where my parents are, whether they’re dead or alive, maybe you’d be as shocked as I am to see how you talk to your mom sometimes.

If you knew I’ve seen a man almost shot over a jerry can of water in the refugee camp, you’d see that it’s not just a bottle of water to me.

If you knew that my features are typical Southern Sudanese, and that this fact is grounds for a life of discrimination, both in Kenya and in my own country, you’d understand how much more fighting needs to be done to be able to say that “everyone is equal”.

If you knew I’ve seen hyenas too, eating dead bodies while I was fleeing civil war, you’d realize wild animals are not just “beautiful” and “peaceful” they way they look on safari.


If you knew the only reason I showed up to your hotel was to say it’s okay you didn’t pick me, I’m happy for those you did pick—they’re my brothers.

If you knew that if you don’t pay my school fees now, my mom says I have to go back to the cattle camp in Sudan next month.

If you knew my ulcers make it impossible to eat whatever food is available to me, let alone study.

If you knew I look nice and presentable because I wore my very best clothes to come to meet you.

If you knew this chance to study means the difference between a wasted life and a future full of hope.

If you knew. If you knew. If you knew.