“Uncle, it’s been a week now you haven’t told us a story,” a kid shouted.
Makol had just opened the sheet-iron gate, which was severely rusted from years of exposure to the Juba heat. He looked exhausted. He was a doctor who worked the night shift at Juba Practice Hospital. They’d gone months without pay at the hospital, a tradition in most government buildings in the country. Before he could fully close the gate, the kids were all over him, two hugging his right leg and three his left.
His uncle was sitting shirtless on a bed outside, next to the bamboo compound. Beside the bed stood a small four-legged plastic stool with a cup, some tea leaves, and a thermos.
“Welcome back, Makol. You look tired!” he said. “Kids, let your uncle rest first, then he will tell you a story. Mary, take your uncle’s bag inside and get him water for a shower.”
Mary was the eldest daughter in the house. She was fifteen years old. She ran to Makol, hugged him, then took the bag from his hand and went into the main house. Makol grabbed a blue plastic chair and sat next to his uncle as he untied his dust-covered boots.
“How was your shift, Doctor?” his uncle inquired.
“It was not bad, Uncle Malou, but if we continue like this many patients will die. Last night we had to perform a surgery using a generator because the power company cut the lights due to unpaid electricity bills.”
“Look at me now, nephew. Since I was relieved from my job I haven’t received my salary for all those sixteen months I worked unpaid. I haven’t been to the ministry but I’m told meya mafih.¹ How are we going to survive in this house?”
“Uncle, tell us a story before you go to bed,” an eight-year-old girl said.
“Okay. Story! Story!” Makol said.
“Story come!” the kids replied in unison.
“Once upon a time, there was a boy called John. John was twelve, but his face looked older than most boys his age. He lived in Kakuma Refugee Camp in northern Kenya, where dust settled on people like a second skin. The roads were always noisy: boda bodas squeezing through the crowds, women arguing near boreholes, children running barefoot between iron-sheet shelters and mud walls.
“Every morning before sunrise, John helped his aunt sell mandazi by the roadside. The smell of hot oil mixed with dust and smoke from motorcycles… By midday, sweat had soaked through his shirt. Other boys spent their afternoons kicking footballs made from plastic bags or wandering around the camp with nothing to do.
“John was different. Even while standing at the stall, his mind was usually somewhere else. He wanted to leave the camp someday. Not because he hated it, but because he feared becoming stuck in it. Kakuma had a way of making people accept survival was enough. At night, when the camp finally grew quiet and the wind pushed against the tent walls, John read books beneath a small solar lamp. He read anything he could find: old textbooks from abandoned classrooms, novels left behind by aid workers, and church donations.
“Inside those books were doctors, scientists, inventors, and people who had changed their lives despite where they came from. That was where his dream started. John wanted to become a doctor. Not because of money or status. Because of his mother. She died while giving birth when he was five years old. People said she lost too much blood before they could get help. At that age, John did not fully understand death. He only remembered the silence that followed it.
“After her burial, the house felt different. Colder. Even laughter sounded wrong for a while. As he grew older, he kept thinking about the same thing: maybe she would still be alive if there had been a hospital nearby. That thought stayed with him.
“Whenever he saw mothers carrying babies in the camp, something tightened inside him. Sometimes he smiled and walked past them. Sometimes he looked away. As a child, he once cut open a dead rat behind their tent using a razor blade because he wanted to understand how bodies worked. His aunt caught him crouching in the dirt. ‘You’ll leave the blade inside that poor animal,’ she laughed. John laughed too, though he had been completely serious about dissecting the rat.
“Life in Kakuma taught people how to laugh at difficult things. School was another struggle. There were no good schools in the camp. The only place you could get a better education was in Lodwar, an hour and a half or even two hours away from the camp. Sometimes John stayed home because he thought he was a genius, considering what they were teaching in the camp. Hunger was also a factor. Sometimes he went to class hungry and pretended not to notice the pain in his stomach.
“Still, he kept dreaming. Many young people in the camp had dreams. Some wanted to become teachers, pilots, soldiers, businessmen, or politicians. Everyone wanted a life bigger than the one around them. John wanted to save lives. But as he grew older, he began to realise that dreams alone changed very little. In the camp, talent often depended on luck. You could work harder than everyone else and remain poor. That truth frustrated him.
“One afternoon, while wiping sweat from his face outside the mandazi stall, John noticed a man standing nearby. He did not look like the usual customers. The man wore a black suit despite the heat. His grey hair was combed neatly backwards, and dust rested lightly on his brown Chelsea boots. He carried himself calmly, almost like someone untouched by the chaos around him.
“His name was Dr Michael. He had grown up poor in a small village in South Sudan before receiving a scholarship to study medicine in Sudan. Years later, he returned to Kakuma through a WHO program to help train health workers. ‘Are you lost, or are you in the right place?’ John joked. Dr Michael smiled. ‘I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. People told me this place has the best beans in Kakuma.’ John smiled back. ‘They weren’t lying, sir. Welcome.’
“Then John noticed the book in Dr Michael’s hand. Gray’s Anatomy. He had seen it before and spent hours staring at some of its pages. ‘I tried reading that book once,’ John said. ‘But I couldn’t understand most of it.’ Dr Michael looked at him carefully. ‘That book is for medical students. Do you want to become a doctor?’ ‘Yes,’ John answered quickly. ‘That’s my dream.’ ‘Then work hard in school,’ Dr Michael said. ‘That’s where it starts.’
“After that day, Dr Michael began stopping by the stall more often. Sometimes they talked about science. Sometimes about life. Sometimes about nothing important at all. For the first time, John felt like someone was taking his dream seriously.
“Months later, Dr Michael introduced him to a small library near the camp offices. John spent hours there reading. Slowly, things began changing. He still sold mandazi every morning, but he also started writing poems in his old exercise books. One evening he wrote: ‘Today I am poor and dusty, but who knows who I will become tomorrow? If this dust does not bury me first, if God still remembers my name, then maybe I too shall rise.’
“Kakuma was not always peaceful. One evening, a fight broke out between refugees and locals. Gunshots echoed through the camp. Women screamed. Children scattered in panic. John stood frozen, holding a book tightly against his chest. That night reminded him how fragile life could be. But instead of killing his dream, it made him hold onto it more tightly.
“People slowly began noticing him. Teachers spoke about ‘the bright boy from the mandazi stall.’ Some admired him. Others mocked him. ‘Books won’t change your life,’ some men told him. Even his aunt was worried. ‘If you leave, who will help me here?’ she asked one night while counting coins.
“John understood her fear. She had sacrificed a lot for him. But he also knew he could not spend his whole life inside the camp. Then one day, everything changed. Dr Michael helped him secure a scholarship to continue his education after completing his primary school education. John could hardly believe it.
“For days, he felt like life had finally opened a door for him. Leaving Kakuma was harder than he expected, but eventually he found himself in Nairobi attending secondary school. The city felt cold, loud, and unfamiliar. Many of his classmates came from wealthy families. Their English sounded polished. Some laughed at his Dinka accent. At first, he struggled badly. But John had survived far worse things than embarrassment. So he did what he had always done. He buried himself in books. Slowly, he improved.
“During school holidays, he returned to Kakuma and taught younger children beneath trees, helping them prepare for exams. People in the camp slowly began seeing him differently, not as a boy who had escaped them, but as proof that leaving was possible. Years later, John passed his final secondary exams and enrolled in medical school in Nairobi. Medicine was no longer just a dream to him. It had become personal.
“On the day of his graduation ceremony, he stood quietly outside the hall while other students celebrated with their families. He looked up at the sky for a long time. The pain he had carried since childhood was still there. But now it no longer felt like a wound. It felt like a purpose.
“That’s the end of the story,” Makol said as he stood up from the chair.
“Uncle, what happened to Dr Michael, and John’s auntie?” one boy asked.
“A story for another day, Bang,” he answered as he walked to the bathroom behind the house. The kids all got up and left except Bang, who stayed there with his legs crossed, waiting for Makol to return.
1. “There is no salary” in Juba Arabic.
