by Dave Eggers
When I finished, it was nine pages long. When I turned it in, the UN took a passport picture of me to attach to my file. It was the first such picture of me I had ever seen. I had been in group pictures before, my head a blur in a crowd, but this new picture, of only me, staring straight ahead, was a revelation. I stared at this photo for hours and held the folder close for days, debating with myself whether or not this picture, these words, were truly me.
I now see it as a mistake, but I brought the picture to Maria one day. I wanted her to see it. I wanted everyone to see it. I wanted to talk and talk about who I was now, the young man who had had his picture taken and was on his way to the United States. I found her outside her home, hanging laundry.
—I’ve never seen you smile like that, she said. She held the picture for a long time; such photographs were rare in those days.—Can I keep it? she asked.
I told her no, that it was necessary for the file, that it was crucial to my application. She gave it back to me.
—Do you think we’ll be taken, too? The girls?
I was not prepared for this question. I had not heard any mention of girls being taken for this round of resettlements. It did not seem a possibility to me.
—I don’t know, I said. Maria smiled her hard smile.
—But I’m sure it’s possible, I said, almost believing my words.
—I was only kidding, she said.—I would never want to go, anyway.
She was an awful liar, always transparent.
I was determined to find out if girls were applying, and a few days later I learned that it was indeed possible, that many girls, dozens of them, had begun their applications. I ran to tell Maria, but she was not at home. Her neighbors said she was at the water tap and when I found her there, I told her what I knew: that girls were invited to apply, too, that they simply had to prove that they had no family and were unmarried. When I told her this, a light came to her eyes, for a moment, before flickering out.
—Maybe I’ll see what I can do, she said.
—I can take you there tomorrow, I said.—We’ll get an application. She agreed to meet me at the UN compound in the morning. But the next day, when I arrived, she was not there.
—She’s at the water tap, her sister said.
I found her in line again, sitting again with her two jerry cans.
—I’ll see what happens with all of you first, she said.—I’ll go next time.
—I think you should apply now. It might take a while.
—Maybe next week, then.
She seemed unmotivated to begin the process. Perhaps it was the nature of the day, too warm and windy, a day that kept many inside. Maria did not look at me that day, did not entertain notions of escape. I had a low opinion of her attitude that day, and I left her there, sitting in the dust. The line moved. Maria picked up her empty containers and moved them a few feet forward, and sat down again.
—What’s happening with your application? Noriyaki asked me.—Any news?
Many months had passed since the initial wave of excitement about the resettlements. We had all turned in our stories, and since then, many young men had been asked to come to the UN compound for interviews. But I had not been called upon. I told Noriyaki there was no news, that I had not heard anything since I turned in my papers. He nodded and smiled.
—Good, good, he said.—That’s good. That means things are on track.
Noriyaki was a sorcerer at convincing me of the most implausible things, and on that day he persuaded me that despite hearing nothing from the UN, I would be scheduled for the first airlift to America. I should begin to plan accordingly, he said—I should begin deciding which NBA team I preferred, for there would be no doubt that I would be asked to play professionally. I laughed, but then wondered if I could indeed play basketball for a living. Maybe I could play for whatever college I eventually attended? Every decent player at Kakuma imagined the day that he would be discovered and lifted up, as Manute Bol had been, and brought to glory. That day, I, too, allowed myself a moment of self-delusion.
—I should tell you now, Noriyaki said that day,—I’m leaving Kakuma, too. In two months. I wanted you to know first.
It had been long enough, he said. He needed to be home with his fiancée. And with me gone, he had decided, it would be the right time to hand the Wakachiai Project over to the next team. It seemed the right thing to do, I thought. We were both happy for each other, that we would finish this stage of our lives and move on together, albeit on other sides of the earth. We talked all that day about how we could keep in touch, how easy it would be with our new, more opulent lifestyles. We could call or email each other each day, send jokes and memories and pictures. We opened two Fantas, clinked them together, and drank them down.
—You’ll come to my wedding! he said suddenly, as if the plausibility of the idea suddenly occurred to him.
—Yes! I said. Then I asked,—How?
—Easy. You’ll have the proper immigrant status. You’ll be able to travel wherever you want. It’s one year from today, Valentine. We’ve set a date. You’ll come to Japan and you’ll be there when I marry Wakana.
—I will! I said, believing it completely.—I’ll definitely be there.
Drinking our Fantas, we savored that thought for an afternoon, the luxury and goodness of it all: airplanes, cities, cars, tuxedos, cake, diamonds, champagne. The day when we would meet again as prosperous men, comfortable and accomplished men of means, seemed very close.
In those days there was euphoria in the camp for so many reasons, among them the Vatican’s first-ever canonization of a Sudanese martyr. Josephine Bakhita, who had been enslaved herself, died as a Canossian Sister in Italy in the late 1940s, and now she was a saint. This was a source of fascination and pride for us all, many of us having no idea that it was even possible for a Sudanese to be sanctified. Her name was invoked at church every day, and was on the tongues of every proud Dinka Catholic at Kakuma. It was an unusual time for us all, a time when for the first time in years the Dinka felt strong, felt wanted by God and faraway nations. A woman of southern Sudan could be a saint, and the Lost Boys could be flown across the ocean to represent Sudan in America. If one event was possible, so was the other. Nothing was out of the question.
When the first resettlement flights departed, there were celebrations all over Kakuma, and I went with Achor Achor to the airfield to watch the planes disappear. I was overjoyed for these young men, fully believing that I would soon join them in America. As the flights continued, though, as the near-constant news of the good fortune of this boy and that boy, I became numb to their happiness, and could only question my own inadequacies. Perhaps five hundred young men left, and as the months passed and I received no word from the UN, I became less happy for those who had been chosen. Parties broke out with every posting. Families celebrated, groups of young men dancing together when their names appeared. Each week there was incalculable joy for them and devastation for the rest of us.
I was not close to leaving. I hadn’t even been given an interview. The interview was the first step, long before one’s name could be posted. Something seemed very wrong.
—I’m very sorry, Achor Achor said one day.
I had already heard. Achor Achor’s name had appeared that morning.
—When do you leave? I asked.
—One week.
The news was always quick like this. One’s name was posted, and then that person was gone, it seemed, within days. We all had to be ready.
I managed to congratulate him, but my pleasure in his good fortune was tempered by the bewilderment I felt. I had done everything right, I thought. Through my job, I even knew some of the same UN staff members who were helping with the resettlement process. Nothing seemed to give me an advantage. I had not been a soldier, I had an exemplary record at Kakuma, and I was not the only one baffled by the fact that so many were sent to America before me. No one understood it, but theories abounded. The most plausible among them held that t
here was a prominent SPLA soldier named Achak Deng, and that the two of us were being confused. This fact was never confirmed, but Achor Achor had his own theory.
—Maybe they don’t want to lose you here. This did not cheer me.
—You’re too valuable to the camp, he joked.
I did not want to be so valuable to the camp. I wondered whether I should be less responsible for a while. Could I shirk my duties, seem less competent?
—I’ll say something to the UN people when I see them next, he said. All of the boys who lived in the household of Gop had been lifted up and transported—to Detroit, San Diego, Kansas City. Soon I was among only a few men of my age left at the camp. The others whose applications had been ignored or rejected were known SPLA commanders or criminals. I was the only one I knew who had an unblemished background but who had not yet even been interviewed. I had been scheduled for interviews, yes, but each time the day approached, something would happen and the date would be pushed back or canceled. One day there were clashes in the camp between the Sudanese and the Turkana, one killed from each side, and Kakuma was closed to visitors. Another time the American lawyer who was present at all the interviews had to go home to New York at the last minute. He would return three months later, they told us.
There is no feeling like rejection coupled with abandonment. I had read about the Rapture, wherein sixty-four thousand souls would be taken to heaven before the End Days, when the Earth would be engulfed in flames. And over the next six months of 2000, it felt very much like I was being left at Kakuma while all those I knew were pulled from our purgatory and lifted up to the Kingdom of God. I had been examined by the powers that be, and was deemed deserving of eternal hellfire.
Achor Achor left one morning and we did not allow drama into our goodbye. He was wearing a winter coat, because someone had told him Atlanta would be very cold. We shook hands and I patted his puffy shoulder, both of us pretending we would see each other again, and soon. He left with another of the Eleven, Akok Anei, and as I watched them walk down the road to the airfield, Achor Achor looked back at me with eyes that betrayed his sadness. He did not think I would ever leave the camp.
After Achor Achor, hundreds more left. Dozens of planes took to the sky, full of Lost Boys like me, so many whose names I never knew.
Everyone found my continued presence at Kakuma very amusing.
—They’ll reschedule you till you’re the last guy! the humorous Dominic said. He was the last of the Dominics to remain with me, but he had been interviewed already and so was buoyed by confidence.—Gone Far, you’re not going anywhere! he laughed. He didn’t mean to be cruel, but he had lost the power to make me laugh.
Noriyaki tried to remain positive.
—They wouldn’t keep rescheduling you if they didn’t want you to go.
He had extended his stay at Kakuma, citing various organizational technicalities and directives issued by his superiors in Japan. But I had a terrible feeling that he was waiting for me to leave before he left himself. I eventually learned this was indeed his plan.
—Maybe they’re waiting for you to leave first, I told him. I badly wanted him to go home to his fiancée. She had waited too long for him.
—I’m afraid that’s out of my hands, he said, grinning.—I have my orders.
Finally, a tornado of a day. I had prayed for such a day, and then it came. In one morning I received word both that I would be interviewed and that Tabitha and her brothers had been accepted for resettlement. It was a wild sort of a day that began, with Tabitha arriving at my door just after dawn.
—We’re going! she squealed.
I had not yet opened my door. It was unheard of for her to appear at my door alone before the daylight was whole. I told her this in an urgent whisper. We would risk the disapproval of the community; we had already stretched their tolerance, I was sure.
—I don’t care! she said, now louder.—I don’t care I don’t care!
She danced and squeaked and jumped.
When I stood and awakened enough to hear and, later, to process her news, she was already off to wake up whoever she planned to tell next. I was not surprised that she delivered this news to me in such a cavalier way. It is a fact that no love fostered in Kakuma could compete with the prospect of leaving that place. Later I learned that her departure date was scheduled for two weeks from that day, and I knew then that I would not see her again in the camp—not in any meaningful way. I knew from watching the departures of so many hundreds of others that the days between notice of departure and the day itself, there was little time for anything, let alone romance. I would see her in groups, walking quickly to and fro with her brothers or friends, taking care of so many details. I suppose we did find a few moments alone, but she was not with me anymore. All romances ended in those days, when so many were leaving Kenya. Even while sitting together in her empty house or mine, Tabitha would talk only about the United States, about Seattle, about what she would find there—Nairobi multiplied many times over! Oh, she would laugh, the kaleidoscopic possibilities!
The morning she gave me her news, I received news of my own. Tabitha’s scent was still in the air when another voice came from the other side of my shelter.
—Achak!
There were only a few people who still called me Achak.
—Who is it?
It was Cornelius, a young neighbor of mine, a boy of eight, born on a rainy day at Kakuma, who always seemed to know everything before any other soul. Months earlier, he had known which refugee had impregnated a Turkana girl, and on this day, he told me that he had heard that I had been scheduled for an IOM interview. It was well-known that Cornelius’s information was invariably correct.
And so it was. It was July of 2001, eighteen months after the resettlements began, and finally I sat in a white cinderblock room, before two people: one white American and a Sudanese interpreter. The American, round in the face and with cold blue eyes, introduced himself as a lawyer, and then apologized.
—We’re so sorry, Dominic. We know you’ve been puzzled by the delay in your application. You probably wondered what the heck was going on.
I did not contradict him. I had almost forgotten that I had used the name Dominic on my application.
Their questions swung from very simple questions about my name and hometown to more involved investigations of the dangers I had faced. I had been briefed by many other Lost Boys about what questions to expect, but the ones they asked me varied slightly. There was a majority of the Sudanese who insisted that one embellish as often as possible, to be sure to claim the deaths of all of one’s family and known relatives. I had decided, against the advice of many, to answer all the questions as truthfully as possible.
—Are your parents alive? the lawyer asked.
—Yes, I said.
He smiled. It seemed to him a new kind of answer.
—Your brothers and sisters?
—I don’t know, I said.
From there the questions went deeply into my experiences as a refugee: Who were the groups that wanted to kill you and what made them want to kill you? What kind of weapons did they carry or use? Before you left your village, did you see people killed by these attackers? What motivated you to leave Sudan? Which year did you leave Sudan? When did you arrive in Ethiopia and by what means? Did you ever fight in the wars of Sudan? Do you know of the SPLA⁄SPLM? Where you ever recruited by the rebel army? What security issues do you face in Kakuma? And finally: Have you ever heard of the country called the United States of America? Do you know anyone there? Do you prefer to be resettled in a country other than the U.S.?
I answered all of the queries without distortion, and it was over in twenty minutes. I shook their hands and left the room, puzzled and depressed. Certainly that was not the sort of interview that would decide whether or not a man traveled across the world and became the citizen of a different nation. As I stood, dazed, the interpreter opened the door and caught my arm.
—You did very
well, Dominic. Don’t worry. You look worried. I’m sure this’ll be straightened out now. Smile, friend. And get used to the idea of leaving this place.
I didn’t know what to believe. Everything had been delayed so long that I felt uneasy about expecting anything. I knew that nothing was real until one’s name was posted on the board, that in the meantime I had to keep working and going to school.
Noriyaki, though, was more certain.
—Oh, you’re going.
—Really? I said.
—Oh yeah, it’ll be weeks now. Days. No time.
I thanked him for his encouragement, but I made no plans. He, however, did. Finally he made arrangements to leave the camp. He was almost a year late, but now he would finally be going home. The relief I felt was enormous. He had been at Kakuma long enough on my account, and every moment he remained there was taking a toll on me. I wanted him to resume his life, I wanted him to finally make a happy woman out of his long-suffering fiancée. We toasted his imminent departure with orange Fanta and marked the remaining highlights on our calendar. There was little of consequence left to do—only the standard games and classes and deliveries of equipment, and one trip into central Kenya with the youth basketball team. We would be chaperones and coaches, and this, we decided, would be the final hurrah of the Wakachiai Project, at least under our administration.
This was late July and the day was clear. Noriyaki and I were in the cab of a converted truck, the two of us in front and in back the youth basketball team, twelve Sudanese and Ugandan boys, who were to travel four hours to Lodwar to play a team representing a Kenyan high school.
The day was so bright. I remember distinctly feeling God’s presence that morning. It was a day that many women, waking and beginning their chores, were calling glorious, a morning for which we gave thanks.
We left the camp very early, about five a.m. All of the boys, and Noriyaki and I, were euphoric to be on the road; Kakuma’s refugees were always happy to leave the camp for any amount of time, for any reason. In fact, there were delays in leaving this particular day, because as was customary, there was a good deal of pleading from a variety of Kakuma’s characters who attempted to argue their way onto the basketball team. Soon enough, though, we were an hour away from Kakuma, fourteen of us, and the sun was rising. I was in the cab of the truck with Noriyaki, with the twelve players, all of them under sixteen years old, riding in the back, sitting on benches, bouncing in the truckbed with every bump of the crumbling road. Lodwar was about 190 kilometers away, and the drive would take more than four hours, given the rough roads and checkpoints. Everyone was in a good mood, though, singing traditional songs and songs of their own creation.