DukeEngage | Duke Center for Civic Engagement

 I used to write for the Chronicle, Duke's student-run newspaper. I remember it always took a lot out of me to write even a simple, straightforward story- I stumbled at asking those prying questions that provoke beautiful results and shied away from embarking on the long and difficult task of really and truly investigating an idea. As all stories are (to an extent, anyway), my stories were focused on the snapshots that made the most sense to me- those that caught my eye, yes, but also those ideas simple enough to report on truthfully and factually. In a way, I always wrote about myself- I worried about what was feasible to get in before a 5:30 PM budget; I chose quotes because of their flavor, but not always because of their relevance; and I balked at finding better sources because it was late at night and all I wanted to do was go back to my dorm and crash. Often, I picked stories not because I loved them, but because I knew they could be written in a reasonable amount of time.  

I'm still too selfish now to understand what it means to be a good reporter.

Someone asked me to tell one of the stories of one of the refugees at St. Andrew's, the church we work through to teach English to Somali refugees- all between the ages of 14 and 20- in Cairo. But I am still too shy- all I have are snippets of the earlier lives of our Somalis and the crowds of young Sudanese refugees who play extraordinarily athletic games of soccer in the St. Andrew's courtyard and converse deftly and happily in their own language, dyed hair bobbing. I have a scrap of paper shakily written by the hand of one of my girls, Ifraa: "I have 5 brothers one sister and mama and grandmother and grandfather and my cousin but my father was die." I have the low, swift voice of Natifa, who wants to visit me in America someday and for me to visit her in Somalia, but only if (In-sha-allah, "God willing") peace comes, so I "don't get kidnap." And there are some cheerful and beautiful things too: the girls bringing Liz a singing camel as a birthday gift, Asli- who wants to be a doctor- kicking butt on her first test, playing musical chairs in the hallway of the old church and learning Somali words from Yorub. 

They all came to St. Andrew's by way of UNHCR (who gives refugees information about educational services), by way of a refugee organization called Amira, or just by word of mouth. The majority of the 700 adults and 200 children taking classes at St. Andrew's are southern Sudanese, although the small group we teach are all Somalis. In a sense, St. Andrew's, the church, and St. Andrew's, the school, are very separate entities- running the school is funded almost entirely by churches, but the classes at St. Andrew's don't have anything to do with religion. Still, there have been consequences; our girls, in their long skirts and lovely hijabs, have been harassed on the street for being Muslim and walking to a Christian church every day. 

"It's okay, we're okay," they say when we ask them about it. 

Perhaps the hardest thing to swallow about St. Andrew's is that it hasn't been recognized by the Egyptian government as a school. After completing their education, most refugees can only be sent back into the community. Fiona, one of our contacts at St. Andrew's, says "This is a problem. This is a really big problem," but despite the school's ongoing attempts, so far the bureaucratic hoops have proved too much to overcome. But for the first time, two Sudanese girls will sit the British IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education) examinations. If they pass, their education at St. Andrew's will be validated. The tests, however, are very expensive, and many of the students will never even reach the level of English needed to take them.

For our Somalis, this information is disheartening. In six weeks, how much English can we really teach them? WIth luck, they'll be able to enter regular classes at St. Andrew's in the fall. But after that, no one knows.

There are so many stories to tell, but for now I can only tell mine.  

At Duke, I’ll always feel woefully inadequate. No matter how smart, funny, kind, beautiful, caring, hardworking or creative I think I am, there will always be someone who surpasses me by leaps and bounds. But yesterday, sitting next to my first Somali student, I felt overwhelmed. There have always been times I’ve needed to reassure myself that I made it into Duke for a reason, but here I need more than reassurance; I need to be certain I’ll adequately be able to teach English to teenagers who are alone in a country that isn’t theirs, and who often only have the resources to afford two of the three necessities of life: food, rent, and transportation. But I’m anything but.

She (Sacdiya) is twenty years old, and wants someday to become a news correspondent and a translator. She easily knows the difference between “How many?” and “How much?” (for example, “How many pens?” and “How much sugar?””) and knows numbers in their thousands and the meaning of “Emergency visit.” When she sits down, she immediately asks how to spell my name. Swiftly, she writes it in her notebook next to “Teacher” and “Cookie”, my nickname here in Cairo. In about a minute, I realize the lesson plan I’ve prepared for her will last approximately twenty seconds. I put aside my notebook and simply talk with Sacdiya, who is amazingly deft in a language she is supposed to know next to nothing about.

Maybe it’s the fact that she is from a country that hasn’t had a centralized government since the early nineties, or that she lives in Cairo because her parents are either dead or want to prevent her from being killed. But in the two days since we began teaching, I’ve learned that often, my inadequacy is less about me than it is about those I influence, both intentionally and not. In the best of worlds, Sacdiya and the other Somalis would be able to attend a university. In this world, they have us—a group of young and inexperienced teenagers to teach them English. All of our students are bright, cheerful, eager and intelligent. They laugh and smile and shyly hide their faces in their hijabs, and they work hard. None of us knows what the future will bring for them, even tomorrow. But for now, we’re all trying.