Going to Prison and Why I Love It

It is 10:00am on an overcast, muggy Nairobi morning. Faux-leopard print bedecks the couch I sit on in a small room located near the front entrance of Nairobi’s Industrial Area Remand Prison. Prison officers and Kenyan CSO* workers crowd the room and everyone looks very smart. Even I chose a suit today over the flip-flops and skirts which usually constitute my interpretation of business wear in Kenya. Comfortable silence rests on the meeting as we all take tea. Mandazi, sausage and samosa—one each—served alongside mugs brimful of sweet, milky chai. I love this about Kenya, the ubiquitous tea time and formality that accompanies as we silently partake. From workmen clustered under dusty, tarped street-side cafés to Parliamentarians, every Kenyan takes tea. Stir, sip, chew. We wait for the last person to finish before beginning our meeting.

Introductions circle the room as everyone recites greetings, their name and the organization for which they work. Aware of the one Mzungu in the room, the guests speak English. My turn: “Habari zenu. Ninaitwa Hannah Beckett. Nafanya kazi International Justice Mission.” I switch back to English having just exhausted a quarter my Swahili knowledge, though building rapport.  “Your English is conc,” Kenyans tell me. Short for concentrated, “conc” means I speak in a strong, fast-paced American accent.

Today the twenty-five stakeholders gathered at Remand represent various organizations providing social services in the prison (spiritual, medical, educational, legal aid etc.). The following two hours' discussion focuses on how to improve coordination between CSOs and the prison service in order to serve prisoners holistically. As IJM’s representative at this meeting, I get to talk about our work and how CSOs and the Kenyan Prison Service can better partner together. 

Snag a suit, say you work for an international NGO and there you have it... instant gravitas. No one knows I am just an intern, not to mention a waitress only six months ago. I love this about my work with IJM— an abundance of opportunities and constant supply of challenges.

The last three months have flown by and busyness characterizes my time here thus far. When I return home from work I just spent the last nine hours interacting, listening, talking, planning and problem-solving. Mentally exhausted, I consciously have to switch off my brain from continuing to think about work and relax, so I also postpone the blogging.

That said, it is nice to be back and I will try to make up for the paucity. Let’s start with work…

I love it.

I absolutely love my job. I do not even excel as an Executive Assistant (improving though, I hope), but enjoy most things about my role. I have an excellent boss who genuinely cares about the work, the staff and seeing change in Kenya. Because he serves as the Casework Director, I get exposure to all areas of our work and ongoing cases. Though rarely boring, my days can seem routine: taxi, coffee, greetings, stillness, devotions, work, lunch, work, coffee, walk, grocery, home//repeat.

I do not get to go to prison every day, sadly (strange statement, that), but I do enjoy a large variety of tasks. Roughly fifty-percent of my tasks pertain to the daily activities of scheduling, editing, meetings, organization and follow-up. The other fifty-percent, and the half I prefer, relates more to long-term projects like research, external partnerships and improving casework processes. I particularly appreciate the hands-on involvement I have and feel more confident to voice ideas, suggest improvements and propose projects than when I arrived. (Event planning stands as the one exception to my above statement. The soul-sucking, stress-inducing duty of office visit and event planning contravene every part of my personality.) However, without a doubt, the best part of my job is my interaction with fellow staff.  

Before arriving in Nairobi I looked forward to getting to know my coworkers and that experience has brought such joy. The dedicated, professional and fun team astounds me at how hard they work and what they accomplish, sometimes in difficult circumstances.

Our lawyers, for example, routinely endure Nairobi traffic and sit for hours in court, only to hear a judge cursorily dismiss them because he has not expended the necessary time to write the judgment needed for case resolution. Our investigators may spend weeks planning an arrest only to encounter a tip-off that spoils the entire operation. Despite this, the staff perseveres without despondency.

Since I arrived three months ago IJM has achieved convictions of two perpetrators of child sexual assault, seen the release of twenty-five innocently imprisoned Kenyans and celebrated the restoration of five of our clients. This represents only a small portion of the daily work done by the group of people I can now call my friends as we joke, laugh, lament, struggle, pray and achieve together. In future I will share more work experiences and successes, but in the meantime... did I mention I love my job?

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*Civil Society Organizations