The first time I travelled to Samburu, I thought nothing could ever match the wonder I felt. I was wrong.
Returning for a second mentoring visit, I found myself just as awestruck, perhaps even more. The land stretches wide and honest, painted in warm earth tones and endless skies. The scenery has a quiet kind of majesty, the sort that doesn’t demand attention yet somehow holds your gaze until you forget everything else.Life there moves in a different rhythm: waking with the sun, herding livestock across the plains and tending to daily tasks before the heat overwhelms you. It is a rhythm shaped by the land itself. Resources are scarce and life can be unpredictable, and yet, amid that scarcity, people find ways to endure and carry on with remarkable resilience.It made me reflect on how different life feels back in Nairobi, where everything moves at an unforgiving speed. We chase deadlines, notifications, and ambitions, rarely pausing to notice a sunrise or watch the sky soften into a breathtaking sunset. We forget the stars exist. In Samburu, the sky insists that you pause and savor the moment.
But the landscape is only part of what stays with me. The bright and determined students from Good Shepherd Minor Seminary and St. Irene School left a deeper impression not simply because of the challenges they face, but because of the agency with which they approach their future.
At Good Shepherd Minor Seminary (GOSHEMS), one of our first sessions began with an icebreaker game called Wolf. In the game, the class becomes a village. Hidden among the villagers are “wolves,” and the rest of the group must identify who they think the wolves are. The suspects then must defend themselves by telling the villagers where they were at the time of the “attack”.
What followed was unexpectedly revealing.
One by one, the students who had been accused stood up to defend themselves with elaborate stories. Several insisted the accusations were personal grudges. One boy argued that the accuser was simply jealous because he had taken his wife. Another claimed the accusations came from someone whose cattle he had raided. The room erupted in laughter each time someone delivered a new backstory.
I found myself caught between amusement and reflection. The confidence and quick thinking the students displayed were impressive. But I also noticed the casual tone in which some of the jokes referenced women as possessions or trophies. As a female mentor standing in front of the room, I quietly wondered what these jokes revealed about how young men were learning to speak about women. I also wondered whether my presence and that of other female mentors might gradually influence how they think about leadership, respect, and partnership.
Moments like these reminded me that mentorship is rarely just about the lessons you plan to teach. Sometimes it is about the subtle shifts that happen simply by being present, by asking questions, and by opening conversations that might not otherwise occur.
Yet what stood out most about the students was not the jokes or the competition in the game but the sharpness of their minds and the seriousness with which they spoke about their futures.
During another session, one student stood up and spoke about his dream of becoming a doctor. He explained that in his village, the nearest health facility is hours away, and many families struggle to reach it in time. “If I become a doctor,” he said quietly but firmly, “people in my community will not have to travel so far to be treated.” It was not said dramatically. It was said like a plan.
At St. Irene School, a student shared a similar determination from a different perspective. In parts of northern Kenya, traditions such as early marriage and practices like female genital mutilation (FGM) still persist due to long-standing cultural norms, economic pressures, and limited access to education. Yet she spoke calmly about finishing school and becoming a teacher so that girls in her village could see another path. “If I teach,” she said, “they will know they can stay in school.”
The more time we spent together, the clearer it became that these students were not simply waiting for someone to change their circumstances. They were actively imagining how they might change them themselves.
Their debates were thoughtful and intense. In one discussion, students argued for nearly 20 minutes about whether young people who leave for university should always return to serve their communities. Some insisted that staying away meant losing valuable talent; others argued that even those who build lives elsewhere can still support home through ideas, investments, and mentorship. What struck me most was not the conclusion, but the seriousness with which they approached the question.
And then there are their songs.
When the students sing, it is not performance, it is something deeper. One evening, as the sun faded behind the hills, they gathered and began to sing together. Their voices rose into the open air, steady and full, echoing across the quiet compound. The harmonies carried both joy and longing, the kind that reaches somewhere deep inside you before you even realize it. Later, one student explained it simply: “When we sing, we remember why we keep going.”
Some of the realities these students navigate are difficult to fully grasp from the outside. Imagine being a boarding student returning home after term ends only to find your homestead empty because your family has moved in search of pasture during a difficult season. Imagine waiting at the marketplace on market day, asking traders if they have seen your family and which direction they went. For several students in Maralal, this is not imagination, it is something they have experienced. In that context, their schools become far more than places of learning. They provide structure and stability in lives that can sometimes be uncertain. They offer a place where young people can think beyond the next season and imagine the next decade.
What struck me most during the visit was the fire that drives these students. Their ambition is not abstract, it is deeply connected to their communities. They speak about building clinics, teaching in local schools, starting businesses, and advocating for younger generations. Their strength does not come from ignoring the realities around them. It comes from confronting them and deciding they will be part of the generation that changes them.
This Community Outreach Programme experience under the Community Service Centre has changed me. It has widened my perspective and softened my pace. I am learning to appreciate what I have instead of rushing past it. I am learning to slow down, to breathe, to notice.
But more than anything, the students reminded me that hope is not something abstract. It is built quietly through decisions, conversations, and dreams spoken aloud in classrooms and courtyards. It grows each time a young person questions an old expectation or imagines a different future.
Samburu did not just give me memories., it gave me a new way of seeing.
Article written by Karen Kibugu
