I love challenges, and I love to push myself. I love to learn and have new experiences. As a person who is determined to grow my career, I challenged myself to take up an internship with Nafisika Trust. Knowing well the work Nafisika does, I wore my full armor of positivity ready to have my first prison experience.

When it really downed on me that I was going to work in prison spaces, my mind pictured a very hostile environment where even breathing was to be done in a strategy. I was lost in my thoughts on how I would walk, dress, stand, sit and even look at the prison wardens.

A mental picture of the unwelcoming incarcerated persons crisscrossed my thoughts; and for a moment, my initial armor of positivity felt pierced and shattered. Regardless, I soldiered on and took up the challenge to face the inmates. Believe me when I tell you that the way the society has depicted prisons and inmates is misconceived and misinformed. Just to give you a little context; my encounter in prison revealed that prison officers are welcoming and friendly, and inmates are just normal human beings with their perfections and imperfections. To anyone who finds themselves incarcerated, with the right attitude, prison is just a wake-up call.

It is indeed true that prisons are buildings that are highly guarded and are meant to rehabilitate offenders. As the Kenyan prisons mantra goes, prisons exist “kurekebisha na haki”. Individuals who find themselves behind bars tend to see that life is unfair to them and that they do not deserve to be in prison and they overshadow the thought of why am I in prison at this time? Why did I have to be convicted? Most tend to ignore what the other side is for.

For the few that I have had the privilege to ask what impact incarceration has had in their life, they often tend to say that incarceration has made them rethink their lives and has re-strategized their way of living. They have found their roots back to religion and Supreme Being that they believe in and seek solace from.

Inmates will tell you that when they converse with each other, they learn that some petty offences they committed in the society or knew someone who committed them was indeed against the law but decided to disregard the said law regardless. Inmates will tell you that they took some things for granted and them being incarcerated has been a valuable lesson not to disregard anything, and therefore, are determined to change for the better.

With organizations that are concerned for inmates’ welfare such as Nafisika Trust stepping into prison spaces, inmates feel empowered and are zealous to have a fresh start. Inmates are now equipped with life skills and psycho education programs that help them navigate their mental state adjustments with the hard hit reality of being behind bars.

Most inmates are enrolling to prison welfare programs so that they can be able to survive cell life and look forward to being reintegrated back to the society as agent of change. The knowledge inmates acquire from such programs is also used to help their colleagues who are struggling to come to term with the fact that prison is not the worst place to be but rather, it is a wake-up call to rethink one’s life.

Being stripped freedom is not something to take lightly; but with the right mindset, one is able to know that they are physically locked up but their minds are free to wander and make sober decisions. It is when inmate gets to know this piece of knowledge that they then face their wake up-call and respond to it for the betterment of their lives. Some need the help of a professional to understand this while others comes to realization of these terms on their own.

All in all, the knowledge and hope that get to be shared with inmates help them to go on about the self-audit they need. And I can reassure you that prison is not the worst nightmare we misconceive it to be; rather, it is a wake-up call to those incarcerated.   

Written by Beatrice Meli

Counselling Psychology Intern|| Nafisika Trust