In Kenya I met a man called Julius, and ever since I’ve wanted to tell his story. He was a great guy, but his story had such an impact on me because he finally made me understand the injustice of climate change...
I’d been talking about climate change for a while, but I’m not sure my heart was really in it. I think a little part of me still associated climate change with glaciers, and try as I might, I just couldn’t get that excited about melting ice. Julius made me realise that climate change really isn’t just about polar bears, and finally made me want to do something about it.
Julius is a farmer living in the Machakos district of Kenya. He has a wife and two children. One of his children is at nursery school, for which Julius has to pay 900 shillings per term; the other is at primary school. Primary education has officially been free in Kenya since 2003, but the government cannot afford to pay all the teachers needed to make this a reality, and so Julius has to pay 200 shillings per term to the PTA to contribute towards pay for the teachers who are not being paid by the government.
"Droughts used to occur roughly every ten years. Now they happen every couple of years."
In a society struggling with massive stigma associated with HIV and AIDS, Julius has been brave enough to get himself tested and admit that he is HIV positive.
Remember that I said Julius is a farmer. Like around 70% of Kenyans, he is dependent on agriculture; dependent on it to make money, to make paying those school fees, and getting that bus to the clinic possible. But he is also dependent on it in order to survive - to eat three decent meals a day. In the area of Kenya where Julius lives, there hasn’t been rain for three seasons. Many people have never lived through a drought as severe as this one.
Droughts used to occur roughly every ten years. Now they happen every couple of years. The severity of the droughts has also increased. Julius is now struggling to get by. He said:
'The tablets are good, they have made me strong again, but the only problem is I’m losing a lot of weight. I know that we have to eat well when we are on these tablets. I know that, and yet we don’t have enough food. What can I do? What would you do?'
He looked me in the eye and asked 'what would you do?' What can you say to that...?
For me, this is poverty personified. Julius is already fighting his own battles against a virus for which a cure has not yet been found, against having to pay for a child’s education that should be free, and now he is battling against climate change. A problem he has had no hand in causing.
The average Kenyan’s carbon footprint is roughly one thirtieth of the average Briton’s. And yet in Kenya, because of the drought, now happening more frequently and more severely than ever before, more and more people are going hungry and thirsty. I’m lucky enough to still not know what I would do in that situation, of not being able to grow my own food and without enough resources to buy any.
And maybe I’m still not the climate activist I’d like to be...
But because of Julius, I’m working on it.
Words: Sarah Rowe
Photo: Flickr user Trygve.u