Its 2023 and I finally graduated! Haha! What a trivial thing this momentous ceremony had become for me.  

Don’t get me wrong, I am extremely happy and proud to have completed my double degree back in 2021. So then why did I wait 2 more years to walk the stage and have that cliché picture taken in my graduation regalia? 

The simple answer was that I needed my mother there. I was not going to celebrate this achievement without the woman who raised me. Those 2 testamurs belong to her more so than I. To me they are just 2 pieces of paper framed nicely and sitting in my cupboard, collecting dust. Yes, they are framed because my mother would kill me otherwise.  

Getting those degrees was not arduous at all. If anyone knows anything about me, they know I have never struggled with academic achievement. But there was more than academics that was at play here, and whilst the studying was cruisy – life did its fair share of beating me down. This was the differentiator to your typical graduation journey. To understand these trials and tribulations and why the graduation ceremony became so trivial, we’d need to rewind 6 years from now and work our way from when I chose to pursue a university education. 

1^st of March 2018 marked the start of a journey towards the unknown. An unknown place; Brisbane, Australia. An unknown situation; living alone – away from home. Unknown people; not a single close friend. Unknown identity; a blurry sense of self. No clear direction, a confused sense of ambition and a heart longing simply for peace. Unknown to the fact that ahead were the worst and the best years of my life. I left my home and all my loved ones behind and honestly, I did not even fully comprehend the toll these sacrifices were going to have. All I knew is that I was sick and tired of being in a broken home and losing myself in the noise of misfortune that life burdened my family with. All it took was an offer letter with a 25% scholarship attached and a loan of KSHS 900,000 (courtesy Oshwal Education and Relief Board) to get started and I was off to Griffith University. 

First year, probably the worst of all four. I was humbled straight into the ground till my face was tasting dirt, figuratively of course. I was responsible for myself, for the first time ever. While university studies were a piece of cake, I was hustling to land myself a job so I could fend for myself and no longer be financially dependent on my mother. A month of job hunting with no luck. I was surviving with the $1000 my mother had given me, which was soon going to runout. I could not muster the courage to ask for more because my proud ego wanted to take complete ownership and that meant financially too.  

The last week of March 2018 rolled around. I had spent the last of the money I came with and no sight of how I was going to pay rent in April. Fortunately, Tuesday the following week, I landed myself a commission-based sales job (the only one I could get) that started on the weekend some 3 hours away from where I lived. Here I went to some random place in the middle of nowhere, with some random people I had just met at some random office with nothing but the prospect of a paycheque. Rent was due that week on Friday and I had to ask my landlady to give me a couple of days grace, so I could go earn some money and pay her rent. The pressure was now on, and you bet I hustled over that weekend and returned with my first hard earned money in life – a whopping $450. I was so happy that Sunday night. I called my mother the next day and I told her I would not be needing any more money. I was so proud. This was the ultimate turning point in my mind. 

To this day I am grateful for the opportunity and the kindness that my bosses at the time, Ankit and Navdeep, extended to me. Not only did they pay my commission in advance that weekend so I could pay my overdue rent, but also planted the seed of possibility for what I could achieve in this foreign land. Over the next 2 years I continued working with them and travelled all over Australia working remote locations and for months on end during my study breaks. I paid for all my expenses including my ridiculously expensive university fees and was also able to travel back home to Kenya at my own expense too.  

I recall paying just over $10,000 for my second semester in 2018 and I cried after making that payment. I cried because I felt that void that was left as I watched months of my hard-earned money get wiped out from my account in a few seconds. I wrote to my mother that day expressing immense gratitude for the sacrifices she had made countless times for me. She had all her life given all her hard-earned everything to raise my sisters and I and I had just gotten a taste of what paying the price felt like. I felt a sense of accomplishment too – and a slight whisper in my head that said – mum, let me carry my own burden from now on, you’ve done more than enough. 

Although I felt like an accomplished “man”, those first 2 years also brought to light all the other areas of life that were struggling. I was dealing with the emotional rollercoaster of a cyclical break-up make-up relationship with my partner at the time, Sukaina. My relationships with my mother and sisters were not where I hoped they would be. My health was mediocre at best, and even though I took care of myself financially – I was still “broke”. All the while, I was cruising by my university studies; hardly trying. I was no longer a top performing student, but neither was I trying to be. I was wanting to win in life, not just in academia. Making money became a critical part of survival, especially when I was expected to rack up $80,000 in university fees alongside everything else. Life though, was expecting more from me – it always seems like it is. I take it as a privilege now – but at the time it felt more of a wake up a call.  

In my second year I fell terribly ill on a work trip, some 6 hours away from Brisbane. I contracted a nasty bacterial infection and I felt like I was almost going to die. I will not bore you with the specifics, but that experience made me re-evaluate my priorities and I got my act together. I started focusing on my physical health, which eventually led me to become more intentional about my mental health too. My relationship fizzled out, for the better for both of us. I started focusing on myself, and the relations with my immediate family. It was also at this point where I finally felt like I started to cultivate the right association and band of people around me who would go on to play key roles in my success over the following years. 

Year 3 came with a new twist now. As Covid-19 hit, out the window went my job which was already in a slump from previous months. I went from being broke into a deficit. What was my greatest accomplishment over my first year was no longer a badge of honour I could wear as my finances deteriorated and I struggled to keep up and make ends meet on my own. I did not want to burden my immediate family with my struggle, and it was here, one of my closest friends, a brother by bond, Mihir, came to my aid. He helped me financially for many months. Helped keep my business alive. Helped me buy a car so I could become an Uber driver. Helped me pay my university fees. Emptied his savings account. I am forever grateful for that, because he not only took care of my burden but also helped keep it away from falling onto my family. Alongside him, friends like Keval, Sumit, Argha, Tarun, Emmanuel & Yash, all supported me financially at various points for the next 2 years until I completed my studies. Ultimately, despite my best efforts to keep this hidden from my family, it did get to a point where I needed my family’s help too and my mother helped me with a final $4000 to get me across the line. 

I completed my studies in November 2021, but I never felt like I earned that degree as it was still on borrowed money and without paying everyone back, it would not have felt like I had concluded this chapter of university. Those degrees were not fully earned yet, and it was not until the end of 2022 that I was able to pay back every single person who supported me in the prior years.  

10^th December 2023, 2 years after the completion of my degree. I finally had the opportunity to walk that stage and click that cliché photo you see and be able to celebrate my graduation with my family and friends. Although the ceremony was just the cherry on the cake, which I anyways am not a big fan of, because the education was not the challenge, but the cost of it sure did leave a bittersweet taste. The real cake though was the life experience over the last 6 years with university only being a very small slice of it all. Almost unimportant. 

Nonetheless, the graduation ceremony was the epilogue of the story. One that comes with the opportunity for me to pay gratitude to everyone without whom this milestone would never be possible. 

• First and foremost, THANK YOU MUM, for everything and more. Words cannot express my gratitude for you, and I will cherish the smile on your face and the warmth of that hug right after the graduation ceremony for a lifetime. This is just one of the many accomplishments that I achieve in your honour!  

• To my sister, FINALI. THANK YOU for being the person that you are. My biggest fan, and one of my biggest supporters.  

• To my other sister, HEMANSHI, despite our differences. THANK YOU for stepping up to help me financially during those last 2 years, and even though mum stepped in to take care of it, I will always remember you offering and am grateful for it. 

• To SUKAINA. THANK YOU for sowing into me and making me want to become a better man since the day I met you, and for keeping up with me and encouraging me throughout the initial years of this journey despite our ups and downs and eventual fallout. 

• To my friends, my chosen family, MIHIR, KEVAL, SUMIT, ARGHA, TARUN, EMMANUEL, YASH. THANK YOU for all the financial help, the moral support, for sticking by me, and for the incredible friendships we hold true to this day! 

• To my school teachers in Kenya, especially CHHAYA AUNTY, THANK YOU for instilling the right foundations and tutelage that allowed me to be able to cruise through university and focus my efforts on becoming a good man alongside a good student. 

• Lastly, I was to THANK the OERB for helping me with the initial seed money to be able to pay for my first semester of university and to GRIFFITH UNIVERSITY for the scholarship and the opportunity to study in Australia and experience the student life that has far exceeded the academic realm now. 

I want it to be known that this feat in life, like any important feat, can never be achieved alone. You are never really put on a pedestal all by yourself, but you are carried there by the efforts of several people.