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Doing my “gong out” August 14, 2018

 I am now an RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer). My last two weeks in Uganda were a good way to end my three years of service.
First, I said good bye to my friends at CARE. They had a nice farewell gathering for me with speeches and gifts. I appreciated the work they do and their professionalism.

I was presented with a photo I had taken of the CARE West Nile Office staff, with my photo superimposed over it.

Close-up of the photo, I hope in five years I will still remember all their names. BIG BLANK SPACE COMING

I

 
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This painting presented to me is striking, but way too big to bring home. I donated it to the office.

I tried to explain to the kids in my neighborhood it would be the last time I would pass by to fist bump with them. They agreed to pose for me, but I don’t know if they really understood. The kid in the front in green was a stitch. His mom would alert him, and he always made a determined run to me, with everyone laughing. he would hardly brush my fist and then bolt back.

Ron was wearing a suit we bought earlier in the year. I was more relaxed.

My Bugiri counterpart, translator, and motorcycle driver Matthews. So good to see him one more time. He gave me the red cap. I have quickly learned since my return this cap makes me look like a Trump supporter. :-).

Sharon and Edith show off their new phones. They really needed them.

Next, I came to Kampala to start my Cessation of Service (COS) process, with three days of physicals and paperwork. Then I traveled east and spent three nights in Jinja, using it as a base for visits to Bugiri and Iganga. I enjoyed a day with Ronnie in Jinja.  We took his computer into the place where we bought it a year ago and got it “refreshed”. We set up a spread sheet to keep track of his expenses. He is about to start his second of three years and loves accounting. He had       looked me up on LinkedIn and was sort of thrilled to learn I had once received a CPA. Ronnie is doing well, and thinks his grades from second semester are good. This semester, at my urging, he is taking a writing course in addition to his normal load. I am checking with the dean whether this is OK.
My former supervisor Adams was away in Kampala but my counterpart Matthews was around. I also met with my Bugiri replacement Molly and some of Azedy’s family, who hosted me my second year. There are five PCVs in Bugiri now, and few more in nearly towns.
Unfortunately, Sharon, who is being supported in nursing school by Rotary Club, and Edith in hair-dressing school, were both away on final exams. I had intended to take them shopping for smart phones, but instead left the money and they sent me a photo.

Selfie of my last taxi ride

Finally I returned to Kampala and participated in the “Gong Out” ceremony. I took a plane home that evening.

Ryan and I watched the famed Ndere Music & Dance Troupe in Kampala the last possible night I could see it.

The last four PCVs from the 2015 Health-Ag class, L to R, Ryan and Ruwani gonged out with me, while Stephanie exits next month.

Home in Colorado. On Mount Evans with my son Clark.

I am in the middle of my last week in Arua, and it’s a few weeks until I return home. After my last day here, I will go to Peace Corps Headquarters in Kampala for a few days, and start my Cessation of Service (COS) process. I’m also taking a few days to visit friends in Bugiri, Iganga and Jinja, including all three students we are helping to support. Then I will return to headquarters for the ceremonial “gonging out” and fly home that night.

Here are some photos for your education and entertainment. Most of these were taken on the way to the CARE office or going to town in the opposite direction. I have been walking briskly a bit more than a mile to work each day,and often both ways. On Sunday I walk to town, same distance. It hasn’t helped me lose much weight but it is good for my blood sugar.

I’ll start a walk to work with White Ants. Two or three times recently, usually right after a rain in the early evening, a plague of winged, “white ants” emerges, flying around my porch light, with some finding their way inside my place. They force me to turn off my lights and then retreat under my mosquito net in bed.  The next morning I found my security guard running around and gathering them before she changed into her uniform to begin the day, Then, walking to work, I found kids picking them from the side of the road.

Showing off their bounty.

Just before school starts at 8 a.m. boda boda drivers are delivering kids to the primary schools., carrying up to three.

I have observed tykes wearing helmets to this school. Good idea.

I walk a rare stretch of tree-lined dirt roads which are shady and cool.

One morning I came across this scene around the corner from the CARE office. Someone took the corner a bit too fast last night.

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Figuring something out at the office

In the land of pit latrines…..

I never heard of this American preacher superimposed over a sea of Africans on a billboard. The crusade was near my cafe, Some of the music was fantastic!

A common sign in Uganda: “This plot is not for sale.” followed by a phone number.

This guy was praising my health for walking to town and turning down a boda boda. That’s worth a photo!

The longest lunar eclipse in a century passed over Uganda last week. I stood outside my house and took this to document my presence for it, This was 40 minutes before the total eclipse. The “blood moon” doesn’t show well from my smart phone of course. A few minutes later it clouded over. I’m told the light on the lower right was Mars. How many people can say they witnessed both a solar and lunar eclipse within a year?

Kids in my neighborhood

My last post about the craziness in Arua in connection with the assassination of the local M.P. did not portray any personal risk. But there are a couple of stories I have held back until now, since I didn’t want people (like my mom) to worry or because of embarrassment. But I want to fully document my experience.

My first encounter with crime happened while I was still in training. At the conclusion to a group shopping trip to Kampala with about six other Peace Corps trainees, we boarded a taxi to return to our training site. I wanted to allow Ndu, a tall Nigerian-American, the front row seat with more leg room. However the taxi conductor insisted I sit in the front. This deference for older white men was common, but in this case, I was probably a considered a more lucrative mark. The man next to me kept reaching across me for the mirror; I was not attentive that he was picking my pocket with his other hand. It’s a common ruse, now with my specific example to cite in future trainings. It was definitely embarrassing. Thieves usually just want cash and we hoped the remaining contents would turn up but they never did. So I lost some family photos, and my Colorado driver’s license. I had to cancel and replace a couple of cards. Ugh.

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As I‘ve said often here, “It’s all part of the adventure!”

Some fascinating events have taken place in Arua over the weekend to spice up my adventure. I am staying neutral in my narrative. Today, Monday, all CARE staff members from Arua are on stand down, meaning we are supposed to stay home until security concerns are lifted. This is the second stand down for me, having first been on stand down in Bugiri during the 2016 Presidential election. The Uganda military and even police from Kampala have placed the town of Arua under lockdown. The Peace Corps security had conversations with each PCV in Arua last night.
This started Friday evening when I was at an Ethiopian restaurant with other PCVs. Casey Jones’ son was visiting and they had just returned from touring Murchison Falls. (more on that later). Our social media (mainly WhatsApp which is dominant here) started blowing up because the M.P. of Arua, Ibhaim Abiriga, had just been assassinated. He was driving with his brother/bodyguard beside him. They had almost arrived at his home near Kampala, and were ambushed from two directions. The assailants riddled the vehicle with over 30 bullets. Witnesses disagree about what they wore and how many. Specifically though, they shot them both in the head. The vehicle crashed into a jackfruit tree. It took several minutes for police to arrive on the scene. The bodies just stayed there slumped in the front seat as a crowd gathered and took photos. I will spare you those gory photos.

The commotion obliterated the crime scene.

Mr. Abiriga was a prominent supporter of Museveni, typically wearing the NRM yellow party color from head to toe, though not the night of the murder. He had aggressively campaigned in favor of the amendment to remove term limits for the President. His shot up Volkswagen was also yellow. No suspects have been arrested yet.

The late Ibhaim Abiriga. Photo from Observer article last fall. In an interview, Abiriga, a Muslim, said he required his wife to stay at home unseen by others.

Abiriga’s Arua home is a 5 minute walk from CARE’s office. Due to security concerns, on Saturday CARE closed its Arua office and I worked from the guesthouse. The whole town was quiet most of the day. Things seemed to be getting back to normal by evening, and Julias and I went out separately for awhile.
Sunday afternoon, there were services for Abiriga at the Gaddafi Mosque in Kampala. Then his body was flown to Arua. Services were scheduled near his home on Monday morning in a football pitch across from the CARE office. The burial was scheduled for Monday afternoon at his family homestead near Rhino Camp. It was called Rhino Camp before there was a refugee settlement established there.
After the plane landed and caskets were placed in ambulances, a mob at the airport overwhelmed security personnel and seized the caskets. They yelled that the police did not deserve to protect the caskets if they could not protect them when they were alive. The caskets were paraded from the airport and a huge crowd formed into a procession, eventually numbering in the thousands, both preceding and following the caskets.

Meanwhile, my Sunday habit is to walk 1.8 km (1.1 miles) to Café Cosmo, located on the other side of town from the airport, to spend the afternoon. It’s very popular with Indian and Western ex-pats. It has good Indian food and pizza and Wi-Fi. I often work on the blog there. I was sitting at my table late in the afternoon waiting for a food order to take home for my supervisor Julias and myself. Then Julias called me because Delphine, the CARE Country Director, was texting him about my safety. He didn’t want to respond until he saw me get back to the guesthouse. (He mentioned later it would be a black eye to CARE if something happened to me. I should hope that applied to all staff.)
At this point I only had limited knowledge of what was happening, except as I left Cosmo the streets were getting busier. Rather than walk, I decided it would be safer to secure “transportation” from Café Cosmo back to the guesthouse. As we traveled the crowds were getting thicker. I was going the same direction as the way to Abiriga’s home. It struck me that this was just a great exciting diversion for the town youths. It was an almost festive atmosphere. At last we got to my road and took it away from the crowds to the guesthouse. I believe we were just ahead of the massive procession.
As I walked into the courtyard, many rounds of gunfire erupted close by. I took out my phone to record them. You can hear Julias yell at me from the front porch “Bullets go up they go down!” He was right; the Arua police were shooting live ammo into the air to disperse the crowds. Not smart for police or me. I was grateful that guns are not so available to the citizens here.
Finally the authorities recovered the caskets. The tents and chairs set up for the services near Abiriga’s home were destroyed by the mobs. There were also attacks on journalists, and camera equipment were smashed Lots of cries not to wear yellow or face consequences.
Peace Corps security says the whole thing was probably well planned and it caught the police by surprise. There is restiveness about a rise in unsolved murders, and kidnappings for ransom are going up. The youth here are a tinderbox.

A burning police motorcycle

Smashing up the at the grounds near Abiriga’s home

Aftermath

The commemorative activities scheduled for Monday morning in Arua were canceled in favor of the just the burial in Rhino Camp.

As I wrote this I watched a stream of the service in Rhino Camp. They showed a photo of his closet full of only yellow clothes. I found this interesting article about the local culture. Yay, Peace Corps Goal 2 to show the local culture to Americans. After describing the events of the day, it says:

To the uninitiated, funerals among the Lugbara, the indigenous people of Arua, is culturally a chaotic and destructive affair.

Like in literally all societies, death is always not expected and mysterious, and to the Lugbara death, of any nature draws a lot of questions, anger and fury.

Although Abiriga is not a Lugbara but a Madi-Okollo, he represented a mainly Lugbara people of Arua municipality. The Lugbara and Madi-Okollo are also culturally and linguistically similar, all belonging to the Sudanic stock. Joel Chakua, a Lugbara and graduate teacher, says the chaos at Abiriga’s funeral “looks strange and a surprise but originally that’s how people mourned in our culture, however natural the death was”. Chakua adds that in Abiriga’s case “the violence should even be worse”, because of the emotive and high profile nature.

According to Chakua, head of Entebbe Adult Education Centre and now in his mid 40s, during his childhood “all funerals were chaotic and destructive”, concluding that once they have vented their anger “it will cool down!”

Aldo Candia, another Lugbara, says such chaotic scenes at a funeral, like Abiriga’s, is “true and normal”. Candia says “in our culture that (chaos) is normal but others see it unique”.

Being cultural, its likely the local organisers took that in stride, but never imagined the magnitude. Chakua says in Lugbra culture, especially in the olden days, “granaries would be pulled down, crops destroyed in the garden, and so forth, as a sign of outpouring of grief”.

In Abiriga’s case, explains Chakua, “the violence should even be worse, we should be seeing bows and arrows”.

According to Chakua, if the security forces are not informed of this cultural aspect, they may overreact, and as he puts it, “this will make matters worse”
(Photos herein are from unknown sources on my WhatsApp, unless I credit the Monitor or Observer newspaper. Narrative supported by links)

We took a bus and then a hike to the Cape of Good Hope. They used to say this is where the Indian Ocean collides with the Atlantic Ocean but it has now been determined its about 40 km to the southeast.

Early in March, I enjoyed a nice week in Cape Town with Blair. We both needed a break. We were there during some newsworthy events. Cape Town is facing the prospect of being the first major city in the world to run out of water. The city is taking extraordinary measures to conserve. Of course, besides the climate change at the root of it, there are some political reasons how this has happened. Taps in public bathrooms were off and we were urged to use the wall-mounted hand sanitizers. I showered with very little water, which is not too different from how I bucket bathe now.

Also, South Africa’s ruling party had just dumped its longstanding President and now he is charged with corruption. Nelson Mandela saved South Africa from civil war, but, as a recent New York Times article points out:

…. the deal was reached on what many South Africans today consider Pyrrhic terms: The black majority was allowed to control politics, but much of the country’s economic resources, including land, has remained in the hands of white South Africans and a small group of other elites.

Sadly, Mandela’s legacy is the endemic corruption of the party he founded, as co-opted by those business elites.

Parliament is also starting the process to appropriate land from whites “without compensation”. Initially this seems disturbing because Robert Mugrabe destroyed the economy of Zimbabwe by mass evictions of white farmers. The South African newspapers and my discussions with many people indicate the process in South Africa will be more deliberate with smaller parcels, and it doesn’t appear there will be mass evictions. And Zimbabwe, after recently disposing of Mugrabe, is actually starting to invite some farmers to return.
More than 20 years after the end of Apartheid however, whites still control over 75% of the land. But fixing past land injustices is embedded in the South African constitution. There has been foot-dragging.

Needless to say, this land was originally taken by force by the whites without compensation. And not just in the distant past. A few blocks from our Airbnb in Cape Town is the District 6 Museum. It preserves the memory of District 6, established in 1867 as a mixed community of freed slaves, merchants, artisans, laborers and immigrants. In 1966, the government declared the land would be redeveloped into a “White Only” community. From then until 1982, 60,000 people were forcibly evicted, sometimes with only an hour’s notice. Survivors of that dark time are available at the museum to talk about it.

We also visited the Slaves’ Lodge and its adjoining museum detailing the slave trade in Cape Town. The slaves temporarily imprisoned in the Lodge were either sold for use in South Africa, or sent to the east, including Asia. American slaves did not come through here. Certainly the most distressing depictions shown at the Slaves Lodge were the forceful separation of children from their parents, and husbands from their wives. I’ll be honest; I didn’t know slave families were broken up until I saw “Roots” as an adult. Today, Americans supposedly aspire to be more supportive of family values.  Of course, besides the history lessons, and water scarcity, Cape Town is an entertaining city with fine beaches and other tourist activities, although, as the article I cited above points out, segregation has survived in a more informal way.,

On the way to the Cape of Good Hope we passed the area of District 6. There was such backlash, it never got developed. The whole eviction process was a waste.

We stopped to observe a colony of Penguins, the only one outside of Antarctica.

Cute little guys and gals

Every afternoon, clouds creep over Table Mountain, which surrounds Cape Town. But it never rained. You can hike or take a gondola to the top.

View of Cape Town from the top of Table Mountain.

Night time view of Cape Town. One building has a lighted outline of the Cape

Not sure what I thought of these “souvenirs”.

Blair has developed an interest in herbs and gardens, so we went to couple of nice botanical gardens.

CARE is building over 800 semi-permanent shelters with funding from the European Union, Norway and Austria. I spent a day with two of our shelter officers assessing construction progress. CARE’s shelters are being given to our most vulnerable beneficiary refugees.  CARE builds for refugees certified by the International Red Cross and the Office of Prime Minister as “Persons with Special Needs” (PSNs), which include female heads of households, the elderly, disabled, and even unaccompanied children.Unfortunately, those with PSN status number in the tens of thousands just in the small areas of the settlements covered by CARE. The demand is heavy for these semi-permanent shelters. It is considered a huge improvement over the white UNHCR tarps and poles, which are designed to last less than a year. These should last several years, with one or two partitions inside for more privacy. They are either 5 meters (16 feet) by 3.5 meters (11 feet) with one partition for 4-5 people, or 8 meters by 3.5 meters with two partitions for 6-8 people. They are entirely made with mud bricks, which are not burned in a kiln, and mud grout, with iron sheet roofs. How many Americans would view such a home as a major upgrade? I wonder what my old HOA would have said if I tried to build one for a backyard storage shed?The construction projects have gotten off to a late start, and the rainy season is complicating the construction.

We advise the contractors to build only a few bricks height at a time, let them start to dry, and move to the next shelter, rotating until they are all built. But the crews hate to move, and keep building in one location, which makes the walls less stable and crooked.

A wall collapsed by rain. Inventories of mud bricks get ruined too, it they are not covered.

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Wind was driving the rain straight into this wall.

To make the shelters last longer, we tell the beneficiaries they need to smear mud on the walls’ surface, covering the bricks. This shelter is almost fished with smearing.

The same semi-permanent shelter as the previous photo, next to the temporary shelter it is replacing.

On the way home from a meeting, we were picking up some staff finishing a training . To pass the time, I played goalie while kids took turns taking shots at me. The guy who took this photo said “Look at Grandpa playing with the kids.”

Explaining that VHF is line of sight, unless there is a repeater tower in between. And he taught this sideways.

A representative from the UN had a training in the use of hand-held radios.  He explained that about 15 years ago, with fewer cell towers, CARE would always carry these radios. These days, however, you often lose the network up north in the settlements, so there is going to be a new gradual roll-out of radios.  Typical uses are in vehicle accidents, or other emergencies, and to communicate between short areas within the settlements. We learned about the difference between VHF and HF frequencies.  UN Vehicles have both types and its own dedicated channel.  I learned the distance to the horizon is 8 km (almost 5 miles). They passed around ten radios and we practiced using them. CARE’s chosen identifier in the settlements is “Whiskey Charlie” which was chosen for West Nile, CARE. But of course there was some mirth as I practiced with it: “Whiskey Charlie 1, this is Whiskey Charlie 3, and it’s Charley”. Now a few people call me Whiskey Charlie. Its getting old.

The tourniquets in the First Aid kits are a hard to describe, but they are pretty nifty. The word “Time” is on there to remind you to note the time, as a tourniquet shouldn’t be on for more than 3 hours.

I also participated in some first aid training, learning mainly how to stop bleeding, including use of a tourniquet, and giving CPR.

There are some crazy things that happen here. Last week in Yumbe, a town near the border in which CARE has an office, Uganda Government officials were seizing motorcycles which had been illegally smuggled over the border. Somehow a Boda Boda driver was hit and killed by a government vehicle. Soon the boda drivers were rioting and burned a vehicle.

Rioting boda drivers burn a vehicle

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My Arua supervisor Julias recently attended some training with other leaders near Nairobi. It required him to sleep in barracks on a single bed which is kind of hard on a big guy.  He had hostage training, which I was curious about.  Some of the main points: Stay as calm as possible, no sudden movements, be compliant, and always let them see your hands. Keep repeating that you are humanitarian aid workers.     Prepare yourself mentally for the idea you might be taken away for a while.  Have a grab bag with your medications.

We speculated about how Trump would handle American hostage situations. It has always been American policy not to pay ransoms. Then I asked Julias about strategies if abducted by ISIS or other radical Islamic outfit. They allegedly separate “true believers” of Islam from others.  They might quiz people claiming to be Muslims about their knowledge of the Koran. (I have no idea about the reality of this scenario)  Julias, who is a Christian, showed off a great deal of knowledge about Muslim doctrine and could speak some important Koranic verses in Arabic.  I asked,  “So If you were abducted, would you try to pass yourself off as a Muslim, or stay with the Christian group?” Julias replied, with a hearty laugh, “Well, you know, even Peter disowned Jesus!”

This guy was under my table during lunch the other day.

On Good Friday we were stopped four times on the way to the settlement by community processions.

A good turnout for a community parliament to discuss the prevention of Gender Based Violence

Then rains blew in from the side

A portion of the West Nile team after staff meeting

Will I walk the long road? Cannot stay.
There’s no need to say goodbye.
-Vedder

As one of my responsibilities, I interview refugees and write “success stories” about CARE’s interventions and how they transform lives. I also receive stories from staff and edit them. These stories are then attached to reports to donors or used with the media or internally, or filed away to be pulled up for use in the future (or never see the light of day). I try to use the refugee’s back story as a bit of a hook, but of course CARE needs to be the central character in the story. Thus I often can’t tell a refugee’s full story since it would be too long, or it has nothing to do with CARE. But the stories of their journeys and struggles are often compelling, so I will share a few. Some are fairly grim. Names are often changed and certain details altered for the protection of the refugee and those that might be left behind.

————-

At age 19, Nancy was living in Juba, South Sudan, and attending a school for nursing. She came home from school one day and found that her parents had been murdered. Soon after, at the advice of neighbors, she left her family home for a safer location. She took with her five younger brothers, four younger male cousins, and two more boys from a neighbor. First they spent two days walking to the town of Yei. After a month, Yei also became extremely insecure, so Nancy led the eleven boys by foot for three days to the Congo border town of Libogo. They often had to leave the road and hide in the bush to avoid combatants. They stayed there for one month while the children rested. Next, they walked to Embokolo in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and lived in a Catholic Church full of refugees for one year. Nancy eventually decided to take the children to Uganda by walking for one day to the border town of Silia Musala. Today, she lives with the 11 boys in a temporary shelter, and wants to resume nursing school one day.

—————————-

Manoah, his five children, and an orphan under his care traveled the 48 miles from his wife’s village to the border. He hired three boda bodas, one to carry possessions, and two to carry Manoah and the six children. They crossed the border in August, 2016. At the border crossing, the luggage was inspected, the family was registered, and they spent one night there. The next morning they were fed biscuits and then were transported to Ocea in Rhino Camp. The family slept outdoors for two weeks before they were given a plot of land in another part of Rhino Camp. Manoah built his shelter with materials given to him by UHHCR.  His pregnant wife arrived soon after.

——

Nelson Mandela (his real name!), 23 years old, is manager of the Youth Garden restaurant, which CARE supported as a livelihood initiative with funding help from the Czech Republic.  Nelson decided to flee to Uganda because “Security in South Sudan did not favor human nature,” citing problems in adequate education, medicine and security. Nelson, two brothers and the wife of one brother had to walk for one week from Yei, South Sudan to the Ugandan border. Sometimes they hid in the bush to dodge both rebels and government troops.

Nelson Mandela in the restaurant he manages

When Nelson’s group finally arrived in Uganda in September 2016, they were placed in Rhino Camp Settlement. “We had nothing,” Nelson says “but UNHCR provided materials to build two shelters.”  

Their parents remained behind, but their family home and neighborhood were soon burned down. Nelson’s parents had to shift to a church compound in Wei with 5,000 internally displaced persons, because the route to Uganda has become too deteriorated. He said all sides respect the church. Nelson told me recently that during a cease fire, his parents went back to their old home and currently live among the still standing walls, with no roof for now, but its dry season.

Eventually Nelson hopes to be a politician, and like his namesake, Nelson Mandela, he wants to “bring my people together in peace.” But he has to get funds to finish his interrupted education.

—————-

Annet is a single mother of two girls and two boys, ages 4-14. She was living in the town of Yei. The security of the town had deteriorated. “My children could not attend school, I was always hearing gunshots, and I would fetch water and see dead bodies.”

Annet decided to become a refugee for the third time (Previously she had come to Uganda with her father in the 1990’s and had been in Imvepi settlement in 2004). She left Yei in September 2016. Traveling with her four children plus two orphaned children of her sister, she was able to obtain transport with other members of her church in a large vehicle carrying 20 refugees. All she could carry was a mattress, two sauce pans and jerry cans. The vehicle was stopped several times by gunmen.  Once they had to pay bribes to keep two boys from being conscripted. Another time, six soldiers, two of them armed, demanded that Annet get out and go with them “to the bush”. The travelers complained, “What about her children? You would have her leave six children with us?” Eventually the soldiers allowed Annet to return to her traveling companions to complete their journey.

Annet was settled into Rhino Camp but suffered from depression, and suicidal thoughts after what had happened during her journey. Without going into the whole part of CARE’s story, she received support from Grace, another refugee who was a volunteer trained by CARE (Grace has her own amazing back story but my colleague interviewed her. I will in the future.). Grace guided Annet to a workshop on trauma healing, and persuaded her to join a women’s group. Annet has made a great comeback, and today she is very productive. Her kids are in school, she helps make bricks for a women’s shelter, and cuts and bales grass to sell for thatched roofs on huts.

Sadly, rape is used as a tool of war. (Besides so many South Sudanese women who have been raped, the Ugandan authorities are reporting 9 out of 10 female Congolese refugees from DRC have been raped.) Below is a full story, written by a psycho-social counselor with my help. I liked the first person approach she used:

She met me at the CARE Reception Center in July, 2017 with a smile on her face. A closer look at her however, unveiled the anxiety and stress hiding behind the smile. Her facial muscles were so tight, and her eyes so red, it was evident she might have been spending sleepless nights of fear and helplessness.

Violet was a 22 year old South Sudanese living in Imvepi refugee settlement. She arrived with a group of refugees in February 2017, after the onset of civil war in her country. She had two boys aged 6 and 3 years, and was expecting a third one.

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Violet narrated that as the war intensified, her husband urged her to take the children, join her neighbors, and flee to Uganda for refuge.  She did as her husband advised, since she saw the dawning of every day bringing in greater tragedy.

Violet and the other refugees moved through the bush, due to fear of both the army and the rebels “who killed ruthlessly.”  She feared for her two children and hoped they would safely reach Uganda. But before they arrived, a group of soldiers attacked them. They took the men away, beating some and killing others. Then the women and some of the girls were beaten and raped.

Violet told me she was raped by a number of men, leaving her with multiple wounds and unbearable pain. She lived under the fear and tension that she might have contracted HIV/AIDS or other STDs. The biggest storm came when she realized she was pregnant as a result of the rapes, which she could not imagine living with. “I only wanted to live for my two children, but now here I am carrying a result of wickedness done to me” she said, bursting into tears. She didn’t know how to explain all this to her husband and in-laws, whom she definitely knew would not take her word.

True to her fears, when Violet told her in-laws what happened , they became furious and insulted her as being wasted and not good enough to be a wife for their son. Her in-laws quickly advised her husband to quit the marriage on claims he would be infected with HIV/AIDS. When Violet’s people tried to talk to her husband, he said he couldn’t live with a woman bearing a child of wickedness. He told Violet, even if there’s a possibility she may be HIV negative, she needed to abort the child, which by then was six months along. When Violet declined abortion due to fear of losing her life, her husband abandoned her and their two children, taking away all their belonging and even their ration card. Violet was helpless, living at the mercy of neighbors, who were getting tired of accommodating and feeding her and her children, taking the little rations they received. She said she hated the child she was carrying and hated herself too. She was so helpless and restless and harbored suicidal thoughts.

THE RISING SUN

One day, CARE volunteers were conducting a community awareness session on Gender Based Violence (GBV) near where Violet stays. She decided to go and “just spend time” there, to relieve her of so much stress and worry.  At the session, she learned she could get help. “Maybe there is still hope, and a reason to live,” she thought to herself. The community was told where to find help for issues related to GBV, and what kind of help was available at the CARE desk. That’s when Violet came to the reception center, where she met me, and narrated her ordeal.

During our first psycho-social support session, Violet and I made a care plan together. We agreed to meet at least once a week to talk. We visited the medical center for an examination, and she was enrolled for antenatal care. Then we visited her area Refugee Welfare Counselor to write a letter to confirm that her husband took away all their property. We went together to the police and Office of Prime Minister to ensure her safety, and to get her a new ration card. We also agreed that we will have to talk to her mother to support her and this worked as her mother agreed to take care of the unborn child after the child stops breastfeeding.

Through the above process with the help of CARE, Violet was able to get a new ration card for her and her children, find a provisional shelter to use, and enrolled for antenatal care where she learned that she was HIV/AIDS free. We continued with psycho-social support through visiting her at her shelter, and occasionally accompanying her to the health center for antenatal visits and some material support for the unborn baby. Violet made a decision not to abort her baby but rather to raise the child together with her two boys. Violet gave birth through Caesarian section on 26^th September 2017, a beautiful baby girl. She seems happier now and wear a beautiful smile every time I pay her a visit and whenever she sees a care staff or even the vehicles passing. For she sees hope being restored.

She thanks CARE International so much for restoring hope, especially for women and girls whom she says encounter greater sexual violence and are stigmatized by society. She has joined a CARE women’s group and she says she uses her testimony to support girls and women whom she knows are going through the same injustice. She henceforth encourages women and girls in her village never to hesitate to report any cases of gender based violence to CARE for they can be sure to help.

———–

Joseph was educated at a prestigious university in the U.K. and had been a part of the South Sudan government in various capacities, with international travel. He fell out of favor with the current regime. One night, seven police came for Joseph with orders to execute him, but due to someone’s intercession, they decided to put him in jail instead.  He spent three nights with 95 cellmates. The police would come in the middle of the night and take a few away. On the third night, at 2 a.m., they came for Joseph. Fortunately he was shown the gate, and set free by a friend.  “I ran for 50 meters fearing I would be shot. Once I realized I was really free, I walked 121 miles for seven days to the Ugandan border.”  After arriving safely, Joseph borrowed a phone to call his wife. It had been ten days since he had been dragged off. The phone call came literally during his own burial service (I am told some Africans will still do burials without a body, and they even do it in the settlements when they hear about a death back home). His wife put the phone on speaker and held it out to the mourners to see if they would agree and confirm it was his voice. Joseph’s wife and child needed to get away quickly and joined him three days later.  He became an immediate leader in the settlement and trained by CARE as a Role Model Man, influencing the behavior of other men toward their families.

He is seeking asylum, hopefully in the UK, but is trying elsewhere too. He says he is still fearful of being spotted by the wrong people, and I have obscured a lot here. There are quite a few well educated refugees just like Joseph in the settlements.

——————————

I have reports due every few months to the Peace Corps. One of the questions is always: “The one thing I wish Americans knew about my country of service is….” My response this month will find disagreement among many of my readers, but its the way I feel:

More than a million South Sudanese refugees are in Uganda today. Now, thousands more are flooding into Western Uganda daily from the DRC. These refugees would not be in these settlements without truly awful events forcing them out of their homes and across the Ugandan border.  The Ugandan government not only welcomes refugees, it allows them freedom of movement (even throughout the country) and they are given materials for a shelter and a small plot of land. Uganda encourages integration with the nearby host communities.

The refugees I’ve met aspire to educate their children, hold jobs, and lead peaceful lives, just like any American or Ugandan, and probably like any refugee from Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, or Iraq (countries in which American military interventions materially contributed to the refugee crises).  Americans could learn a lesson about this Ugandan generosity. I like to remind Americans that we have  accepted and absorbed 1.3 million refugees from Viet Nam. We can’t cause the crisis and then become a “gated community” and turn our backs. Ever hear the phrase “You broke it, you bought it?”   America has a moral obligation to accept more refugees.

Now a few more photos:

We’ve outgrown our office space and are moving to new offices next weekend. Here are staff working outside in the shade of a mango tree.

Every day at dusk thousands of fruit bats fly over Arua on their nightly quests to eat. This bat parade lasts 20-30 minutes.

The heat has been brutal. No rain since before Christmas. If you look at the temperature app on the blog during the day here, you always see temps in the 90’s. I came home early one afternoon and caught the guesthouse security guard napping in the shade.

Security guards watching a Nigerian movie on a flip phone using a memory card.

I think every post I highlight women carrying stuff on their heads

I like the geckos that hang around to get bugs for me. Surely the cockroach in my drain could feed that gecko for a week. This is a separate compartment from my room, and so far I have seen no cockroaches there. It’s an incentive to keep food out of my room. Meowri would have gotten this one.

This is the first story I wrote and submitted for CARE way back n September. I was not at this birth, I just interviewed people and wrote about it. It was in the first edition of a new newsletter from CARE Office in Kampala that Ruwani put together:

Sometimes, the miracle of life occurs in surprising and unusual ways.

Recently, in the West Nile region of Uganda, a team from CARE, along with health workers from the district, headed for a routine clinical mentorship exercise for midwives at the health facilities in Rhino Camp refugee settlement. While driving, the team noticed a woman squatting on the side of the road in great pain, surrounded by curious onlookers.

Mid-wife holds the new born. The pattern on the kitenge means “hope”.

One should consult their doctor about the dosage pattern that levitra online purchase http://deeprootsmag.org/category/features/page/4/ is been given to you along with the medicine. But sources say that about 4 ounce of watermelon levitra cost contains citrulline, an amino acid. Older people with some disorders of cardiac activity should take viagra cialis samples generic under doctor’s supervision. Abdominal Infection- If the patient is suffering from any chronic illness such as diabetes that is one of the most hunted products on the internet these days. purchase cheap levitra is a key. “Suspecting a problem, we pulled over, and quickly determined the woman was in the second stage of labor,” said CARE’s SRMH Specialist, Mike B. Mukirane. “She had been walking to a local health center for antenatal care, felt overcome by her labor pains, and stopped to deliver her baby.” The woman, a refugee from South Sudan, had nothing with her, not even a traditional kitenge cloth. Fortunately, one of the CARE trainers, Sr. Joyce Anite, a mid-wife from Arua Regional Referral Hospital, had her medical bag, which included a surgical blade to cut the cord. However, their vehicle did not have a first aid kit, neither did two other NGO vehicles the team flagged down for help. Finally, a second CARE vehicle arrived with a first aid kit containing the supplies needed for a safe delivery.

While preparing, another pregnant woman on her way for routine antenatal care and treatment came upon the group and gave her kitenge cloth, which was placed on the ground for the delivery. Soon, with Anite’s assistance, a bouncing baby boy was born within 20 minutes. The CARE team prepared a pad out of bandage and cotton from the first aid kit to safely transfer the mother, along with her baby, to the health center for further assistance. The baby was full term, weighing a healthy 2.8 kgs. (6.1 lbs) and the mother was provided a Dignity Kit.

“We were allowed the honor of naming the baby,” said Mike, “so we named him ‘Geria’. A local name which means ‘born on the roadside’.”

Over 1,000,000 refugees from South Sudan now live in Uganda, and 82% of them are women and children. To help improve sexual, reproductive and maternal health, CARE International in Uganda has been supporting refugees from South Sudan and host communities by providing equipment and expertise to health centres and health workers.