gorillas!

The alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. Our last full day in Africa. Gorilla tracking day. We had been looking forward to this since we booked our permits in May. What a way to spend our last day. Now, we know we had said back in January, “Who knows when we’ll be here again?” But this time we mean it. It’s not a big secret that we’re trying to start our family this year (apologies to Harvey Bruce – expand our family). And despite the fact that one of our fellow trackers yesterday was a Dutch man who had just spent a year traveling through Africa with his wife and one year old daughter as part of a Lonely Planet project on traveling with young children, we’re thinking it’s truly going to be some time before we’re back.

Anyway, we were staying at the Kinigi guesthouse, high in the Rwanda mountains, just miles from the borders of the Democratic Republic of Congo to the West and Uganda to the North. It was a fairly simple operation at the guesthouse, but no one stayed there for the accommodations; everyone we met was there for one reason: gorillas. Of course these were the same gorilla families that Dian Fossey had made famous through her book (and eventual Hollywood film), “Gorillas in the Mist”. The permits are pricey and the philosophy that powers the operation (one which Fossey vehemently and understandably opposed) is that only through tourism dollars can the government protect these incredible creatures. Before the money was rolling in, the government (as well as the governments of Uganda and Congo) just couldn’t afford the manpower and resources needed to keep the poachers from killing the adults to sell their hands and feet in the local markets, or from kidnapping the babies to sell to zoos. Our guide told us that in order for the poachers to kidnap one baby, they have to shoot and kill ten to fifteen from the family. After seeing them, I just can’t imagine it. Gorillas share 98% of our genetic make-up; killing one would be like killing a dear relative, albeit a rather furry one…

I don’t know how many of you have seen Aimee when she is REALLLY excited, but it is a sight to behold. Aimee is not someone whom I’d call a morning person. But yesterday, as soon as that alarm sounded, she was in high gear. She sort of doesn’t know what to do with herself so she kind of buzzes all about the room, sometimes saying things in a voice that has to sort of squeaks through her constricted throat muscles. Often, the things she’s saying are not words that I recognize but rather unrecognizable patterns of tones and grunts that seem to signify excitement. Later, in the jungle, I recognized a few of those same grunts and groans coming from some of our primate cousins… At one point, on her way to the bathroom, she jumped on and off the bed for no apparent reason. At another point, she came over to me as I was packing and grabbed me in a bear hug. I have to remind her that she actually needs to get ready because her mind is going in so many different directions that nothing is really happening. While there is a lot of movement and energy, it’s sort of a spinning the wheels kind of thing. I should also mention that it is grand fun to see her in such a state…

She was still buzzing at breakfast and talking about how she hoped we would get in the Susa Group. There are about nine different families of gorillas on the volcanoes. Oh yeah, the mountains that they live on are all dormant volcanoes. All over the area, houses are built from volcanic rock. The river beds are lined with porous grey, dried lava. The paths up the mountain are littered with chunks of volcanic debris. Anyway, there are three groups of gorillas that are solely for research groups and restricted to tourists. Then there are nine groups open to tourism. There is a strict limit of eight permits granted per group per day. Each group is allowed just one hour with the family from the moment they find the group. When we were booking in May, the 14th of July (Vive la France!) was the only available day in the week, and we got the last two permits. Each permit is $500 so there weren’t a whole lot of scruffy, twenty-something backpackers here. In fact, we were among the youngest people on the trek. I’d say most people were in their forties and fifties… Anyway, the Susa group is the most famous of the families. For one, it is the largest. There are thirty-six gorillas in the family and four silverbacks. The other reason for their fame is the fact that twins were born to the family in 2004. It is the first recorded successful gorilla twin birth in history. Apparently it is very, very rare for twins to survive. Their birth was cause for great celebration in the country, and the President and his wife named them during the annual naming ceremony (called “Kwita Izina" in Rwandese). It was clear when we arrived at the Volcanoes Park Headquarters at 7 am that a lot of people wanted to be in the Susa group. Aimee and I, typically, were the last people to show up at the headquarters. We waited in line at the desk and eventually filled out our paperwork, showed our permits, and then went outside to mill about, talk to other travelers, and wait to see what happened next. There were wooden signs staked into the ground around the front lawn, each sign with the words painted, “VNP Welcomes You to (name of gorilla family) Group”. Next to each sign two guides in park ranger outfits were stationed. There were some group names we recognized. Group 13 is well-known for its friendly silverback. Pablo group is fairly well known. And of course, Susa. We met an American family from L.A. They really wanted to be in the Susa group. They tried going over to the Susa sign but were shooed away by the guides and told to wait for assignment by the officer in charge. So Aimee and I waited and watched. “Let go, Let God”, despite the cheesy bumper stickers, is a motto we travel by. So we just kind of smiled to one another and said it: Let Go, Let God. The officer in charge was randomly grabbing people and placing them in groups of eight and then asking them to follow him to one of the signs. We wondered how we would be chosen. Group after group was assigned. The mother in the American family went again to the Susa guides (note: honestly, only American travelers seem to be so pushy) and this time, the guide walked over and said something to the officer. I decided to stick close to the American woman because maybe the guide told the officer that she really wanted Susa. I figured that if I was in proximity, I could get us in. So the officer came over – there were only about three groups left, including Susa -- and asked the family how many. They said “four.” The officer had walked over with another couple so he said he needed two more. I raised my hand, holding up two fingers. Aimee raised her hand. He totally ignored us. He grabbed two other people and asked the group to walk with him. Aimee thought we had been chosen and started to walk with the group. Very disappointed I said, “Aimee, it’s not us.” We were bummed. But lo and behold, they were led to a different family! Not Susa. There were sixteen of us left on the lawn. Another group was rounded up. Again, we tried to get in but were ignored again. They went off and didn’t get Susa. There were only eight of us left and there was only Susa. We couldn’t believe it. Sure enough, the officer came over, rounded us up, and took us to Susa! We were ecstatic. Aimee was beside herself. She wanted to see those twins so badly... and as we stood at our welcome sign, we definitely sensed some Susa Envy.

Our group was interesting. An American trio: a couple in their early forties traveling with their female friend. The couple was tough. She was pretty high maintenance and kept nagging her husband about drinking enough water and putting on more sunscreen throughout the trek. He had done the trek in 1988 but had gained a little in the middle since and I thought several times that he was going to have a heat stroke or start vomiting, or both. He was beet red within minutes and I couldn’t believe he made it to the gorillas. Then there was a young guy from Seattle who was fit and very nice. There was Abbe, our Dutch friend. His wife and kid went home last month so he was solo. He was a bit chatty on the hike but a very friendly and likeable guy. Finally, there was a young Indian named Raghiv. Very sweet, very nice guy who miraculously showed up that morning and secured the one permit remaining due to a last-minute cancellation. Not only did he get a permit but he got the Susa group. What luck! But I knew Raghiv was not much of a hiker. The guides had told us that Susa was usually pretty far up the mountain and that we should be ready for quite a hike. When we arrived after a forty-five minute drive to the base of the mountain, the guides started handing out bamboo walking sticks to help us on the ascent. Raghiv asked what the sticks were for. I thought, “Hmmm… Has he ever hiked before?” Well, literally about five minutes into our 90 minute hike, Raghiv was on the ground. He sat down, dripping sweat, and needed to rest. I felt bad for him. The forty-something was in bad shape, too. He and his wife were already bickering about something. She said, “Chris, don’t be so pessimistic!” Then she yelled to the porter who was carrying her backpack, “John! I neeeed some waaater!!!” Oh boy.

But enough about our companions. I should mention that we were with two guides, a porter for whomever felt they needed a bag carried for them up the mountain, and several armed soldiers. The soldiers were there to protect us and to be on the lookout for poachers. They hiked all the way to the gorillas with us and then watched our bags as we spent our allotted one hour with the family. Before the tourists show up each day, a different group of trackers is already on the mountain tracking the families from the spot where they left them the day before. It can take several hours to find them. As we were driving to our jump off point, they still had not found them. We were traveling to a spot based on their last known whereabouts. Sometimes groups can be very close to the boundary of the forest. Let me explain. There are several different parking areas that the tourists are dropped at with the guides. From there, depending on the location, it can be a short, level walk to the boundary of the forest, or it can be a long, steep climb. Then, once you are inside the protected boundary, it can be a short or a long hike to reach the family. It is all totally random and based on where the gorillas happened to have nested the night before and where they happen to be that day. We spoke to one group of tourists the day before who got to the jump off, walked across the dirt road to the boundary and had a very short, twenty-minute walk across flat ground before finding their family. They were a bit disappointed. Of course, with everyone we spoke to, any disappointment over the nature of the hike dissipates quite quickly upon seeing the gorillas.

We were not disappointed at all. We had a real experience. Our hike felt like a 90 degree climb up the face of a mountain. It took about an hour from the cars to reach the boundary. We went fairly slowly to account for the folks who were struggling. But that was fine with us because it was easy to get winded at the altitude at which we climbing. The path went through the locals’ patches of farmland and it always feels a bit odd to be these rich, white tourists tramping through the countryside, passing shoeless peasants and their children working their land. To me, it’s uncomfortable but I think it’s the discomfort of actually having to face the gross inequities that I’m the beneficiary of. In America, too often, I think we are able to shield ourselves from those inequities a lot of the time. The unofficial, class-based zoning laws see to it that we don’t have to see what we don’t want to see. But here, there is no escape. One needs to recognize ones privilege and question that structure, question that set-up, ask why that is. And hopefully, ask how that can change. And also confront the survival instinct that wants to give… but just so much. Just enough that I’m still O.K., still living the way I’m accustomed to living. I recommend Wallace Shawn’s play, “The Fever” for a much more eloquent expression of this dilemma…

So we hike up this trail and finally get to the edge of the jungle. We rest for a moment and are told that the gorillas about another half-hour hike in. We enter. And we are in the jungle! We keep climbing upward through thick bamboo and thick, leafy foliage that the guides have to occasionally hack away with their machetes. Nettles grab at our arms and legs as we pass. With each step the jungle gets thicker. I’m not nervous but I am definitely excited. Aimee is visibly thrilled. She says her heart is pounding. Finally, the guide stops short and holds up his hand. He has been in radio contact with the mountain guides all morning and now he is talking to them again. We are standing in a clearing. All around us is thick growth that is almost impossible to see through. We are told to be still and stop talking. Then he tells us to move up and behind him, quickly! We hear the breaking of branches all around us. Crack! Crack! Everyone moves. We are told to remove our bags and leave our poles on the ground. Take out our cameras. As I am moving, I see him. A huge – I mean HUGE – silverback standing just behind the bamboo, eyeing us. He is massive but I only get a glimpse because the guide is telling us to move. Now the mountain guides come out from behind some branches, smiling. They point in and say something to our guide. The army is assigned to protect our bags. We are told to follow the guides and porters as they disappear into the bush. We do. As we walk, the guides make a very distinct gutteral sound, almost like they are clearing their throat. They say it’s the way to assure the gorillas that they are friends.

And there he is. One of the silverbacks. We can’t be more than six or seven feet away from his back. And he seems very deliberately to have decided to keep his back to us. His back is massive. I don’t even know how to describe it. He was just a mass of black muscle. Not far from him was a female, Poppy, the oldest gorilla of the family (gorilla lifespan – 40 -45 years). She was just chilling, chewing some bamboo sticks, casually checking us out. Now there was excitement but no fear. The gorillas went about their business, more or less unconcerned about us. The guides constantly checked in with them by making their throat noises. The silverback continued to “ignore” us so one of the guides called down from another spot and told us to come up. We were all to move as a group and we did. The jungle was thick and it was tough to walk but we came up to another spot where a female was sitting while a number of kids – including the toddler twins! – were playing. And they play! They were all wrestling and running around, swinging up on the bamboo poles. It was incredible. The children were running all around us, chasing each other through the jungle, mock-fighting, having a grand old time! Every once in a while we would be told to stand up straight because one of the silverbacks was approaching. Or a mother was approaching. Aimee and I were sometimes a few yards from one another and thus, saw completely different things. At one point, she later told me, she say one of the mamas carrying a pink little baby in her arms, cradling it in her arms. It was tiny. We found out later that the baby was just three weeks old and that it was very rare for a visitor to see. In fact, we never saw the baby or that mom for the rest of the hour.

Incidentally, Aimee always asks our guides about how the different animals birth. We found out that when a gorilla is giving birth, the other females make an inner circle around the mother-to-be and watch over her. The males form an outer circle facing outward as a wall of protection. If anything approaches, they charge. Our guide told us that he was bringing a group of tourists to see Susa when the males started charging them. He couldn’t figure out what was going on but sure enough, the twins were being born!

What to say? The hour was just incredible. The gorillas were at once with us and at the same time completely unconcerned with us. They allowed us into their world and it was one of the most spectacular things you could ever imagine. To look at their faces and into their eyes is like looking at a human being. The gorillas kept moving, climbing higher into the jungle and we kept following them – carefully. At one point we were on a small ridge. I think we were following one of the females. The group was kind of split in two (we were separated by about five feet or so) and the guide at the front of the line told us to stand up. We could see through the bush a huge silverback coming toward us from above. The group that I was in – the one lower on the ridge – heard a cracking from below and turned to see another silverback coming at us from below. We were in a precarious position. The guide at the top didn’t seem to know that there was another male below us. So we were getting different sets of messages from the two guides. The top guide was telling us to be still and the bottom one was telling us to move. I was third from the back. Behind me was the husband and wife. She was pushing me nervously: “Umm. Keep moving. Keep moving. He said to keep moving.” But I wasn’t scared. I wanted to see the silverback and he didn’t seem aggressive. The guide was relaxed and I knew he wasn’t scared. Again: “Keep moving. He said keep moving!” I had about had it with this one so I kind of snapped, “GO!” She hurried by me and I got to really look at this silverback as he moved by us.

Aimee was snapping away. She went through roll after roll of film. We were balancing wanting to take photos and then just being with the gorillas, without feeling the need to film. It was awesome to simply watch them. Unfortunately, we had left the roll of 400 in our bag because we thought the light would be too dark to film at such a slow speed. It was a bit of a blow to have run out of our good film at the end because the very last thing that happened was we came upon the dominant silverback – it was the first we had seen him – sitting in a nest of grass and bamboo. We must have been about three feet away from him. He just sat and ate making little grunts and snorts as he chomped his food. The guide said he was happy. He was enormous. His fingers were like large, black bananas. His head was like a watermelon. Above him a little baby swung on a bamboo pole. I snapped what I could with the digital but mostly we just wanted to be with them, to watch them and to see them. The guide told everyone to take their last snaps because the hour was up. We said thank you to the papa gorilla and then turned to go. We hiked back through the jungle and, on jelly legs, down the mountainside to the cars. I had a splitting headache at that point. The sun, the altitude, dehydration, adrenaline drop? I don’t know but both of us were totally spent and elated. It was about 1:15 p.m. We got in the jeep and went back to the hotel to pack and head back to Kigali.

So my computer battery is on 20% and we have about 10,000 francs in our pocket (US $20) and it is time to board the plane in a few hours. We are so sad to leave here. We love Africa. We’ve loved our time in Rwanda. We miss our friends in Gulu. And we also miss our friends and family. It’s time to come home.

and always the same...

July 11, 2007 (written by Aimee and Kevin)

We’re in Kigali and feel culture shocked. Rwanda is much more developed than Uganda. It’s almost hard to believe that the two countries could be side by side. (then again, I think of the United States and Mexico.) We spent the day taking care of business (getting money exchanged, picking up our gorilla permits, etc.), and then spent the afternoon at the genocide museum learning about the horror that took place here only thirteen years ago. At that time, the tension between the two groups of people here (artificially created in the early 20th c. by the Belgian colonial government), the Hutus and the Tutsis, exploded and resulted in the death of over a million Tutsis and moderate or sympathetic Hutus in just over three months. It puts it into horrifying perspective to think that a sixth of the number of people who died in the Holocaust were killed here in just one twenty-fourth of the time…

We were with a guide, Dietier. He lost both parents during the genocide. He and his younger sister were taken into a friends house and hidden for two months. As we approached the museum – at the top of a hill overlooking a slum and the fancy, upscale city center, the latter above the former on the opposite hill – we were surprised that there was a huge line of cars and hundreds of people on foot approaching the museum. Dietier told us that the market had been closed on this day to allow the local merchants to visit the memorial. It was really something to be at the museum with these people, the survivors of the genocide, as they gathered to mourn and to remember. As we entered the gates, the mass of people weren’t going inside the museum but were instead heading down a set of stairs outside. Our guide told us that we should try to go inside first because the others would be coming in after a ceremony in the rose garden. It was very nice because we had the museum to ourselves and were able to go slowly through each section. Our hearts sank as we walked with Dietier through each room learning about the history that lead up to the genocide. Dietier explained (in French, one of the two national languages along with Kinyarwanda) about the sometimes difficult-to-understand political and cultural subtleties that led up to the genocide. We read accounts from the locals and watched many explicitly violent and heartbreaking videos of the violence that occurred during that spring and summer of 1994 (as America was transfixed by O.J. and his white Bronco). Everything in this memorial was absolutely horrifying, but a few things stand out: The women who were brutally raped and purposively infected with HIV so that their deaths would be long and painful; the tiny children (as young as a few months old) who were brutally beaten and tortured before they were killed; the fact that neighbors or family members turned on friends and relatives in what was, literally, an instant (the signal for the violence to begin was the explosion of an airplane carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi); and perhaps worst of all, the fact that the West could have completely prevented this had it cared to. Our government and the U.N. had the information and intelligence to know what was happening. It is said that as little as 5,000 U.N. troops could have prevented the deaths of a million innocent lives. Not only did the French government supply the killers with 12 million dollars worth of arms, but Kofi Annan and Bill Clinton (and the rest of the world) sat idly by, knowing full well what was happening, and did nothing. Once again, the world watches as Africans die because it is too complicated or too local or too expensive; the problem is too big… But to be here and to see and meet and talk with these beautiful people (whether here or in Uganda) is to see and know them as fellow human beings, as brothers and sisters who care about and love their children, who are struggling for work and money; who worship like us, who laugh like us, who live – with the obvious exception of the unbelievable luxuries we take for granted – just like us. It is all we can do to hold back tears – really – almost every day we’re on this continent…

In one of the books we’re reading it states that 99.9% of the people of Rwanda witnessed extreme violence and killing during those 100 days. It is eerie to walk the residential streets of Rwanda and picture the scenes of a bloody genocide. We are just down the road from Hotel des Milles-Colline (made famous through the film, Hotel Rwanda), where people ran for refuge in hopes of saving their lives. One of the last rooms at the museum contained a pictorial overview of all the genocides that occurred in the twentieth century, from Armenia to Rwanda to Darfur.

What on Earth is this creature called “man”? We, who pride ourselves on our technologies and cultures and civility? We, who can travel to space and to the depths of the seas? We, the only animal to conceive of divinity and meaning, to have the ability to reflect on our own consciousness? And this? Genocide?? The attempted destruction of entire peoples based on superficial differences like color or religion or, in this case, tribe? And it keeps happening. It is happening right now. What in the f-ck are we doing here?!?!? Different eras, cultures, religions and ethnicities. And always the same…

On the drive back to our hotel, we spoke to Dietier about the process of reconciliation. What is incredible about Rwanda is that just 13 years after this genocide, there is almost complete recovery. Of course, the country has not had the resources to try to address the psychological wounds that abound in (literally) every psyche here. But the young (45 years old) leader here, Paul Kagame (a Tutsi who, from everything we’ve read and heard about him, seems loved, respected, energetic and, amazingly for sub-Saharan Africa, untainted by major scandal or corruption) and his government have implemented a sweeping reconciliation program through which the Hutus have been almost universally forgiven by the families of their victims (thousands upon thousands of Hutus are now standing or awaiting trial for their crimes; many others were able to flee). Dietier told us that in order for people to move on they must forgive. He shared with us that the man who killed his parents came to him later to ask for forgiveness. It’s unbelievable to walk the streets here and feel safe, to feel that there is a lack of tension in the air. The people are different here than in Uganda. No hearty greetings. No big smiles. They eye us as we walk by. There is a seriousness in their faces. There is no hostility toward us, just something more (perhaps understandably) reserved in their demeanor. The city center is well-developed and thriving. Investment is working. In just 13 years, this country has roared back to something resembling normalcy. Of course there is disparity. Of course the government has critics. Of course too many people beg on the streets and go to bed hungry. But considering the fact that more than about a sixth of the population was brutally murdered just over a decade ago, the state of affairs must be seen as a powerful statement to the will, determination, and capacity of these people to forgive and to love. It is awe-inspiring to us in the same way that the Acholi people are able to laugh and to love so easily so soon after they watched two generations of their people wiped out. How to fathom the duality of mankind – the great capacity to kill and the greater capacity to live? It is a fascinating planet, no?

Photo 1: Us on the Bus to Kigali
Photo 2: Welcome to Rwanda
Photo 3: Hotel des Milles-Colline

Gentle Creatures

July, 6th 2007

I had to unplug from blogging and writing this week. I had no energy for it. To recall all the events of the week feels like too much, but I feel compelled to at least follow up from my last blog. My last entry was mostly about Harriet. After her cesarean and the death of her son, her body became extremely infected. She was not monitored closely enough by the doctors and ended up with an advanced case of sepsis. When we arrived last Friday morning, her mother, Catherine, was crying and was worried that her daughter was going to die. She told us that during the night Harriet’s breathing was very labored and she was completely unresponsive. It was clear to me that she needed to be transferred to Lacor hospital immediately. We had to wait around for her transfer to be signed off on by the head doctor and then we had to arrange for a car. They don’t just have an ambulance on call ready to go. Once the ambulance is arranged, you personally have to pay for petrol. We helped the family with this cost. What about the families that can’t afford the petrol to Lacor? Harriet was in really bad shape when we transferred her. She was making these deep moans but her eyes were fixed and her breathing was very shallow. Her body was in septic shock. Harriet was taken off the gurney at GRRH and placed on a straw mat in the ambulance with eight relatives crammed around her, including Rachel, who rode with her in the back. We traveled the bumpy dirt road to Lacor and were greeted with frustration by the head maternity nurse. She gave me a long lecture about how GRRH always waits until the last minute to transfer patients to them. She was angry about how this affects the records and statistics at Lacor because, unfortunately, many of the transfer patients die. After all, Gulu hospital is the “referral” hospital. It was a shock to witness the Lacor doctors at work. They moved fast and treated Harriet immediately. We talked to them about the issue of negligence in Harriet’s case. They had a lot to say on this matter and confirmed what we’ve been witnessing at GRRH. Once Harriet was stabilized the doctor told us that he felt very optimistic about her chances for recovery. I felt so relieved. We told her family the good news and left thinking that she would regain consciousness within two days. We told them that we’d come to check her the following day. Her brother, James, spoke English well and was our main way of communicating with her family. He was also a dedicated brother and had been at Harriet’s side everyday. Around 4 pm the next day Rachel and I were getting ready to go to the hospital. I decided to call James just to check in with him. To my shock he told me that Harriet died at 1 pm. I couldn’t believe it. I still can’t believe it. It was just three days before her death that we were singing and dancing together. She was a strong, funny, lively, beautiful girl. How could this have happened? Our conversation was short. I asked him to call back with details about her burial. We hung up and Rachel, Kevin, and I were dumbfounded. I was furious. It wasn’t until later on when I was alone with Kevin that I broke down. It was just too much. Rachel and I attended her burial. She was buried on a plot of land that her young husband’s family owned. The land was deep in the bush… and I mean deep. We drove to a small town and then hiked about 2 kilometers into the bush. James escorted us along with Kenny (our driver and friend from St. Monica’s). I was glad to have him with us. Her family had been waiting for us. They were about 75 people gathered in a clearing in the middle of the bush. Harriet was wrapped in blankets. One was a the katange (cloth) that she labored in at the hospital. Her mother also tore a piece of that material and was wearing it around her waist. They unwrapped her face so that we could see her. Again, I couldn’t believe she was dead. It was heartbreaking to see her mother. We had spent so much time with her mother from the time Harriet arrive in early labor, through active labor, and then post cesarean and the death of her baby. I felt very connected to her and at a loss…The burial was very simple. She was put into the ground and her cousins poured dirt over her. Then they got inside the hole and pounded the dirt on top of her with their feet. This was followed by pounding the dirt with large wooden poles. The women and men sat separately. They watched silently. Harriet’s mother cried a little, but quietly. Rachel and I sat on the straw mat with Catherine and the other mothers of Harriet and we all held hands. She had many mothers, at least four. I think her father had five wives. After the last bit of dirt was pounded down the women erupted in wailing. They began weeping, screaming, and pounding their chests. I was totally taken off guard. The women then got up and began the procession back to the village. The crying and grieving continued all the way down the path. As Catherine passed the grave she threw her flip flops on top. We took the long and sad walk back to our car. Catherine and her sister got in and we drove them back to the IDP camp. She wanted to show us where the baby was buried. We walked through the camp until we got to a hut. There, inside the outer wall of the hut, was a small mound of mud. The baby was inside the wall of the hut. It was so sad to see that little mound of mud, and hard to believe that their baby was buried inside. They took us to where Harriet lived and then we said our goodbyes. There was closure for me in attending her burial. It helped to mourn with her mothers and family. It helped to see her face.

During the week of Harriet’s and her baby’s death there were two other babies and two other mothers who died. The two babies were both women that we had been working with. Their story is equally as important and painful as Harriet’s but I don’t have the energy to retell it during this entry. Even now as I write, Kevin and I are on a bus to Kigali, Rwanda, and nine days have passed since Harriet’s burial. It feels like a long time ago.

My last week in Gulu was filled with a lot of grief and joy. I was fighting a bacterial infection and had the worse case of tonsillitis ever. My body just broke down from the stress and emotional weight of the last month. In that time Jess and Ellen arrived to Gulu. They were here for just a short time but their presence was lovely. The women and staff at the hospital appreciated them so much. They “doula-ed” each woman with great tenderness. I took them to meet the TBAs at Kongya Goka IDP camp. Again, we were greeted with song and dance. In return, Ellen belly danced and was a huge hit! They talked to them about the role of a doula and showed them some positions and pressure points that are helpful for women during labor. They appreciated our short childbirth education class and we were so grateful in return for the wisdom that they shared with us.

I learned a lot from this pilot program about what works and what doesn’t work. In our time at the hospital we witnessed what to us looked like negligence… I wrote about the lack of critical thinking in my last blog. Looking back on that blog I have to apologize to my Acholi friends. I could go back to my blog site and edit it out but I feel it’s important for it to remain. There is critical thinking here. There is self-reflection. It was arrogant of me to write otherwise. It’s hard to process and live in it at the same time. There are days of utter rage, it’s true. But that rage is mixed with the most heartbreaking compassion. The rage is not directed at anyone in particular. I think that once we start indicting the victims, we as westerners lose the wider context of the suffering of the culture. That line is a constant test. My last day at the hospital was a sobering one. I learned a lot from my midwife sisters about what is needed in order to work as a team even in the midst of negligence and death. It is easy to focus on the mistakes at the hospital. It is easy to point a finger at someone and call them incompetent. But the doctors and midwives are not to blame. The hospital is not to blame. The people of Northern Uganda have been so deeply traumatized by war and poverty. We can come in and jump into problem solving and criticizing—all in the name of “research”. But at what cost? We will never know what their reality is. I came to GRRH because the conditions are so atrocious. I came because this hospital is severely lacking in supplies, training, and staff. I came because they are my friends. The women that work in this ward everyday are completely overworked. Often they are not paid for six months. They carry heavy loads at home with orphaned children that need food on the table and school fees that need to be paid. Even the head nursing officers can barely survive. So I apologize if I simplified my own analysis of the situation. I was angry the day that I wrote that blog. I still don’t have answers. Do I need to? For me that’s not the point. I have love for my friends, even the ones that participated in Harriet’s and her baby’s deaths. I am humbled here everyday.

I learned that there is no greater human power than kindness and love. I love this place and the Acholi people so much. My own personal commitment is galvanized with each visit. I had many heartfelt and tearful goodbyes, always to the shock of my Acholi friends. Crying when saying goodbye isn’t part of the culture- as far as I can tell…The nuns at St. Monica’s threw me, Rachel, and Kevin a goodbye party. As usual, our dinner turned into a dance party and was the perfect way to celebrate our goodbye with friends that had been so loving and hospitable to us. They even baked us a beautiful Sacred Heart cake! The next day (Friday morning) we drove Rachel to the bus park to see her off. It had been a month of intense and powerful work together. This was a unique situation and one that I will never forget. I’m grateful for all that I learned from my midwife sister.

July 9th, 2007
We feel good. We’ve just returned from a day-long safari at Murchison Falls with the NYU students and Teachers for Teachers exchange program. There is nothing better than being on safari with the hot sun pouring over you riding on top of a matatu and gazing over the landscape scattered with animals---especially giraffes! I felt in love with these magnificent gentle giants. [editors note: Mrs. Brill has a documented history of falling in love with long-necked, gangly creatures with knobby knees and brown spots all over their skin.] We got to Backpackers hostel at 11:30pm and found out that there were six beds for eleven people in a shared room with ten other travelers that we didn’t know and who already were asleep. Not to mention that there were no pillows or mosquito nets on the beds. It was at this point that we had a simple choice: laugh or leave. As it was midnight already, we were over roughing it and decided to book ourselves into a decent hotel in Kampala. I took about five hot showers in two days.

…So now we’re on the long road to Kigali. It’s a nine hour bus ride and luckily we’ve got great seats up front.

We’re happy to have this time together. The jungle and gorillas are calling.

Love to everyone back home,
Aimee

photo 1 Midwives at GRRH (Sister Millie, Sister Anna, and Sister Irene)
photo 2 Jess and Ellen giving a demonstration on positions during labor
photo 3 Kevin and Sister Rosemary at our last dinner dancing calypso
photo 4 Beautiful giraffes!

Downs and Ups

I have not felt like blogging this time around. As Aimee has written, this trip is very different from our first. We have come back into a network of relationships and responsibilities, both old and new. We’ve come back with the understanding that we very likely will not be back this way for quite some time, and we are trying to utilize each moment for the work we’ve come to do. One of the first things we discovered when we arrived in Gulu was that the two brothers who we’ve been sponsoring in school since February are in very different situations. Fred, the younger boy, is in his first year of secondary school in a private, Catholic school. His campus is secluded and very green. There are only 130 boys there and they have (old) computers, functional science labs and, most importantly, a feeling of normalcy. Stephen, his older brother, is twenty years old. He dropped out of secondary school seven years ago when his Aunt could no longer afford the school fees. When we met Stephen, he was driving a matatu and trying to support Fred and his Aunt. He had a terrible stutter and he seemed, in many ways, traumatized. I think that for Stephen, just the pride of being in school and wearing a uniform has contributed to a major shift in his personality. His stutter is considerably less pronounced, he is smiling a lot, and he talks positively about his future. Unfortunately, the school that Charity for Peace placed him in is in ruins. It honestly looks like a burned out squatter flat. The school consists of a single administration building pushed back from a dirt road atop a small hill on the outskirts of town. If no one were in front of the building, you would honestly think it was abandoned. There is graffiti all over the face of the building and the windows are almost completely broken out. Next to this building is the boys dorm. When we went in, the smell was enough to knock a person down. Trash and dirt is piled in every corner of the living quarters. When the power is on, there is a single lightbulb on the ceiling to illuminate the room. All of the boys sleep on thin, foam mattresses on the floor. It is quite a sight. Fifty or sixty boys to a room, crammed together like sardines. Stephen had few clothes and just a thin sheet to keep warm. Despite the fact that he had been in school for six months, they had failed to provide him with the uniform that was supposed to be included in his fees. The weather now ranges from very hot in the midday to quite cool in the evenings and throughout the night. Stephen was complaining that he was quite cold. He also told us that he had yet to be shown his report card so he had no idea how he was progressing in his studies. When I went to speak to the headmaster, a man who seemed to be in his late twenties or so, he didn’t have a very good explanation for the uniform or the report card, but both miraculously appeared within a day or two. On the day that I came by to pick up a copy of the report card, the headmaster asked if I worked for an NGO. When I said no, he said he was sorry to hear it because he was going to ask me if there were any job openings in my company. Text books are only for those who can afford the 20,000 shilling cost per book, so hardly anyone has books. That’s not just at Stephen’s school. I have only seen one or two children in any of the schools I’ve been to who have even a single book. Fred, even though he was in a “good” school, had no mosquito netting on his bed. He had only two shirts, a pair of pants, and a pair of shorts that substituted as underwear… So sponsoring a child, we’ve discovered, requires a lot more than just writing a check and sending it to some charity. There has to be some follow-up. Now we are in the process of getting Stephen into a better school where we can be somewhat sure that he is not freezing on a cement floor each night. If we hadn’t come back, Stephen may have finished his schooling in this place and he would never have mentioned anything to us because, to him, it was a better situation than he had been in…

On a completely unrelated note, I was feeling quite homesick this week. I had been getting quite a bit accomplished last week. I was plowing through a lot of reading for N.Y.U. that I had fallen behind on during the year. I was preparing some abstracts for papers and conference proposals. And I had started working with the prisoners and Gulu prison on a theater piece. Things were moving along wonderfully, but then I came down with some terrible infection. I don’t know if it was viral or bacterial or what. A lot of the locals are convinced that it was malaria. Whatever it was, it threw me for a loop! I was truly down and out for about five days. High fever, vomiting, night sweats, headache, intense joint pain, the whole nine yards. Aimee was amazing. Despite all the intense weight she was carrying on her shoulders from her days at the hospital, she really nursed me back to health. I was so out of it, I wasn’t really aware of what was going on for her. Nevertheless, she was transporting back and forth to Gulu Independent hospital to get checked, to get medication, and then sitting with me at home until she was sure I was comfortable. So after a tough, long weekend, I am feeling much, much better. But ever since I got sick, my spirits have been really low. Actually, I’m feeling a bit like myself today. We’ll see if I can maintain through the day because for the last few days, I’ve been pretty low. Dreaming of the Atlantic Ocean, Brooklyn pizza, and Brian Lehrer (my favorite NPR host in New York). Missing my niece and nephew and my brothers and my parents and my cat (!) and feeling sorry for myself about all of it…

But then I woke up this morning and the sunrise was absolutely stunning. The air was clean and fresh and I felt a bit lighter. As I walked down the red-clay roads, I tried to see the scene with fresh eyes again. I tried to remind myself that it was pretty incredible that I was strolling down this road in Central Africa. It is incredible. Aimee and I don’t know when we’ll be back here. It may be many, many years. It may be never. I know I’ll have pizza again. And I’ll swim in the ocean in a few short weeks. But when will I see this African sunrise? And when will I live with a group of singing, dancing, drumming nuns? When will I be offered a steaming bowl of white ants again as an after-dinner treat? When will I have the chance to enter a Ugandan prison and do a bilingual theater workshop with 100 inmates? It may be a while. So I’m telling myself to stop bitching and start rediscovering these landscapes. When we left in January, we said that it had been a once-in-a-lifetime trip. Well, now it’s been twice-in-a-lifetime and I don’t want to take it for granted. I still look forward to coming home in a few weeks. I really do miss everyone, and I can’t wait to get a slice and some chocolate ice cream. But it will keep. For now, we are here and I want to soak it in because I don’t know if I’ll pass this way again.

More to come…

The Privilege of Self-Reflection

6.26-We’re in the middle of our third week. I can’t believe it. My days are booked. Today Rachel and I are working the evening shift at the hospital so I have the morning to write and catch up on some things around St. Monica’s. After lunch, we’re teaching a workshop with the child mothers that live and go to school here. Sister Rosemary asked us to teach them a course about mothering, focusing on the basics of washing and caring for their baby etc. We’re hoping to have more of a conversation around the joys and challenges about being a young mother. We’ll see how it goes…

Well, I’m finally feeling like I’m gaining clarity on the purpose of this trip. Our meetings with the TBAs have pointed most directly to what’s most needed and what can be most easily sustained. My heart is with them. They are a vital part of the health care system in the North. They are not compensated for their work in any way. Yet, they identified so strongly with being a TBA as a profession. It is their profession. They are proud and passionate about their work. If they’re lucky they’ll receive some sugar or sim sim (peanut) paste as payment for a birth. Most of the time they are not paid. They have been forced to move into IDP camps because of the conflict, without any support from the government at all or any supplies to protect themselves. They attend births often unprotected without any gloves. They shared with us about their concern about contracting HIV and other diseases. Some have been living in the camps for a few years, some up to twenty years. Once again, women are carrying the heaviest load for their community without any recognition, training, funding, or outside support. This is what feels important to me. Each group that we’ve met with has a leader. It would be feasible to implement a program to support the TBAs through local leadership to get them supplies, funding, and training. I believe that with long-term governmental and NGO support these women could change the structure of healthcare for women living in IDP camps. They have sincerely asked us not to forget them.

The hospital is another story. The need for supplies and training is also very great. I filmed and witnessed a cesarean birth two days ago and was horrified at what I saw. It is not their fault. To begin with, the two surgeons performing the procedure were both junior doctors. They have been trained in an outdated technique. I watched in horror as this poor woman was butchered with a 10 inch midline incision. Blood was pouring off the table as she lay with her scarred uterus on her stomach and her placenta in between her ankles (they just left it there). To everyone’s surprise she gave birth to twin girls. I honestly wasn’t sure if she would make it out alive. Thank g-d she was in the cesarean ward the following day. She is in severe pain but she is alive. This was her second cesarean. Each day at the hospital is horrifying. I wish it wasn’t this way.

One thing that I have found here is the absence of critical thinking. As a culture, they have been taught not to question. The roots of this absence come from the conditioning of being colonized. There is a formula for everything they do. Thinking outside of the box is not even an option. There is no awareness that there is a box. There is a lack of self-reflection. I see how in our culture, self-reflection is a privilege. This is extremely disturbing when it comes to birth, an art that so heavily relies on intuition. From the time we are very young, our parents ask “How do you feel, honey? Did that make you feel sad? Did your feelings get hurt?” Your feelings are a privilege. I am constantly trying to find ways to reframe that question. It just doesn’t translate here. Kevin is finding the same thing with his work at the prison. The men there are most comfortable being a collective, but to ask someone to individualize a performance is foreign to them. It took him 45 minutes the other day to have them act out something from their own experience. The removal of one’s own personal experience from the culture plays into birth in a fascinating way. You might think that women would birth silently, shamefully, or introspectively due to a lack of individualism and self-reflection in the culture. But we’re finding the opposite. Birth gives these women permission to emote and be dramatic. It gives them permission to feel, shout, scream, rage, and cry. It’s an eruption of emotion! The midwives in response will laugh and call them “stubborn”. The performance of birth comes to a screeching halt after the baby is born. A woman that was tearing at my neck and kicking me one moment becomes immediately docile and expressionless after the birth. Or she goes from a raging fit to being so lovely and sweet.

Last week, a young midwife, Beatrice, fresh out of midwifery school joined us on the maternity ward at GRRH. She is obsessed with conducting every birth and in my opinion, a little “catch obsessed”. Each birth is approached the same way as if each mother’s needs are the same. I appreciate her passion for wanting to learn. I share that passion with her. But what I’m witnessing her practice is actually dangerous to the mother. She was taught to do thorough vaginal examines after a mother has delivered. As a student in this system (British) you are taught to learn through rote memorization. That is they way to succeed. Do as the book says. So even if we have controlled a mother’s bleeding with nursing or breast stimulation, she insists on vigorously inserting her hands inside a woman after each birth. One of the last mother’s that this happened to fainted in the hallway five minutes after being examined in this way. It’s disconcerting to say the least. We are always walking such a fine line. A dangerous line. An important line. There is a time and place to step in and protect mothers, to actively train the other birth attendants and midwives, and there is a time to respect their practices and watch. I do not blame the women that I’m working with for what I see as negligence. It would be naïve and arrogant to do so. The problem runs so deep, and is a direct consequence of the effects of colonization. But at what point, as a culture, do you evolve from that history? Where does critical thinking come from? As a culture, what is the catalyst for questioning? Rachel calls it “a shell of Western medicine”. It’s true. It reminds me of how women were treated in the nineteen fifties when the medicalization of women became the trend, and sadly, remains as the dominant paradigm. So here we are…and this is the “referral” hospital that the TBAs are being told to send their women. This the place for high-risk mothers. This week one of the mothers came in with a prolapsed uterus. Her uterus was still hanging out of her vagina two days after she first came in. She left and went home untreated.

We’re filming our days here with the hope of creating a documentary that will not only tell the story of the hospital, but help to raise funding and awareness for the TBAs. Soon, two more doulas will be joining us. That said, I question if an exchange program is what is most needed here. If my intention is to create a sustainable project for TBAs I have to be honest and say that it is not about bringing more of “us” here.

July 27th – I’m returning from a very upsetting day at the hospital. It is honestly just getting worse and worse. We came for the evening shift and found out that one of the mothers lost her baby in a cesarean section. It took a few minutes to find out that it was Harriet’s, a seventeen year old girl that I was with all yesterday. When I left her at 4pm she was 8cm dilated, the heart rate of her baby was strong, and she was in good spirits. We spent most of the day walking the halls and singing a song that we made up. “Today is the day of birthday. Today is the day for your baby to come...” then I would ask her, “When will your baby come?” “Today!” When will it happen?” “Now!” and she would point to her belly. Then she would tell me that she thought we should switch bellies. She wanted me to have the big one! I asked her when this should happen and she responded “Tonight!”. We laughed together and kept on walking. Out of all the teenagers that I’ve worked with I felt most connected to her. She was responsive in a way that I hadn’t experienced with other girls. She had a large group of mothers helping her, supporting, and loving her. It was shock to come back today to the news that her baby had died. What happened?! What went wrong?! I was not satisfied with the doctor’s explanation that her pelvis was compressed. He said that he got a call at 1:30am but he was not on-call that night. He tried three other doctors and not one of them answered the call. Apparently, one was officially on-call but his phone was off. So he waited until the his morning shift and gave her the cesarean at 9am. By that time the baby had already died. I went to see her in the cesarean ward. A ward filled with about ten beds full of recovering mothers, most with infected incisions. The room smells like shit and piss and is full of flies. I don’t think the mothers get cleaned up or cared for. Usually one of their relatives is responsible for washing them. She looked at me asked about her baby. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t understand. No one had told her that baby died. It was explained to me later that the policy is to wait a few days until the mother has recovered. I spoke with the doctor again (the junior surgeon who performed the cesarean). I told him that she was awake and that she had been asking for her baby. We walked to the ward and I thought he was going to give her news. Instead, he lied to her and told her that the baby was not well but that we’re hoping he will be better by tomorrow. He was speaking in Luo so I thought the whole time that he was telling her truth. Instead, he lied to her face and to mine. There was nothing I could do except hold her hand and be with her. I left it up to her mother to tell her, but I don’t think she has. Her family had been informed and had taken the baby home after the cesarean. It wasn’t until a few hours later when Harriet was asleep that I got the real story. I took her mother outside in the hall along with a translator to find out what went wrong. The translator was this wonderful woman who has been working at GRRH in the dental ward for ten years. I was told that she was 9 cm at 9:30pm. She felt the urge to push but was told that she was going to get slapped if she cried or screamed. The midwives then went into the back room (the room were we change) and slept throughout the night. They told the mother and Harriet that they would only come out to clamp and cut the cord. They totally left her alone. They abandoned her. Her mother said that no one touched her, no one encouraged her, or helped her. About an hour later she was pushing on her own. The baby came down and was close to crowning because her mother said she could see head. Again, no one came to be her, check the fetal heart rate, or help her push her baby out. They left her in that state until morning. The baby was in distress with his head compressed in the birth canal for twelve hours. Of course, by the time they performed the cesarean in the morning he was dead. The mother said to me that she thought of us all night because she knew we would have helped her daughter. She said she knew we would have touched her. The woman translating, Janet, was extremely open and told me that this happened too often at this hospital. “The midwives hit and hurt the women. They should not treat mothers this way. They should be encouraging them, especially such a young girl.”
My blood rushed through my body. I was livid. An entire month of justifying, of playing mediator and peacemaker, came to an end. What is happening at this hospital is criminal. I’m sorry to say it. It needs to be reported to the administration. It needs to change. I apologized to Harriet’s mother. I told her this should not have happened to her daughter. I asked her if I could film her story with Janet translating and she agreed. I’m going to return to the hospital today to follow-up with that and a few other things. My heart is so heavy. There’s really no time to process here. I just seem to be moving on. There are so many issues colliding at once. I’m reflecting on my first time at GRRH. What was the difference? The majority of my time, I was working with two other midwives, Jackie and Jennifer. I haven’t worked a shift with either one of them this trip. Compared to the midwives of this trip, they both are kind, knowledgeable, and thorough in the care of mother and baby. They taught me a lot. In that time, I never witnessed a resuscitation. I never saw a baby die. I knew the conditions were atrocious but I felt that the mothers were being cared for.

This type of violence against women happens all over the world. It is another case of victim/victimizer. The truth is I have compassion for the midwives abusing these women. I see how little they have, how unsupported they are. But this can’t go on… Will my reporting them really do anything? I doubt it. But I feel like I can’t leave here without handing in a formal report on the conditions that we’ve witnessed. I do feel clearer about my own role at the hospital. I’m putting my energy into educating. I don’t want to reprimand or continue the violence I’ve witnessed by assaulting my midwife sisters. I want there to be real rehabilitation for the women and staff. I even thought about incorporating non-violent communication into the next trip (who knows when that will even be?).

Sorry for the extremely long blog. I’m really just journaling for my own sanity. It helps to write. The week in Rwanda is looking really good right now!

Love to you all. Thank you for your support and Love. I feel it. The work is hard but I love it, and it's what I came here to do.

Ps Update on Kevin:
Kevin told me that he plans to post a blog this week. He just hasn’t felt like writing. He’s working at the prison everyday from 9-12. He’s also advising the NYU students on the Teachers for Teachers program. It’s all going well. Unfortunately, he got sick last week but has made a full recovery! We have our “dates” throughout the day and week. But we’re really looking forward to an enjoyable last week together in Rwanda. And we can’t wait for gorilla tracking on our last day!

Love,
Aimee


Photo Kevin's first night out after a week of being sick!
Photo Sister Florence, our Ugandan mother who we love so much.
Photo Harriet in labor

Birth in Question

June 20th, 2007

The walls are covered in a streaked brown stain spanning seventy years worth of women laboring. They coat the corridors of Gulu Hospital and are a permanent fixture in the story of birth at the maternity ward. I feel caught in a conflict that has no resolution, only temporary ebb and flows—some positive, some negative. The more I work here, the more complex the issues become. Am I just here as a witness? Am I here to bring back the narratives of these women? Am I here to “help”? Does my very presence only solidify the constructs of Western power in a developing nation? I try to keep it simple. I take it ALL in. My heart is bursting, aching, crying in love. I don’t want to be preachy, but only G-d can hold this love and pain. I feel alive here for that reason. I am always brought closer to this presence. It is extremely humbling. The role of the midwife is just that—a role. I watch, listen, act, and care. I’m laughed at by the women that line the corridor whenever I give labor support to a birthing mother. It’s a cultural difference. Women don’t really touch the birthing mom. But the mothers in labor are very responsive to a loving touch and comfort. Many of the women don’t speak English but they respond to a kind touch. Who doesn’t?

I literally am walking in two worlds. Yesterday at the hospital, we resuscitated a baby back to life. We watched it go from blue to gray to pinkish brown. We watched its breathing go from shallow to steady. After many attempts of trying to explain that this baby needed oxygen immediately, we trained the grandmother to give mouth to mouth. She didn’t understand what that was so after several more minutes, Rachel got a glove, ripped a hole in it, placed it over the babies mouth and gave him mouth to mouth. It was the only way to save this baby. We’ve noticed that the midwives don’t assess the newborn after they are born. Have they become so apathetic to witnessing death? Has it become such a normal part of their daily experience that it no longer warrants emergency intervention? I watch this and wonder…aware of my own biases, aware of my own arrogance. But when you know you can save a life how can you just walk away and let that baby die? It is extreme. The mothers scream out. They grab you and pull on you with the force that is the tsunami of birth. My shoulders ache at the end of the day and yet I rush back to check on these mamas eager to see them holding their new baby the following day. I love these women. There is so much that I don’t understand. So much that I’m trying to put together.

I hop on a bodha and head back to St. Monica’s. Yesterday was the Feast of the Sacred Heart. It was a day of celebration for the nuns here. I go from being immersed in birth and the relationship between life and day into overflowing exuberance! Within a short time I was sweating and dancing my heart out to Ugandan music with the girls (and Kevin). They can get down! We sipped on homemade pineapple wine and resumed our dance party with the nuns after supper. Happiness, togetherness, and a sense of family envelops the convent. We spent the night rejoicing in this celebration of the sacred heart (I love that). The night ended with the earth quaking which for me was the perfect response to the type of day that I had.

The last few days were spent traveling and speaking with TBAs (Traditional Birth Attendants) in IDP camps. We heard the stories of over seventy women. These women are the villager midwives who have come into this calling through their mothers and grandmothers. One woman said she started as a midwife at the age of twelve. There is a very interesting dialogue going on between TBAs and nurse midwives in Uganda. It is now illegal to give birth in the villages and all TBAs are being trained to refer their women to the hospital. But we’ve found that the relationship between TBAs and the hospital midwives is very good. They respect each other and recognize the differences of their roles in the community. Many of the midwives are grateful for the TBAs because the truth is that they relieve a lot of pressure and work for them. The midwives are all understaffed and overworked. The TBAs are being trained through large NGO health programs. They are being trained in the Western way. We’re watching how this force comes in and undermines the ancient wisdom already present in the Acholi people. They learn their information through song, dance, and skits. They are a lively bunch! We have even exchanged cultural dances. They taught us some traditional Acholi dances and we busted out havah nagilah. We even got one of the elders bouncing up in the chair!

There is a lot more to write about our time with them but I’m at the internet café with little time…

I love you all and look forward to seeing you in a few weeks.
Afoyo!

thank you for all your comments!

xo-aimee

photos:
TBAs in Koro
TBAs in Bobbi demonstrating how when the refer a mother to the hospital