Seeing Gulu Through New Eyes

Before I start writing I’d like to dedicate this trip to our dear friend Komakach Kenny Odongpiny. His absence from our lives is deeply felt. His tragic death only underlines how severe the suffering is for the people of Northern Uganda…

Wow, we’re back!

Being here a second time feels very different. What I look at, smell, hear, taste, and touch is now familiar. What was all so new the first time has rushed back into my senses and landed in a previously recorded place in my memory. It didn’t take long to jump right back in. I’m focused on the work and on the relationships that I have here with my dear friends in Gulu. Once again my heart is touched beyond all measure by their kindness and generosity. It is quite amazing to be with people who witness the worst suffering and still emanate a joy that surpasses anything I have ever witnessed before in my life. I love it here.

Kevin and I are staying at “St. Monica’s Girls Tailoring School” with our friend, Rachel, a midwife from Brooklyn. The girls here are survivors. Many of them were abducted during the war. Just the other night about twenty child-mothers were dropped off with their babies. Many look despondent. It’s as if they are somewhere else… We eat all three meals at the convent with the nuns that run St. Monica’s. There are a lively bunch! Every meal is filled with a lot of laughter. We feel like we’re in the African “Sound of Music”! Each Sister has a very distinct personality. Sister Jane is a big woman who jokes all the time. Sister LaCosta is a beautiful Sudanese woman with a fiery spirit. She is combative in a way that makes everyone in the room laugh. Assunta is another Sudanese woman with deep, dark skin. She is quiet and thoughtful and has a very caring spirit. And then there is the Mother Superior, Sister Rosemary. She is a large woman who shakes all over when she laughs… and she laughs a lot. She loves music and will sometimes turn on the radio, bust out the house-made wine and donuts, and shake her booty around the kitchen during supper. It’s been a delight to be with them. The work they do in this community is amazing. Of any group we’ve seen in the community, they are efficient and organized. The school is dedicated to the practical training of the girls in an effort to make them self-sufficient and employable upon their graduation. They study tailoring, secretarial skill, cooking, and catering. To Americans, this might seem awfully backward, dated, or sexist, but in the context of this culture, it is actually something that can help these girls to survive. In the absence of an ability to go to academic institutions, their other options are few.

The girls stay up late into the night. Our room is just on the other side of their dorm. Every night we hear them singing, talking, laughing, bathing, joking…I’m glad they have each other. After twenty years of war, and twenty years before that of the brutal dictatorships of Milton Obote and Idi Amin, we are glad they can laugh with one another now. The other day, children from the Catholic schools from around the area came to gather for mass in the assembly hall. It struck me that just a year or so ago many of these children were still night commuting, or were held captive by the rebel army. Many of them were abducted and trained to be killers. I sat looking around the room. I started noticing all the scars of different girls and boys. A machete scar on one girl’s head, another one on the neck of a teenage boy. The confusion, pain, horror, love, and joy of these child soldiers washed over me. Thank g-d they got out. But now what?

Kevin and I walked home later that afternoon. It is customary to greet someone when you see them so we walked over to the nuns who were in front of a group of little ones. The children (about 15) were singing to the nuns. When we approached the nuns asked them to sing us a song. They started “Hello friends, hello vis-i-toors, we’re so happy, we’re so grateful, we’re sooo happy to be with you…” It was the sweetest song. One of the nuns, Sister Sunta, leaned over and whispered “that one is Kony’s daughter”. I looked over at this beautiful little girl singing to me with her shining eyes. She was probably six years old. How do you reconcile being the daughter of a mass murderer and rebel leader?

June 10th – First day back at the hospital…it was a difficult day. The first baby born did not survive. She ingested a tremendous amount of meconium which, in and of itself, isn’t fatal. I worked on her for a long time. I thought she was going to make it. The power was out so we were limited with what we could use to resuscitate her. Suction tubes and a manual resuscitator machine just aren’t enough. It’s a very helpless feeling to watch a baby die knowing that her life could probably be saved back home. But the people here don’t think that way. They believe that G-d determines the outcome of every life. I believe that too. This was the fourth baby that this mother lost. She still has two living children. The hospital is in worse shape now than it was six months ago. There is a desperate need of supplies, updated medical information, structural renovations, and training. The list is endless. And this is just one small hospital in one town.

June 13th
It’s 10pm and I’m feeling wired. It’s been a long day. Rachel and I were at the hospital for 9 hours straight with only a 15 minute break. I don’t have the energy to write about the day or our experiences at the hospital. I have had to stuff so much of what I’ve witnessed today. I can’t even begin. If I launch into a story it will be out of context and seem so dramatic. Every birth is “dramatic” and is happening in a cultural context that is so different from ours. It piles on – layer upon layer upon layer. The history of colonialism impacts how the midwives are practicing which impacts the care that the women are receiving and on and on….violence against women, lack of funding, HIV, severe poverty, abuse of power – all these issues collide and I’m left with a complexity that is paralyzing to write about. I stayed up late with Rachel talking about our day. I could not have a better birth partner with me. I am learning so much from her knowledge as a midwife. It’s also a tremendous help to have a partner at the hospital. We’re conducting births as a team, processing together, and weeding through the issues to get to the heart of why we’re here. She’s a strong, loving, and determined woman. It turns out that our paths in our lives have crossed before. I put this pilot program out there and feel like what’s come back in return is perfectly aligned. It’s good to trust life!

There is so much we haven't even touched on yet so we will try to write soon!

Sending love to everyone back home.

aimee & kevin

photos: 1) Aimee with Sister Florence (senior midwife in Gulu), Grace (midwife in Gulu), and Rachel (American midwife traveling with Aimee)
2) A & K in extremely wealthy, extremely humid Dubai during our layover...