Dinner with the Family & Down A Rebel Highway

On Saturday I went for dinner with the family in For God again. Regina the 10 year old came running out and jumped up and hugged me when I arrived which was a nice welcome. Regina then showed me all the pictures she has drawn and some stories she has written. She is very good at drawing for a 10 year old. Lucy (the mother) then showed me her photo album. She has met the pope which is a pretty cool thing to be able to say! Many of the pictures were of her two husbands, both of whom were killed. Susanna (the semi-adopted daughter of Lucy, who is aged 21) and I then went for what I thought was going to be a nice stroll around the village, but ended up being about a 6km walk to a ‘beach’ that has been made about 7km outside Gulu. It’s in fact a small lake, with a moth-eaten wooden boat tied up on it advertising “boat ride 1,000”. I imagine if you summed up the courage and paid the 1,000 it would be more of a stand in a boat, watch as boat sinks, fall in, swim back to the side, be annoyed experience than an actual ride. Some may consider that UGX 1,000 (30p) is about a fair price for this kind of experience, but I stuck to drinking a Fanta instead.

When we got back dinner was served. One of the items served, a bitter green vegetable, was possibly one of the most disgusting tasting things I have ever eaten in my life (and I’ve eaten dog before!). It had been put on my plate though, and I didn’t want to seem rude, so I ate it very quickly to get it over and done with. Unfortunately, this was understood as ‘he’s eaten that all already, he must really like it, let’s give him another massive portion of it’. Lucy then bought a cup through with “oil from grinded tree nuts” in it, which she said made the green stuff taste even better and she poured liberally over the green-ness. Unfortunately, she was misinformed; it in fact made the green stuff rate even higher up my list of ‘things to NEVER EVER eat again, even if it’s massively rude’. Aside from this, and being told the meat served was “beef meat” when it in fact was tuna, the meal was very acceptable. It seems however that Ugandans eat massive portions, and I myself don’t eat very much, especially not when confronted with a plate of Carbs. I ate all that was given (which was hard as I felt massively full) but refused seconds. Lucy got very concerned as she was worried that my “parents will think I have not been feeding you and be cross with me”. At this point I made up some elaborate lie about how I was sick when I was younger and so I can’t eat very much food at one time. She seemed satisfied by this. Sometimes a lie is better than the truth.

I had bought my camera to their house and offered to take pictures for them, which I could print in the UK and post to them. I had meant pictures of them, but little Emmanuel interpreted it to mean anything he could every possibly want a picture of. So I now have a camera full of pictures of Michael Jackson taken from the TV, the Virgin Mary, taken from various posters they have on their wall. I also have some nice ones of the family too though, so I shall make sure I shall post those. In return, Lucy is going to make me local chilli powder and ‘sim sim paste’ (like peanut butter) to take back to ‘my mother’ so she can ‘cook it for’ me! Lucy also found it hilarious to give me a small chilli and tell me that it is not very hot, to which I put the whole thing in my mouth, and instantly started sweating, my eyes watered and I went bright red. “It is very hot really” she laughed as I gasped for air. This apparently passes for comedy in For God!
Yesterday I travelled with my friend Sunday Ojara who is the teacher at the school where I sat in on the music class. We went to his village called Lukome (pronounced Loo-Ko-May), which is 10 miles North of Gulu. He drove me on a motorbike he hired, and gave a running commentary of our surroundings along our journey, which took about an hour as the roads were horrendous quality, with huge gulleys and potholes the whole way. Sunday informed me how people were slowing moving back to this area from the Camps, and how it had once been a rebel hotspot, as it took them between two points. Driving along it was hard to imagine how afraid and isolated people must have felt taking this route, as the narrow dirt road is surrounded either side by tall grass which reaches well above head height. There could be a group of rebels just 1 metre away from the side of the road and you would have no idea until it was too late. The empty houses and neglected farm patches are testament to the fear that pervaded amongst the communities along this route.

As we neared Lukome, Sunday pointed out a neglected house that was falling apart, and some ramshackle huts on the opposite side of the road. He said “This is where my uncle and family lived. They are all dead now”. I sensed this was a bit of a trip down memory lane for him. We also visited the house where his grandma lives. She is a very elderly lady and can no longer walk, and so she has to crawl around hunched over. She is alone now, and clearly struggles with life. She asked Sunday for some money as she would like to eat some meat which she couldn’t afford. He had no money with him, so I gave her UGX10,000 (£3.50). She was absolutely delighted, as she had only been expecting UGX500 (15p) from Sunday. She asked that Sunday go to town and buy her all the things she was wanting, as with so much money she could get everything she was missing.

We reached Lukome proper, and he took me to a statue that commemorated a massacre carried out by the LRA in 2004. They overran the Ugandan Army contingent that was supposed to be protecting the village (as so often was the case with LRA attacks, the Ugandan Army was unable or perhaps unwilling to protect the villagers in their care), and massacred the whole village, burning all their houses to the ground. The statue only lists the names of the bodies that could be found, but Sunday informs me that many more were killed, but the violence was so extreme their bodies weren’t found. One of the people listed shares the same surname as Sunday but I didn’t want to enquire whether it was a relative of his.
Lukome really had the feeling of being in the middle of nowhere. The trading centre which used to be busy now consists of three buildings, one of which is completely destroyed with grass growing inside to the height of where the roof would be if it hadn’t long since collapsed. Another building housed a shop that sold such a varied array of items I can only assume it was the only shop for quite a distance. As we left town a meeting was being held, attended by maybe 30 people, which Sunday told me was a land dispute. When young rebels return from the bush, their parents have often been killed, and so they have no way of knowing or proving where their land is located, so these disputes are very common. From my research, they seem to be one of the major challenges associated with the reintegration of former rebels, but like everything else I have experienced in Gulu and its surrounds, these intense and emotional disputes are dealt with with restraint, understanding and civility.