A Day in the Life!

Every morning, we wake up at 8:04 Erin’s alarm clock. We groggily walk to breakfast at the porch of our hotel, looking out into a busy street, where we see Tom, Collin, Brynn and Leilah already waiting for us. Our omelets come, we make toast, tea, and take our malaria meds. Gideon, a photo journalist from Tanzania, and Fred, a Kenyan writer ask us about our plans for the day and try to convince us girls to come home with them or at least “let them take a white lady on a walk”. We decline. We thank God for Col and Tom. We devour our food. We take our Nalgenes and filter the swamp water and wave our magic wands in them. We hold our nose and drink. Charles, our kind Acholi driver, picks us up and takes us to the safehouse. Sometimes he tells stories about when the LRA was operating in Uganda, how they burnt down his hut, how they killed his best friend, he smiles because death is different here, much less serious because it’s much more common. We drive past markets, broken down restaurants, women with water jugs on their heads and babies on their backs, bodabodas (mopeds) holding six people, and George (a twenty something carpenter we met when our van broke down) waving us by.
We get to the safehouse, Bright, the most adorable, helpful four year old you will ever meet, Colleen, a sassy ten year old who relishes in any opportunity to laugh at us, and Clinton, a brilliant pre-teen who has a huge crush on Leilah greet us at the gate. They give us huge hugs and practice their English. The neighborhood kids gather around us and ask our names. Sheila, a two year old terrified on Mzungus (white people) cries and tries to run. When we get too close to her she points her finger in our face and shouts her favorite English word: MEAN!!!! We go inside, and Richard, a gawky painter directs us what to do with our brushes. We paint for hours, getting to know each other and sweating buckets in the heat. Julie calls us in for lunch, a feast of rice, beans, cabbage, and nasinasi (pineapple). We eat, play with the kids, and go back at it again. Sometimes we do laundry, we are all learning to do it by hand and we are pretty laughable. Our wrists are not as tough as the locals so they bleed. We sing Black Eyed Peas and laugh anyway. Sometimes Adam (my first self-found Loveland friend) comes by and we talk about life plans and how to best bless people with the talents we’ve been given and how to deal with everything we are seeing here. He is building a medical center twenty kilometers north of Gulu and is a seriously amazing man. He is going to treat my pets when they are sick (he is going to vet school in a few months) and I am going to deliver his wife’s babies. He sticks around and helps us compile bags of rice, beans, and posho (flour). We load them into a van and take off.
Charles smiles and greets us, the safehouse kids and their surrounding neighbors gather to wave goodbye as we go. We set off for a camp. Either Abili, La Roo, Ti-Tuku, or Obiya. We play with the kids, give them a ball, they dance for us, we take their photos and interview them for sponsorship stuff, we pass out the food, hug them, and something as the sun is setting I run off after kids in the fields. The way the light hits the grass makes something more beautiful than I have ever seen. I look at these orphans, in all of their joy, and choose it with them. I tickle them and they hold me tightly. As they run back to their huts I do some yoga gazing at the sky and Tom comes and tells me not to run off by myself. I shrug him off until a man comes up to me and starts to give me an invasive hug. I decide to listen to Tom from now on. We get into the van and wave goodbye.
Then comes dinner, after a long, hard, sweaty dirty day. We pray together, laugh about the miscellaneous events of the day, such as Charles getting a 500 shilling (25 cent) fine for waiting too long for us in the car outside our hotel, or a kid squatting and peeing through her clothes during a dance. All of our germaphobe tendencies have been killed off. It was either them or us. TIA. Nothing is exactly ‘sanitary’. We play cards, I drink a beer, the girls drink Stoney’s (more intense ginger ale) and we laugh until we cry. Sometimes Erin plays her guitar, she sings like an angel and the staff and other residents crowd around the door to hear her. We shower, some of us check email, write blogs. We all end up in someone’s room just talking. We discuss poverty, video games, oppression, America’s greed, what we are reading, how to improve life for the lower 80% of the world, love, marriage, relationships, life histories. We change our opinions. We encourage one another. We really do all love one another. We say thank you for everything (Tom taught us that), we remind each other gently that our purpose lies only in glorifying God, and the rest is details, we point each other to scripture, books, blogs that will help us along our journeys. We tell stories. Everything is surrounded in love and laughter and sometimes tears.
As it gets later, we all shuffle into our rooms, say goodnight to Dennis and Goddy and Mrs. Ocot (our loving staff, eternally ready for a conversation), we read our bibles and books and write in our journals and pass out despite the droning sound of club music coming from nearby.
And there you have it!
P.S. Excuse the repetitive nature, grammatical errors, and lack of eloquence in this blog. I am usually exhausted, hungry, and have just finished sobbing my eyes out. Your patience in this is much appreciated.
P.P.S If you would like to contact me privately, please email me at suzinafrica@gmail.com