This is a first for me: I was given contact information if any of you wish to donate or help somehow. There are still not enough blankets for these kids, and the primary school where they gather has no sanitation. This struck me as a different movement for a few reasons: it is not sponsored by any foreign NGO, it was started by local unpaid volunteers to deal with the problem of kids coming to town to sleep at night for protection from getting abducted by the LRA. It is not funded by anyone; the only help they have received is from a local bank, which donated a few thousand blankets(but not enough). So if any of you wish to find out more, or help in some way, contact this man:
Komakech Charles Okot - Technical Advisor, Charity for Peace Foundation
2567788844
y2kkoma@yahoo.com
Use Western Union with the name Charity for Peace Foundation
This is a real grassroots thing, meanwhile in the rest of Gulu the NGO's happily fulfill their narrow mandates and ignore the rest of the problems in northern Uganda.How convenient.
From Gulu I went south to connect to a bus heading north, to Arua - the furthest town from Kampala in Uganda. I had heard that there may be transport from Arua to Bunia, and indeed there is - on the other side of the border. A little 'fee' later, so I did not wreck my actual visa with an entry stamp, on the back of a motorcycle with the locally knowledgeable driver, I was in Aru - noted on many maps, but in actuality a tiny dirt road with a few shops. The air office was staffed by a shockingly attractive Congolese woman who spoke perfect french, and told me that the planes leave when full - and the next one would be leaving tuesday. However, I was more interested in a method to reach Bunia via land. There are some off-hand truck drivers that brave the roads, but the risk of getting waylaid is extremely high - with such bad roads, and me being an obvious Muzungu(white man), word would spread quickly and an ambush on the way would be almost guaranteed.
Arua itself is a surprisingly large town with a surprisingly large population of Lebanese people - the Lebanese have a knack for founding businesses in the most out of the way places imagineable. With nightly power cuts and only an oil lamp to keep me company, a chorus of dogs barking outside, and the red dawn of Central Africa the view from the Veranda, Arua left a mark on me. It's essentially a dusty, bustling, small African muslim town(different again from many towns along the way, which are overwhelmingly Christian), but very frontier-ish. And it took a hard 12 hour bus ride through beautiful scenery and a sometimes good road, sometimes very bad road, to get back to Kampala.
In the northwestern corner of Uganda, there is a beautiful European road from the village of Nebbie to the town of Arua. It has nicely marked lanes, and even - gasp - road signs! And speed bumps! but an hour later, you're on potholed red mud, where many a truck can be seen flipped on its side as the drivers take no cautions despite the harsh roads. I am still bouncing. And the woman with the four kids who was sitting across from me had a very hard time indeed.
And so, from here I head west to Kasese, ultimately to Beni. From there I shall try, again, to reach Bunia. Beni is a sizeable town, or so they say, and hopefully some sort of public transport goes to Bunia. At worst, again, there are flights - when roads and rebels are bad, it is interesting to note how quickly charter airlines spring up to keep the flow of business going.
