a very serious dance off at our kibibi village location during our monthly bead collection.
(i love the men i work with)
easter weekend on the ssese islands, lake victoria, uganda // scrappy puppies, vivid thunderstorms & fabulous lady friends // a time of rest & restoration before diving into new legs of adventure
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“and when all is said and done, rest.
as a new journey will soon present itself
full of adventure & experience
which we will embark on over & over again”
it was my brother’s birthday yesterday and the ladies from our jinja studio agreed to making a short birthday video with me for him. naturally, it turned into a dance party..
and then continued on as we closed the studio for the day..
and then started back up again this morning, when our fabulous executive director arrived in from the US office.
(this is my new favorite way to start and end a work day)
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i love how women in this country love to dance
and how i feel like a white girl fool but dance with them anyway.
(because they won’t let me not)
i love that the best dancers are the oldest women, every single time
and that i teach them the can-can and they (try to) teach me how to move my booty in ways that are just not at all in my DNA.
and i love that - somewhere in the dancing & laughter & hollers - we get back to who we are, who God made us to be {bold, playful, strong} & the delight of having life.
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a friend recently sent me a snippet from shauna neiquist’s book, that i last read (ironically) when i was living and playing with kids in mexico, which said:: I WANT EVERYDAY TO MAKE GOD BELLY LAUGH, GLAD THAT HE GAVE LIFE TO SOMEONE WHO LOVES THE GIFT.
i like that thought. here’s to God having some more good belly laughs in his day~
a sweet video (by nike) on a 10 day adventure around the world:: MAKE IT COUNT
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life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all. {helen keller}
you only live once but if you do it right only once is enough. {mae west}
above all, try something. {franklin d. roosevelt}
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i never worry about the future. it comes soon enough. {albert einstein}
one who makes no mistakes makes nothing at all. {giacomo casanova}
do one thing every day that scares you. {eleanor roosevelt}
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in the end it’s not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years. {abraham lincoln}
if i’d follow all the rules i’d never gotten anywhere. {marilyn monroe}
action expresses priorities. {gandhi}
the responsibility to protect:: every single person on the planet has inherent rights and should be defended against the worst crimes against humanity. first by their own government, then by the global community. no matter where they live.
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let’s feel beyond ourselves & find ways to walk hand in hand with international communities.
let’s find ways to use our voice.
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{watch} KONY 2012, PART II - BEYOND FAMOUS // background on Invisible Children’s cause, recent activity from US politicians, the African Union and the LRA in the DRC, CAR & south sudan // to see more statistics on LRA’s recent activity in this article
a few weeks ago i had a long weekend and took a much-anticipated trip to rwanda. three girlfriends of mine from kampala and i piled into a public bus (think: greyhound bus) of blaring dance music, got snuggly with all kinds of pleasant smelling individuals and slept through the night of heading south. stopping at the border at 2am, we walked across the (quite wide) line between uganda and rwanda and stepped into the world of no plastic bags, dramatic mountains and spotless streets. it was a whole new africa.
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ambitiously, we took another bus 3 hours west the next day to the massive lake of kivu, which borders the congo. a girl’s got to see the country while she can! sitting over the lake at a fabulous french bistro, we -naturally- had a conversation about how to financially be smart with investing and saving while getting to work where our passion meets our purpose, in underdeveloped countries. how we got in so in depth in this conversation in that setting, i have no idea but i love this about my friends. smart, adventurous, compassionate. (my heart is full) a little playing in the park of funky trees and boys (only? weird.) swimming in the water and then we headed back to kigali, the capitol city. (bus travel time now totaling 18 hours)
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the following day was city day of seeing the classics- craft market of carved gords, mud paintings and exquisite textiles, the kigali genocide museum and the hotel des mille collines, which the film “hotel rwanda” is about. i walked through the genocide museum with my friend mary, who went to APU while i did and was mentored by some of the alpha leaders i trained but who i never met… until uganda, of course. something about us walking through the gardens of unity, division and reconciliation and the underground museum felt familiar. we learned about the holocaust during our freshmen “beginnings” class at APU, about what happens when hatred and division flourish, about the horrific things human beings can do to each other when they stop seeing themselves in one another. and then to walk through and learn about a time where a similar thing happened in africa, after the world was supposed to “learn our lesson”… strange. sobering. scary, in a way.
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the rwanda genocide happen almost overnight. there was a lot of underground movement and preparation (evident through historical documents and the sheen fact of how quickly it was executed) but it was division, hatred and lack of value given to some that had been going on for decades before the violence in 1994. they say that the number of UN troops that helped evacuate expats out of the country would have been enough to stop the genocide. they say that there are always choices we can make to protect life, even in genocide. they say 1 million people were killed.. 2 million people displaced.. 500,000 women infected by HIV/AIDS due to the genocide weapon of rape.. they say countless orphans are filling houses of distant relatives or complete strangers now. due to hatred turned to violence, while the world just watched. they debated if it was really happened. they didn’t want to get politically involved.
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on the wall of the museum was a quote from apollon kabahizi, which said:: WHEN THEY SAID ‘NEVER AGAIN’ AFTER THE HOLOCAUST WAS IT MEANT FOR SOME PEOPLE AND NOT FOR OTHERS? this rocked me. the rwanda genocide happened in 1994, when i was 9. it’s easier for me to learn about mass horrific human actions like this when they occurred before i was born, but i was alive and playing and dreaming at this time. and, somehow, this makes it closer to home.
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at the end of the museum there’s a room full of photos of killed loved ones that family members have brought in. they are photos of young men showing off their muscles and new bikes.. of couples in love, in front of homes, at their weddings.. fathers holding babies, women with big beautiful afros.. kids in their school portraits.. real beautiful, hopeful people. looking at their faces i kept wondering how we allow things like this to happen in the world. how division and judgment can lead to violence and a horrific scar through history. how my voice can do anything.
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to know how to use my strong, loud american voice with my powerful government who listens to me is a reoccurring question i’ve had while living in a place where that isn’t the case. the ugandan government turned a blind eye to the north while the LRA tortured, abducted and burned through. the world turned off their tv sets while one people group brutally killed off their neighbors of another people group in rwanda. and i click off the cnn online new story about innocent people being used as human shields on tanks in syria.
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a friend recently reminded me that i can’t fight everyone’s battles, that america can’t get involved in everything, that sin in the world makes things messy and dark. but i think there’s something about us being human together -right here, right now- that is significant. i can’t help but feel that the things that happen in my lifetime, with the power of my educated, american, loud voice, is somehow connected to me.. to my children’s world.. to yours. what that looks like and what i can (really) do? still walking that one out, heart broken, eyes opened, learning as i go.
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one storied hero in the kigali genocide museum said:: IF YOU SAVE ONE LIFE IT IS LIKE SAVING THE WHOLE WORLD. i guess that’s where we can start.
let’s find some beautiful place to get lost.
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photos by beautiful&fabulous ashley turner for sseko sandals // random little forest in the city & some kampala besties
a few months ago, while living in kampala, i stopped by an awesome company called EMBER ARTS who work with acholi (large tribe from the north) women that fled to kampala during the LRA activity in the north. i learned how to roll beads with these women, got to meet their babies, took some photos to promote their gorgeous work, had a christmas/dance party with them and even did a creative arts day with them. a lot of people have been asking me about what’s really going on over here with kony&the LRA and what ugandans are saying. recently, the EMBER ARTS ladies viewed the film KONY2012 and my friend and the founder, james, wrote about their reaction on the EMBER ARTS blog::
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Today I showed our Ugandan partners ‘Kony 2012′. For any who don’t know, ‘Kony 2012′ is a 30-minute film by Invisible Children that became the most viral video of all time, getting over 100 million views in about one week. It aims to rally US support to stop Joseph Kony, the leader of the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army that terrorized Uganda for two decades, and continues to terrorize three central African countries.
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I wanted them to see the film because it impacts them more than it does me, and so their thoughts on the subject are valuable and can help guide my own.
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During the 30-minute runtime their eyes were glued to the screen of my laptop. I have never seen them so attentive. At times they would whisper recognitions and explanations to each other. When Kony or LRA victims were shown they would often sound the unique tsk-tsk-tsk of Acholi displeasure.
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When the film ended I asked them for their thoughts.
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It was clear that the wounds of two decades of violence are still very tender. Women immediately started sharing stories of their own families – children lost to abductions, siblings lost to violence.
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And this led to their first reaction to the film and its plan: it comes twenty years too late for Uganda. You can imagine the sting. America, the world’s great super power, finally awakens to your two decades of terror and loss, only after those decades are over, only after you have started the long, slow, painful work of healing and rebuilding. And finally now they want to stop Kony.
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But beyond that reaction they saw that stopping Kony will save hundreds of thousands Congolese, Central African Republicers, and South Sudanese from the sort of pain that they and their families have been through.
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The Ugandan government failed to stop Kony, they said. Indeed, it seemed unconcerned with stopping him. The local peace processes failed to bring an end to the violence. The only hope, they believe, is American support and military action. And at least one of them would rather Kony be killed on the spot than given the dignity of a trial.
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But whether captured or killed, if Kony was stopped in 2012, they all agreed that there would be a deep collective sense of relief in northern Uganda. They still fear him. They are scared to this day that he and his terrorizing forces will return to Uganda. If Kony is stopped, they told me, all of northern Uganda will celebrate.
sometimes in life there are reoccurring concepts that keep arising from things one reads, lines in movies, talks with old friends, wisdom from a stranger. i think this is quite amazing about life really, and it probably has more to do with what one is paying attention to than a coordinated effort from the universe. nevertheless, one pays attention to this kind of stuff.
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lately the occurring concept popping its head up in my world is {keep fighting, don’t go quietly} the fight i keep thinking of is of the dreams i have for the women i work with, for the communities that they live in, for the children they are raising, for the children walking around who no one is raising, the wars and the corruption that has been and is still waging. i feel like i’m barely getting sips from the fire hydrant of learning about the intricate factors involved (major reoccurring lesson: there’s more factors involved that imagined, and imagined), the depth and length of effects on individuals//society//future and the small, practical things which actually are the ripple effect sort of thing for those i’m walking alongside at this time. the things that are simple, just a bit of time, attention, education and resources. the things that the people here, who know their problems than any of us white, educated, well-fed people can draw up, are asking for.
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with that being said, if you haven’t already- please watch the short 30 minute film released by friends at invisible children:: KONY 2012. you’ve probably already heard of it because you’re {1} one of the 78million people who have viewed it, or {2} you’ve heard criticism and/or buzz of it. living and working in uganda, i can tell you that: this isn’t a scam // this is real life horror with undertrained soliders trying to look for a sneaky terror of children and innocent families with too little of resources // what kony has done in uganda has effected nearly every ugandan i’ve met in ways that i can hardly stomach or see myself mentally surviving, in ways that will continue to effect this beautiful country for generations // that no other country, generation, village, family, or child should ever. again. have to face even the fear of what kony has done in uganda and continues to do in bordering central african countries // that no child should ever fear being abducted. (imagine your childhood fears including this) // that 26 years of this kind of thing has got to stop and, truly, some powerful players (that includes americans whose voices are actually heard by their government) need to get involved because what effects another, even oceans and meal preparations and cultures away, effects us all. we’re human, we’re the world, we’re the future together.
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i believe in what invisible children is doing here to raise awareness, because not enough people know about this and once you do its horrific and shocking and should cause you to STIR. they may have simplified the issue but it’s the starter fluid of awareness » action. as i read the massive attacks from ill-informed and comfy-cozy critics from my chair in jinja, uganda, i can hardly believe that there is such a revolting resistance towards justice for children and innocent families anywhere in the world. please watch, and let it soak in. let it stir you.
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and if you have questions about invisible children, about kony, about what the US government issued regarding their assistance here, do your research first. a good place to start: invisible children’s extensive and honest response to the critiques… honest words from their CEO…and a friend’s, who used to work for them, really good take on the film and the resulting chatter. (i welcome any questions, comments or ideas regarding this as well)
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this weekend i went to the genocide museum in rwanda and learned about the realities of the international community’s hesitation to get involved in that situation, resulting in a million people slaughtered and 2 million people displaced… sometimes, as martin luther king jr. once said, IT’S TOO LATE. i hope we don’t wait until it is again. may we - each, all, you&me - keep fighting for justice // for hope // for redemption
{team ngobi in front of the jinja studio} i’ve only been here two months but these women have wiggled their ways into my heart very quickly. what a crazy/amazing experience to get to work with them, laugh with them and design gorgeous pieces with them. today, we had them sport the drape necklaces and i thought they were simply stunning wearing the jewelry that is always in their hands but seldom adorning their necks..
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i’ve been thinking a lot about all the talk going around with the {KONY 2012 film} by invisible children, considering where i work and the realities of those i work with. and let me just say- knowing people in the organization and being on the ground in uganda with them, i’m behind them. they’re giving a voice to those that have been voiceless for much too long. they’re not a charity, they’re an advocacy group and i admire their creative and bold efforts, in the face of indifferent and inadequate governments, sheltered and terrorized communities and a purposeless group of violent murderers, brain-washers and rapists. a lot of the women i work with, and know in uganda, have been affected by the LRA’s activity in uganda in at least some way (some who have lost all their siblings, to murder or disappearance, even). who of us can walk alongside anyone and get it perfectly right? hard, really hard. but i like what teddy roosevelt says about ‘bold, persistent experimentation’~
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it is common sense to take a method and try it: if it fails, admit it frankly and try another. but above all, try something. the millions who are in want will not stand by silently forever while the things to satisfy their needs are within easy reach. we need enthusiasm, imagination and the ability to face facts, even unpleasant ones, bravely… we need the courage of the young. yours is not the task of making your way in the world, but the task of remaking the world which you will find before you. may every one of us be granted the courage, the faith and the vision to give the best that is in us to that remaking!
somedays, the project director & the production manager just gotta do some modeling of the akola jewelry for a nordstrom buyer & have a good laugh. MJM & SJC in front of a camera, this is just what happens..
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the only people for me are the mad ones,
the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time,
the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing,
but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow Roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars,
and in the middle, you see the blue center-light pop, and everybody goes ahh…
(jack kerouac, on the road)
game changer:: employing women.
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example:: yesterday i spent my morning sitting out under a palm tree on a tarp, making jewelry samples with two of our studio leaders who head up our only off-site jewelry location in a village area called nabukosi. hellen and charity are two of our older women who are full of spunk, dance moves, questions about other lands and diligent teachers. (i absolutely adore them) i wanted to hear about how their time has been training the women at nabukosi and they told me about how one, rose, had just had a baby right after they left the day before. “she made great products all day and then went and had a baby at the night!” (ugandan women are extraordinary) they told me about how they talked to rose about not being able to work for 6-8 weeks so she can take care of the new baby human on the planet. a huge realization for her of the financial reality of having another child, something she had never considered. and then it happened: the ripple affect in the banana grove where the group was working with the young women who were pregnant or still planning on having their full 6-8 kids quota (the AVERAGE amount of kids ugandan women have).
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“having kids means they don’t get to work for awhile so if they keep having kids then they don’t get to make as much money, take care of their families as well or do the things they want to do in the future,” hellen explained. her and charity would know. hellen has 8 kids and didn’t start working until she was older (and now owns 200 chickens!) and charity only had 4 children because she’s always worked and wanted to work (and has pigs now, which is a pretty big deal in uganda). did we know how perfect these two women would be to initiate this learning for the nabukosi group when we promoted them? absolutely not. but it couldn’t be any more perfect… and significant to the women as they earn a good income and start improving their and their family’s livelihoods.
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this story got me really excited… we {the akola project, with the UAPO} employ women to make some jewelry that make girls feel pretty in the states. » they get paid per hour and therefore, as long as they show up and work hard, they have a steady income. » this puts money into their hands which is significantly more likely to go school fees and other children-related things in the home (vs. beer, which unfortunately happens quite often when it gets into mens hands here) » kids go to school, they learn, they get into universities, they get great jobs. » those jobs bring more money into their families (and the parents and any orphans, also common in uganda, they’re now supporting) and it brings more money into uganda. » more money into uganda means better jobs and more opportunities for the country as a whole, for future generations, for better roads and schools and hospitals, for better teachers and politicians and scientists.. and for a million other things that we can’t even dream of right now. “and then uganda is like china or america!” charity exclaimed.
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YES. exactly. this is the stuff i study in grad school and talk about and dream about… and then i was sitting there, hearing about the process and the learning and the changing right there on a tarp under a palm tree. give women jobs and you’ll change everything. it’s not a cure-all, it’s not the one way to solve poverty, it’s not a flawless system. but it’s a game changer here.
so here’s what i want you to do, God helping you: take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. instead, fix your attention on God. you’ll be changed from the inside out. readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (romans 12:1-2)
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today begins LENT:: a time that has always seemed so beautiful to me.
simplifying, remembering, preparing, sacrificing.
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sacrifice what surrounds us// sacrifice what feeds us, expanding our worldview// sacrifice what describes us, re-examining how we represent ourselves&our priorities// sacrifice what calls us, fight injustice// sacrifice what consumes us, re-orienting our everyday activities// share our sacrifice with others, being a creative activist
i’ve been very taken by the idea lately of surprise. surprising myself, surprising things of life, surprising parts of others. i’ve been trying to keep my eyes looking around for it, my mind open to the things i can catch. i never thought i would return to ethiopia within two months of being there.. and i never thought i would go on a business trip to ethiopia in my lifetime. but, my new wonderful job sent me off to addis, the capital city, and a few places in the north part of the country for two weeks to collect supplies for our ethiopian collection, conduct some research with one of our new volunteers, becca, and built some relationships with a few fabulous contacts.
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a few surprises along the way…
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{one} i always try to walk the streets of cities i’m in to really taste, feel, smell, hear the place but last time i was in ethiopia i was with a friend, zipping around the city behind the metal and glass of her car. this time i was doing a lot of walking… alongside begging families, gum-selling kids, guys selling burned dvd’s, of regular-living-breathing ethiopians. i was trying to figure out how to navigate the largest outdoor market on the continent. i was bluffing my way through haggling for a “fair price” from taxi drivers. it was a whole new ethiopia to me.. full of grit and inconvenience, and something so true and beautiful.
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{two} research trips are always exciting because you have absolutely no idea how things are going to turn out. some days are what feel like total failures of chasing empty rabbit holes. other days are the most unbelievable course of events, and therefore ecstatic energy because you just had no idea how the day would be! we had a lot of the latter on the trip.. we met the grandfather of a place that sells intricate silver pieces in the jewelry district of addis, working in the downstairs part of the store in a method that has been passed down through his generations.. and then exclaimed “coffee!” and so we sat with the ladies of his family and had thick, rich ethiopian coffee in their shop. we traveled six hours through dramatic mountains and valleys of the north to meet a man who casts the famous metal crosses of ethiopia out of a mud shed in his backyard. we had the best macchiatos of my life while fulfilling orders with our supplier in the market. we saw textiles being made from the silk worms to the dying of thread to the massive looms to the twirling of the tassels (www.sabahar.com). we exchanged production management experiences with a group of girls who started a gorgeous jewelry project (www.ravenandlily.com) as a source of income, skills and health training and child care because they were meeting women who were dying from HIV/AIDS as they waited for healing mountain waters to save them.
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{three} i gave a rose i got at a restaurant (which i got, apparently, for being female on the 14th of february from the restaurant. thank you, thank you) to a woman asking me for money on the street with a baby strapped to her back and a toddler walking next to her. the pure laughter of wonder from the child as he grabbed it and the look of sweetness and delight on the woman’s face was… no words…
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i’m humbled and in awe of these experience as they unfold. of the ecstatic energy that surges through me, as the surprises pounce.. or rather -more so- as i actually notice a few of the surprises. and i’m finding that sometimes the things that start off as anxiety or just total unknown//unrecognized end in some of the most memorable and stunning experiences yet.
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it reminds me of something my favorite author, anne lamott, writes:: “when a lot of things start going wrong all at once, it is to protect something big and lovely that is trying to get itself born - and that this something needs for you to be distracted so that it can be born as perfectly as possible.” pay attention.. be patient.. and look for something perfectly surprising. maybe it’s almost here, in front of you, passing you by..
