Training Update (Overdue)

Hello everyone! Sorry for the long delay in updates, I've been traveling and training out in the bush and haven't had internet or even electricity for the past few weeks. The few weeks of training have been packed with experiences... Some experiences have been both beautiful and disturbing. I've seen the excitement from suffering villages as the watched water gush from a freshly drilled borehole, the beauty and simplicity of family unity, a beautiful sunset over the Nile river, the disgusting brutality of a mob, and God's protection.

Before I start, I just want to warn all of you that some things I describe in the post are graphic, so if you're reading this to your children (as I heard some of you are), I suggest you read it first before reading it to them and skip over those parts if you think it necessary.

My first two employees (George and Asiki) and I first traveled to the city of Yei in South West Sudan (8 hours of traveling by a minivan with 23 people in it) and stayed there a few days. The director of the organization we are training with asked us to come there for training and then said the schedule had changed and we were headed back to the county of Pader in North East Uganda. That meant another three days of traveling.

The county of Pader is known in Uganda for one of the areas most affected by the LRA (Lord's Resistance Army). The LRA is a evil group of people who's leader is literally Satan incarnate. He convinced many people that he was a spiritual leader when he performed miracles and healings. Remember that even Satan has power... Right down the road from where we were drilling is a memorial to 23 villagers that were massacred by the LRA a few years ago. According to the people I spoke to in the area, those 23 people were killed and boiled, and the other villagers in the area were forced at gun point to eat the bodies. I apologize if this is not something you didn't want me to tell you but it is simplify part of life in the area.

The night after we started drilling the second well, I saw a family (parents, children, grandparents, aunts, uncles) sitting around a fire just having a wonderful time together. They were talking, laughing, and singing together. It was picturesque and a beautiful display of family unity and fellowship.

Coming back from Pader proved to be quite an adventure in itself. While sitting in the "taxi" waiting for it to leave, I made small talk with a twenty-something year old woman sitting next to me. After we finished talking, she went into a store about 20 feet from the taxi. Well after about 10 minutes, I heard a bunch of screaming and saw the woman on the ground getting caned and kicked by the shop owner. Apparently the woman had been caught stealing something. If that wasn't bad enough, a bunch of men gathered around and started kicking, punching, and pouring hot tea on the woman too. These men seemed to actually be enjoying themselves and were just happy to have an excuse to beat up a woman and not get in trouble for it. I tried to get close enough to the woman but the mob was too thick... To be completely honest, I didn't try as hard as I could have. I'll admit that I was really scared and because of my fear, I failed to help someone weaker than myself. I definitely regret my weakness when my courage was tested. And if you are thinking that is was good I did not interfere, ask yourself if you would think the same thing if this same thing happened somewhere in America?
Thankfully, a police officer came and got the woman out of there before the mob could kill her, a definite possibility. She'll definitely think twice before she steals again. David tells me that if you get caught stealing in Kampala, you can count on being killed.
The next day, I traveled from Gulu to Moyo. This 5 hour trip turned into a 11.5 hour day by bus because of the poor roads. When I first got on the bus in Gulu, a man on the bus directed to an open seat near him. It turned out that this man was a very good friend of David Kaya and he was coming back to visit Kajo Keji after five years of school/work in Australia. This man turned out to be a Godsend since I relied on him heavily to help through the terrible day as there were many difficulties. At one point, we had to transfer buses because the road was blocked and if it weren't for this man (Alex), I wouldn't have known to do that. We walked with all our bags about 2.5 miles until we got to the bus. After we got on the next bus, we got to the Nile and crossed it by ferry at sunset. Seeing the sunset over the Nile was absolutely beautiful.

Well, I finally made it back to Kajo Keji today after spending the night in Moyo. My boss Mr. Radler is in town for a visit and wants to go over some business with me. I'll be here for about a week and then make the trip back to Pader for more training... I'm not looking forward to that trip.

I'll upload some pictures soon!