My entire squad is together right now at debrief in Kaptigat, Kenya. We celebrated Christmas/New Years as a squad on the 31st of December. The day started out great. I was in charge of decorations, so I woke up early and myself and some others tried to make the area we were decorating into a “Winter Wonderland”.
Unfortunately, that afternoon I got incredibly sick. I spent the entire day in bed with a bucket at my side. I could hear everyone screaming and singing when midnight hit and am incredibly sad that I missed all of the events of the day. Luckily, I could not have gotten sick at a better place. The facility that we are in for debrief is so nice (even though there are spiders wherever I turn!). I get to sleep in a bed and there is a restroom right in my room. So as much as it sucked being sick, I’m happy it happened now.
We are heading into Uganda on the 3rd of January and we have a two day bus ride to get to Gulu, where we are going to be working. My team, along with the team Transformers, is going to be working in Gulu, Uganda. Gulu has been a hub for IDP’s (Internally Displaced People) after all the violence that occurred there. An exciting fact is that Gulu is a base for the organization Invisible Children. I am incredibly excited to be working in an area where they are based even though we will not be working directly with them. They came to Asbury one year and did a presentation and showed us one of their documentaries. That is when I decided I wanted to go to Africa. And now, here I am, about to go into an area where Invisible Children has worked! One of their last documentaries was based in Gulu, so you should check that out! Uganda has been at peace for two years now and the goal is to get all the IDP’s back to where they came from by April.
