Day of Resting

Day 10

For the past week we have been going non-stop from very early morning until well after dark, so today was a much needed day of resting. When we returned to Iriiri after visiting Nabwal last night, our van would not start, so it was after midnight by the time we arrived at our guesthouse in Soroti. It was a long, bumpy, and dusty ride, so we were thankful to have a day to recoup, refocus, and prepare for more busy days ahead. Some of the team went to "the center" to get a few things from the market in the morning. But mostly, the day was spent catching up on sleep, reflecting on the past week, and just relaxing at the guesthouse.


In the evening, we took a walk over to the location of the Timothy Retreat. On the way, we passed through several neighborhoods of Soroti. You could hear a faint "Muzungu" (white person) being called out, but unlike in the villages, the children did not surround us or want to shake our hands. Some would wave, some would smile and laugh, some would shy away, and others would just stare. Also unlike the villages of Karamoja, the people of Soroti live in brick and cement buildings with tin roofs. Rather than manyattas, the land is divided into plots (or lots) along dusty streets, some with high fences and gates. The sun was beginning to sink low in the sky, coloring everything a warm orange color. Cows, pigs, and goats were roaming around grazing on the roadside grass or rummaging through the trash-laden streets for scraps of food.

The location of the retreat is Soroti Central Secondary School. The school was founded in the 1970's by a man named Santos as a place for orphans and vulnerable children to get an education and be trained in Christian values. This was in the wake of the Idi Amin reign in which hundreds of thousands Ugandans were killed in one of the worst genocides in Africa. He also took on 150 children who were orphaned when LRA (Lord's Resistance Army) rebels raided the Teso region in 2003, as well as has other students from the surrounding area.


The most memorable thing of the day started with a poster. Hanging on the door of the main building, it read "Stop Child Sacrifices" with instructions such as don't go with someone you don't know and shout loudly if taken by force. We surmised that it was a mistaken translation and would have read "Stop Child Abductions" if it was in the US, but we found out later that it was much darker than that. Just last month, a boy from the neighborhood behind the school was lured away and killed as a sacrifice. The people here are so desperate that they seek the advice of witch doctors in how to get rich. The witch doctors tell them that they will get rich quickly if they make a sacrifice to this god or to that god. These sacrifices can be animals, children, the elderly, etc. Last year, three boys tricked a teenage girl into coming with them. They slaughtered her, removing several of her organs and leaving the rest to rot. Authorities later found her head at one of the boy's homes (the witch doctor wouldn't except it because she had pierced ears). As horrifying as that sounds, this is real here. Things beyond what we can imagine or comprehend. This is the fight they are fighting. A fight against ancestral beliefs and spiritual powers. This is a land and a people who need healing.

Michaella