17 July - Full Day!

As I began my day with a warm shower - ah! - my first at this hotel! I thought about precious things we so take for granted in the US. Things like expecting we will have hot water for bathing and safe water to drink. When I pour from my big water bottle into more portable16 oz. bottles, I get upset when I miss and lose precious spills onto a counter top. At home, such things are trivial; here they are important.

We had plans to meet our colleagues from Makerere University in the late afternoon, so we had our morning open. Religion is a major part of Ugandan life, with over 80% of the people identifying as Christian. Neither John or I are Christian, and we were in the interesting situation in which there was only one of our religious assemblies in the whole of the country, both located in Kampala. Sadly, for mine, Unitarian Universalists, the minister has had to flee the country because of the UU support for GLBT people. The government of Uganda has long tried to implement a law that would sanction death for those found "guilty" of being gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender. Always, the international community has threatened withdrawal of support if such a bill were to pass. Still, being non-heterosexual can land a person in jail in this country. Because Unitarians support the GLBT community, the church in Uganda has been under attack. With the minister curerntly in the US, the congregation seems to have stopped its meetings at present.



John is a Ba'hia, and one of the five temples in the world is situated in Kampala. So we went there for the Sunday service. It was similar to a Quaker meeting, though not as spontaneous. It was nice to see the position of importance children were given in the service. Between the readings, there was such beautiful music in many part harmony made by a 15-member choir. Music and readings were given in four languages.

Afterwards, we were invited to the temple director's home for "tea," which ended up being a lovely Ethiopean meal. We spoke about our work and learned about possible connections with people in the country with a similar vision.

We returned to our hotel about a half hour before Betty and Cornelius from Makerere arrived. This was another very fruitful meeting in which we had the benefit of their wisdom on the local post-war situations, and they got to hear our thoughts for creating a program that was really built on the ideas of the people and students in Lira. We talked about the instinctual "fight or flight" mind of people, and how we can gain, through mindfulness, a compassionate response to problems based on awareness and intentionality. It was a very good meeting.

Tomorrow, we meet with UNESCO in the morning and a political science lecturer at Makerere in the afternoon, who will give us a better perspective on the political history of the conflict and present-day challenges. For now, I am exhausted! and in great need of rest. So much to process.