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Paula Kooistra
Uganda – January 2009

This year we did dentistry down at the Salt Mines at Lake Katwe. We did dentistry out of an open air building with a roof and half walls, as we were treating patients – some of the goats would just wonder in to the building and make their way past our dental chairs while we were working. Not the most sterile situation but what are you going to do…the people would just shoo them out but they would come back in again.

One day as we were working in the clinic up at Gulu, I had an older woman sit in the chair I was assisting at. I noticed a perfect round circle on the top of her head about 2 inches in diameter. Couldn’t help to wonder what would make a spot of that size on the top of her head and hoped to get a better look at it to see if maybe there was something I had in my bag back at the hotel I could bring her the next day for her to put on it thinking it was possibly a fungus or something. She happened to see me looking at it and asked our interpreter to please let me know it was a scar on her head from where the LRA rebels thunked her on the head. She had him tell me of how one day she was working in her garden at home and the rebels came, beat her and took all her belongings from her house and left her for dead. Her story left me speechless and thinking of how she has seen so much devastation and lived such a hard life. It made me more thankful for the country I live in, my safety and thankful that I don’t have to live in fear everyday of my life.  

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In the Gulu IDP camps (Internally Displaced People’s camps)

The lives of the majority of the Gulu children are very, very sad. Their stories are of horror, hunger and the daily struggle for survival. When you see a child on the street in Gulu……it is a safe bet they don’t have parents and families because of the war that has gone on up there for so many years. Many of those children witnessed the killing of their parent, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles. Some of the kids you see on the streets there may have been the lucky ones, if you want to call them lucky, that were let go by the LRA. (Lords Resistance Army) but now the families believe they are possessed by the devil and don’t want them back. And if they are taken back, they are usually treated differently because of what has happened to them. It has only been quiet in Gulu from the war for about the last 2 years but the LRA is still active and can return at any time so I think that people in that area still don’t feel truly safe from the nightmare they have lived for so many years but are grateful for the peace so they can try to rebuild their lives.
The children we come in contact with in the camp have a hard life. They are dirty, malnourished, and hungry and have nothing but the clothing on their backs. These children are the poorest of the poor and will do anything for a handout and some help. I don’t know how many of them actually go to school, we are always there during their winter break but there are schools in the village. The schools are very poor though, they have no school books for the children or supplies, my understanding is they learn by mimicking the teacher.. Most children probably get up in the morning and wonder if they will eat that day. I know that many of the children are responsible for going to the community water pump, filling their jerry cans and lugging them back home for the family. We so often see a family (mother and children) all packing water cans as they walk down the road. They gather things they can take to market and sell for a little amount of money in hopes to buy food for the day. They help their families with the daily chores of the house and in their free time they get to play. They love soccer or as they call it, football. They use homemade balls that are wrapped with twine and play in their bare feet. Most of the children don’t have shoes and as you can see by the photos, they don’t have clothing that is clean, in good condition or that fits them. These children are so desperate for anything that when we were handing out the tee shirts Judy brought with her, we had to stop midway through because the kids were starting to punch and fight each other in order to get a shirt. I tried to get them to stop but it just started back up again and that’s when we stopped. The last thing we wanted was someone getting hurt. The people in the camp are just so poor that when I come home and go to get myself a Tylenol out the cabinet, I am grateful because I can and I have the means to buy them, they don’t. We go there and work for the day and then go back to our hotel where we have running water, a bed with clean sheets and food that is cooked and served to us and some complained because we didn’t have hot water that morning or there is no power when we get to the hotel or the food isn’t cooked exactly how we wanted it or they just don’t like it. I can see how the people there think we are rich and spoiled. Let me tell you…as long as its not ice water I am showering in….I will take that cold shower when we get back because I know that I have it so much better than the people I left in the rearview mirror.

Paula