Wednesday, May 11, 2005

Schoolchildren in Uganda: Photo I


Schoolgirls in southeastern Uganda - Iganga District
Photo by Susanne Behnke, Uganda 2003

2 comments:

Ingrid J. Jones said...

Dear Bill, This is my favourite photo so far. Interesting to see your posts on Uganda but disappointing to see at first glance that you made no mention (as far as I can tell, I need to re-read) of the world's most neglected humanitarian crisis in northern Uganda where horrific things are happening. I have kept a log of reports over the past eight months at Uganda Watch http://ugandawatch.blogspot.com

Why is northern Uganda so forgotten and neglected, Do you know? I've spent some time searching for blogs from Uganda. The ones I have found so far are in the sidebar at Uganda Watch. More to follow. I'd like to find out why it is such a neglected region - is it maybe because of its reputation for corruption?

The LRA are carrying out horrific violence both within Uganda and over the border in southern Sudan. In the Congo the rebels believe they can gain strength from their victims by cooking and eating them. It seems to me there is too much belief in hocus pocus and magic charms and stuff in Africa.

Libyan leader Col Gaddafi recently labelled the violence by rebels in Sudan as primitive and senseless which I agree with. It will all end in a political solution anyway so why not work on the solution now instead of fighting, maiming and killing and creating so much suffering and trouble.

Hope you get a chance to visit some of the blogs in Uganda and do a blog round up so I can post it at Uganda Watch with links to you. Bye for now. Kind regards from Ingrid at http://sudanwatch.blogspot.com

BRE said...

Hi Ingrid. Like yourself I have also researched and archived quite a bit on the atrocities and violence in Northern Uganda. I do not think that I have posted anything about that on this blog so far, but I do intend to address the subject in the (near) future.

The photos of these children are very inspiring to me for personal reasons. I had a delegation of people from Uganda visit with me here in Germany back in 2003 at the request of the photographer, Susanne Behnke. We of course discussed many subjects re: life and issues in Uganda, including the 18+ year civil war in the northern districts and the murderous madman LRA leader Joseph Kony:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kony

My Ugandan visitors were shocked and frightened by how much knowledge I had on the subject and by what I had to say about Kony, the LRA and their President, Yoweri Museveni. The smart ones understood my message and took it back home with them to pass it on. So you see, there is a whole story behind my interest in Uganda but I haven't decided to go public with it just yet on this blog.

The children represent in part what I am fighting for down in Africa and the forces that keep me focused on the African continent and drive me forward are very very powerful indeed. There is a lot more that travelled in those ships from Africa to the Americas hundreds of years ago than just slaves and greedy merchants, sea captains and sailors. A lot more and it did not die at sea or in the suffering and struggles to settle the New World, may God be my witness it did not die.

I hope to be able to express all of this much better on this blog in the coming months (and years), and more importantly I hope and pray to be able to make a difference along with millions of other people in the lives and futures of children like these shown in the photos before my time is up with the Big Man upstairs.

I haven't spent so much time at Uganda Watch, it is difficult enough to keep track of the amount of great information you post to the Sudan Watch blog. I'll try to at least scan Uganda Watch for new information. You should checkout P. Scott Cummins blog at:
http://www.pscottcummins.com/blog/

Scott is a good writer and from what I can determine he has a lot of experience with Uganda and he does some great things for youth in Uganda. The next time I'm up in in the American Northwest checking on "Junior" (my prize black breeding bull) I hope to be able to visit this man and learn something about Uganda. That is if my old cowboy friend Danny Crow hasn't sold Junior to those beefeaters from NYC or worse yet, eaten' him! (God forbid).