I AM WOMAN HEAR ME ROAR

This LJ stuff is fun!

Have you guys ever heard of a girl from Sudan named Nyambol?

First, let me give you some background on the Second Sudanese Civil War. It was the longest civil war in history, with the highest number of civilian casualties--yes, higher than World Wars I and II. Officially, it started in 1983, but unofficially, it's really been going on since 1978.

Nyambol was a girl living in a village in South Sudan. Her parents were killed by the SPLA (Sudanese People's Liberation Army) sometime during Anyana II (I'm sorry, I don't recall the exact year). Nyambol went to live with her uncle in another village. She suffered many hardships, including sexual abuse at her uncle's hands. She was impregnated. She was twelve years old.

When her uncle announced one day that he would marry her off to his neighbor so he could get the dowry (in Sudan, and many Arabic-speaking nations, the prospective husband pays the dowry rather than the prospective wife), Nyambol decided enough was enough. At age thirteen, she ran away in the dead of night. She didn't know where she was going; but she walked and walked until the sun rose and set again.

An exhausted Nyambol was discovered by a group of aid workers who happened to be in the area, searching for SPLA sects to rescue child soldiers from. A confused aid worker asked Nyambol, "Why are you wandering at midnight?" Nyambol told them her story.

The aid workers immediately took Nyambol out of the country. She went to the US, where she attended high school, and then college, and then went back to Sudan to become a great political leader and an opponent of the SPLA.

When she was twenty-five years old, she went back to her little village in South Sudan and told her uncle, "I forgive you."

My throat is tight every time I think of this story and this beautiful, inspirational young woman.

To close, here is a very profound quote from Emmanuel Jal, former SPLA child soldier, that touched me, and I think it might touch you too.

"The real soldiers lay down their arms as soon as they can."

We had wonderful guest speakers from Sudan today. (Four young women, all around ages seventeen to twenty.) They told us a little about the politics and the last civil war, and how difficult it is to be a girl living in Sudan. I wish them luck and peace.

On that note, have you heard of the "night commuters" of Uganda? Thousands of children leave their homes at night and flee to urban centers so the LRA will not capture and victimize them when their homes are destroyed. Some of them have already been victimized by the LRA. I feel so sorry for these children, but so glad that Yoweri Museveni has set up these urban centers in the first place. Men (and women) who give a damn are what the world needs.


eta: When I say "we," I mean at my college campus.

This article breaks my heart.

I love Zeromancer. Listening to them late at night/early in the morning is the best thing ever.



Everlasting teenage recoil,
Fall in love with anything,
Come undone with hearts unbroken
And wish upon a lucky star

...Did Yoweri Museveni have John Garang killed?

John Garang was the founder and former leader of the Sudanese People's Liberation Army in South Sudan, as well as the former president of South Sudan. (The guy occupying both of those positions now is Salva Mayardit.) For those of you unfamiliar with the history: The SPLA is an army that formed in retaliation to Sudan's Islamic government. (Sudan is overwhelmingly an Islamic nation.) They're a group of Christians who think Islam is evil, yadda yadda yadda, and they kidnap children and force them to fight for them. (You might want to read War Child by Emmanuel Jal if you're interested in knowing more about this.)

Anyway, it's been said that Museveni, the president of Uganda (and the guy trying to stop the LRA, another huge child army in East Africa) was political allies with John Garang.

Most people know the story of Garang's death: A Ugandan craft was sent to pick him up and bring him to Kampala. Mysteriously, the vehicle crashed. Garang was found dead. The driver's body was never found.

Museveni's very outspoken against the LRA's acts of brutality against children. The SPLA often mimics those acts of brutality, and in fact, it's been said that the SPLA gets most of its support (and some of its child recruits) from the LRA.

Did Museveni kill Garang because he knew it would cause a power struggle within the SPLA and general havoc? Was that his attempt to weaken the SPLA's/LRA's hold over children? Was it similar to the actions he took with Operation Iron-Fist which resulted in the deaths of Latek and Lukwiya? Some people even believe that he was responsible for Otti's mysterious disappearance/possible death (although one LRA defector claimed that Kony had Otti executed for treason).

I don't know, but I never found it credible that Museveni, actively trying to put a stop to the world's biggest child army, would be friends with a man who openly backed that same child army.

My journal format is extremely ugly. >_>

Nothing else to report. The people who read this thing already know about my allergy scare with Matteo. Thank God my brother Connie is a doctor at the hospital Kosta and I took him to. Priority patients ftw!

So if any bigshots from the CSC are reading this:

Matteo Kwundyi is allergic to turnip greens.

Might want to fix your paperwork. B|

It actually snowed! Wtf!

This was the first time *ever* that Matteo saw snow, so of course I had the camera at the ready. He freaked out at first (it was hilarious), but eventually he came to like the snow so much that he spent pretty much all day out there. (Except I didn't want him getting sick, so I kept making him come inside every hour or so to get warm/dry.)

Picture time~

( Behind the cut! )

...I'm worried about my brother Aello. >_> He's twenty-five and not dating anyone. My brother Nicky (Nicky's a bit of a player) keeps making fun of him. I wonder if I should hook him up with someone from my college...

Oh wow. Last night, in the imaboku chat room, a bunch of the CSC members started up this great political discussion about the action that needs to be taken in Sudan to stop the SPLA. I started thinking about Yoweri Museveni in Uganda and wondering just how different he was from Mayardit in South Sudan.

Everybody knows the LRA kidnaps and forcibly conscripts children into their ranks. They are responsible for some of the most terrible crimes against children. Children as young as four are given weapons and taught how to fight. Girls are treated as non-combatant sex slaves. Torture, rape, and beatings are common for all the children. If you can't fight, you're killed. One of the cruelest practices the LRA enforces is when they force their newest child recruits to kill their siblings or best friends as a way of hardening them to war.

Now, I consider Museveni a good man because he's been taking action to disband the LRA and has succeeded with several sects in Uganda, even though the LRA, as an army, is not simply a Ugandan problem. (The LRA covers most of East Africa, with its most prominent bases in Uganda, Kenya, DR Congo, and Sudan.) Museveni has established a link with UNICEF which, in turn, established a link with the CSC, which allows the CSC to take decommissioned child soldiers from Uganda and give them financial and medical support (and even a new family and a new home, if they don't have one). Museveni established the NRA (National Resistance Army) to take down some of the LRA's most prominent members, including Vincent Otti and Odong Latek. He has taken actions to stop crimes against humanity and does not tolerate rape, pillaging, and hate crimes in his army. Some other things he's done: He's built a lot of schools in Uganda and made education compulsory, and the HIV rate in Uganda has dropped dramatically since his reign because he has taken action to improve health care and improve the equipment in hospitals.

Museveni's been criticized in the past because the NRA accepts recruits who formerly fought in the LRA--including children as young as fourteen. (Note that the NRA does not forcibly conscript them the way the LRA does; what's going on here is that children who escaped the LRA decide they want to fight for the NRA, and Museveni does not forbid them.)

Okay. Okay.

I don't like this, and I doubt anyone else in the CSC does either. We're of the strong opinion that children should not fight, period. Children should be children. Museveni's been criticized because he's said things such as (paraphrased, people) "Letting veteran child soldiers fight for us is not damaging them psychologically; the damage is already done" or "These children have been fighting since they were four, what am I doing to them that hasn't already been done?" His approach is that these child soldiers are extremely skilled, and if they want to contribute their skills to his army, he's going to let them.

I don't agree with that approach...probably most of us don't. In fact, I hate that approach. But I can at least understand where he's coming from. He never forces them to fight. If they want to stop, he lets them. And let's remember the connection he's established with the CSC, which allows them to leave the army and the country any time they want. Let's also remember that he's trying to stop the LRA so that there won't be any more child soldiers (veteran or not) in the future.

So, I consider Museveni a good man because he knows that children deserve a childhood, and he's trying to let that happen. Is he a great man? Maybe... Terrific? No. Not at all. I wish he would put his foot down and say "No children will fight in my army, whether they want to or not." But he's still a hell of a lot better than Omar Al-Bashir, who just turns and looks the other way when the exact same crimes occur in Sudan.

There's a reason Museveni wins all sorts of awards and gets hailed as this great political leader who represents a new order of freedom and peace. I just wish we had a Museveni in Sudan, too.

Is that too much to ask for?


eta: Linked this picture in the chat room yesterday. Matteo loves his jelly donuts.

Every time I try to watch a new anime...

...I just wind up rewatching Now and Then, Here and There >_>

What's wrong with me?

It's been about eight years since I first saw this series, and every time I see it again, I fall in love more and more.

It's also one of those amazingly cerebral series where you literally notice something new every time you watch it that you wouldn't have picked up on the first time.

For example:

Did you notice that Shu marks his time in Heliud by making scratch marks on his kendo stick?
Did you notice the doll Lala Ru finds in the desert is the one that belonged to Elamba's sister/daughter (depends on which version you watch)?
Did you notice the number of kids in Shu's/Nabuca's corps gradually decreases as the series progresses?
Did you notice Sis' house has a couch in the dining room? (wtf)
Did you notice that Soon's rifle is a bolt-action?
Did you notice that Boo's handgun has a silencer?
Did you notice that the boy Nabuca comforts in episode six is the same boy Kazam rescues in episode 13 (the one Sara decides to raise)?

I could go on and on. It's chock full of details that elude you the first time around. You literally notice something new every time you watch it.

I think I'm gonna go watch it in French now. >_>

Kill me.

Lol okay, so I woke up this morning around 8:00-8:30 and got dressed. I realized my pants were sliding down by butt. "Wtf?" said I. I'd been feeling dizzy for a while now every time I sat up. That's something I experienced when I was a few weeks pregnant (minus the sliding pants) so I thought, "Again?" Then I realized it was impossible since Shawn's in Iraq right now. (I'm so slow. >_>)

So I went upstairs and weighed myself.

Apparently I'm only 102 pounds, and apparently that's unhealthily underweight for someone my height and age. ._.

How do I bulk up? I wonder if I have a tapeworm. A friend of mine (Tai) has similar weight loss problems, but in his case it's because he has a very specific sickness. To my knowledge, I don't have one. Nor do I have an eating disorder. I do tend to run around a lot, though. I wonder if that's it?

NowIamscared. Ahahahaha.

Mush, am I satisfying you yet? >_> /seriously cannot think wtf to write in this thing

Okay, I'm really bad at this blogging/LJ/whatever it's called thing because I'm sort of a private person. If I wanted to commit private thoughts somewhere, well, I would do it in an actual diary, and not in a place where anyone could read what I'd said. >_>

But a few friends kept saying to me, "Hey, try it! It's fun!" So I've decided to at least try and find something to write about.

Let me think...

I've been with the CSC for a little over a year now. The requirement to be a sponsor is that you have to have been an active volunteer for at least a year, age eighteen or older, and a social worker has to stop by your house for a couple of visits to make sure it's a place that's suitable for a child to live in. (This is how it's done where I live, at least, which is North Carolina, in the United States. For friends of mine who live in Canada and are also signed up as sponsors, I'm not sure whether or not the practice is any different.)

Okay! Great! So after that process, I was hooked up with my very first ward.

The papers (huge packet, by the way!) told me that his name was Matteo. They weren't sure how old he was; they estimated about six. He had been decommissioned from the LRA in Uganda. This would be his first time staying with a sponsor overseas, and my immediate thought was "...Oh jeez, and the poor kid gets me." I'd never done this before, it was my very first time! Finding out that I would be his first sponsor was incredibly nerve-wracking. I wanted to give him a pleasant experience, to help him heal and transform, and I was afraid I was going to completely fail at it.

He showed up on December 28th. He spoke English probably better than my own son does. Interacting with him at first was heartbreaking, but I'm so proud of him, and of the aid workers who have gotten him to this point where he could start functioning like a child again.

Matteo really made me realize that no matter where you go, children are children. All children are innocent, and to exploit them in any way is abominable, and the most horrific, most heartbreaking thing a human being could possibly do. Children are only innocent for so long before they inevitably grow up, and then they become us--adults. That innocence is so short-lived that I think it's incredibly, incredibly dire to let it last for as long as it can, and not to disrupt it by forcing them to grow up years before they're ready.

I have him until February, and then he'll be staying with a woman named Lisa Kohler (awesome woman, I've met her a couple of times--she lives in South Carolina). After that, he goes to live with his aunt and two cousins, who have moved from Uganda to a peaceful district in Nyanza, Kenya. I hope to keep in touch with Matteo, to meet him again over the years, to visit him with his family, and to give him lots and lots of hugs. I hope everyone who meets him is as proud of him as I am, and I hope I can be there for him in the future if there's anything at all he needs. The CSC doesn't let you travel on volunteer missions to the east unless you've been an active member for at least two years (and even then, you need the military to be willing to go with you into the areas of conflict), but I hope to travel to East Africa in the future, maybe when I'm done with school and the police academy, and meet with Matteo again. He's changed me forever, in the best way imaginable, and I can only hope I've changed him just a little, too--in the same way.

Here is a picture I've taken of him, which I'm allowed to post with the permission of the CSC.



He isn't sure when his birthday is, and in fact, he hasn't celebrated one since he was two, thanks to the ridiculous conflict going on in his home. I decided to give him a birthday party while he was with us. Don't worry; that tiny cake was not the only cake. That was the cake that was just for him, and no one else. When the guests arrived, we had a second cake and a party that lasted until eight. It was so much fun. I hope he had fun too--I gave him a toy airplane and the CSC said he's allowed to keep it. Just wish Aello had been there! Oh, that kid sitting next to Matteo is our neighbor, Tim. He's an adorable little boy. And yes, ugly womanz lighting candlez is me. >_> Like my new hair?

Btw--Yoweri Museveni is a wonderful man. Ever since he's been in power in Uganda he's been doing everything he can to disband the LRA and rehabilitate child soldiers. God bless that man. Now if only we could have the same kind of action in Sudan!

I am in class right now.

Yup.

Mommy loves you, Sammy!

...I just found out I belong to a community called "kaulitzcest."

Huh? ._.

Okay, apparently I am supposed to update this thing more.

...Don't know what to say.

I hate journaling. >_>

But love my son.



Harrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

...This is probably the coolest Halloween costume I have ever seen.

>_>

- ImaBoku
- Naru Taru
- Bokurano

Okay, I just remembered why I avoid LJ. >_>

IT'S STUPID.

So I'm updating my interestz rite? And liek I put in the names of two of my favorite books--"Murder on the Orient Express" and "The Handmaid and the Carpenter." Dumbass LJ tells me an interest can't consist of more than four words.

UM, HELLO. THEY DO. DEAL WITH IT.

Lolz prob'ly last login evar. >_>

Stfu Mush.
JUST STFU.

...

It's really been two years since my last entry? >_>

That shows you how much I just LOVE journaling. [/sarc]

I can't help it. None of my friends are into LJ. Hence, I tend to do what they do and go IRC hopping with them. >_>

I srsly love those sons of bitches. I can't imagine my life without them. They're truly a blessing. n.n As are my family. I'm generally just a very lucky person.

Okay, so news lol. My fiance's in Afghanistan right now. >_> Yes, that's right. After bickering with him over it for so long, I finally caved and let him join the army. (Lol, love how it sounds like I dictate his life. >_>) We had been arguing on that point for...years, really. Even when we were broken up. (We had a long period during which we weren't seeing each other, though not for lack of trying on his part...God do I love him.) But it's something very important to him, so I need to let him do this.

So far, so good. Here's hoping it stays that way.

I neglect LJ way too much.

Well, it's not customary for me to submit my private thoughts to a place where anyone can read them. >_> Maybe that's why.

WHEN'S IT GONNA BE FRIDAY.

This week has lasted sooo long...

I hate school.

It's not cool. >_>

Unless you are a fool.

Okay, shut up.