Together We Are Free August 1st - 7th

NOTE: I have tons of pictures of our Gulu trip, but they wont load, but they will be posted in the next day or 2...

At 5:30am Ricky, Seth, Erin, Rachel, Alexis (Director of Education for Remba), and I boarded a 10 hour bus ride to Kampala, Uganda which was followed by another 6 hour bus ride up north to Gulu, Uganda. When I went to Gulu last September as a roadie, a HUGE chunk stayed there, so I was itching to go back! The bus ride is long, and bumpy, and you better hope you don’t have to use the bath room because you get maybe 2 chances the whole ride. But the ride from Kigali to northern Uganda is phenomenal to say the least! Deep valleys, clouds of mist hanging low over the thousands of hills in Rwanda, and miles and miles of the greenest and plushest scenery you have ever scene. Then all of a sudden the buss is traveling at, no joke, 90 miles per hour. Hitting speed bump after speed bump, and pot hole after pot hole. If you were sitting in the back, which we were, every 10 feet or so you are jolted out of your seat, your head barely missing the overhead bags that constantly fall, and then thrown back down into your seat as your stomach hits the floor.

Then we reached Gulu! The point of our journey to Gulu was to film for a Ugandan man that Rachel met a few years back. Rachel and a few other women that I love, Lisa Dougan and Amanda Flores, met this man named Denis, fell in love with his story and his beautiful heart and promised that they would bring some one to film his story so the world could hear it. Denis was a former child soldier in the LRA, escaped and was rehabilitated. He now has a soccer league which helps rehabilitate former child soldiers and helps integrate them back into society. So Ricky, Seth, and I spent a few almost every day filming Denis, his story, some of his boys on his soccer team, his family, and getting beautiful footage from around Gulu.

Other than filming Denis, I got to do a lot of things with Invisible Children Gulu!

Erin, Alexis, and I got to visit the IC Gulu office. I have been there before so it was mostly for Erin who was the Schools for Schools President at Texas Christian University and for Alexis who knew very little about IC. So we got to tour the office, get a run down of all the new programs, and while touring the office I was able to see different staff members that I met last year. It was kind of strange because a lot of the Gulu staff that I have never met already knew of me because of Together We Are Free… it was cool to be recognized by them, but also kind of weird because I am shy in situations like that ☺

On the 3rd day, Erin, Lexi, and I got to go visit Pabo Secondary School. Erin and some of her fellow students have been raising money through Invisible Childrens School’s 4 School’s progam for a school in Uganda called Pabo SS for the past 3 years. Thousands of students all over the US raise money for 11 schools in northern Uganda, but few get to actually see the work they have done first hand! I was so blessed to be walking through the school with Erin as she was awe struck by the school. It was amazing to see the students there thank her for what she has done for the school and for her to be able to take the pictures she took, the conversations she had there, and the experience back to her fellow S4S students and give them that push to continue to help raise money for Pabo. Right when we were done with Pabo, we were able to visit St. Josephs College Layibi. When I worked as a roadie for IC, Layibi was the partner school for the region that I toured, and I was the S4S representative for all the schools in the states that raised money for Layibi. I was able to visit the school last year and SO much has changed this year, it looks like a whole new school. They have begun the projects that my tour (fall tour 2008) raised money for. Crazy story, so the parents of the boys who go to Layibi saw how much IC was doing for the school and their kids so the parents all raised money and gave it to the school for a new class room block. THEN... the government got wind of what IC and the parents were doing for the school and they were basically humiliated because that is the governments job to put money in the school. SO since the gov realized they were being shamed, they put money into the school and an ENTIRE school block was built and renovated! It stretches across the whole school and other building were painted and new desks. BEAUTIFUL!

After visiting the schools, we were invited to go to the IC staff house and watch Together We Are Free on the projector because I still had not scene it! It was surreal, beautiful, and just what all of us that put so much work into The Rescue needed! We needed people to know what we went through to make the Rescue happen, and that is exactly what the film did. I had no idea what to expect… I thought the video would make the Rescue look al glamorous and epic, which it was… at times. But it showed so much more than that, it showed all the work it took to make it a reality, the long wet days that we spent outside waiting and waiting for the Rescue Riders to come, the nights we felt completely defeated, and the beauty of how we came up on top and endured, TOGETHER! The video was mostly about my story and what we went through in Chicago waiting for 7 days to be rescued, and I am so thankful that our hard work was recognized… But I don’t want anyone to think that I was a hero, the real hero’s are those kids who have been living in the bush for years, taken against their will and are forced to kill or be killed. Yes, it was hard waiting outside for a week and feeling like you are screaming as loud as you can for your voice to be heard and you go ignored for that long. But what kept me going through each and every day was the thought of those thousands of children who have been fighting for their lives for weeks, months, sometimes years to escape the LRA. If they can endure for that long, I damn sure can fight for a week on their behalf... They are the true hero’s!

On the last night that we were in Gulu, we finished up filming with Denis and we went to grab some food at Kope Café (a local restaurant in Gulu that Jolly’s family owns). Erin, Lexi, and I walked in and sitting right in front of us was Jolly Okot (Invisible Children Country Director). I had been hoping to see her the whole week but we kept missing each other. I had to do a double take, she screamed, I screamed and she gave me the biggest hug in the world! It was totally God that I got to see her on the last night. We all ended up sitting and eating with her. Her and I talked for a while about Lobby Days, the Rescue, Together We Are Free, what I have been up to, and what she has been up to. We all talked with her for a few hours. She told us the story of how she met Jason, Bobby, and Laren in her own word. It was great to hear it from her perspective. Jolly asked us if we would stop by the IC Gulu office the next morning because she wanted some of the staff to meet me. Of course I agreed, but not really knowing what I was going to walk into the next morning. We show up at 8am, and when Jolly said “I want some of the staff members to meet you…” what she meant to say was “I want you to sit in the conference room and I have told EVERY person in the Gulu office to come meet and thank ‘the girl from the Together We Are Free film’!” At first I was completely awkward and shy from everyone thanking me and staring… But they were all so genuine and real! I have never felt so appreciated in my life! One of the mentors stood up and said that he didn’t understand what gave us the drive to stay outside for the whole week, and he thanked me and everyone else who took part in the Rescue for enduring, and what we did has made him realize that any thing is possible and to work harder each day. It meant the world to me to have these people recognize and appreciate what I had done, because THEY are the ones who kept me going when I was a roadie. Going to Gulu last year and seeing their dedication and all the hard work they do made me work harder on the road. So to hear that from Jolly and the other staff, meant the world to me!