Aside from seeing the hippos, lions, and amazing waterfall, I was disturbed by seeing signs of instability in northern Uganda. The remains of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) attacks were not hard to miss; we passed by hundreds of homes for Internally Displaced People (IDP) and saw the remains of deserted burned trucks attacked by the LRA a year ago. Although things have settled down in northern Uganda in the last few years, the aftermath is still here. I spoke to a woman working with young victims of the LRA who were kidnapped for sex slaves or forced to be in the army at the age of 12. The disturbing past cannot go away that easily. It was just over 2 years ago that the owner of Red Chili’s (a hostel where we stayed for a few nights) was killed by the LRA. The sad thing is that, of course, the killing of one mzungu gets much more media than the killings of thousands of innocent Ugandans. We sat around the fire one night at our camp in the delta. Maybe the lions would come visit later in the night, or maybe the hippos walking up from the water. I looked across the lake as the sun set into the distance. As beautiful as it was, I could not help but look into the wild lands of the DR Congo and wonder what is happening. Images of the IDP camps and burned trucks kept running through my head. The deserted lands remain a home of instability and violence. The LRA may have fled most of Uganda, but remains a problem in the neighboring DRC and Sudan. It was another reminder that I have lived an easy life.
