Today we walked all around Kiryandongo with Joseph, a teacher at St. Bahkita. He is a refugee too, and lives in the camp not far from the school. The camp is a maze of little corn gardens and huts and pathways and shelters. There are lots of children playing and livestock running about: goats and chickens and ducks and pigs and a few cows. The ground is dusty and hardpacked where there aren’t plants growing, so rainwater runs right off, and the houses are made of any and everything, and most are one room only. My cheeks are exhausted from smiling and hands exhausted from waving, because every single person we pass (which is hundreds and hundreds, everyone is out and about because there isn’t really an inside anywhere) looks at me curiously, and the children especially want to greet me. I don’t speak Acholi or Arabic or any Lugandan and neither does Osborn but I think they are daring each other to say hi to me, or shake hands with me. Often to get my attention they point and shout “mzungu!” which means “you!” So I smile and wave and say hi and then they run up and we shake hands and smile more and then I keep walking and repeat the process 5 feet or so along.
