The Wittes Travel to Sudan

We're on our way to Southern Sudan to visit the Trinity Peace Village in Kuron.  The village was started by Bishop Paride Taban.  Here's the Wikipedia entry to Bishop Taban:

Paride Taban (1936) is a Sudanese Emeritus Bishop of the Roman Catholic Church and is co-founder of the New Sudan Council of Churches. Taban was Catholic bishop of the Diocese of Torit in southern Sudan from 1983 until 2004. Since his retirement from the diocese, he has been leading an effort to make peace in Sudan real by setting up the Kuron Peace Village, established in 2005.

Peace Village Kuron endeavors through education and a demonstration farm to help people of southern Sudan produce enough food. It also works to provide education for people living nearby, emphasizing education of girls, but also providing classes for boys and adults. The farm also brings people of different tribes together, an attempt to promote general peace among the many neighboring ethnic groups.

Sunday, August 31:  Getaway day.  Gaby and I are packing and also having a brunch party for (wife) Babs' birthday, which we'll miss this Thursday!!:((

We'll travel to London, where we'll meet up with Dan tomorrow.  The three of us will leave for Nairobi tomorrow night, arriving on Tuesday morning.  We plan to stay at a Hostel run by German nuns (!) that night and fly the next day to the northwest border, at Lokichoggio.  "Loki" is an enclave where many NGO's (Non-government, non-profit organizations) have their outposts.  The East Africa U.N. Food Program originates from here.  We'll meet Sister Florence from Isohe Clinic here, plan to stay overnight, and then drive across the border "for about a day's drive" to Isohe. We hope to have internet access there. We plan to stay in Isohe for 4 days, helping and gathering information in any way that we can.

There are many unknowns in this trip.  Stay tuned.

Mike

G. and I had dinner with Mary Clark on Friday.  Mary spent 6 weeks at the Kuron Peace Village earlier this year.

August 31, 2008

Spent most of the day packing for the  trip. Got Passport, tickets info, money, cameras etc ready to go. Trying to pack light considering all the camera equipment I’m bringing and the fact that we will most probably take a small plane into the Sudan interior where baggage weight could be a factor to reach Kuron as the roads are still reportedly impassable due to the long rainy season they are having.
LAX  to London non stop on British Airways.-dw


September 1, 2008

London Heathrow Airport. United now with Mike and Gaby, who flew out of San Francisco, finding them buying coffee near the gate for our  flight to Nairobi, Kenya. Another all night flight awaits us.-dw


September 2, 2008

We arrived in Nairobi. After a long wait in the queue (in contrast to Emma Watson, whom Gaby spotted on our plane, star of Harry Potter movies, and her companion that are whisked through the visa process) for a transit visa through Kenya we find Teody , our diocese contact who greets us with her driver. The drive into Nairobi to the guest house where we will spend the night is in itself a bit of culture immersion. First they drive on the left here and the roads are awful. Following a lane is completely non existent. The pot holes can swallow cars whole and the dirt shoulder or sidewalk is an acceptable driving lane except where boulders and rocks have been piled to prevent this. The Muslim women walking the streets,  some colorful and not completely covered and others  completely shrouded in black except for the eyes mix on the side of the roads with the stylish modern dress of other men and women. The many pedestrians walking, the many people not going anywhere just sitting finding time, charcoal vendors, plant vendors, knife sharpeners, natural limb furniture makers and wicker weavers set up wherever, and the general life on the unkempt trash strewn and in disrepair highway  and streets  is a real eye opener. In the neighborhoods security is an obvious issue. All neighborhoods and or homes have gates maintained by a guard. Walls surround all compounds topped with either broken glass or razor wire. Joblessness and poverty are an obvious problem here in Nairobi.
Fighting much traffic we are finally taken to the Pension Guest House that is run by a sect of nuns originating out of Germany.  They use the funds generated to support their orphanage of some 80 Kenyan children. We will stay until our Sudan visa is acquired by our liaison, Teody. My papers that I sent Postal Express never arrived and this may delay us a day.  
Assuming we will get our visas to Sudan as planned we purchase our plane tickets to Lokichoggio by the Sudan border to leave tomorrow. Lokichoggio is, I’m told, a desolate place set up on a wind blown plain near the Sudan border by the United Nations as a headquarters to distribute the food  gathered from world relief groups who’s intended use is distribution in the needed area of Sudan. There we will be met by another contact who will take across the Sudan border and on to Ishoe our first intended destination where we are delivering funds raised in the USA to construct a solar generating station for the clinic in the village.-dw

Today has been a series of  wild rides through some seemingly un-mappable roads in Nairobi.  Teody and Joseph in front, Dan, Gaby and me crammed in the back of Joseph’s Toyota Corolla, careening into each other with the back and forths of the game of dodge ’em that J. is playing with some very big buses and  trucks.  It is all more than worth it as we stop for lunch at Habesha, an outdoor Ethiopian restaurant, which I could never find again in a million years.  Teody ordered a sampler of about eight really delicious dishes, all served on a huge flat bread of maize, which we would tear off and scoop a bit of one of the spicy dishes onto with our fingers. Best -food-of-trip so far!--mw

Teody has worked feverishly to get our visas for Sudan. They were supposed to be ready today at the Embassy. We park outside while she's admitted through the security gate. Signs say "no photographs", and the guards only let in cars after looking under each one with mirrors--for plastic explosives. I guess.

The Guesthouse Westlands, run by the German order of Precious Blood sisters has a very tropical air. Common dining hall opening onto a small patio with many broad leaf plants.  We met a middle-aged black man at dinner, who was visiting Nairobi “for both business and pleasure”. He lives in Tanzania and was bussing back there tonight. He and our host German nun were un-sure were California is.  The good sister had us as Australian, and wondered how far the trip form there to here was.  This had Gaby in stitches, and me wondering just how far Australia WAS from here anyhow.--mw

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Breakfast with the Sisters of The Precious Blood  Guest House.

“MakingTime”:  Teody Lotto, our guide and our local life blood here in Nairobi, gave me a book by a Dutch Missionary in which he interviews Southern Sudanese refugees.  He spent hours, sitting under trees, listening to their stories.  In Africa, much value is placed on “making time” by chatting with friends and listening to their stories.  In the West, we call it “wasting time”.  What a different perspective, placing high value on sitting listening to friends.  Taking in and spreading their stories.  Hopefully we will be able to “make time” during our short stay here.

As Dan reported, Nairobi is a bit of a cultural shock.  A huge, sprawling, diesel-engulfed beast with no obvious heart. Thousands of locals, seeming to charge aimlessly up and down the streets, going…where?  Teody tells us that un-employment is intolerably high here.  Joseph, our amazing, intrepid, and fearless driver (Massai Cabs) warns us to roll up our windows when we slow down, to avoid having a hand dart in and spirit away valuables from our person(!)  We feel a bit imprisoned here. We are safely hanging out (making time) at the Guesthouse Westlands  as we await Joseph, Teody, and our ride to the Airport for our flight to Loki. But outside the guarded gate, is a bit of unprotected chaos.  A bit of me senses that  American fear is behind this;  that familiarity would remove much of this feeling of guarded imprisonment.  

Gaby and I were up most of last night, our bodies still convinced that it is daytime.  Gabs watched "American Gangster" on her iPod (are you kidding Me?) at 3am. I read a little then drifted off as the morning trucks started bleating in earnest outside our window.

At breakfast today, here at Westlands, we talked with a 40-ish white woman with a very British accent. She was born in Nairobi, lived here until she was 14, then moved  to Tanzania until now. She had just moved back to Nairobi.  “Work.” She could have been from London.  I had forgotten about the colonials.  Very white and western folk, born in Africa before Independence. Still a strong presence, and left over cultural reminder of the not-so-long ago days of  European rule.--mw

Sept. 4:  HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BABS!! from us three in downtown Loki!  Yesterday was (another) travel day: wild ride to Jomo Kenyatta Airport, quick

Sept 3
Today we leave Nairobi for Loki (Lokichoggio), a border town with Southern Sudan and our entry point  for Sudan. As a pilot I’ve read that Africa is where most planes taken out of service in other parts of the world end up. The jet we take to Loki I’m sure is one of those. A 1972 F28 Fokker East African Airlines commuter jet. As we land at Lokichoggio on a runway just wide enough for the landing gear  , off  the end of the runway is the remains of the same model jet that obviously had made a less than successful  though probably survivable, crash landing not too long ago.
Lokichoggio is the area of the Turkana tribe. Distinctive in their dress and style the women wear colorful wraps with colorful beaded necklaces piled from shoulder to chin. The UN has turned this place into its headquarters and staging area for relief to Southern Sudan. Their many large tents are prevalent as we land at the airport. Wind swept  hot and dusty we are met by Dominic who takes us to the preferred ‘Hotel’ where we await our guide Sister Florence for the journey into Sudan.-dw

Patience and the art of waiting.”Making time” again, as we await our various contacts. When  Sister Flo can’t be at Loki to greet us, we stagger out of the UNHCR dominated airport, to a dirt lot swarming with Land Cruisers. On the windshield of one: “Mike Dicocese of Torit”

Sept. 4, 2008 10:20am
So we’re ‘making time’ in Lokichogio waiting to hear if our truck will get repaired in time to leave today for Sudan, and Ishoe. Sister Florence explained that when we get to the border we’ll wait for a convoy to form to more safely cross the ‘no mans’ land  between the border and Ishoe to prevent raids on the vehicle. Apparently somewhat common occurrences on lone vehicles. -dw

Sept. 4, 2008 10:20am
Sister Florence showed up explaining they had trouble with the truck and that’s why she couldn’t meet us at the airport.
So we’re ‘making time’ in Lokichogio waiting to hear if the truck will get repaired in time to leave today .for Sudan, and Isohe. Sister Florence explained that when we get to the border we’ll wait for a convoy to form to more safely cross the ‘no mans’ land  between the border and Isohe to prevent raids on the vehicle. Apparently somewhat common occurrences on lone vehicles.=dw

1:30pm
With the Toyota Land Crusier truck repaired we set out for the border. There are no paved roads here.
We arrive at the Kenyan border to exit immigration. Nothing more than a tin covered  open air shack with an ’official’ sitting behind a desk. A few soldiers lounge in the shade of a truck by the “gate” a  tree limb pole between two rock piled cairns .
Gaby and I shoot some photos of the area and border outpost. A soldier yells for us to stop and then the immigration official demands my camera. I’m reluctant and a minor standoff  ensues but is quickly resolved with visually showing the official that I’ve deleted the digital photos from my camera, our apologies , naivety and assurances we will not  shoot photos of border installations again.
Sister Flo says we’ll wait here for the armed convoy  she asked for to escort us across the 20 miles of road through no-mans land. The land in dispute between Kenya and Sudan.
Renegade Turkana  tribes and bandits are known to block the road in the no-mans  land with a tree limb or rocks to stop a vehicle and then at gun point take what they want.  This is the reason for the armed convoy. But after waiting an hour and still no convoy the Sister says we must go as she worries for the time of day and the long road ahead, cause as it is, we face some driving after dark. “God will protect us” says the Sister. Ok, so I renew my faith for a day and put my trust where hers lie.
Off we travel through desolate African savannah. Driving as fast, 60 -80 kph, as the vehicle can navigate over the bone jarring and at times impossible ‘highway’ to Sudan. At one time ,Martin our driver tells us, elephants roamed the area  but are now gone, either killed off or relocated to the parks.
 As Gaby says “the ‘Lion King’ got it right,” as it feels like we are driving through that animated vision. Tall termite towers some as high as 12ft or so dot the landscape with the ever present iconic savannah acacia trees filling the view to the horizon.
Safely through no-mans land without incident we arrive to the Sudan border and are welcomed to the country as Americans with only a per functional look at the Sudan visas that were so difficult obtain in Nariobi, Kenya. 
With few stops along the way we proceed into Sudan and on toward Isohe (also known as Isoke)and always spoken as Isokay)about a total of 220km from the border. We cross many creeks either dry or low flow. Martin, our driver, tells us with a sudden rain storm though we may wait hours for the water to lower as he has in the past to make the crossings. We see lightning but no rain.
25 km from Isohe we turn off the ‘main’ road onto the road to Isohe and the only road toward Uganda. “Road” is not a proper description here. Driving at night on a one lane track through grass 10ft high and from recent showers it hangs heavily over the road. The ‘road’ is still wet and muddy from recent rains and is obviously impassable should it rain heavily. Somehow the 4wheel vehicle makes it through some challenging mud bogs. Around 10pm we finally arrive in Isohe where we are welcomed many times over and shown our rooms and where we can take a primitive shower. -dw


Sept 5, Isohe, Sudan

Hot and muggy the air is thick with heat, the sounds of the insects, and moisture. We awake to see where we arrived the night before. Isohe is a beautiful village that lays in a lush mountain valley  surrounded on all sides by these  immense  rock spires and mountains.-dw

One addition to Dan’s account:  we stopped in the town of Kapoeta.  Only one or two apparent staff are on site at our arrival at the new “hospital” there, which seems to be situated in the middle of a muddy swamp. Dark, no power, no plumbing. A few patients lounging about.  After Sister Flo met with someone nearby (impromptu meetings seem to be the norm here), and Gaby takes endless photos of the several kids we’ve attracted (and displays them to the thrilled subjects, staff re-aligns our stuff into two vehicles, Dan in one, Gaby and I in the other. And off we go…or not. It is after all supper time.  So a quick stop at the Kapoeta Junction Inn, for chicken and rice (the chicken had a nice long life) and warm Coke, and satellite feed of English League football on a dark dirt “patio“ next to the dirt road to Isoke.-mw



Sept 5, Isohe, Sudan

Hot and muggy the air is thick with heat, the sounds of the insects, and moisture. We awake to see where we arrived the night before. Isohe is a beautiful village that lays in a lush mountain valley  surrounded on all sides by these  immense  rock spires and mountains.-dw

Ditto! Dan got up first today, and came to our room, describing the scene outside as “right out of King Kong”. Yep.  No doubt. Hard to believe that this little, exquisite, box canyon valley, an hour up a single track dirt “road”, is the site of such local ambition: a little hospital, a Tb ward (separate), a clinic (attached to the hospital), a maternity ward, a lab, and a “kitchen garden“, where pregnant women are taught how to plant and grow nutritious crops. Above this enclave, is the sisters’ house, outdoor grass-hut kitchen and outhouse with showers and hole-toilets. Above this is a large brick Catholic Church, and the priests’ and Diocesan workers quarters.  And next to them is the Italian NGO, AVSI’s enclave, with a large staff of 30 or so, including an Italian doctor, Doctor Salladini, a “retired” trauma surgeon, who has spent nearly 30 of his professional years in various African countries and Afghanistan.

On the veranda of the sisters’ compound, we meet Dennis Okunu, a twenty-something Ugandan agronomist who is program director -for the Diocese of Torit- of a fascinating effort to educate young pregnant women to growing high protein and high vitamin A crops in their home gardens.  He has developed a large garden with soy, maize, a high vitamin varietal of sweet potato -“98% of the daily need”-, cowpeas, and amaranthan, a grain crop high in protein, whose leaves are also high in vitamins. “If I sit them down to talk to them about these things, they drift away, but if we dig in the fields, they get excited”.  Clearly, malnutrition is the most prevalent and dangerous disease here, but it’s root cause is complicated by culture and politics:

Ancient tribal culture has a basis in dowries for 10 to 12 year old girls being married off.
Cows make up the traditional dowry for these girls.
War and international arms-trading has resulted in a huge number of automatic weapons in the hands of many men.
During the war, between about the late 80’s and 2005, bombing from the North, and vil