The girl in the turquoise dress

two years ago i visited uganda for the first time. we visited IDP camps in and around gulu before settling in at the village of hope where we taught ESL, Bible stories and songs and got to know some of the most amazing kids ever.

at the camps the children would greet us and sing, perform a small dramatic piece or recite scripture. then our team would introduce ourselves, sing a few songs back for them and then, my favorite part, just get to know the kids while taking pictures or teaching them our songs.

it amazed me that these children, dirty and in ragged clothes, many of them without shoes, could be so joyful, praising and worshipping and genuinely happy to see us. i know many children at home who are bitter complainers, who aren't joyful even in their [embarrassing] abundance. and so this was a shock. and a delight. it was bittersweet.

at the very last camp we visited i spotted her - the girl in the turquoise dress. her smile and sweet shyness drew me in. i don't know what it was about her that captured me above all the rest of the children i had met that day, but i took the image of that girl back to gulu with me. while the rest of my mission team played bananagrams, i sequestered myself in my room to journal about what i had seen, how i was moved, and to of course bawl my eyes out in private.

a little of what i wrote that day...

that girl. the one in the turquoise dress. she seized me. i am drawn into her and want for her - with a kind of desperation - her joy, her childhood, her success. may she know she is special and loved and unique and dear. may she look to You and say, You bless me with your love, You are the giver of life and all things good. it is You and You alone that sends kindness into the world. may she be captured by You, hope-fully devoted to you! give her You, Lord, all of You.

may the VOH kids recognize Your love in our smiles, Your sacrifice and strength in our presence and embrace. may they see You in their presence through our goofy attempts to care and relate. may You and You alone receive the glory, the fame, the accolades.

just a few weeks ago we returned from another amazing trip to the village of hope in uganda. and we took a day to visit what is left of the camps in gulu, to see the children who are still there.

and i saw her.

the girl.

she wasn't wearing a turquoise dress anymore. if she didn't outgrow it, it must have fallen apart. but what she wore was still ragged and she was still dirty, and many of the children still weren't wearing shoes.

she seized me. again.

two years. it had been two years since i'd seen her last and she was still there. TWO YEARS - that i know of! possibly more! every day for the past two years she has woken up in the camps that her acholi people had no choice but to move to, and now they are being forced out of. they are being asked to leave and at some point an eviction notice (aka a burned down hut) will turn them out onto the streets or into the bush.

every day she risks eviction. every day she fetches water and cooks her meals. she may even be the head of her family, bearing the burden of caring for younger siblings, it wouldn't be unusual. every day she walks to school, perhaps with a fear that she will be jumped or raped. every day. for two years.

what must that feel like to a child? because even as an adult it is hard to imagine.

the sun had set while we were at that camp, so we piled into the van and headed back to the village. it was a long ride in the dark - darkness i was thankful for as it concealed the tears of grief from the rest of my team. i couldn't even speak. my heart was surely breaking.

"what's it going to take?" i kept asking. what will it take to get those kids out of the camps and into the village where they will be safe from all of that? where they will have a house mom and aunties to look after them? where they will no longer have to be concerned about their own safety and they can finally be a kid, because that is what they are - kids! children! babies!

so what's it going to take?

the village of hope has already built homes and moved in almost 200 children. and they have two more homes funded, but they cannot move more children in until they have the money to provide for them.

i believe child sponsorship is key to getting those kids out of the camps and into the village. and voh already has a program in place for this - they just need people to give, they need people to sponsor a child.

what's it going to take? something that we already have - we just choose to spend it at kohl's or starbucks or 7-eleven. these kids wake up in the camps every day and we shake our heads and say *tsk tsk, how tragic* and take another drink of our slurpee.

i just can't live an unaffected life anymore. and i hope you can't either.

sponsor a child.

give them something we don't even have to think about in our own lives: a safe, loving home, food, clothing, education and medical attention.

what's it going to take?

maybe it's going to take you.

sponsor a child

 

by the way, the girl? the one in the turquoise dress? ...her name is susan.