Rumpole and Yoda: When there really is no “law”...and a rant.

Warning references to old British  and American TV and movies, are coming; in addition to frustrating and sad moments.

Go get a cup of coffee or maybe a glass of wine…this is a long one, but please try to read it all…

I had the opportunity to sit in high court yesterday.  While the courtroom itself is very basic, long tables, long benches, lots of microphones that don’t work and the crest of Uganda on the wall above the high court judge, who by the way was wearing some kind of Japanese Kimono robe?? Maybe he just likes red and wanted to add some color to what would be one of the longest days I have had in many, many years.

So judge dressed like Asian Yoda, attorneys dressed like they watched too many Rumpole of the Bailey episodes, sans wigs, and the prisoners dressed, well, like everyone else in the room. Oh I should mention that every case, except the one I am there to see is a defilement case (for the Americans, read rape…of a child).

First case is called, and it is to determine if the statement the accused (and yes they pronounced it achused…all frigging day!) had been signed under duress. Here is where it gets a bit frustrating. This is how justice works here. Someone, anyone, can have you arrested on their word only. You can be held for two days without being charged with any crime. During the two days you are locked in a cell maybe 6x10 with up to 15 other accused people. No toilet, no bedding. Twice a day you are “paraded” in the yard where you are questioned, and questioned, and beaten to try to “get the truth”. Ok so maybe that is some of the sad part. Finally, this accused, was taken to a room with only one officer (he was not allowed to have a witness…that is actually the law) where he apparently made his confession and was cautioned (given his rights to remain silent…there is no right to have an attorney, a witness, a friend, someone, anyone).

So State Attorney calls Detective (fat old man dressed like mobster in Florida). Takes him through the sequence of events that led to the taking of the statement…in painstaking slowness… even having him read the statement and show us all where everyone had signed. Then detective is cross examined by the defense attorney who asks exactly the same questions…not exaggerating here, which again includes him identifying the document and signatures. We are now one hour into this…the best is yet to come. It goes back to the State Attorney who, and I am not making this up, asks exactly the same questions again- starting with his name, rank, how long on the job…and yes having him once more read and identify the signatures on the statement. Hour two is gone…there are 8 more guys waiting to have their cases heard.

Then the accused is taken through the whole question, cross process except he is only asked to identify his signature. Oh and did I mention that court is in English, the accused is Acholi (who spoke and understood English) but had to wait to have all questions translated to Luo and then all his answers (even when he answered in English, his lawyer told him to answer in Luo) had to be translated to the court. As hour three is moving on, the judge finally rules that the statement is admissible and then offers the accused the opportunity to give his defense---literally his side of the court case! Hour three gone. Finally about halfway through that painfully slow question, translate, answer, translate, pause for everyone to write it all down long hand….the judge decides to hear the rest another day and the accused is excused.

My butt now is sore. Ok case number two….don’t remember, my brain stopped working because I am hungry and so appalled by the lack of preparation by the attorneys...who all appear to have been hung over and who clearly had not looked at the files until that minute in court.

Hour four…gone Lunchtime. Sad part coming….

Back in court the first case called is aggravated defilement. So defilement is sex with anyone under the age of 18, and aggravated defilement is sex with a child under the age of 10 while infected with HIV. The judge starts to read…the entire trial transcript…which would have been laughable except that he began with “there are four things that have to be proven for aggravated defilement” 1. Child was under 10 2. The assault happened. 3. The accused is HIV positive and 4. That it was the accused who did the assaulting. “the child was eight, the defilement took place, the accused is HIV positive, so it is the last requirement that must be determined.” The penalty for this crime is death. Yes, an eight year old girl was raped by a 30 something year old man who was not only HIV positive, but knew that he was HIV positive…this happened in 2012.

One hour later after we had been treated to a really bad episode of Criminal Minds read out in court, and while the accused stands, blank faced, it is recommended by the “advisors” that the judge find the accused guilty of the aggravated defilement.n I am not sure what their qualifications are, but all along I thought they were the court reporters (there are only two and they kept switching out with another two),  Judge then sets another date for the accused to receive his judgement—so not really sure what the purpose of that whole production was?? I should mention that while the judge was reading about the achused he also kept talking about the “prostitution” and I spent a great deal of horrified time trying to figure out what prostitutes had to do with the case…Prosecution, prosecution, light bulb now on. Ugandlish.

Next case, also aggravated defilement, but for some reason we were not treated to the extended details of the crime, just the “advisors” recommendation, guilty of simple defilement- not sure how any defilement can be simple, but one of the four criteria must not have been proven. Again another court date set for the judge to make a ruling.

The next two cases went quickly, withdrawn by the State Attorney after five years---five years!

Oh and the reason I was at court, a friend of mine was put in prison for seven days because his phone went off in court the week before. After seven days,  he stayed in prison for an additional three days because the judge was took a long weekend so there was no court...imagine being sent to Vacaville or San Quentin because your phone goes off in court! (and he had turned it off, but it accidentally turned on while in his pocket). Did I mention he is a husband, dad and really amazing human being? Yeah...that does not matter to those with the power.

A few years ago I read a book by Gary Haugen, founder of International Justice Mission called The Locust Effect:Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence. It was sad, shocking, depressing, and dealt with the reality of injustice faced by the poor in developing countries. Uganda is a developing country and  I have had glimpses of the corruption and inequality of justice for the poor…I can read about it, and even see small episodes of it, but I have now been baptized in it and quite frankly am not sure what to do with my new knowledge---hence your opportunity to read this blog because sometimes I just need to get it from my head to the page in order to process.

The men in court yesterday were there because they could either afford an attorney, or they had friends or family who could afford an attorney, or the victim could afford to press the case forward. For the rest of the accused…and remember a case can be brought against you on nothing more than one person’s word…you can sit in prison (not county lock up people, with toilets, TV and two to a cell) but prison, for years…forgotten by a system that operates on bribes.

Two stories: 1. Survival Like in healthcare and education here in Uganda, in prison, only the basics are provided- building, guards, blanket (if you are lucky, sometimes takes two months to get, sometimes taken by the mean prisoners). Feeding is once a day and consists of the water the beans were cooked in, followed by beans 100 give or take, and then posho measured in three inch square (think solid cream of wheat cut like jello). It is the responsibility of your family and friends to supply real food etc.  Those without visitors rely on those with visitors for their survival. They cook for you, you share some of your food…that is survival.

2. The Step Mother I have written in the past about how all the evil step-mother stories must have originated in Uganda…here is another one to add to the list…a fourteen year old boy is set to inherit his father’s cattle. The step-mother is not happy about losing the wealth (cattle are like a really good mutual fund) to this boy and decides to accuse him of defiling her daughter. Accused, arrested, charged, thrown in prison…forgotten. Now sixteen, he has not been visited by anyone- unfortunately too many Ugandan men are afraid to be men and do the right thing, instead, they hide behind their horrible, evil wives. So he seeks out ways to survive. He has not been to court and probably never will. He should not even be in the adult prison, but in the remand home for juveniles. He will sit in prison because he has no money, he is just a child and his story is sadly not unique.

If you made it this far, thank you. A bit of a rant coming up here…. I told you there would be sad parts and I am really trying to understand, as I have for the past year, how people can be so cruel to each other. How we cannot see past our own comfort to believe the things that are really happening to people outside our immediate circle. How we can be so desensitized. Humans of New York is doing a series right now on the refugees arriving in Greece…read the stories please, read Gary Haugen’s book please. Take this seriously please. Please please please educate yourself, it is sad and depressing and will rip your heart out, but isn’t that better than being numb to the world? Isn’t that better than not feeling anything? Be thankful that your ancestor’s boat landed in America instead of say, Hungry (not that a boat can land there but you get my meaning). I am blessed with so many opportunities because my Great grandfather made the decision to save his family by traveling across the globe to look for a better life and his boat landed in New York. He was processed without question (name, age, country of origin, boat, number in the family, I have seen the records) - he was not asked what God he prayed to or what his political affiliations were, or even if he could speak English (he couldn’t). Was everyone happy that the “immigrants” had arrived? NO. But they were welcomed and allowed to come and provision was made and the world did not end.

                     New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

---Emma Lazarus (1900)

Apathy and Empathy

Apathy is by definition a “Lack of interest, concern, or emotion; indifference.” It is what is happening to our world…to us as individuals. We are numbed by the bombardment of media images of pain, suffering, violence and death making it difficult to process the horrors taking place in the world…so we shut down, click to the next screen, and scroll past the unpleasant posts. I have seen comments from people that include: “if you are living a good life, why not leave well enough alone” REALLY? Is it just about us and our comfort? I sometimes think that compassion lessons with the increase in technology.

On the other hand, empathy is “the power of understanding and imaginatively entering into another person's feelings.” It is the connection of one human being to another for no other reason than because we share a humanity. 

Is it possible for us to reverse the trend? Is it possible for us to genuinely feel the pain of a mother or father who has lost a child to hunger, murder, or illness? Or to imagine what it must be like to live in fear of your government, have bombs drop on your village, or live in a refugee camp for years on end?

We, (and I use that term in the most Western sense) rather than sit complacently in our comfortable lives, should rather feel a need to create a world in which all children can go to school, eat at least two meals a day, and where parents have the ability to work, provide basics like clothing and shoes. Or where girls are not raped on the subway or on the way to the latrine, where public servant actually means serving the public, and where we care enough about our environment that we treat for what it is…the thing that gives us all life.

I am not speaking as one “holier than thou” because I am as guilty of falling into the apathy trap as anyone. But it is time to stop pretending that we have not created a greed filled culture in which money talks and honesty, truth, compassion, and love have lost their meaning. I am calling out the “religious” who quote the Bible while shaming their neighbor, and vilify anyone who does not accept their “teaching” as correct. I am calling out the presidents, prime ministers, legislators and judiciary who “serve” the people while imposing laws that suppress freedom of speech, assembly, liberty, and belief. I am calling out the teachers who sit back while their classrooms are turned into factories for sedated students and places where creativity and individuality is banned. And I am calling out each of us to really look at those around us, to feel for one minute the pain or loss or desperation that they are feeling and to find a way, human to human, to empathize.

Birthdays

Birthdays…we all have them and yet for some they mean so much and for others…well they don’t even know the date. I was asked the other day how people here celebrate birthdays. It is something that I have thought about off and on but never very deeply. When a student a couple years ago told me that it was his birthday, I asked what he was doing. He replied, "Going to class." I was so sad that no one was doing anything for his birthday that I went a bought him a candy bar. He must have thought I was crazy…but thankfully never said so.

You see, birthdays are not celebrated over here, at least culturally. This seemed so strange to me mostly because of my culture. I was brought up in a home where celebrating your birth was one of the biggest days of the year. My parents always made us feel special, right from the waffle breakfast in the morning to the slumber party that night. My mom even made pie or cheesecake because I did not like ordinary cake. I can see now that it was a celebration of me, as a person, someone special and individual and I was important.

I had my own theories of why birthdays are not celebrated here. Money being the main one, and information. So I asked around and it turns out I was not far off. Extended family is very common and important in the Acholi culture, which means lots of people. Most families are peasant farmers, making very little money…subsisting on what they grow, what they can sell or trade. It would be impossible to celebrate everyone in the family’s birth every year. The second reason is that there are a lot of people who don’t know when they were born. There are no official records kept, no birth certificate, social security card, hospital records. Which got me thinking how obsessed we are about age. What age did the baby learn to walk, when was she potty trained, when did she start school, turning 10, 16, 18, 21, 30, 40, 50…100. And of course all the commercial items aimed at each age, walkers, training diapers, “back to school”, driving, insurance, voting, drinking…and then the age reversal products to make us younger and more beautiful. 

I kind of like the idea of just living life every day and not counting down every year only to wonder where the time has gone.

I am turning 50...and a bit... today and some days I forget how old I am. I actually have to do the math. This may be because of my age, or because I really don’t keep track anymore. I know I have people who love me; I have people I love. I am doing something that inspires, frustrates, breaks my heart and makes it sing. 

The one thing that I think gets missed when birthdays are just another day in a person’s life, especially that of a child, is the feeling that just for one day, you are special, you mean something and your life is worth celebrating. So for my birthday this year, I want everyone who has taken the time to read this … far… to celebrate the life of someone close to you. Not because it is their birthday, but because they are special, they mean something, and their life is worth celebrating. And for God’s sake, eat something delicious for me!

Simply Life

Simple. Life is really a simple thing.

Holding a baby,
laughing with the women in the market,
talking to a friend,
walking down a road and noticing the beauty,
watching a storm roll in,
looking at a plate of food so full of color you take a picture,
stopping to greet, putting aside your “work” because someone needs your help, simple.

It becomes less simple when you become outraged that a woman…it could be your mother or sister, your wife or aunt or cousin or grandmother… is being threatened, abused, oppressed, or treated like less of a person only because she is a woman,
wonder how a mother could leave a child…just leave and never look back,
want to see every child have the chance to hold a book and understand what it says,
struggle to understand how anyone can have so little value for life that they take it from another.

What is it the makes us want to be right?
Have power?
Inflict pain?
Impose on others?
Be cruel, thoughtless, selfish, radical, and extreme?
Would it really be so hard to live simply, so others can simply live? To give generously so that other can simply have?

Life is really a simple thing…

But we don’t live it that way.

Wake Up

“Wake up, all the teachers
Time to teach a new way
Maybe then they'll listen
To what'cha have to say

'Cause they're the ones who's coming up
And the world is in their hands
When you teach the children
Teach 'em the very best you can”

If you want children to be empowered to bring peace and stability, you must first educate them.

Education is a word that can mean so many things, but what is universally agreed is that education in some form is a good thing.  One dictionary says that education is: “the knowledge, skill, and understanding that you get from attending a school, college, or university”, another: “The wealth of knowledge acquired by an individual after studying particular subject matters or experiencing life lessons that provides an understanding of something. Education requires instruction of some sort from an individual or composed literature. The most common forms of education result from years of schooling that incorporates studies of a variety of subjects.” I have always loved learning. Not necessarily the process of learning, the rote memorization, the mundane and often repetitive solving of math equations, chemistry…but the ability to answer any questions about anything because I had the books or teachers or later the computer. I was never really good at creative writing and maybe that says something about who I am, but I am really good at research and I think that comes from a curiosity to KNOW.

 I have had the opportunity to see different aspects of the formal educational process- private school, home school, public school- American, British, Ugandan…there are similarities in them and pros and cons, but what needs to be addressed in any educational setting is the uniqueness of each child. While I don’t advocate an un-schooling model, because I believe that children need to be guided, encouraged, empowered, and provided the resources to learn; I have been frustrated by teacher centered learning, parent dictated learning (often not allowing for students to develop their own voice), and a completely centered approach that basically lets the teacher off the hook and requires a child to know what the educational options are that are available to them.

I have been traveling to different school settings since I arrived back in Uganda, trying to learn as much as I can about what is already in place, how it is serving the kids and how it is failing them. I was fortunate enough to watch an amazing group of secondary students debate a topic about education. Their arguments were insightful and intelligent. And at the end I wondered if they had truly listened to what they had just said…had they realized that they had discovered many of the failures of a broken system? Did they see the irony in a system designed to elevate the elite and keep the poor in poverty? A system designed by a Colonial power that failed so miserably that it no longer has colonies? Because the truth of intelligence is that it does not come with money. It comes with curiosity, determination, hard work, and a love of learning. Any child can have this, it is not reserved for those born into wealth, for those attending the “best schools”, for those with loving families, a safe place to sleep and food to eat.

Mother Teresa Primary started with the children of the most vulnerable women, girls really who had been abducted and returned to find they no longer had a place in their community. There are still many students who in our terms have “nothing”…and I mean literally nothing more than the clothes they came in. And yet they are bright, hopeful, curious and so eager to learn. Our mission two years ago was to empower these young people who so desperately want to change their world. Keeping them in school is a start. But finding those who are not in school or are in such rural areas that they lack the opportunity to explore their potential is part of our mission moving forward. We cannot change the broken system, but hopefully we can support those who will. If those wonderful young men and women debaters take what they learned about their failed system and work to change it…work with courageous teachers who care about their students more than their pay check; work with local leaders willing to affect change with action and not just words and promises; and work with each other not to empower “the best” but to encourage all those who follow them…well that will be education in action!

One Day, One Jar

We started Educate for Change after being touched by the lives of the children we met, and who became part of our hearts, while teaching in Uganda. Some of us have had difficulty explaining exactly what happened to us there last summer, and I have struggled to not just explain it, but try to incorporate it into my life here. I have learned this week that Educate for Change is not just about trying to level the field in terms of providing educational opportunities for children regardless of where they are born, but it has created the opportunity to change the hearts and minds of my students through education about kids just like them, living in very different circumstances.

On Wednesday, I received an email telling me that Opwonya Christopher, the little brother to one of our scholarship students, Ocaya Isaac, had passed away. Isaac has already lost both parents and is the main caretaker for his older brother who suffers from epilepsy, and his 80 year old grandmother. What can I do to help this amazing boy through another loss? How inadequate I feel so far away. So when Sister Hellen told me that when they went to bury Christopher his grandmother was living in a hut with a roof in such bad repair it threatens to fall any day, I decided to ask my students to help. A one day roofraiser- very simple…I told them that Isaac, the student they had raised money for earlier in the year, needed their help again. One day, one jar and bless their hearts they raised almost $200. One boy brought me a baggie full of coins and another girl organized a bake sale for next week with her whole class pitching in. We only have 130 kids in our middle school and today was the proudest day I have ever had as a teacher.

Most of the time I wonder if my students get it…if they will ever see the big picture, the world outside their small town world…and then there is a moment when they go beyond my expectations and open their hearts to help a boy who they will probably never meet.

I was truly blessed when I got off that boda boda at Mother Teresa’s Primary School last June and I need to remember that I am equally blessed to touch and be touched by the simple, generous hearts of my students every day. 

Respecting Cultural Norms (a relflection)

I meet my partner teacher in the staff room (a room about 20x30 with school desks around the perimeter for each teacher, a large table in the center of the room and a TV- yes- and it is on all the time- I sit and watch him copy notes from the text he is using for East African History- literally word for word with only some additions of his own.  We then walk across the courtyard (the big grassy/dirt area) to the classroom where the seventy-six Senior 1 boys are waiting for us. You see in Uganda, the teachers do not have a classroom that the students come to, the student stay in the classroom and wait for a teacher to come- sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t- but the boys stay just the same.  They stay in one big room, rows of benches with maybe eight inches of writing surface attached and they sit three to a desk. All have notebooks of varying sizes and styles, and blue pens. My partner teacher brings a chair for me to sit in and then proceeds to dictate the lesson to the boys, occasionally writing whole paragraphs on the blackboard (and by that I mean the concrete which extends out from the wall by about a ¼ inch and is painted black), with chalk- yes chalk.  When I say dictate- I mean saying each sentence or part sentence over and over four or five times while the boys write furiously in their notebooks. This goes on for either forty or eighty minutes. Then another teacher arrives (or not) and we head back to the staff room to wait for the next class that he teaches. My teacher has three sections of Senior 1 (basically 7^th grade, but the boys can be anywhere from 11-16ish) and three sections of Senior 4 (that would be 10^th grade or age 15ish to 18ish). He meets each sections three times during the week for 40 minutes- sometimes the blocks are back to back, making an 80 minute class.

The reason for the age range is that some boys either missed some years of school because they were abducted by the LRA and became child soldiers, or were in some other way affected by the war, or they could not pay the fees to attend; so they missed school until they could pay again. There is no free school in Uganda- all the government schools cost, the boarding ones, like cost more-as the parents have to supplement the food. The government pays about 15cents per student per day for food. For girls, missing school once a month because they do not have sanitary pads is common. This puts them behind, if they get far enough behind, they quit or are forced to quit because their parents will not pay if they do not perform.

It is interesting to be a teacher in the era of globalization. In many respects we do live in a global village. We all eat, sleep, love, learn, have families, listen to music, enjoy friends, work, play, and try to get through each day the best we can. In other ways, we live very different lives. This was most recently brought to my attention because my eighteen year old daughter, who is spending the year in Senegal, just came face to face with the kind of violence, that while not uncommon in America- is condemned- but in Senegal is culturally accepted.  Her host mom beat her host sister so violently that the daughter lost some of her hair and had a broom broken over her head; all because she had not cooked Emma’s dinner.  There are many cultures that accept violence towards each other as normal. As a visiting teacher in Uganda, I had to stand by while children were caned. You might wonder why I stood by, why could I not just step in front of the teacher with the cane and stop them. As teachers in America we are federally mandated to report suspected child abuse. It is our job to help kids, not just to learn, but to show them how important each and every one of them is, what their potential is, and to believe in them - sometimes when no one else does. Charles Leadbeater said, “Your vantage point determines everything you see.” This is extremely important to remember when considering comparative education.

Where we come from, our own cultural norms, biases, and experiences will influence how we interpret the data. Comparing educational models and outcomes is not just about statistics, it is about real people who live very different lives, in cultures we may or may not understand. Our definitions of education may also vary and I agree that expanding the definition to include non-traditional elements is vitally important. Education must be made relevant to the users and include traditional, non-traditional, public, private, teachers, students and families. Having an overreaching goal of education for all, or lifelong education are the big umbrellas under which we can compare educational models. But such a comparison needs to account for the many cultural, environmental, and resource differentials that exist globally.

Education is not a miracle cure as has been pointed out by a number of authors and studies.  Pouring more money into a broken system, a new idea, or technology for the sake of technology is not an efficient use of our resources. “It is not enough simply to get the technical details right; reforms must also navigate the challenges of the nation’s political economy” (World Bank).  Our best resource as teachers is each other. Supporting each other, learning from and teaching each other, providing resources for each other and most of all trying to understand the unique issues we all face and not apply the West is best attitude to education in the developing world. I may not agree with the cultural norm in another culture, and it may be right to change it, but I do have to respect the cultural norm in that country. What I did in the caning situation was to have a discussion with the teachers about why they cane, why they cane even though it is now illegal in Uganda to do so, and what other methods/punishment might yield the same results. I learned from them, they learned from me.

Change does not happen because we wish it, or pray for it, or donate a room full of computers to a school with no electricity. Change happens because we set an example, we educate, and we work within the cultural norms to make a personal connection with other human beings on the planet in the hope that we can learn from each other

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