"You Punctuate Our Suffering"

The village of Lukodi lies about 17 kilometers north of Gulu Town. On May 19, 2004, LRA rebels stormed the village and slaughtered more than 100 men, women, and children while the government forces retreated. Today, a stark memorial stands in a clearing among the tall grasses and occasional shady trees. Only about 45 names are listed though many more died. Soon, the site will move to location nearby, where it will develop into a community center devoted to the memory of the victims and embodying the hope of the survivors and future generations.

We were invited to Lukodi by Vincent, a primary school teacher and member of the Community Reconciliation (CORE) Team. Residents and committee members walked with us to the memorial sites. They shared their stories and narrated the events of that tragic day. In soft and solemn tones they described the brutality and horror of the attacks, the bitter sorrow of displacement, the aftermath of the war, their ongoing struggles to recover from the trauma, and their efforts to cope with persistent impoverishment. They talked of peace and healing and hope for the future.

Standing before our group, the head teacher of the primary school eloquently expressed his appreciation that visitors had come to Lukodi. We were certainly not the first group of foreigners to pass through.

“You punctuate our suffering.” The phrase simply slipped from his lips amid other remarks, yet tore through my heart like a bullet and lodged in my brain. “You punctuate our suffering.” It was pregnant with meaning and complex moral implications. Our visit was a break in the everyday routines of the village. It provided the residents an opportunity to show us their place and speak of its history and their experiences. Perhaps it gave them an opportunity to make a connection that might lead to more tangible assistance in the present or future (provided we might remember them and return again, as several residents noted often does not happen, despite what visitors say).

But our visit also required them to relive their trauma, to lay it bare in front of a group of strangers, to drag the buried horrors back out into the daylight, as the villagers had been forced to do with the newly buried bodies of their murdered loved ones by the forensic investigators for the ICC. Our presence did not relieve any suffering. Nor did it intensify what few of us could hardly imagine enduring. We merely punctuated that which constitutes a central part of what it means to be from Lukodi.

Why did we go to Lukodi? To honor a polite invitation? To take pictures of schoolrooms and smiling children? To play a game of soccer with the youth? To visit a war memorial? To play witness to a drama of terror we as North Americans can scarcely grasp in terms of lived experience? How should we understand the head teacher’s words and what it means to northern Ugandans to have foreigners punctuate their suffering? I struggle with these questions and how to communicate the gravity of these lessons to the students, how to process them myself.

GSSAP is not about war tourism. We did not come to northern Uganda as voyeurs to the violence that has penetrated the lives and landscapes of this region and its residents. We did not come to save souls or heal wounds. We are not trying to give voices to the voiceless or agency to the disempowered. We are not here in the name of charity or pity. We do not wish to contribute to further dehumanization through patronizing good intentions.

GSSAP came to Gulu so that we can learn from Ugandans and others about the staggering complexity of the causes and manifestations and consequences of both conflict and peacebuilding. Our objective is to learn to think critically, to view the problems and possibilities as Ugandans view them, to engage our analytical minds and reflect sincerely upon – perhaps to interrogate mercilessly - the humanitarian and humanistic impulses that have led us to this point. We are here to form human connections, some fleeting, some durable and long-lasting. We try to remind ourselves continually that endeavors like this should not first be about us, although we MUST own these lessons ourselves and carry them forward in our lives. GSSAP is about seeing, creating, sustaining, challenging and transforming the relationships we form not only on the basis of common personhood but also the historical, political, and economic ones that link us in ways we often scarcely can grasp.

We are deeply indebted to the people of Lukodi and stand in solidarity with them, in common humanity and in painful humility for the chasm that exists between us, in spite of us, because of us.

References: Justice and Reconciliation Project. The Lukodi Massacre: 19th May 2004. JRP Field Note XIII, April 2011