coming around again

Incredible, beautiful day! I enjoyed every minute of it.

After church we followed James to meet with some of his Sudanese friends. So much fun! We met Victor Chol, director of SLBGVA, along with many other Sudanese (Gol and Garang were there; I met Angelo Deng who looks so familiar, Bol was a blast. . .all are amazing). Most of the Sudanese in this group speak English, Dinka and Arabic. However, there are a few variations (some don't speak as much Arabic but may speak Swahili; some may not speak Dinka but another dialect / language). I finally met one of Peter's sisters too.

We sang several hymns / songs in English, a few were sung in Dinka and several in Arabic. Then a reading in Arabic, (ironically the very same chapter in the Bible that I heard that morning at church - in English of course). 

The Sudanese Lost Boys and Girls are survivors of Sudan's Civil War. During the late 1980's, these young children, mostly boys between the ages of six and nine, fled the war in Sudan that destroyed their villages and families. They made an epic thousand mile journey by foot across the Sahara desert and the Nile River to refugee camps in Ethiopia. After four years, they were forced to flee Ethiopia. About 20,000 made it to Kakuma refugee camp in North-Western Kenya. Between 2000 and 2003, over 4,000 Lost Boys were relocated to the United States. Others were given asylum in Australia, Canada and some European countries. Through hard work and the generosity of their host communities, most of these Lost Boys and Girls have attended, or are currently attending, post-secondary institutions of higher learning.

The Sudanese Lost Boys and Girls Volunteer Association, Inc. (SLBGVA) was formed as a demonstration of their gratitude and as a way to 'give back' , not only to their host communities, but to the ones that are left struggling in parts of Southern Sudan. Their purpose is to connect individual volunteers and non-government organizations (NGO's) that are working toward building communities through education in Southern Sudan. The NGO's and communities, which their volunteers help, benefit as well as the volunteers. Their immediate goal is to send 5 volunteers to South Sudan, to complete a first-part of activities of their larger plan / goal, in May of 2008.