Naomi's blog

Dec 13

Graduation, Growing and Safely Home

I hope the run up to has filled your hearts with warm whispers of waiting and that these colder days have found you cosy inside.As the year comes to a close, it is a perfect to moment to be thankful for all that has been given to us this year. In particular:

Safe Arrivals Home

Now, finally, Gordon, Joyce, Loice, Rachel and Emma are all safely back in their homes. Some are now in the Lydney and others in the bustle of Nairobi, but they are still at the heart of what Marol Academy has done this year.

Nhial’s Graduation from Teacher Training College

A star of the college, Nhial Bona has finally graduated from Yei Teacher Training College. He is the first trained teacher amongst the 90,000 Apuk Dinka and will return to Marol for the 2012 school year. We are so, so proud of him. And we hope to send another teacher for this two-years’ training. It seems one of the most lasting legacies that is possible. We have only been able to do it thanks to the funding from teachers in the UK. So, thank you.

Growing Support in the UK

Hope for more people in the UK to love, be envisioned and serve the children of Marol.

Nov 21

Through the plane’s small window and across the thin tarmac that shimmers in the sun, you can see a handful of cattle grazing at the runway’s edge. A tiny plane comes into land as the engine on our Kenya-bound flight kicks into action. Just a few months before, after a miscalculation by air traffic control, our plane had been metres from landing on top of another when flying into Juba airport. The sight of the strip of tarmac always reminded me to thank God for his mercies. But, it was soaring up over the vast, green lands and snaking rivers that was the real reminder of God’s provision. Beneath us was spread South Sudan and its post independence hope. God had done mighty works in this nascent nation but there were many more left to do.

Yet, looking down on the glistening roofs reminds you of what is hidden in Juba, is not always the hope that seems more abundant in the village. NGOs and the UN are accused of consuming money intended for South Sudan. The government is accused of using South Sudan’s money to buy the biggest cars that can fit on its crowded streets. Land Cruisers, high security fences and quick construction characterise this city that few Southern Sudanese would recognise as their own.

Yet, with the jumbled streets and the beating sun, this is still almost a reminder of Marol. This morning saw me land into the mist of a London morning. From home to home in just an afternoon and a morning.

Back in South Sudan, five people died last week in the grazing lands where the cattle from Marol are kept. School-aged boys, guarding the cattle, often come into deadly conflict as they attempt to protect their family’s wealth. Recent disarmament campaigns have confused the usual security setting. Fear of more conflict remains while these families still grieve their loss. At the moment, Marol has no secondary school teachers for 2012 although we have dozens of eager students.

Plus, due to student protests, many schools in Wau have been closed indefinitely meaning that even less secondary education is available in the region. Marol needs more teachers so that we can keep providing.

In other news, this week the leaders of the church of Sudan gather in Juba. This includes Bishops from the Nuba Mountains and the Blue Nile who are experiencing intense persecution as civil war erupts in these regions.

Nov 9

The Joys of Juba

Just before the thatched roof bar in our hotel is a small bridge that leads over a little stream that gushes down to the Nile. When it rains, the little flow becomes a torrent to carry Juba’s rain fall down stream. Over this bridge, as you walk out of the hotel and into the rest of Juba, the roads run red with mud and small boys, whose play was interrupted by the rain, shelter beneath thin grass roofs. For a moment the bustle of motorbikes and Land Cruisers stands still, too timid to face the torrent.

Yet the people of this city over time have seen everything from seasons of being besieged during the civil war to bursting with development as it is now. Juba has the chaotic haze of any bustling city. The educated and aspiring, the entrepreneur and the nephew all descend on Juba. Life comes and goes here….

Again and again and again the University of Juba did not open. It was meant to open in April, then August and then October. The students returned but the lectures never started. And with no lectures and no funding, the students now sit in the university accommodation without a means of getting food or the money to return home. The promise is that the university will open in December but students are not confident. The University of Juba was initially founded in 1975 to support the education of Southern Sudanese, yet during the war the university was moved to Khartoum. While some of the university’s departments reopened in Juba after the peace agreement of 2005, since the Southern government took over this year they have found it hard to find teachers and funds to get the university open.

The same is the case in Wau and Malakal. Further East, there are increasing whispers of possible attacks between Unity State and Warrap State. Rebel leaders just over the border from our county seem to want to advance towards us to make a political statement. The rebels are also claiming that many soldiers already in Warrap State will defect to their cause. At the moment it is far from a reality, but it is a season of rumours of wars. The rain laden swamps will hopefully act as a natural barrier for peace at least for now.

In other news, having thought things were coming together, there are small complications with the details of my PhD due to new regulations at the university that had not filtered down to the department. I am also seeking funding and would appreciate your prayers for provision. I know my struggles are nothing compared to those at the universities in South Sudan but it has still upset me. With the growing threats of conflict in Warrap, I hope the work of my PhD will serve well the communities of this land.

Nov 3

Governance, Grain and Research

The euphoria of the new nation has already been stiffled by the tough circumstances that this new land faces. Due to a blockade by Northern Sudan on trade coming to the South, prices have rocketed especially in cities nearer the Northern border (such as Wau).

Grain is beyond the few pounds that families can gather together. With no secondary schools in the villages (except for Marol’s S1 class), families have tried to save all they can to send their sons to school in Wau. However, this means they must also save enough money to pay for their son’s food. As the food prices have soured, these school pupils can no longer afford to eat. There have been protests in desperation.

When the raids came in May, one of the chiefs of Gogrial East was amongst the dead. His home was far northeast in the county and his attempts to defend it saw him killed in the relentless attacks. Therefore, this season has seen the appointment of his replacement (as well as the appointment of a new chief for another area). This appointment of new leadership has bought with it inter-community tensions.

As Marol Academy organises its own leadership and governance to last the school through this next generation, I hope that these tensions do not interfere with Marol and pray for protection for those children and gives them a chance to learn. Marol sits on the boundary between two communities, both of which have children craving education.

This week I head to Juba to do a little work to earn a few pennies. I fly on Wednesday night and head to Juba as soon as I can get a visa (prayers for this are much appreciated). The work is on the idea of “community” and will inform strategy for the for an organisation in South Sudan for the decade ahead. I am growing in awareness of the macro level influence good research could have and am praying for the wisdom to have a good impact, however small it might be. Yet, I would really appreciate prayers and peace as I try to balance the various demands.

I also seem to miss the village more than ever at the moment. Lots of me wants to go home.

Oct 3

Teachers, Tiredness and A New Term

Glistening in the sun, and interrupted by the occasional tuft of grass or tree, the road to Marol now closer resembles a river than the dry track of the dry season. Yet, with shoe-less feet, the children will wade through the water tomorrow morning to return to Marol. They have just had a week’s holiday and will return to a new term at Marol Academy. It is now only a month and a half until the school year comes to an end.

Yet, there is much work to be done in these weeks and much to pray about for the year ahead. We desperately need a secondary school building and secondary school teachers. We hope to build a simple, four-classroom secondary school with a store room. We are yet to know where either funds or money may come from…. Emma, Loice and Rachel (Kenyan, Christian teachers who recently graduated from university) have been a pivotal gift to allow the Academy to keep learning this year. They were given to us by Focus - the Kenyan Christian Students’ Union. In January 2012, 3,500 Christian students will gather in Kenya to be “commissioned” for their call at a massive Focus conference. It sounds such an incredible event and something I can hardly dare dream that South Sudan will see one day. It seems that Marol is quite a tough location to survive in unless you are confident that God has called you there.

I am quite exhausted as I process all that has happened these last years in South Sudan. It would be good to have the time and space to do that this season. Home, in itself, lets that time trickle in but I have a tendency to keep busy. Moments of stillness are rich but not always often enough. Plus, I hope to write a couple of articles soon to sum up my academic work so far.

PS. The picture is the car of an NGO stuck in the mud. The photo was taken a couple of weeks ago on the tracks of our county.

Sep 21

Abyei report of flooding

Life and Death

As I sit on a friend’s spare bed, having spent the day exploring with another, I am reminded again of the richness of having gracious and patient friends back here in England. The last weeks have been steeped in trying to settle back into this homeland, and have been reminded of the blessings of friends. I am grateful and, slowly, starting to feel rested.

Back in Sudan, the teachers at Marol are in good health but the road from the market to the school remains as nearly five miles of swamp. Having had their homes bombed to pieces in May, the people of Abyei are now facing some of the worst flooding in memory. Crops and people have been washed away. Fifteen have been killed and ten thousand displaced. The attached reports illustrates this.

- Life - Thank God for Ayak. Beneath their thatched roof, a few hundred metres into the forest, this little girl was born on Saturday. Her safe arrival seemed a little miracle as her mum (Regina) had fallen seriously ill with malaria prior to her birth. Her mum and dad (Dut) are the couple that could finally marry, and escape the clashes in Abyei, after the gift of cows by an Englishman. Ayak literally means drought. Yet, now, she brings much happiness to this little family.

- And Death - If you turned through the towering crops towards Bol’s circle of mud huts, the children would spot you and run to greet you. Madut’s little legs carried him the fastest and the girls would run closely behind. Nyanut’s silent presence would always watch from a distance, too shy for the bold greeting of the younger children. Nyanut was about ten year’s old and lived with her uncle (Bol) for much of last year. Her mother lived about three hours walk away. She had been lent to Bol to care for his youngest daughter.

This week she died of malaria. No one could afford to take her to Wau to seek treatment. Please pray that I have the right words to say as I speak to people in the UK about South Sudan.

Aluet - Bol’s daughter

Sep 19