Last night, I watched Last King of Scotland at my professor's house with my Politics class. It was really intense and I don't know if I'll ever watch it again. Before the movie, we had dinner of spaghetti with sauce and meatballs and Parmesan cheese and salad with ranch dressing. And garlic bread and Coke. It was delicious. We had an intermission partway through and had coffee and apple cake. I'm starting to like coffee now. I might try to bring some home for people. I heard of a good place to get some whole beans.
But anyways...Last King of Scotland is about Idi Amin, a fairly well-known "president"/dictator here from 1970-1979. The story itself, about a young doctor who comes from Scotland and becomes Amin's personal physician, is fictional but the background is true. Basically, Amin was head of the military and overthrew the previous leader, Obote. The people were really happy because Obote was no good either, but Amin wasn't educated past about 3rd grade and was a little crazy. During the years he ruled, 300,000 Ugandans were killed, including quite a few of his advisers and one of his wives. One of the lines from the movie talks about how people in a lot of areas weren't even digging graves because there were so many bodies. The movie also talkes about how Britain backed Amin's rise to power. In class, we've talked about how the US and other Western nations will back stable regimes in Africa even if they're really oppressive. We give money to suit out own economic interests. The movie's rated R and there's some swearing and a couple graphic sex scenes and violence. It was really the last scenes that got to me. It was about the doctor, so the actual events weren't true, but thinking that people were tortured and mutilated and...I don't know. And Obote came back to power after Amin. He was in power until 1986 and he killed even more Ugandans than Amin did.
In class this week we've been learning and talking about poverty. That and then seeing Last King of Scotland is just...overwhelming. Some of the movie was shot in Entebbe airport, the airport we flew into. There was also stuff shot in Kampala. Watching it and thinking after, I was just thinking that I've been there. And seeing the people - how they dress and how they talk and the music and the dance - it's familiar. I can see people and think how true it is. I see guys with guns standing outside buildings here. True, it's not as many as during Amin's time, but there are still military guys here. It's still not really democracy. They're shutting down a bunch of TV and radio stations soon. They still don't have a lot of the things that I'm so accustomed to, like freedom of press, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly. We were talking in Politics one day about how amazing just a peaceful transfer of power is. In 206 Kenya had elections and members of the losing party started a riot and started killing members of the winning party - just normal people, killing their opponents and their neighbors. And then talking about poverty in Uganda, in Africa, or in the world. It's just...this is all so far outside what I know and what I can process. How horrible would it be to watch a child, to watch your own child, slowly die because they don't have enough food? Or they don't have the right food? Or of something preventable or treatable - like diarrhea or malaria?
So few have so much. It's not like there isn't enough food in the world; it's just that it's all concentrated in certain areas. Hunger isn't some insurmountable problem that can't ever be solved. Yes, Jesus said that the poor will always be with us, but how does that mean that we shouldn't try to help? How does anything else n Jesus' teaching imply that we shouldn't try to help? Also, I'm not saying that us randomly giving money is going to solve anything either. as I mentioned, the governments here are largely corrupt. Giving money to the guys in charge doesn't mean it's going to get to anyone who actually needs it. I've heard from a few people that Compassion is really good. The money goes right to the kids, to help them and their families, to train them in a trade and help them get out of poverty. It made me really happy that I chose a good organization to send my money to. I've been learning about a lot of other stuff related to this, but...it's really hard to explain.
A week after I get home, I'm going to Disneyland. I'm excited now, but I also know that it's going to be really overwhelming. It's weird to think about coming home, about how I'm going to be different or what I'm going to tell people when they ask how Africa was.
On a lighter note: there was a bee in my room today. It buzzed really loudly and flew by my head and I went out to the doorway/hallway. The girls across the hall came out to go and do something and laughed at me. Agatha told me that bees and good luck and that I'm going to have 5 visitors today. She visited once and Eseza came by with Robert (an adorable little redheadeed toddler boy) and said hi, so I guess that's 3. Agatha said she'd come by 5 times if no one else visited me.
Also, my flight information changed. KLM changed one of my flights home. My flight from Amsterdam to Entebbe is the same, but my flight from Amsterdam to DC is leaving 2 hours later, which means I need to change my connecting flights because 2 hours isn't enough time to go through customs, pick up my bags, recheck them, and go through security, as well as probably have to get to a different terminal. I'm not too excited.
I don't really have anything else to say, so I won't. Vaya con Dios.
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