Kelly Fisher '03 has spent the past three year working for the Mennonite Central Committee in Uganda, where she focused on building peace, providing relief aid, and supporting local initiatives with the Kotido Peace Initiative (KOPEIN).
Through "peace meetings," KOPEIN facilitates dialogue between the various ethnic groups of the Karamoja Cluster, a region that spans the borders of Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, and South Sudan. These cattle-keeping people, who originate from a common ancestry, attend the meetings to air grievances, reconcile differences, and discuss ways that they can share resources and solve problems.
As Information and Documentation Officer, Kelly documented KOPEIN's activities though photographs and written reports, developed a networking website for other peace-builders, and provided technology training for staff members. She has also helped to manage the Ik Education Project - which sponsors 80 children from the Ik community, a marginalized group in the northeastern corner of Uganda.
Each year, Kelly's team hosted a community meeting in Kamion, where they held discussions about students' progress with parents and elders, followed by songs and a meal of goat and posho (corn meal boiled into a thick paste and eaten with stew).
Kelly reports that some of the many new skills she gained during her time in Uganda include learning how to: enjoy roasted goat, eat politely with her hands, buy snacks and useful items out of a bus window, text and drink coffee while riding through rush hour traffic on a bodo bodo, fold a sambusa, defeather a chicken, be gracious when she wanted to scream, cry with her neighbors, rejoice when the rains came, wear beads for celebration, wash clothes by hand, apologize when her dog escaped and ate her neighbor's chickens, crawl through the tiny door in the wall surrounding the village, properly brand a cow without ruining the hide, protect her hair from dust, harvest sorghum and pound it into flour, roast ground nuts and grind them into paste, never refuse an offer of meat, and love the dust of a dry land.
When Kelly arrived, armed raiders and bandits roamed the bush. Today, it is safe for Ugandans to visit their neighbors' farms and to sleep in their villages. Many challenges lie ahead for the people of the Karamoja Cluster, but they continue to build villages, cultivate farms, and improve their overall quality of life. Kelly is hopeful for their future and is grateful for the privilege to have helped plant and witness the germination of the seeds of peace.
This article first appeared in the TASIS England Today magazine, Autumn 2012 issue.