The shirt off their backs

July 17^th 2007

These past few days have been pretty rough here in Gulu. Fall Out Boy is here shooting a video in the IDP Camp where I went earlier this month. All of the IC office staff have been pulled and pushed to the limits. It’s especially crazy because on Thursday Schools for Schools is beginning their implementation at the 10 S4S schools here in Gulu…which basically means that building will begin at some of the schools (like Awere). Also just after we leave on Saturday, the first group of High School Students will be coming to stay in Gulu for two weeks—this actually includes Downingtown East, incase you care.

Anyway, one of my friends here, Jamie, is working this summer as the Schools for Schools Intern. He’s great, and definitely totally fun to be around. The only thing is that he doesn’t know much, or anything, about filming, or the process of shooting a music video. But for the past two days he’s been helping the camera men, doing all sorts of bizarre things. Basically all of the staff have weird jobs like this, which are not actually their jobs or their expertise. Some of the staff leave the house by 6am and don’t return until around 11pm or midnight. It’s crazy because they are suppose to be doing their real jobs, but instead they have to spend the whole day out at Awer Camp, helping to film this crazy video.

So far, I think I am pretty convinced that having Fall Out Boy here is not a good thing for the Acholi people. They are just so counter-cultural (as we all are as Americans). It has really woken me up to the degree of sensitivity which must be used as Americans come out here. For example…

The music video stars an Acholi boy and girl. On the first day there were many takes which included the boy. The director was trying to find the right shirt for the boy to wear, and for whatever reason they were out at the camp (about 35 mins from Gulu town on a boda- aka motorcycle) and did not have his full costume. The t-shirts they had were not the correct color. There were a ton of kids all standing around the video shoot, and the director would just point to a kid, and say “Can we use that shirt? That’s the right color.” So then one of the head IC staff members, Katie Bradel, would go and point to the child, and ask him if she could trade shirts with him. She’s been here a really long time (like 3 years) so she can speak to them really well in Lwo. As he gladly agreed (mostly b/c he probably didn’t really understand why he was giving his shirt), he handed over his shirt, and then about 10-15 other kids started to take their shirts off and handed them to Katie. To be honest they probably thought they would be getting something in return.

It’s very common for Acholi to assume that a white person will give them something. Many children have asked me for money, very forthright, and one kid even said to me, “You give me your water bottle” in reference to my Nalgene.

Anyway, Katie then took about 20 shirts to the director. Apparently the shirt which was the right color did not fit the boy in the video. He didn’t like any of the other shirts, and so Katie had to go back and give all of the kids their shirts. It turned out that they ended up trading up shirts, one for another, until the director was finally satisfied with the shirt. The best (huge sarcasm) was that somehow by the end of the day, amongst all of the video shooting, that one shirt got lost (probably between costume changes and takes). So it turns out that all of those shots have to be redone tomorrow because they don’t have that shirt anymore. All of that for nothing really.

Now this may seem weird, but things like this have happened all day. Just crazy requests, when I don’t think any of them really have an understanding for Acholi life. They are also going to simulate war, by burning down someone’s hut. They are then going to rebuild them a new hut, but it just seems strange and wrong.

Even though that end of IC is going crazy, I think things at school have been going smoothly. I must admit today was my hardest day to be at school. It’s weird to think I will be leaving soon, and I may never see any of these people again. I am feeling very torn about a couple different experiences. I must admit, teaching science at Upper Merion will be quite different.

Peace.