“Thanks, Coach. But I don’t want the other players donating money. I would never expect that.”
“Sooley, they don’t have any money, okay? They’re a bunch of broke college kids, same as anywhere else, but they want to help. They know what you’ve been through and they know about your family. They care, and we care.”
Samuel bit his lip and nodded.
Lonnie said, “I’m keeping the ball. You get to class.”
* * *
·?·?·
In response to the ongoing and worsening crisis in South Sudan, the United Nations, in 2015, budgeted $800 million in aid to the region, with the money to be divided primarily among the neighboring countries. Aid aimed directly for Juba had become suspect. Reports from the field repeatedly said that the desperately needed cash was bottled up and diverted by the government. Uganda was to get half of the money. Over 700,000 South Sudanese were living in twenty refugee camps and settlements, and by midsummer around a thousand were arriving each day. The situation was dire. The demand for food, water, medicine, and shelter became overwhelming.
For several reasons—lack of funds, bureaucracy, regional feuds, corruption—less than one third of the U.N. commitment arrived. Uganda did its best with the money as NGOs scrambled to plug the gaps. Camps hurriedly designed for 5,000 refugees were overrun with five times that. Children died of starvation, malnutrition, malaria, and other diseases.
The current crisis attracted the world’s attention again and was well covered by the Western press. Late each night, Sooley read the stories and reports online. After lights were out and the dorm was quiet, he sat on his bed and scrolled through the internet. Occasionally he found photos of the Rhino camp—Beatrice had said they were in Rhino South—and he studied the faces of hundreds of his people, hoping desperately for a glimpse of his mother, or James or Chol. He still clung to the prayer that Angelina was there, somewhere, searching for her family.
When he was certain Murray was sound asleep, he turned off his laptop, pulled the sheets over his head and said his prayers. Often, he allowed himself a good cry.
CHAPTER 28
Beatrice kept her coins hidden in a small plastic pouch that never left her body. She hid it in a cotton scarf tied tightly around her waist. She had shared some of the money with her two friends from Lotta, and had sworn them to secrecy. No one had money in the camps, and any rumor of it would be dangerous.
The new arrivals were being housed in tent cities, or at least the lucky ones. Thousands more were outside the gates, waiting to be admitted, registered, and hopefully fed. Once inside they slept on the ground until a tent was available.
In the older sections of the settlement, where many of the refugees had lived for years, the homes were made of wood, baked bricks, and thick straw, and built to last for years. The Ugandan government had given some of the homeowners a small plot of land to grow vegetables and raise chickens and pigs. This created commerce, and there was a busy market area in the center of Rhino Camp South. Refugees with a little money could buy better food, medicine, clothing, and other necessities. There was a lot of bartering and trading.
With the $100 Samuel had sent her, Beatrice bought a few items that would not attract attention. He said he had a job, in addition to being a student, and that he would send more. “Don’t send too much,” she had said. He always promised to come rescue them, but cautioned that it would take a long time.
Knowing her oldest child was safe and prospering was enough to lift her spirits, but the monotony of life in the camp was taking a toll. There was so little to do to pass the time. No home to clean; no food to cook; almost no laundry and no creek to wash it in; no school for the children. The weekly outdoor Mass attracted thousands and gave them a hint of normalcy.
On a Wednesday, she was up early with the boys and chatting with her neighbor about the daily search for food. There should be three food trucks within a half hour’s walk and they debated which might have the shortest breakfast line. This was a favorite topic of conversation for people with little else to do, and since food and water dominated their lives they talked about them nonstop.
When the children, all eight of them, were awake, the three women began the trek toward the chosen food distribution point. They chose badly and waited two hours for a bowl of rice and small loaf of bread. When they finished eating, Beatrice sent James and Chol with her two friends and began the sixty-minute walk through the crowded streets to the Doctors Without Borders hospital.
Each week more people packed into the camps. She passed tent cities, streets lined with shanties that looked flimsier than tents, and other streets with sturdier homes. In some sections the people were packed tightly together, and in others the sprawl went on for miles. All were displaced, all driven from their homeland by men with guns. Her parents had talked of the old days when famine forced people to leave their homes in search of food. Now they were driven out by warlords and their heavily armed militias.