Gusco Peace Center, Gulu

Workshop Topic: building peace

The original plan was to auction the tiles made on 2 October 2005 by former abductees recently returned from the LRA rebel ranks, to finance some kind of vocational training program for them.

In the end, for a number of reasons, we've decided to sell Peace Tiles gift items with some of these images on them instead. We plan to return the original tiles to hang on display at the Gusco Peace Center, as a welcome for the abducted children who find their way there. We hope to build on this mural by adding more peace tiles to it over time.

The money raised from selling Peace Tiles gift items from this collection will be used to provide a small craft supply fund. Several of the children asked for this specifically. They are terribly bored.

When the army finds rebel hideouts or ambushes them in the bush, they bring the children to Gusco to wait while their families are found. All of their basic needs are met, but there just isn't anything to do there. Most children stay from 3 weeks to 3 months. sometimes a year or more...

We hope the new craft supplies fund will help them pass the time, at least a bit. We've also discussed possibly selling some of the things some of them might make. It would be a nice way to help them with some school supplies.

I came across something from Kevin Sites hotzone blog last week that made me understand the request from the kids for something to kill the boredom at a deeper level:

The LRA held 15-year-old Deo for only two months. It was a hard time -- and it shows.

He says in that time he was beaten almost constantly. He is a like a Swiss Army knife of nervous tics. His face, hands and feet are all constantly moving, shifting, rearranging invisible air molecules.

He feels more peaceful when he has something in his hands. A smile spreads across his face as he beats the drums outside one of the center's grass huts.

So, craft supplies... and hopefully more peace tiles it is!