Welcome to WE Center Gulu ONLINE!
Over the past 2 decades, more than 25,000 children in Northern Uganda have been abducted from their schools or homes, and forced to serve as child soldiers and wives in the brutal Lord's Resistance Army. An entire generation of childhoods have been lost to this forgotten global tragedy that terrorizes children, every single day.
Thousands of young night commuters flock each night from their villages to sleep in the relative safety of the region's major towns. They live on the run from fear, with very little time for parental guidance and support during their formative years. Former abductees who've been captured by the army or managed to escape, face the daunting emotional task of picking up the pieces of their shattered lives. Many have been forced to kill their own parents and siblings. Young girls of 13 and 14 have HIV infected babies. Almost every child's education has been disrupted. Families have been forced from their rural homes into Internally Displaced Peoples camps, where food must be bought... but there are no jobs. Happy childhood memories are obviously in short supply in Northern Uganda.
By connecting you to these shattered hearts, WE can change that. In fact, that's why we are here!
WE Center Gulu ONLINE offers a squidoo view on the real lives of Northern Ugandan children, local and global grassroots efforts underway to help them, and practical ways that you, your family, or your community can reach out to lend a healing hand.
WE Center Gulu
Creating a global grassroots safety net for the most vulnerable children on earth
Thanks to a recent award from the Omidyar Network, Life in Africa will begin community Webbed Empowerment operations in Gulu (Northern Uganda) in January 2006. The new WE Center Gulu will be located at the Charity for Peace Foundation night commuter shelter. Our primary aim is to empower children and the communities that care for them through global grassroots relationships and resources that are available via the World Wide Web. Learn more about our plans.
On the ground giving
Who are we, what are we doing, and how can YOU help us do more?
- Life in Africa
- Life in Africa's Webbed Empowerment Centers connect Ugandan communities with people, ideas, opportunities, experiences and resources that are available through the world wide web today. I'm starting this lens just a few weeks before WE Center Gulu operations begin, and will try to use this as a place to share what we find as that endeavor continues.
- Invisible Children
- Order the movie, invite your friends to watch, and then decide to do something about what you see! The (excellent) rough cut is available now; watch out for the feature film playing at a theatre near you in 2006.
- The Kids League
- The Kids League regularly distributes footballs, used team kits, and playclothes to children in IDP camps who want to play. Send donations (valued at $50 or less please) to Gulu Kids League, PO Box 8392, Kampala - UGANDA
- Outside the Dream Foundation
- Outside the Dream offers a full scholarship to Uganda's finest schools and academic institutions for bright, motivated children. In partnership with Life in Africa, Outside the Dream is reaching more children from Northern Ugandan families affected by war.
- International Peace Tiles Project
- The International Peace Tiles Project envisions a world in which schools and other public places around the world are bound together through the visual arts. To do this, the Peace Tiles projects seeks to stimulate and support the production and exchange of "Peace Tiles," intimate works of art that, when displayed together, create vibrant, dynamic, large-scale murals.
- Kabira International School Uganda (KISU)
- KISU secondary school students are working with Life in Africa to raise funds for educational and income generating projects in Kampala's displaced Acholi quarter. KISU students have also participated in a number of Peace Tiles activities facilitated by Life in Africa member artists.
Peace Tiles Factory Gulu
connecting people and communities through art and education
As part of the amazing Global Peace Tiles Project, Life in Africa hosts peacetiles workshops for communities of children affected by conflict. Discovering the value of their own creativity in uplifting others, groups of night commuters and former abductees have made peacetiles murals for refugee children in Darfur, for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and for other victims of the rebel conflict that affects their own lives.
Beginning in 2006, we plan to start covering all of Gulu with peacetiles murals! WE ALWAYS NEED miscellaneous craft supplies, odds & ends, and small artifacts that the children can use in their peacetiles collages. Please send any extyras you have lying around to LiA Peace Tiles Factory Gulu, PO Box 28825, Kampala, Uganda.
Click on the photos to learn of other fun ways to support the Peace Tiles Factory Gulu community of war-affected children and the grassroots organizations dedicated to their care.
A gift from the hear...
Gulu to Darfur 2: Pe...
WE Center Kampala Ma...
pray4peace
Really cool stuff you can buy
- Peace Tiles Factory Gulu - Unique gifts that give!
- Purchase unique gift items imprinted with "PeaceTiles" made by Northern Ugandan children, as part of the global PeaceTiles project. All purchases support the WE Center Gulu and organizations working to impact children affected by conflict and disaster.
- Visible Children Solidarity Bracelets
- Produced by Ugandan craftmakers in IDP camps, the revenue on these solidarity bracelets also helps put Northern Uganda's children into school.
IDP Camp activities
Pumping life into deadened communities
In 2006, Life in Africa introduces a number of new programs designed to inject life into the IDP Camps of Gulu District.
WE Center Gulu is teaming up with a number of dynamic global and local partners to create fair-wage craft production jobs, scholarships for bright children, global awareness building activities, and microfinancial planning & banking services for our members in the IDP Camps.
Click on a photo to see how you can help!
Unyama Camp for IDPs...
Koro camp in Gulu
Fashion4Football use...
Invisible Children b...
Life in Africa discussions
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Deeper insights on Northern Uganda's tragedy
Aboke Girls. Children Abducted in Northern Uganda
Amazon Price: $17.95 (as of 10/10/2008)
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Alice Lakwena & Holy Spirits: War In Northern Uganda 1986-97 (Eastern African Studies)
Amazon Price: $22.95 (as of 10/10/2008)
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Crocodile's Eggs for Supper, and other Animal Tales from Northern Uganda
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Living With Bad Surroundings: War & Existential Uncertainty in Acholiland, Northern Uganda (Uppsala Studies in Cultural Anthropology, 35) (Uppsala Studies in Cultural Anthropology, 35)
Amazon Price: $61.44 (as of 10/10/2008)
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CHILD SOLDIERS IN AFRICA: A DISASTER FOR FUTURE FAMILIES.: An article from: International Journal on World Peace
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Trial Justice: The International Criminal Court and the Lord's Resistance Army (African Arguments)
Amazon Price: $67.00 (as of 10/10/2008)
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Used Price: $71.60
