A few days later I stood on a small red clay path in a slum in Kampala, Uganda. I had ventured there just to get a sense of the life in place like that. As I was preparing to head back to my vehicle, a young woman with two children approached me. Her face looked in pain, a sense of frustration; even a tinge of anger was visible to me.

"No one cares" - blurted out of her mouth. "These are my children." I looked down a boy and girl about three and five years. The looked neatly dressed and were well groomed. I could tell that the mother had made a few sacrifices to get them that way.

Her speaking to me again jarred my thoughts. "I have gone everywhere looking for help, to the government, to the churches, to "UNICEF", to "Save the Children" and other places but no one will help?"

I asked her why she needed help and with tears streaming down her face she told me of how she had been married and her husband had been unfaithful and contracted AIDS, and now she had it and was dying. There was no one to take care of her children and she needed help. She told me that no one cared, no one was there to do something about or for her children.

My heart was touched. I felt something within me. I felt that I was to do something here. That the universe had revealed a need to me and I was to be part of the solution, I was part of her answer. I not only saw the need. I knew that I also would find the answer in the same way; that whenever we face a problem, wherever we come across a need we are also given the power and all that is needed to do something about it.

Most of us - feel so helpless - so impotent to change our world and yet divinity has imparted to us a portion that is enough to meet any need we might face. Throughout my years in Africa I became keenly aware that I had been empowered to face anything, any situation, any problem as an opportunity for the gifting in me to be released and to create a miracle in the midst of hopelessness.

And yet sadly, we settle for a portion way less than our potential as we go through life, not realizing what has been given to us, not realizing of what has been deposited in us for a time that we are facing today. That the problems we are facing are an opportunity, that we are not just a dimly burning wick trying to survive in life, but in us are resident all the powers of the universe and all we have to do is risk it.

The problem is that most of us never put to test what is in us, we are like the person who at the end of his or her days comes to God like in the account I found by anonymous writer below.

He saw people love each other. And he saw that all love made strenuous demands on the lovers. He saw love requires sacrifice and self-denial. He saw love produce arguments and anguish. And he decided that it cost too much. And he decided not too diminish his life with love.

Africa, showed me something about myself.  It showed that I could and was enabled to make a difference. That I could care, become aware of a world beyond my own, have the inner compassion move me to action, and have the gifts and power to do make a difference in the lives of others.

The dear woman I met on the path in the slum of Kampala told me that no one cared? She has died since. Her children are in a home and school I managed. She was wrong. There are people that care and have the compassion, the power to do something about the need and have been divinely equipped to do so.

The result has been that I now know, that I am not just a person with a soft heart, but a person equipped to make a difference. To impart and give resources that are beyond my natural self. That I am not simply here to live a decent life, but to make an impact in the world in which I live.

Never will I forget an encounter in the slum of Kampala when I saw things not just as they were but as they could be, and the most amazing thing was - I could be part of the solution.

I had decided to leave Africa, resign my position and go back home. People asked my I was leaving here when I seemed to be at home here. There were many reasons, from being robbed, held prisoner one too many times, malaria, the organization I represented. The list seemed endless. I wanted to go home. I did not even know where home was, but I felt that the door had closed for me here. For some time I had felt what I call divine discontentment, a restlessness of spirit, a yearning. Yet at the same there was an apprehension in me about the future, about what I would do for a living, or where I would live.

I asked myself things like "could I live a normal life?" "Could I adjust to a Western civilization that had grown distant to me?" "Could I enter the dog eat dog mentality business world?" There were simply so many things going on in my head. I also felt a deep need for a relationship with a woman I could relate to, who would understand my heart. I yearned for the friendship with a soul mate with whose heart mine could be knitted together with. I wanted to be near my children and yet I questioned whether this was the right move for me. After all Africa had been to me my finding place, it had been my Jerusalem, my Tibet, my Mecca, my Ganges River. It had been the place where I found my spirituality anew. Where joy came once again after a night of loss and pain. The place where I found myself, and came home, but I still had things floating around in my head that needed a resolve as to my future, my life back in America.

Just then Francis Olero, and old friend and to whose village we were headed, broke in and said "it is not far from here." I smiled, since if anyone in Africa tells you it is not far, expect to go another half day. However in just a few minutes we entered his village just south of Lira, Uganda. After a few turns we made it down a small path to his grandmothers house. "We are here my friend, we are at my home."

Home was a small house made of mud, with an awning under which were couple of ancient chairs, that may have never seen any better days. Just then Grandmother appeared in the doorway. She seemed ancient for Ugandan standards since life expectancy was only about 40 years. We jumped out of the truck and were welcomed with the typical greeting "you are most welcome." I smiled at this old woman who had seen much in her life, who had experienced pain, life, love, wars and death and yet she seemed to have an inner determination to live in spite of the odds.

Even though it was early in the morning, as was customary I was expected to buy beer and soda for all, and the number had increased because there was this white man who had come to visit.

I took out my laptop computer and played some multimedia stuff for the kids who had gathered and they were simply amazed at this box with moving pictures on it.

Grandma had gone back inside and soon appeared again with a cup which she handed to me. Take this Muzungu and drink it. It is Lira Lira. Lira Lira I had heard about and especially tales about its strength. I took a swallow and my throat strangely burned. A burn that lasted for some time. I looked up at her and we both smiled and she said, "You like Lira Lira." Yes, I do like it. She then smiled at me in a knowing manner, laughingly asking. "Too strong for you, white man?" She could tell by my facial expression that this was certainly something out of the normal for me. What was to follow was even more so.

The drinks arrived, food came out and we just started talking and laughing in the

African fashion of family. Where every person feels welcomed, where you can rest and stay, enjoying the shared life.

Sitting there I noticed some headstones in the garden area and I walked over and began to read the inscriptions on them. Grandma came over, stood beside me and began to tell as to who was buried where.

She pointed to the largest marker and said "that is my son, and he has gone home." "You are going home too." I told her that I was leaving tomorrow and she smiled and said, "I know, you will your way home." There was long silence between us as I pondered the words of this woman who seemed to know so much.

She turned to me and looked into my eyes saying "open your hand, what is there?" I slowly opened my hands and said "nothing." After another long pause she said "all things have been given to you, all things have been prepared for you to go home. Everything that you need is in your hand." Then she walked away leaving me with all kinds of thoughts of things that I knew in part and I wanted it so much in its fullness.

I walked away from the house, the garden and sat under a large tree. It was then that it hit me. She had not been referring to anything physical. She was addressing the issues of my heart. The gifts that I had been given and had shelved. She was talking about the presence of God in life and that there was nothing that could prevent me from arriving home, to be at peace with myself, to look within and find the treasures that had been deposited within me.

On the plane I realized that home was not a place, a space, but that home was within me. Home was the process of putting to use all that been given to me.

Home did not turn out like I thought. It has been better and I find that home is getting closer.

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Last updated: 13 February 2008

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