On the ground: America crammed into two weeks

Papito, one of our student advocates from last tour, leads a workshop during Face to Face Tour training in our Gulu office

“What items should go here?” I asked, pointing to a column on the whiteboard titled Things to Bring.  “What things are most important, things you’ll definitely need during your time in the US?”  We had already covered topics like American food, sexuality, government, and tipping; our workshop on packing was one of the last in our two-week training session.  I faced a forest of raised arms and hands.  “Yes?”

“Salt?” one student suggested straight-faced, uncertainty lightening up his voice.  The group burst into laughter.  I couldn’t help but smile.

“Good suggestion, but actually you won’t need to bring salt with you to the US.  I know some of you complained that food from last tour wasn’t salty enough, but you can buy salt in the US if you want to.  We have lots of it.”

Questions and answers, questions and answers.  For two weeks, Invisible Children Uganda’s staff worked to prepare 22 Ugandans for the rollercoaster of life that is the IC roadie experience.  This fall, Ugandans will travel around the US for months, teaching Americans about the LRA and the work Invisible Children does.  Some questions they asked during training were easy for us to answer—Should I bring salt?—but others were more difficult—Why do so many Americans get divorced? and Why do Americans give their clothes away to thrift shops if the clothes are still in good condition?

From nine to five each day, we met in ICU’s Gulu office to dig through mountains of information.  We watched IC media and praticed FAQs from stage; we worked through writing exercises and piles of statistics; we acted out scenes from restaurants and airplanes.  I know we couldn’t cover every aspect of life in the US, but we tried.

Sending a group of first-time travelers abroad isn’t something IC takes lightly.  Outside of the weeks of training that IC facilitates for our Ugandan advocates—two weeks in Uganda and two in the US—we’ve put in countless hours establishing a support network stateside to ensure our tours run smoothly.  Nothing is left to chance.  Ugandans who traveled to the US in January and others who toured in the spring taught us a few things we needed to do to make this upcoming tour problem-free:

More team heart-to-hearts.

Less bottling up emotions.

More blankets and long underwear.

Less high heels.

More horse rides, more movies, more long conversations on even longer drives, and more pizza.

Less five-hour-naps-in-San-Diego-that-prolong-jetlag.

More honesty—with themselves, with IC staff, and with fellow teammates.

Less assumptions, less fear of trying new things.

More soup.

Less salad.

More salt.

–Andrew