Heavenly Temple Closeup

I was talking to a friend at work last week. He explained that he was going to take his wife and daughter camping this last weekend. I was confused about his daughter though, because we’re both empty-nesters. He reconfirmed this and said that she was back in town for a little while. She is out of Africa.

His daughter is a Political Science major and had been doing study abroad in Uganda. She had been studying Kony. According to Wiki, Joseph Kony is the head of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a Ugandan guerrilla group. Kony has been accused of ordering the abduction of children to become child-sex slaves and child soldiers. An estimated 66,000 children became soldiers and two million people have been internally displaced. Kony has been indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court in The Hague, but has so far evaded capture. In my estimation, Kony is a very bad man.

I remember him telling me about her plans when she embarked upon her studies. My friend was noticeably uneasy about this proposition. I think that he had every right to be uneasy. On her return, she jokingly gave her dad an Ebola hug. As part of her studies, she interviewed Kony’s relatives. His uncles recounted stories of little Joe to her.

Her travels across central Africa also included Rwanda. She sang karaoke at the infamous Hotel Rwanda. I couldn’t contain myself at this point and had to ask, “Did she slay the audience, or did she die on stage?” Bum-bump-da

I have to admire her courage for embarking upon this adventure. I imagine that my mind like any parent’s mind could quickly wander to a multitude of worst case situations. I pray that this is only idle fretting. This story puts my friend in a new light. I had always judged him as a mild-mannered man. Then he spawns this heroine and has the fortitude to let her dreams come true. Still waters run deep.