Today is a really beautiful day for us, and we hope for everyone in the TVP community. The 24 heifers purchased with proceeds from the project have been delivered up to Kitgum to the Rwot Omiyo Women’s Group along with veterinary drugs and supplies for the group to start their new self-sustaining dairy operation. This group was the first one I ever sat down with, the ones who sang me that first “Dwog Paco” song beaconing the children home.

When Anna Gabriel, Ryan Gall, Ariana Delawari, Hadas and I set out for Kitgum last Fall to find the ladies, we just had a photograph from 2008 of mine to go off of but we tracked them down and it was an amazing homecoming and celebration for us all. And for me in particular, my mother had passed away recently and the memory of “Mama” Elisabeth Ochola who had captured my heart two years before had helped me immeasurably to push through a lot of difficult times, both in all that’s involved in starting a new non-profit and also personally. It was a very emotional moment, and before we left when she heard about my mother she said to me, “I am your mother now,” and lightly bit my pinky – a little tradition of remembrance. Those women have taught me so much, not just about the best that we as humans are capable of in terms of forgiveness, empathy, understanding, and what a real community looks like, but also of just how to live one’s life here on this place we call earth. That’s what we wanted to share with people around the world in starting this project and what we mean when we say that this is no charity.

-Hunter