Kin Gang

I knew three days before I left last year that I was coming back. I knew it was the people pulling me in and I wasn't finished yet. But what exactly it was, i just couldn't put my finger on it. Returning has been a great experience but so different. In a way, I picked up right where I left off--although at a new school, I had already began building my relationship with Sam Baker (the school not the man who freed the slaves in East Africa). So what is it that makes me feel Acholi when I'm here? One word. Kin gang. Okay, one word in English. Community.
What's different about community here than my community at home? It's definitely the collectivist culture. At home, I have my communities that are a part of me but rarely do they mix--my family, my Crawford friends that have become my best friends, my AWCPA friends...but that's the trick, I know everyone in my community. Here, it's different. I'm immediately a part of the broader Acholi community. Walking around town, everyone greets each other and smiles. But it's much more than this. It's walking by myself and greeting an Acholi woman in Acholi in unison as she greets me, then her hugging me to show her excitement. It's David telling a random mother not to cane her daughter and her apologizing. It's being followed by a street kid and asking some people in the market to ask him to leave us alone. It's my boda driver calling to make sure that I'm okay when I stay late at school. It's people like Miriam who I have no idea where I met her or how I know her but she knows my name and greets me in the market. It's shopping for vegetables in the market and feeling more comfortable than shopping at Safeway. It's falling up the stairs at Uchumi and everyone rushing to help me up yelling "Sorry, sorry!" It's knowing that wherever I am, I am always welcome. It's carrying on full conversations in Acholi until I run out of things to say with complete strangers. It's introducing myself as Atim and knowing that people are actually starting to believe I am really Acholi and not a mzungu. And it's so much more that I can't even put into words.
So what does this all mean? It means that I've accomplished what I came for. Although I'm not finished, I think I will feel some sort of closure and be ready to leave when the time comes. However, this will not be my last time in Acholi Land because it has definitely become a part of me. I also know that as I begin to seriously think about moving abroad, I think I would be just fine living in a collectivist culture where I am a part of something bigger than myself.