In 2023, we had been dating for about nine months before we decided that our first major trip would be to Gulu, Uganda, where Chris had been working with the Center for Peace and Development at the University of Oklahoma.

He has been helping the Annual Women’s Peace Conference of Northern Uganda for several years. The conference sees 100-200 women each year, representing 17 tribes. They network and talk about topics that affect them like marital violence, polygamy, and other such topics. We facilitate and organize the conference as well as teach them the skills to run it for the future so that they may take ownership of it without any Western interreference.

Additionally, Chris lectured students of OU on Gulu’s history with post-colonial society and their relationships with Japan, China, and the United States.

We also worked with the Sisters of the Sacred Heart under Mother Alice and Sister Rosemary Nyrumbe, one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People.

Samina took this time to assist with the conference organization and meet with the teachers of the Sisters’ Compound, which runs a primary school that serves the community and the children of the women’s prison that is operated just across the street. Many times, the women are able to visit their children during the day.

Not known to anyone until we arrived, but the Sisters’ Compound—where we would stay—was a 5-minute walk to the region’s Jamatkhana! We traveled 24 hours to Uganda, with a 6 hour drive to be 5 minutes from Jamatkhana, a sign that we were where we were supposed to be.