I grew up in a family of four children, three boys (Ken, Innocent, and me, Xhavia) and a girl, Caro, who was the last-born. We lived with our mother as a single parent. Ken was a very quiet and peaceful boy. He didn’t like aggression or mischievous behaviour so much. Innocent, or Inno, was an aggressive type who might not start a fight, but was always ready participate in one. In our neighbourhood there were many families with children, ranging from age eight to fifteen.
We would play football and other exciting games together and this really created a strong bond among us. We became brothers and sisters who would defend one another whenever one of us ran into trouble with children from more distant places.
We walked to school together, went to church together, played games together, visited one another’s houses to watch movies at night, in turns. If one week we watched TV at one family’s house, we would shift to another the next week. Our parents were all okay with our connections and bonding, and would welcome any child within our clique. We called ourselves “The Unbwogable,” a word of Luo origin, meaning unshakeable, unbeatable, or indomitable. It is formed from the Luo word “bwogo” (to scare or shake) with the English prefix “un.” We felt we could not be shaken or intimidated by any of the other mischievous cliques of children we came across.
As children, we would always disagree on a few things. This would occasionally result in fights and quarrels, despite the closeness we enjoyed. But fighting with children from other communities or distant neighbourhoods was always the order of the day. Our group would move into other neighbouring communities to fight with the children over baseless things, like toy cars that we made out of sorghum stalks and woven wires. The confrontations were always orchestrated by a boy named Gogo, the oldest in our clique. He was very argumentative, liked to fight, and on top of that a master planner of mischief. The aim was to destroy the neighbouring kids’ cars, or take them by force for ourselves. We would wrestle or punch, and sometimes we’d throw stones at each other, which was quite dangerous. Our parents never knew about the fights because they happened under the pretext of “playing with our toy cars,” or when we were fetching water from the borehole, which was far away from our homes.
We’d also carry on our fights and confrontations near the church, when we went there for prayers on Sundays. We would stubbornly attack neighbour children who were moving in groups and starting fights.
On one Sunday after we’d gone for prayers our fate came when Gogo gathered us outside the church and said, “Hey guys, who would love to see an aeroplane landing and taking off?” Okello and a few older boys, including Okwong, Franko, Adison and Anyakun, seconded the idea immediately. Franko said, “Maybe we’ll find a new clique of children to pick quarrels with!” My elder brother, Ken, didn’t like the idea, and he tried to stop me from being part of the journey. But I was interested. Ken then had to follow us because he did not want to go back home alone, where he’d have to avoid answering questions. He didn’t want to be punished for leaving me. Perhaps he also wanted to protect me.
Ken and Felix had always been the most humble kids in our clique. They tried stopping us from going to the airfield by explaining what would happen if things didn’t go well. Among these were: we could be arrested and taken straight to police cells, and later to prison, young as we were; or the security operatives might be directed to shoot and kill anyone who shows up in that manner, so we could lose our lives. Their doubts played on our fears, which were heightened by the rebel insurgency that terrorised our region then, which kept everyone on a very high alert. Felix suggested our parents would be very mad at us if they learned of our behaviour. Nevertheless, the rest of us stood firm with our already burning desire to go, and indeed we all left.
The airfield was about two kilometres from Arua City centre, near the roadside. It wasn’t fenced so anyone could just climb the cliff-like shoulder of the road and walk straight to the runway. Nobody in their right senses would do that because it’s out of bounds and was always under guard by soldiers.
We reached that place on the road safely and, without wasting time, climbed the roadside cliff and headed straight to the runway. By that time the soldiers who guarded the premises were relaxing somewhere invisible to us. They were nowhere to be seen.
We foolish boys majestically approached the runway. But before we could put one foot on it shouts and screams came from all corners of the airfield, in a frenzy, as if armed robbers or rebels had stormed the place, causing a state of confusion. We saw soldiers running towards us while others corked their guns and took cover. The ones running toward us shouted in Swahili, telling us to stop and put our hands up.
The truth is that during this period there was a rebel insurgency in our region, affecting almost the whole northern and eastern districts of the country, so everyone was always on alert. To be exact, these soldiers thought we were rebels or their allies sent to plant land mines on the runway of the airfield. It was true that rebels abducted and trained young children to carry out their atrocities. We were very young, between the ages of eight to fifteen. The soldiers surrounded and captured us. Upon seeing how scared and terrified we were, and how ignorant we were of whatever was going on, they calmed down and handled us lightly. They asked us a thousand questions in Swahili. Thank God that I and about three other children could understand a few words. We were so terrified, trembling and crying, all that could come out of our mouths was, “Saidiya sisi,” which in a very local Ugandan Swahili means, “Please help and forgive us,” with our hands raised to plead with them.
Amused by our frightened crying, the soldiers decided to amplify our fear by threatening to take us to our parents. That was the worst threat of all. We begged them to cane our buttocks with sticks instead of taking us to our parents or the police. After an hour’s pleading and begging and crying, having sensed that we weren’t bad children, only stubborn ones, the soldiers forgave us and warned us strongly. They actually became kind and showed us the right path to take to reach a viewing place if we wanted to see the airplanes.
There was already an airplane coming to land, just a few minutes before we were bundled up, and we calmly walked to the viewing point to witness two airplanes landing and one taking off. Four others were parked in the airfield. We spent about two hours at the airfield, then finally walked back home. We walked hurriedly, as if we were being pursued by the soldiers and angry community members that gathered to see us.
One week after the incident we decided to tell my older brother, Inno, who was living with our aunt in a different district and hadn’t been part of the group that day. He threatened to report us to our mother whenever we did anything bad to him. But he feared the possibility of our getting grounded (after being thoroughly flogged) and that our mother would decide to always send us to the village during holidays, and thus deny Inno the enjoyment of holiday relaxation together. He had just returned home to continue living with us. So Inno never told.
Our sister regarded our mischievous behaviour as something to keep secret, because it would cause rifts among our parents and they would start blaming and pointing fingers at each other, accusing each other of bad influence. As a result of it, we would get separated and would no longer be able to continue with our clique. Indeed, if the community had learned of our escapade, most youthful community members would scream and shout that we should be arrested and beaten thoroughly, while the elderly ones, mostly the mothers, would sympathize with us and say that we should be handed back to our parents after receiving some floggings. Thank goodness that never happened.
