{"id":293,"date":"2023-01-08T00:53:24","date_gmt":"2023-01-08T06:53:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/box5458.temp.domains\/~ivingse5\/?p=293"},"modified":"2023-01-08T00:53:24","modified_gmt":"2023-01-08T06:53:24","slug":"julius-and-franca-interview-june-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/?p=293","title":{"rendered":"Julius and Franca interview June 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

A story unfolds;<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Julius, a tall lanky man from the Ateso tribe of NE Uganda, arrived in 2017 to attend the Sustainable Ag School along with his best friend Enoch.\u00a0 The two of them were very shy and rarely spoke up in the classroom, but it soon became obvious as they cared from their individual gardens that Julius was a natural farmer.\u00a0 He talked about the struggles in his mind with the differences in the new methods of farming and the traditional methods of his family and tribe, but he was open to learn and try.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He returned to his family farm after the school and began to quietly implement the new ideas.\u00a0 His family was indifferent to his farming attempts and\u00a0 his father was insisting that Julius join the army to get a paycheck so he could marry and start a different life.\u00a0 Julius said, NO, he had a job, he was a farmer and would continue farming.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

During the 2017 school, he met Franca who was in a discipleship class on the YWAM base.\u00a0 They became friends and after their courses continued their friendship long distance.\u00a0 Franca\u00a0 returned to her home in Kitgum where she decided to farm to make some extra money.\u00a0 She had watched the SAS during her time in Arua, but when she farmed, she used the traditional ways, burning the land and plowing to plant her crop.\u00a0 She farmed one acre of maize and got only 8 sacks of maize and from the 15 kg of beans planted only harvested 3 basins of beans – of which she had to share with her partner in the farming venture.\u00a0 The return was barely enough to pay for the costs.\u00a0 She began pondering on the different farming she had observed the SAS practicing, where she had witnessed much more productive yields and healthier crops.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After a three year long distance relationship, Julius and Franca married and she moved to his family compound in the Katkwe district.\u00a0 The first season after they married, they farmed together, using completely new methods to her.\u00a0 They didn\u2019t burn and they didn\u2019t plow, in fact they gathered the very material which was traditionally burned and used that to put back on the fields as mulch!\u00a0 With a hoe and a measuring rope, they planted 1 cup of maize seeds and got an entire sack from the one cup planted.\u00a0 She was amazed.\u00a0 They planted other crops and the results astounded her.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t understand the details of why it was more successful but it was no longer just a theory.\u00a0 When the opportunity was presented for Julius to return to staff the 2022 school, inviting Franca to join as a student, she was excited.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When this invitation came, Franca was pregnant with their first child, due in early December.\u00a0 The baby would be 2 months old by the start of the school, so they continued to make plans to attend.\u00a0 After laboring for several days, the doctors concluded that the baby would need to come through a cesarian section. Joshua was delivered safely, but now they faced a very costly hospital bill of 800,000 Uganda schillings.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The good news is that prior to the time of their son\u2019s birth, Julius had planted 105 sukumuwiki (a type of kale) plants that were thriving.\u00a0 He took these greens to the local market, their size and quality catching the eyes of the shoppers. He explained to people how his crop was entirely organic and safe to feed to their children.\u00a0 After only two visits to the market, he never needed to return.\u00a0 Phone calls came, the word spread and people began to pay in advance for orders of the succulent sukumuwiki.\u00a0 They even traveled directly to the farm to pick up the orders!\u00a0 His face beamed as he told the story of how the the sale of these greens enabled him to completely pay the hospital and doctor bills where normally this would have put them in extreme debt and burden.\u00a0 Now they were free to continue with their plans to come to Arua for the SAS.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Franca enthusiastically participated in the class and now says she understands all the science and \u201cwhy\u201d behind the farming that the SAS teaches.\u00a0 She beams as she shares her vision and dedication help others to learn.\u00a0 She discovered she really enjoys teaching, volunteering often to teach many of the subjects in the partner community that her SAS team works with.\u00a0 Their son Joshua\u00a0 has been a delight in the class and everyone adores him.\u00a0 Truly a SAS village raised baby!<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now we go back in time to Julius\u2019 story.\u00a0 Still single, he contacted us in 2018 with an interest in helping staff the 2019 school. \u00a0 He wanted to solidify his knowledge base with goals to make his family and extended family totally food secure and to develop confidence to teach and lead in his community.\u00a0 He wanted no more seasons of hunger for his family and if he could succeed in that, he could start to influence his community to do the same.\u00a0 Of course we said yes! And welcomed him to the team. \u00a0 As expected Julius served well, reliable to do any task, led by example, worked as hard or harder than the students, and absorbed all he could to become more effective as a trainer and a farmer.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He returned home after the 2019 school and expanded his work to more acreage on the family\u00a0 land.\u00a0 His extended family struggled with alcohol dependency and the farm suffered from neglect. \u00a0 Julius challenged them with their choices and lifestyle but it took tragedy for them to finally change.\u00a0 After a night of drinking, an aunt died. \u00a0 Other family members blamed Julius\u2019 parents, accusing them of poisoning the aunt and stormed their compound, burning their house and all their possessions.\u00a0 Franca and Julius\u00a0 had only been married one week.\u00a0 The angry mob did their best to run Franca off, taunting her that she had no future there.\u00a0 Later it was found, the aunt was HIV positive and the drinking coupled with the drugs she was taking for the HIV as well as the damage from the disease was what had caused her death, but the destruction was done.\u00a0 Julius said \u201c I knew how much God had changed me in that time because before SAS I would have taken a panga (machete) and cut those people.\u201d\u00a0 Instead, he\u00a0 focused on healing his family through the painful events.\u00a0 In time, through love and perseverance, Julius and Franca were able to lead his family in a process of fully giving up alcohol and start to build a healthy God centered lifestyle.\u00a0 Through that same love, forgiveness and perseverance, the broken relationships in the community are healing as well.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The family began listening to Julius, started following his practices and asking questions as to why he was doing such strange things as mulching, making compost, not burning and not plowing.\u00a0 Julius says it has been step by step, slowly slowly.\u00a0 His mother now goes out to cut and carry mulch to the gardens every chance she can after seeing the difference it can make in the crops coupled with the unpredictable rains of the region.\u00a0 Julius says he has attained the goal now of their family and extended family being food secure.\u00a0 Beaming, eyes dancing, he exclaimed \u201cNo more hunger seasons, our family is now food sustainable.\u201d They now know how to grow food throughout any season of the year and feed their family and others.\u00a0 [For those of you reading this, this may not seem such a big thing – but for the former village peasant farmer, who has faced true hunger, this is a very significant thing.]<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

From the shy young man who his father thought had no future in farming, Julius is now a farmer in demand.\u00a0 Other farmers in the area are watching him and seeing his astounding successes.\u00a0 Laughing, he says he cannot take a nap in the hammock under the mango tree, because the neighbors see him and disturb him to ask questions and get advice. One day as he was resting,\u00a0 a neighbor came and said you are being called to a meeting.\u00a0 A farmer association in the area under the NGO – Partners for Children Worldwide, who\u2019s mission is empowering families to affect poverty and hunger,\u00a0 were seeking a leader.\u00a0 The community suggested Julius, thus his being called. The NGO forms farmer groups which meet every Tuesday for teachings and sharing information\u00a0 as well as develop a savings program where micro loans can be made to the member farmers. \u00a0 They also have a seed program to sell seeds based on the farmers ability to contribute.\u00a0 To date, there are 9 groups formed with 24 families in each group.\u00a0 Julius leads one group and has become in demand as a trainer and speaker for these farmer groups, walking or taking his bicycle long distances to spend time speaking, consulting and encouraging.\u00a0 Now, he really wants to take Franca with him to teach.\u00a0 He brags on her teaching ability and says they will make a great team with her teaching gift and him one on one with the men and Franca with the women.\u00a0 She is passionate about teaching nutrition to mothers to give the children a better life as well as training the women to make kitchen gardens to increase the availability and diversity of vegetables for their families. Kitchen gardens will be another completely new idea to the area, but one that will make a huge impact on families.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Their vision to reach people with a message of hope, physically, socially and spiritually, coupled with tender hearts that know the plight of their neighbors and the potential for transformation with real and tangible solutions, will continue to become reality. \u00a0 We see it in their faces as they share with us,\u00a0 we experience it with them as we spend time together and we know it because we know them.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Extra trivia:<\/span><\/p>\n

Interesting tribal history from Julius.\u00a0 Many years ago when his tribe migrated from the north of Uganda, they reached the far northern tip of Uganda and the chief hurt his foot.\u00a0 He stopped to let his foot heal and decided to settle there.\u00a0 Part of the tribe wanted to continue south so they split the tribe.\u00a0 The tribe that stayed became the Karamoja tribe which means \u2018too lazy to move on\u201d and the tribe that continued became the Ateso tribe which means \u201cthey will die in the bush\u201d. Both tribes then created their own language so they have distinction between the tribes.\u00a0 The Karamoja tribe are the cattle keepers and consider all cattle to belong to them.\u00a0 If any Ateso or neighboring tribes in other districts obtain cattle, the Karamoja will steal the cattle because \u201call cattle are theirs as THEY are the keepers of the cattle.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It\u2019s fascinating that the splitting of tribes continues to today and when a tribe forms, they create their own language that may or may not contain words similar to the former tribe.\u00a0 Thus the reason Uganda has so many tribal languages, some similar in language and some not though many of the tribes are related.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A story unfolds;   Julius, a tall lanky man from the Ateso tribe of NE Uganda, arrived in 2017 to attend the Sustainable Ag School along with his best friend Enoch.\u00a0 The two of them were very shy and rarely spoke up in the classroom, but it soon became obvious as they cared from their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=293"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":294,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions\/294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingseedsinitiative.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}