Goin’ Back to ‘Ganda

Today, at long last, I was inducted into “good enough.”  No candles on my favorite cake, no balloons congratulating me, not even a whisper of congratulations.  Just some Dutch lady in a KLM uniform grudgingly acknowledging that I was now good enough to enter the VIP lounge at the Amsterdam Schipol Airport.

“I have been inside before, you know.  I know what where the soft drink machine is.  I know where you keep the extra crackers when the bowl on the counter is empty.  I also know what the inside of the ladies room looks like.” I almost said all of this to the lady behind the counter in response to her rather dismissive look.  Or was that just a Dutch look?

I really had been in there before.  But I had spent a whole lot more time sitting outside looking in at the people who were good enough.  On my first trip to Uganda in January of 2010, I accompanied Jay Milbrandt . . . and he was good enough.  He had a card that said so.  They let him right in and he got to bring me along because good enough people get to bring in friends.  This VIP lounge had it all.  It had all the alcohol I could drink.  For free.  I drink precisely as much as Romney, but I could have gotten real sloppy if I wanted to.  Instead, I taxed my bladder like it was a One Percenter in a second Obama term by drinking four times more Diet Coke than is currently legal in New York City.

When my own version of April 15^th arrived a few minutes later, I was so sleepy from the trip and so distracted by the excess caffeine about to mount a jailbreak, I little-boy stepped into the little boys’ room.  No urinals?  Those Dutch . . .  Hmm, are those high heels under the stall I see tapping in front of me?  Those Dutch . . . or is that an Idaho Senator?  Is that a couch I see in the corner?  That’s weird.  Oh wait.  Am I . . .?

I retraced my little-steps and confirmed that I am a buffoon.  For the record, there are seven urinals and zero couches in the boys’ room in the KLM VIP lounge.  The lounge also has WiFi, and they proudly display the Security key at the front desk.  On each of my six subsequent flights to Uganda, I have been Jay-less.  So each visit to the VIP lounge has generated the same derisive laughter from the lounge’s bouncer. “But I have flown on KLM twice, thrice, frice . . .,” I pleaded on consecutive trips.  “I have been anointed “Silver Elite” by your partner airline.  Am I good enough yet?”  Once, I even approached the counter like I was in a soup line on a Seinfeld episode.  Maybe I wasn’t following the approach rules, I wondered.  “No soup for you,” Helga barked.  Apparently Seinfeld is syndicated in Amsterdam now.

I always had the last laugh, though, because while I was getting humiliated at the counter, I memorized the WiFi code, then camped out the like the proverbial leper outside the temple gates and caught up on e-mail.  Today was finally different.

“Yes, you are good enough.  Please come in and make yourself comfortable.”  Apparently, having a “Gold Elite” card does the trick.  And apparently flying back and forth to Uganda seven times gets you a Gold Elite card.  So here I sit at the weigh station between Los Angeles and Entebbe, Uganda.

I had not intended to return to Uganda so quickly, having lived in the capital city of Kampala with my family from January through July of this year.  I returned to teaching full time this past fall, having completed a seven-year administrative stint at the law school, which culminated in the Ugandan sabbatical.  The Ugandan judiciary could not have been more gracious and receptive during our stay – you don’t need a Gold Elite card to be considered good enough by the beautiful and kind people of the Pearl of Africa.  With the cooperation of a couple-a-three dozen dedicated civil servants in the judiciary, Ministry of Gender, and in the prisons, we were able to propose and pilot a new framework for moving juvenile criminal cases from arrest to trial that drastically shortens that time frame.  Also critical to the success of this J-FASTER program was the financial and logistical support of Sixty Feet (sixtyfeet.org), a Christian organization based in Atlanta who is pouring itself into imprisoned children in Uganda.

From the beginning, we understood that the hard part of implementing this program was not going to be the initial pilot session, or even the follow-on session we did as I was leaving.  The challenge is, and will be, sustainability and self-sufficiency.  This trip will focus on advancing those long-term objectives.

Pepperdine funds a law-school alumnus every year to live and work in Kampala embedded within the judiciary.  The Nootbaar Fellows, as they are called, work primarily for the Commercial Court as mediators.  (Incidentally, the Nootbaar Fellows are named for the benefactors of Pepperdine’s Nootbaar Institute for Law, Religion, and Ethics – Herb and Elinor Nootbaar).  Herb turns 104 next week, and I scheduled this trip to Uganda to ensure that I was back in time to attend his birthday party a week from Saturday).

The 2011-12 Nootbaar Fellow, Shane Michael, also branched out and provided valuable assistance and vision for the J-FASTER program in the Criminal Division, as will the new Nootbaar Fellow, David Nary.  David arrived in Uganda for his year-long fellowship earlier this month, and one of the goals for my week-long trip is to connect him with all of the wonderful people with whom I was blessed to work early this year.

Also on the agenda is to check on the implementation of the database project we initiated for the largest Remand Home in Uganda.  Remand Homes are prisons where arrested juveniles are held until their trials, which can take up to two years.  Kampala is home to the largest such Remand Home in Uganda, where 150 or so children are kept.  Since we have been coming to Uganda, the Naguru Remand Home has kept a massive, table-sized book where periodic hand-written notes are scribbled about each child.  The credit for bringing this project from an idea I had a couple years ago, to a functional system goes to Sixty Feet, who designed and oversaw the implementation. The Naguru Remand Home now has a computerized tracking system that, if properly maintained, will provide all material information about every child in the Remand Home, including court dates, medical records, disciplinary records, etc.  The official launch of this project came after I left and I am eager to check in to see how it is going.

The part of the trip I am most excited about, however, is hanging out with Bob Goff for a couple days just before I return home next week.  Bob is completely nuts and has a potentially fatal allergy to anything ordinary.  We are going to have a dinner with a bunch of our judge friends next Tuesday night, then we hope to create quite a stir at a place where lots of locals hang out for long periods of time.  I have no idea how it will go, but I have no doubt that it will be memorable.

I covet your prayers for this trip and for the kids in the Ugandan prisons who are “good enough” to warrant the time and attention we hope to provide them as they seek to gain access to justice.  I am grateful to Dean Tacha for continuing to support the vision of her predecessors of living out the mission of Pepperdine Law School by seeking to serve the forgotten and voiceless at home and around the globe.