When an Elephant Cries

About the Book

I had been looked after by a witch doctor, endured the shame of being named Odur for rubbish pit, following the incident of my umbilical cord and placenta, when the government official turns up and gives me another name, “Munu,” which in Acholi is for white man. In my moment of anguish, his simple gesture helps free my mind trapped in shame to wonder, and I begin to imagine the possibility out there for me as Munu.

About the Author

I had been working for the Technology Company, in England, for twenty years, starting as accounts clerk, and despite family commitment, hard work, perseverance, rigorous self-study, I had become a finalist of the enviable qualification of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) and, as a result, got promoted to a position of trust fund analyst within finance department. It was while in this role that I realised, in order for professional members of the institution to increase their contributions to the fund, it was essential that I explained to them, in writing, what trust fund really was all about, and so I wrote my first article on trust fund in Members’ Magazine. I was surprised by the response. One member, after reading the article, rang me up and astounded me by offering to donate between one hundred to two hundred thousand pounds to the fund. Encouraged by it, I later went on to write more articles, and as I did, I enjoyed every moment of it. The complements from readers were not only wonderful, they gave me immense pleasure and satisfaction, and in the end, I found the whole experience the best ever in my twenty-year working life with the institution. I later got a job as a finance manager in London, becoming a top accountant in a building society, and I was thrilled that the hard work had finally paid off, but as fate would have it, I lost the job within just only four months. Since it was my first time to ever lose a job in my working life, I was devastated and terrified, rightly so, as I found myself exposed to all sorts of dangers, not least for the fact that I was now in a foreign land, thousands of miles from home and without any source of income. The following Monday, having no job to go to, I started putting my thoughts and despair in writing. Not only did it feel good, it read well too, and I was not only emboldened but also happy in the realisation that the loss of my job might have opened me a new door. When an Elephant Cries was originally intended to capture the entire story of my life, cataloguing every main event from when I was born to the moment of reflection, but in the end, it became clear that I could not capture all the essence of my life in one book without making it too big. Besides, I recognised, being my first book, I was yet an unknown author, and so I decided that the book would have to be split into two parts. This first book traces my life from birth in Uganda to when I landed at Heathrow in England. The second book, in the elephant series, will take on the story of my life in England. Hopefully, a third book will follow. It was the bizarre behaviour of my parents, not believing I would make it to five, given the high infant mortality rate in my family, which made them do the unthinkable by dumping my umbilical cord, including placenta, into the rubbish pit. In a world where traditionally the after birth remains were buried in a glorious ceremony of music and dance, their outrageous action could only be sorted by the involvement of a witch doctor to ward off the evil spirits. It was therefore no wonder that, soon afterwards, they were summoned by Angura the witch doctor. My mother, Kabaka Laberlok, was then tasked with subjecting me to the daily and monthly rituals. My personal memory of the haircut, foul smell of herbs, as well as goat dung smeared on me is captured in the book. At the age of five, my father decided to migrate from Pawel, my cradle land, to Amuru, some thirty-five miles away. The bicycle ride with my father to a new home in a complete uninhabited wilderness west of Gulu town is described in detail in the book, but it was a chance meeting with the first ever government official, during a crisis of my own making, that would have an enduring legacy in my life.