africa

From the Champlain College Website:

John Bul Dau, recently named one of America's "Most Caring People," will be guest speaker at Champlain College's Martin Luther King Day observance on Monday, Jan. 18,  at 6 p.m. in Argosy Gymnasium in the IDX Student Life Center.

One of the storied "Lost Boys of Sudan," Dau is featured in Christopher Quinn's award-winning documentary, God Grew Tired of Us. Born in war-torn Sudan, Dau is one of 27,000 boys driven from their villages when the northern Arab government attacked the ethnic minority population of Southern Sudan in 1987. For the next five years, Dau led groups of displaced boys across Sudan for hundreds of miles facing starvation, disease, and violence. In 1992, he was placed in the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya where he learned his ABCs and 123's at the age of 17. In 2001, Dau was selected to immigrate to the United States and settled in Syracuse, NY.

Since then, through his John Dau Sudan Foundation, Dau has raised $700,000 and returned to open a clinic in Southern Sudan, which has provided care for more than 25,000 patients, most of whom had never seen a doctor before.

A Night of Music - Honoring African and African Derived Music and Culture

Mohamed Abdi, President of the Somali Bantu Association of Vermont and Abdullahi Hassan, both Burlington School District Liasons for Bi-lingual and Bi cultural Home School, present the Somali Bantu historical and cultural background, their educational and other experiences here in Vermont. A presentation of the Cultural Diversity Series of the Diversity and Equity Office of the Burlington School district and Fletcher Free Library.

The area of Abyei is located in the center of Sudan between the north and south, two regions of Sudan in conflict.  In July of 2009 the Hague Permanent Court of Arbitration ruled on the boundaries of Abyei.  Now the people of Abyei will vote on whether to be part of the autonomous South Sudan government or the Northern government.  This area has a rich and complicated political history as well as oil resources that further complicate the political process.

In October of 2009 Sudanese refugees living in the northeast of the United States gathered in Burlington, VT to celebrate the Hague ruling.  The people gathered represent various ethnic and political groups speaking English, Arabic and Dinka.

for more information: New Sudan Vision, http://www.newsudanvision.org,  The Hague Permanent Court of Arbitration website http://www.pca-cpa.org  and the South Sudan government website  http://www.gossmission.org/goss