LUMO

Visit of Dr Jo Lusi and showing of film LUMO.

7.30 pm on Wednesday 11th March at Ebenezer Baptist Church Columbus Ravine, Scarborough. The Mayor and her Consort have accepted an invitation to attend. 

Dr. Jo Lusi, director of  Doctors on Call for  Service  (DOCS), is a highly  respected Congolese  orthopedic surgeon who,  along with his wife  Lyn, runs the HEAL  Africa  hospital in Goma,  Democratic Republic of the  Congo (DRC).DOCS and  HEAL Africa are charitable  organizations who  work together to bring  physical, social and spiritual  healing to the vulnerable by  rebuilding the health and  medical facilities in the  conflict-ravaged and poverty stricken DRC. Dr. Lusi has lived through  some very difficult  circumstances, including  struggles as a refugee,  the tribally inspired  massacre on  the Rwanda  and Burundi border,  civil war in DRC and the  devastating Mt. Nyiragongo  volcano eruption in January  2002, which destroyed the  HEAL Africa hospital. The hospital has since been  rebuilt, and CFHI’s IMED  program helped to equip  the  new, state-of the-art  operating rooms and wards  by sending two containers  of modern equipment.  One of the main functions of  the hospital is to provide  reconstructive surgery to  women who suffer from  fistulas caused by numerous  brutal rapes during the civil  war. HEAL Africa provides  the medical care these  women need to begin the  process of healing, so  they can focus on a brighter  future for themselves and  their children.  In 2006, IMED sent supplies  to equip five HEAL Africa  out-clinics in rural eastern  DRC.  Dr. Lusi asked for operating  room equipment and  surgical supplies as well as  examination tables,  wheelchairs,crutches, desks,  and other items.  With these supplies Dr.  Lusi and DOCS volunteers  will be able to provide  quality medical care  to communities who have  been seriously affected  by conflict and poverty  and have received no aid. Lumo is a feature-length documentary about a young Congolese woman on an uncertain path to recovery at a unique hospital for rape survivors.

The agonies of war torn Africa are deeply etched in the bodies of women. In eastern Congo, vying militias, armies and bandits use rape as a weapon of terror.

Recently engaged to a young man from her village, 20 year-old Lumo Sinai couldn’t wait to have children and start a family. But when she crossed paths with marauding soldiers who brutally attacked her, she was left with a fistula— a condition that has rendered her incontinent and threatens her ability to give birth in the future. Rejected by her fiancé and cast aside by her family, Lumo found her way to the one place that may save her: a hospital for rape survivors set on the border with Rwanda.

Buoyed by the love of the hospital staff, and a formidable team of wise women known to all as “the Mamas,” Lumo and her friends keep the hope of one day resuming their former lives, thanks to an operation that can restore them fully to health. A feisty young woman with a red comb perpetually jutting from her hair, Lumo faces the challenge of recovery with remarkable courage and sass. As she and her friends recover from surgery, they pass the days by gossiping and sharing their dreams of one day finding love.

But when it looks like her operation may have failed, Lumo’s faith is thrown entirely into question.

On this uncertain road to recovery, Lumo shows that the solidarity of women can bind the most irreparable of wounds.