Eulogy: Requiesce in peace, loving sister Dr. Joy Kyeyune Kyazike

Summary: Dr. Joy K. Kyeyune who until her untimely death was living and working in the UK, died of stroke aged 52 on September 24.

Jinja | A gentle and noble soul that never rests until everyone else is happy has rested! What we are, you were, and what you are, we shall all be. During this hour of darkness at noon, a shining star has faded and with it the illumination of our lives and hearts.

Great people come once in a thousand years, sometimes never. We are grateful to God that she came at all. A true servant leader of her generation, a trailblazer of many ideas that uplifted those in need, and a paragon of compassion who has signed out too soon.

The delectable Joy had sublime qualities and an unsurpassable inner beauty: the beauty of the heart, that she freely, willingly and generously shared with people from around the world for the common good of all. The news of the passing of this mystical sweet soul was so devastating to me. It was a shock that found me in the middle of an academic assignment which consequently got fatally affected too.

In moments when I would experience these types of pain and hopelessness, I would call on Joy and all would be fine. She is no longer there! Her departure leaves a gap. Joy was that quintessential doctor of the human body and soul. She enriched others with her presence both physically and emotionally. She always endeavoured to address inequalities and social injustices gently without stepping on people’s toes.

I first met Joy in 1991 when we joined Makerere University Medical School as undergraduates. With only one or two medical schools in the country at the time, this was the era when joining a medical school depended largely on the contents of one’s brain and not dictated by the largeness of one’s political brawn or how deep their wallet is.

Joy was one of the brightest stars in Uganda sallied seamlessly through the vicissitudes of the medical school at a time when training for human medicine was such a nightmare.

Joy had a magnetic personality. She was gentle, disciplined, full of respect yet loving with very high moral values. All our classmates will agree that she had an angelic aura. Her halo effect hypnotised classmates with a sense of affection and aesthetic beauty. She had that unpretentious mile-wide smile that brought peace where there was none and was capable of even melting the icebergs of the South Pole.

I am grateful to God for having been part of that illustrious class of 1991 to which Joy belonged. This class has produced for Makerere University two Guild Presidents and went on to churn out formidable players in medical specialities that are now restoring hope to those that have lost it across the world. They are in America, Europe, South Africa, Australia and everywhere.

Joy radiated warmth and an unadulterated charm from the bottom of her heart. And one would wish a conversation with Joy goes on and on forever. She had an ear to listen to problems, a mind to understand them and a resolve to help people sort out issues.

Let me also tell the world why this departed angel has been key in the second edition of my life and what her untimely demise spells for me: As the Guild President of Makerere University in 1996, and towards the tail end of my medical studies, while remaining with a few weeks to wind up my undergraduate programs, the slumbering giants of the injustice of our country illegally chased me from the University.

This singular event drew a dark curtain on my otherwise promising medical career in the prime of my life. In an unprecedented travesty of justice, my attempts to later join the University of Nairobi to complete my degree were frustrated by the same system effectively bringing to close my aspirations to practise medicine for my people.

In the pell-mell of that mad confusion, I retreated to Eastern Uganda, my home region where my aspirations got covered in layers upon layers of villages and I lived in untold squalor. I participated in the life of our country by teaching in private schools where I taught thousands upon thousands of students.

Also read: Remembering Dr Joy Kyeyune – a gem whose generous heart goes silent

Joy was foremost among the people who made efforts to excavate me from that ill-gotten hopeless situation. Going forward, it is an inconceivable life without the presence of this extraordinary friend.

In late 2020, the iconic Ivory Tower of Makerere University went up in flames and its magnificent splendour was destroyed. The burning of the Ivory Tower was symbolic of other ugly events that had been occurring at the Hill over the years. This particular one was likened to the demise of my career 25 years earlier.

A friend in the US, James William Mugeni, recalling those historical landmarks sent out calls looking for me. One of the first people to arrive, found me sequestered in one of those villages behind other villages. It was Dr. Joy!

She told me, “Githo, the mighty Ivory Tower is in ashes. As the world is rallied to rebuild it, you are the SHORT TOWER of Makerere Universitwhichat was also destroyed and sacrificed at the altar of neoliberalism years ago. We too are going to restore you.”

She quickly assembled a group of doctors called “Together We Can Rebuild the SHORT TOWER”. She contributed generously and worked tirelessly for my restoration process that’s still ongoing. In my second edition of life and therefore second liberation, Joy was among the people featuring very prominently.

She was an invaluable member of the Steering Committee which organised people from around the world. They bought me a phone so that I could connect with the fast-moving bold new world, a laptop which now enables me to enrol for online courses, and purchased for me a piece of land. Other efforts were still underway.

Also read: Only 35 per cent of the government land in Lango is registered

Having lost my only biological sister years ago, Joy had stepped in to play the role of Auntie to my daughters. And they were enjoying every minute of fraternising with their new amazing Aunt who surrounded them with love and tenderness. Joy indeed mentored one of them during the last years of her course in medical school.

This young doctor-daughter was looking up to Joy for all the inspiration and guidance on earth.

Joy encouraged me that life begins at 50, and I was beginning to pick up the pieces and move on once more. I enrolled for an online degree and she was going to be the main pillar for the mobilisation of tuition. The news about her demise got me in the middle of an academic assignment whose deadline was that very day.

As you might guess, the outcome was awful and hence the small world that I had started to rebuild inspired by Joy, is beginning to crumble and is tumbling down once more.

I don’t have enough words with which to mourn my sister Joy. In her, I have lost a friend, a loving sister and a comrade whose love transcends borders and tribes. She was a true nationalist, a patriot and a leader we shall forever miss.

After crying enough during those many painful lost years, I had convinced myself I had no more tears left to be shed. Her demise reminded me that I still have plenty of tears to shed for my country. As the grim reality becomes apparent, it gets more difficult to accept that all we had hoped to achieve in this world, can still be achieved without her.

Joy, the shining star to many, touched many lives least amongst them my mother Regina for whom she sent a Christmas gift.

Being the humanitarian that she was, Dr. Joy had joined the drive to save Dr. Anthony Buhangamaiso who needs a Kidney transplant and for whom a fundraiser is ongoing.

When the guiding star fades, the sailors tend to get lost at sea. In the middle of this grief, we are in the deep blue high seas of life and lost a trusted ally. It couldn’t be Joy going at this hour. The rest of the journey is not going to be easy but we shall remain firm in the hope as believers that we shall regroup with her in glory when our time comes.

My sister Joy now belongs to the ages. We shall always cherish her sweet memories and carry her in our hearts for as long as life endures. Departed to glory, she is no longer bound by time, she is timeless. The silent phenomenon that will always whisper in our hearts, those high moral values.

We shall remain eternally grateful for the life she generously shared with us while it lasted. I grieve together with the family and friends of Joy who will dearly miss her. Our son Moses, sister Anita, brother Jimmy and other close family relatives, let’s take heart with well-placed hopes that Dr. Joy was a staunch Catholic who believed in life after the resurrection.

We can’t be comforted enough at this hour of grief. John 11:26 says, “And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die”. It’s a great consolation to us that our Sister, Mother, Friend, and all though not with us, is in a better place with the Angels and with God.”

For Joy so loved the people of God that she dedicated herself to the service and love of others. She lived a Godly life which has gone back to the author of everything.

Romans 14:8 affirms, “If we live, it is for the Lord that we live, and if we die, it is for the Lord that we die. So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.”

For Joy who loved the Lord so much, there could be no better place to be than back in glory to God the Almighty, author of life.

Ruth 1:16-17 assures us Joy is with the Lord. “For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge.” Joy has gone to be with the Lord.

While we suffer all sorts of fear, pain and anguish, we should mind about the Epicurean thought about death that makes a pertinent observation. “Death is nothing to us. When we exist, death is not; and when death exists, we are not.”