CWARM, a broken arm, and Grandpa’s visit

Grandpa and David relaxing by the pool at Club du Lak T. Sunday evening.


As I now have written well over 40 entries into this blog, I have found myself worrying about whether or not these stories can possibly continue to be interesting. Even though we are living in an unusual place, we do have fairly regular routines, and I was worried that this might begin to get a bit tedious to read.

Fortunately, with Oren, there is an assured amount of unpredictability which should keep this blog interesting indefinitely. This week he managed to break his arm. I have jokingly said to others recently that Oren breaking bones was always a matter of ‘when’, not ‘if’ as far as I was concerned, but it was still quite traumatic for me as a parent at the time it happened.

As I wrote last week, we have been in Kigali for MCC regional meetings. The group is called C-Warm (Central and West Africa Regional Meetings). We hosted MCC reps from Chad, Nigeria, Burkina Fasso, and Congo, as well as the area directors currently based in Pennsylvania. We had daily sessions to discuss MCC’s policies and organizational health, as well as challenges we face in our regions. We also had an opportunity to do some field trips in Rwanda to show our visitors around. Kigali and Rwanda in general are really nice places to visit, and the temperature was quite cool (in the 60 at night and 70s by day).

Oren’s accident happened on Tuesday, the second full days of meetings. Fortunately we were doing our conferences in a large upper room in the guest house itself. Oren and some other kids were playing outside in the lawn and driveway, overseen by two young Rwandese child care workers. With Timmy and another young boy there, I knew Oren would be playing rambunctiously, and I was not particularly alarmed to hear him cry out during play, and probably need a bit of attention for a bruise or bump.

The cry came about 4 pm. I decided to go out and get him so the meeting could continue uninterrupted. When I went down, Oren was being brought into the house by the babysitters. He was crying and I took him up in his room to watch a video while we finished the meeting. I asked the babysitters what had happened and they described a game where Oren was running down the hill and crashing into the gate (like a runaway train). He had hit hard and begun to cry. He was in our room for about 10 minutes and I went to check on him. He said, very surprisingly, “Daddy, I’m hurt very bad.” I was going to pick him up, but when I touched his left arm he yelped in pain, and something did not feel right. Oren had a long sleeve shirt on, and I was worried about what I thought I felt when I touched it. I immediately, and gently, removed his shirt to see what I had feared--a marked deformation in his left forearm. The bone was obviously broken (not coming through the skin though.)

I picked him up quickly, ran into the meeting and said to Rebecca that I had to go to the hospital immediately. She stayed with David and Zachee and I went to King Faisal Hospital in Kigali. Cindy the proprietor of the guesthouse, assured us that good health care was available in Kigali.

Zachee drove while I kept Oren awake, fearing he would go into shock. When we got to the ER, it was basically empty, and we got right into a room. The nurse gave Oren a shot of some analgesic that really drugged him, splinted his arm and sent him to X-ray. The X-ray was the only part of the procedure that seemed a bit crude by western standards, but fortunately he only got one.

When we looked at the film, it was obvious the radius was broken. We then had a fairly long wait for an orthopedist, who was not at the hospital, but when he did come, he gave Oren’s arm some gentle traction and put on a plaster cast. (fortunately surgery was not necessary to reset it.) He told me it should heal completely normally, and he could have the cast off in 3 weeks.

The total time in the ER was about 4 hours. We left at 4 and got back around 8. The group had gone to have dinner at a pizza parlor and we all got back to the guesthouse about the same time. Oren was generally very brave through it all. He did cry some, but not very much. He was also very patient in the hospital. It has been interesting watching him get used to having a cast. He seems to like to tell people that he broke his arm too.

Despite the fact that the last 3 trips to Kigali have all involved trips to the doctor for various reasons, I am glad that Oren was not in Bujumbura when it broke, I am not sure how good the facilities are here.

Unfortunately it has been hard to reign him in, and remind him that he cannot jump off ledges, swim, play in the sand, or run around recklessly. He has already fallen down about 4 times despite my attempts to protect him. He is also very disappointed that he cannot hold his paper when he colors and usually asks someone to sit next to him and hold his paper when he works.

The rest of C-Warm went well. One of the highlights was a day when we went up-country to visit one of our partners. Friends Peace House has a Femmes en dialogue group who do some shared income generating activities. These included, cultivating beans, brewing a kind of traditional banana ‘juice’ (beer), raising goats, and Portobello mushroom growing. The unique thing about the group is that it is comprised of women who were survivors of the 1994 genocide, working side by side with women whose husbands are in prison for acts of genocide. The project has been successful in bringing these women together, as well as giving them a means of livelihood. Most are widows (or defacto widows with husbands in prison.)

We had a chance to talk with the women as part of our field trip and they shared some moving testimony about the affect of working in such a group.

The place where we went for the field trip, Musanze was also about 2 hours north of Kigali and close to the park where the lowland gorillas live. There is a spectacular range of volcanoes there that were just coming out of the clouds by the time we were leaving. It was some breathtaking country none the less.

By Friday, and after at least two 4am trips to the airports to get reps and their families on planes back home, we were very happy to see this conference come to an end. We were not looking forward to the challenging task of getting 3 boys (Timmy, Oren, David) along with Zachee and us, up by 5:30 on Sat. so we could get back to Bujumbura before 1 pm. The reason for the rush back was to meet my father!! Dad had been teaching for several weeks in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and decided to take a flight south to see us. (There was a direct connection.) He was arriving after 1pm, but we were six hours away in Kigali, with the unpredictable Rwanda/Burundi border between us. With considerable effort we did manage to leave early on Saturday and raced down to Bujumbura. We took the newer route but did encounter a lot of truckers at the border which slowed our crossing down somewhat.

Long story short, we pulled into Bujumbura just after noon and dropped off Zachee and Timmy at their house. After unpacking ourselves we headed to the airport. When we got there we found the plane was late, but no one in the airport on a Saturday has any information about its ETA. So we had no idea how late it would be.

Instead of waiting with 2 kids and Rebecca. I dropped them off at Oren’s school where there was a school program celebrating spring. We had not planned to be back in time for it, but we now were. Oren did create some interesting stir among his classmates showing up with a broken arm. They were happy he was back after missing a week of school though. (Fortunately we had practiced Oren’s class song with him all week.) I went back to the airport to get my dad, and by the time I got back to the airport he was waiting on the curb. I got him and we rushed back to school just on time to see Oren sing with his class!

I have to say, it is really amazing to see him begin to find a community of his own in school. He really went from hating it to loving it, and sang loudly (in French) in the front row.

“Quel temps fait-il, Monsieur le temps? Dois-je rester dedans? Quel temps fait-il, Monsieur le temps? Moi, j’aimerais sortir!”

He still cannot speak French although it is pretty hilarious watching him try to talk to Timmy. He basically speaks English in a kind of slurry way, and thinks that is French. (Timmy has no idea what he is saying but Oren usually accompanies it with furious gestures as well-- usually orders like ‘Get down, from there’ or ‘Give me my train.’) But Oren is definitely learning to understand more.

It is also apparent that Oren’s new favorite activity is coloring, and he does it with considerable skill now. I would not have thought a 3 year old could color so carefully, but apparently the ‘Belgian’ coercive method has really worked on him. (Actually it is an activity consistent with his own predisposition toward order, focus, and a touch of obsessiveness.)

It has been great to have Dad here, and he did pack a large stash of chocolate chips and jelly beans from Grandma, which thrilled Oren. We took dad to church today, and then did a little sight seeing. First a stop at the “Musee Vivante” a good example of a third world zoo. There were a lot of interesting dangerous creatures of Burundi, including mambas, cobras, crocodiles, and even a leopard from Congo. But there is not much concern for safety and the keeper happily opened cages to let us take pictures, or agitated the snakes to make them attack. Still we had fun. There are also some examples of traditional Burundian housing. (This is the place where I wrote that they offer to let you buy a guinea pig to feed to the reptile of your choice.)

After that we went to Club du Lak Tanganyika for dinner. (The night before we took him out to Indian.)

I was also able to set up several lectures in a leadership conference for my father to give. We will be doing that this week, and it should be very interesting. I will let you know more about that next week.

I am going to stop, here lots of other things to say, but there was just too much this week.

3 Davids and a trip to Kigali

Oren found the camera this week and took some photos, here is a good one.


Last week I wrote in a state of mind affected by my inability to cope with the constant reminder of dire poverty here. I really tried to do better this week in the face of what I identified as “Kingdom priorities.” I had my first chance on Wednesday when my language teacher arrived. I met him at the gate. He told me there was a young boy lying outside the gate who was refusing to move because he was hungry. I went out with him (my teacher, named Jean Baptiste) and we began to talk to the boy, who looked to be about 13. He told us he was a Congolese refugee who had fled to Burundi two weeks ago with his mother and younger brother. Their father was in Tanzaniya. The mother and his brother and him were on their way to a refugee camp in Burundi, not far away. I asked why he fled and he explained that soldiers had entered his village and chased them out. I asked if he wanted some rice and beans, he said yes, so I invited him in the gate and I went in to get him some food. When he sat down with his food, I asked him his name, he said his name was David.

I was glad that I did make the effort to ‘be interrupted’ from my daily routine. The language lesson started late, but I had done something for a stranger at the gate. As I said last week, it is so easy to look at the faces of poverty as anonymous hoards, and not see individuals, or be in complete despair about how little onc could do, and do nothing. I did not provide any lasting solution to David’s problems, but I did not do nothing or ignore him, or look away. I was able to look him in the eye, and offer him something because I could see he was a person, in need.

We had talked about my self critique (of last weeks blog) in our small group, and I realize how good it is to be accountable to, and encouraged by, others. One of our friends told me about Mother Theresa’s famous quote. “We can do no great things, only small things with great love.” I really understood what that meant in the encounter with David from Congo.

That was my first encounter with a David that week, but not the last.


The second David I met was a 2 year old at a funeral. He was the son of a woman who died of pre-eclampsyia, a complication of pregnancy. She was the wife of a friend of ours and someone we work with frequently. David was one of 4 children left behind for this young man to care for. At the funeral, David was in his father’s arms looking at the burial site. He did not want to leave because he new his mother was there. It was hard to imagine the extent to which his life was so suddenly and drastically changed by this tragedy.

This was the first Burundian funeral I had attended. It lasted about 6 hours and included a service, a drive to the burial site and service there, then a ‘reception’ where those attending were invited to sit and have a fanta. A collection was taken at that time.

Although it was in Kirundi, the service was beautiful, and Burundian church choirs are wonderful, singing and dancing even at an event as somber as a funeral.

Among the many things that went through my mind at the funeral, was how much we in America take for granted about pregnancy and childbirth. While there is some risk, the fact is, I do not know of any woman in the US who died as a result of pregnancy or childbirth. (Granted I have the privilege of being in a professional social class.) But since I have been here, less than a year, I know of wives of 3 colleagues who have died of complication related to pregnancy. They were all relatively well to do, so the problem was access to good healthcare. It is really painful to see this, and to realize the risk that women accept in order to have children. It goes without saying that the fact that Burundians like large families adds to the risk.

The third David I spent time with this week is my own 4 month old son. He is truly a happy child and a very sage air about him, even at this age. Zachee gave him the nickname Mutama, which means ‘old man’ in Kirundi. But it refers to a venerable old man. It seems to fit him, because he so often looks like a little wise old man, with his funny face and joyful smile. I had a lot of quality time with David on Thursday and even took him to the doctor here for some vaccinations. I thought about how lucky this little David was to have the care that he has, the love of 2 parents, and the blessing of good health and access to food.

As I considered the other 2 Davids, one whose life has been ravaged by war, and the other who lost his mother at such a young age, I could not help but wonder about the challenges, the crises, that would shape the life of my young son. Granted, he has so many advantages by accident of birth over these two children—access to good health care and citizenship in a country that is not in a constant state of war, but I don’t believe I can protect him from all bad circumstances. I am realizing how vital the mission of giving him a good faith foundation, that will protect him through circumstances I cannot protect him from. I am once again reminded here, of how fragile and in need of a savior we are.
“My soul finds rest in God alone. My Salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and my foundation He is my mighty fortress, I shall not be shaken.” --Psalm 63:1

(The other important David in my son’s life is his grandfather David of course who I hope will be a major influence on him. David Sack is recovering from cancer surgery. We skpyed him last night and he reported that he was improving, but has been frustrated by how slow the progress is.)

We are in Kigali Rwanda again this week for the conference I have written about previously. It is hard to believe that we have moved from the role of newcomers to the role of hosts for a conference of MCC representatives in our region.

On Saturday, Rebecca, Oren, David, and I, along with Zachee and Timmy, got in the Landcruiser and drove to Kigali. (Oren and Timmy will miss a week of school.) This trip keeps getting easier as the border guards now all recognize us. We get by quite easily. We are hosing the conference in the Africa New Life Ministries guesthouse, where Rebecca and I love to stay. I picked up arrivals from the airport in several trips on Sunday.

Our reps from Burkina Faso, Chad, Nigeria and Congo were pleasantly surprised, but stunned to find how cold it is here this time of year. Up in the hills in the rainy season it can be in the 50s at night. We played volleyball with the kids when they arrived, then had an icebreaker contradance. We did the Virgina Reel among other dances, and the African staff at the guesthouse enjoyed seeing some American traditional dance. (I can’t say we were stellar performers of it though.) A couple of them even participated.

This may have been an even bigger cultural shock to the Mennonite reps, as Mennonites have a heritage of not dancing at all. (Too fleshy!) But we had a lot of fun.

One of the perks of having a conference is the arrival of visitors from the US. We usually ask visitors to bring us all sorts of things from our families. Melody Rupley, our area director, had received a care package from our families to deliver. Among the items, including epi-pins and other meds, was a favorite subway car of Oren's that had been left in Baltimore. He was, needless to say, thrilled to be reunited with it. I tried to capture his initial reaction in a photo.

We will be in Kigali until next Saturday when we return to Bujumbura, where, happily, my father wil be paying us a visit. He is teaching in Ethiopia right now and thought he would pay us a visit as long as he is on the continent. (Oren is thrilled and counting on Grammy sending him with chocolate chips--we are hoping so too!!) More on that next week.



Bonus photo: For anyone who complains about the time it takes to mow a lawn in the US. Here is how it is done in Burundi, with a machete. It usually takes a whole day for our gardner to ours.

Jesus and the Mutwa Woman

I have found myself oscillating between moods this week. I am wondering if it is the deeper culture shock setting in, or if my antimalarial is beginning to make me psychotic. (One of possible side affects of mefloquin.) Honestly there are days when I am really excited about what we are doing and motivated to get more deeply into lives in our different communities, and other days when I find life here quite oppressive. Right now, I have to admit that I am really struggling with the constant staring and asking for money. I am just beginning to get a taste of just how desperate the poverty is here, as I will illustrate a bit later, but even the way I am addressed regularly by strangers on the street, is hard to deal with. The common Kirundi expression is “Mzungu, imha amahera!” Or if they can speak French they will say Mzungu, donne-moi l’argent!” Mzungu is the word for white person, and it is shouted at us almost constantly when we take a walk, or drive in the car. People, usually children, will shout and point at us to let everyone within earshot know that mzungus are in the area. The exclamatory ‘Mzungu!!” to let all know we are arriving is like an unwelcome celebrity status bestowed on us—as if exuberant fans had spotted Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie walking down the street and wanted everyone to see. I am not sure why, even in the city of Bujumbura, where westerners are not an uncommon sight, we still get this curious reaction wherever we go.

It is probably most troubling to me, because mzungu is my race. And being classified first and foremost by race is uncomfortable. (I should hardly complain about that, given what Africans have had to deal with.) Furhermore, my race is associated with wealth so the frequent rejoinder “Mzungu, give me money!’ as a standard greeting by many strangers, is to be expected, I suppose. But as much as I try to rationalize it, it exhausts me. But not so much because I don’t like to be stared at, as the sinking feeling I get that there is a strange Catch 22 to our entire mission here. Is it possible that the more we try to do to help, the more the dependency on us grows? And the more we are perceived to be the great white cash cows that our NGO’s prove to be? Even income generating and microfinance projects are all based on this principle: “Mzungu, give me money.”

OK, I will step off my high horse a minute and give you another perspective that is still haunting me to this day. Last Sunday Rebecca and I were leaving for church. We were rushing because we were late and I had been asked to help lead the worship. We pulled out of the gate of our house and I got out of the car to close it. As I did a very small boy came up to me and looked pitifully at me and said: “Mzungu, Imha amahera.” Exasperated and harried I said “NO.” and jumped in the land cruiser and shut the door. Just before I drove off, I stared into his eyes for a moment. What I saw as I sped off pierced me to the soul. “I tell you the truth, whatever you did to one of the least of these my brethren, you did unto me.” (Matt 25:40) I realized I was looking at the eyes of Christ in him, and looking back at me, I saw a person in a nice car, well fed, on the way to church to pray and thank God for his many blessings, and how fortunate he was not to be like those poor wretches on the road. --I am honestly filled with self loathing at my callousness and failure to be living a transformed life through the gospel.

I have been thinking all day about Kingdom priorities. We heard a message about Mark 5:21-43. This is the story of Jarius, the ruler of the synagogue coming to ask Jesus to heal his daughter. On the way, an unclean woman with an issuance of blood deliberately, and secretly touches Jesus’ robe to be healed. She is, but Jesus, stops and turns around, and asks her to be identified. Terrified, she steps forward and admits to her action. He says to her: “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.” After this delay, Jesus continues on to Jarius’ house where, because of the delay, they are too late, the girl has already died. Jesus, not to be dissuaded, insists she is sleeping, goes into the room, and taking her by the hand, says: “little girl, get up.” and raises her from the dead.

The message today focused on Jesus’ timing, and the sense one might have that Jesus is not in a rush, and takes the time to be in the moment with each person. Even if it might have seemed he was going to be too late for Jarius. Ultimately Jesus’ timing led to an even greater miracle.

While this is all true, I hear something more radical in this story about Jesus’ priorities related to my experience in Burundi: In Jarius we see a good man, a faithful man, who by the standards of the world is successful. He is the leader of the synagogue, well educated, good provider, looked up to in his community. When his daughter is sick, he goes to Jesus in confidence of his power, and with due humility (kneels at his feet) asks for his help. When he asks Jesus to come, I have no doubt that many people, including the disciples remarked on what an honor it was for Jesus to have such a man as this come and fall at Jesus’ knees for healing. I have no doubt that clearing the way for Jesus to assist him was a job the disciples did with sense of urgency and defference one accords a man of Jarius’ class. “What a great endorsement awaited Jesus if he could pull this off” they might think,--Jarius himself was asking for his assistance!

In the crowd though is another person who needs healing. She is marginalized, and distained like a mutwa (pygmy) woman in Burundi. Everyone knows she is unclean. (Uncleaness was not a private matter at that time.) She was obliged to let all know her status, lest they touch her and be defiled. She would never consider herself worthy of being healed by Jesus, or having Jesus take time for her and certainly not touch her. Her solution is to just secretly touch Jesus, anonymously, not get in the way, but just get a little something for herself, unobtrusively. “He is on an important assignment to save the daughter of the head of the NGO, and could not be delayed for someone like me a wretched mutwa woman.”

But the story tells us something very different about Jesus’ priorities. When the woman touches him she is healed instantly. But Jesus, nonetheless stops the rush to Jarius’ house and asks who touched him. I can imagine that woman’s horror. She is busted and will probably be beaten for deigning to do such a thing. But she knows there is no way out so she comes forward. (Probably to the horror of the crowd and disciples.) But Jesus, seems to want to make a very deliberate point about who is first and who is last in the Kingdom of God, as opposed to what the world sees. I say his stopping was deliberate because the healing had already occurred. So whatever else Jesus is doing, it is not to accomplish that end. It seems very much a teaching point, not only to the woman, but to the crowd, the disciples and Jarius. He stops to give the woman an identity and a blessing! He acknowledges her with love, calls her daughter, and wishes her continued good health! Jesus stops his trip to save the gentleman’s daughter to heal the unclean mutwa and honor her as a dear family member FIRST. Then he continues on his other mission.

He does go on to heal the little girl as well, but his timing, to the eyes of those of us who are used to privilege might seem to be late, even if he did raise her from the dead. I also noticed that Jesus calls her little girl, but does not use the more intimate word daughter, that he used with the other woman.

I think of my son. If he gets sick here in Burundi, I would certainly be able to get access to one of the great doctor’s here. I could probably phone ahead and have him waiting for me at the polyclinique. I could rush him in the landcruiser and would probably even be moved up to the front of the line when I got there. I am a mzungu. I have here, even now, even 60 years after colonialism, the entitlement of wealth and race; or (if I flatter myself) at least the respect of those around me for the work I am doing here. What if I did have to wait in line behind everyone else, how would I feel? Cheated? Disrespected? Outraged?

When I read the story, I see myself as Jarius, with my sick child, going faithfully to Jesus, knowing he can save my son. I can imagine how Jarius must have felt when he saw what the love of Jesus really looked like. All those people that the good, pious, Jarius probably avoided noticing, or maybe helped from afar, through a local charity--the outcasts, peasants, street kids, widows, were all ahead of his child for Jesus healing touch, and his patient blessing. Jarius’ daughter was ultimately saved, but I wonder if Jarius had a change of heart from seeing the master’s priorities. “He who is first shall be last, and he who is last shall be first.” I don’t have answers, but I am finally starting to ask the right questions I think.

I do know that I want to have his eyes and heart for the forgotten here, but I think I need to start by not being in too much of a rush to get to church.

That was probably a bit long winded to make a point about the challenge of being here, constantly surrounded by so much need, that we often do not even see. We were having a conversation with the Carr’s last week (our Scottish architect friends who are building an orphanage.) Val commented to us on her concern that the orphans may need to learn to eat a different way with a new dining room, that is not all sharing one plate of food. When she asked the local supervisors of the project, they just laughed and said basically, their eating style would not change. “Every family in Burundi eats off of one plate. You learn to share and not be greedy that way.” Honestly I had never thought about just how little I understand this culture and the way it is so shaped by poverty. Again I think of the way we eat at our table here. Each of us with our own plate and more food than we could ever eat in one meal in each of the serving dishes. I laugh at my own ignorance in thinking that somehow, because we are eating rice (or plantain) and beans, we are somehow identifying with the poor in this country. But we always have as much as, or even more than we want!


I do want to include some actual news here as well:

Rebecca’s dad continues to improve from his surgery. We were even able to see him briefly on Skype tonight. He looked in good spirits, although, clearly he has had some serious surgery on his jaw. He could speak though, which was good.

We had a very difficult bit of health news here. There is a couple who has been part of our small group here. They have been gone for several months for some rest and relaxation in Thailand. When they came back this week we were told the shocking news that during a routine doctor visit, they found a mass on the woman’s lung which appears to be stage 2 lung cancer. This week they had to pack up their lives here and head back to the US for her to begin treatment. We are still reeling from the news and did what we could to pray for them and help to get them off. But it was so completely unexpected! Please keep her in your prayers. Her name is Delia.

We also went up to Bura Sera to see Jodi. We had several interviews for a performance appraisal of her position and her work with the partner. Her work at the Batwa school inspiring to see and she has so much ambition to help build their capacity. When I talked to the directors they told me the biggest challenge is to keep teachers for the school when salaries are so low. The tuition for these kids is about 5 dollars per year. The teachers payroll, for all teachers, for the whole school is $15,000 per year. They depend on grants and giving to raise the teachers’ salaries. It is hard to get. It is aggravating to me that many granting organizations are happy give to build a new school or to provide school supplies but bristle at the idea of paying teachers’ salaries. I think that should be the main priority. A good teacher can teach under a tree, but a new school building with no one being paid to teach in it, is not educating anyone. Jodi is working hard to find grants for this school whose unique mission is to educate these most marginalized children in Burundi.

We got back from Bura Sera on Saturday evening (in a torrential downpour that made the road incredibly difficult to drive on). We stayed at Jodi’s house but did have dinner with the priests in the seminary. It was great to see them although to be there during Lent meant we did not get to sit down with many of them for a meal because they were fasting. They actually fast for breakfast and lunch during Lent and only eat dinner—the priests as well as all the seminarian students. They then take the money they save from the food they are not buying to give food to the poor. What I find amazing about this is that no one around here is rich, yet they are so willing to be sacrificial to help those who are even less fortunate than they are.

Today we went to church, then had a day at Club du Lak T. We met up with the Carrs again and tried a new Ethiopian restaurant that opened up here. It was delicious and we have really been enjoying the Carr’s company. I have also appreciated seeing in them a model of generosity that I like. They do not pretend in any way to be poor but are deeply generous. The kids go regularly to the orphanage to teach children how to play with Playstations the Carr’s bought them. In their home they are always inviting many of the orphans (teenagers) over to play at their house on their trampoline. They really enjoy sharing the good things they have with other. I think I am really appreciating that way of being here more than those who are rich and feign a certain attrition to identify with the poor. “In defference to your need, I will pretend to be needy while I live here and do without things I can afford and will go back to someday when I leave.”

I think I see that to live out God’s Kingdom priorities here, for us Mzungus, is to try to embrace Jesus’ deep generosity manifested in his respect, and kindness to those who were truly suffering. I don’t want to hide my wealth, but rather learn how to share from the heart, my time, my money, my home, my culture, my savior, with openness and true joy.

I am not there yet, but my eyes have been opened.

Dreaming of Bardavon, Tintin in Tibet, and Carcisonne:

Oren and his friend Crystalle at Ubuntu by the pool.


Well I can’t say it hasn’t been an interesting week, although putting things in order of importance might be difficult. Despite being here and surrounded by many pressing needs, we have found ourselves preoccupied with home-that is the US. There have been several reasons for this. For me, an interesting milestone passed by. The Bardavon Opera House Gala, the biggest dance event of the year for the Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre came and went. As the director up until last year, it was a bit strange to think about it happening, and I cannot deny that I did feel some pangs of sadness at missing the excitement of my old job, especially this performance, attended by nearly 2000 people. For any of you who have made an abrupt career shift maybe you can understand the sort of feeling of vertigo one experiences from time to time—like I am going to suddenly wake up in my bedroom in Poughkeepsie New York to discover that the past nine months have been a strange dream. I have to confess that I am certainly not yet as good at my new job as I was at my old one. I am hoping that I will improve over time.

The other reason we have been preoccupied with home is because Rebecca’s dad (Dave) has had an extensive surgical procedure to remove a spot of cancer on his gum. The operation required replacing part of the jaw with a piece of his fibula (leg bone) and a tracheostomy as part of the recovery process. We have been praying about him and checking email almost hourly for news about his recovery. So far we have been getting very good reports.

I also need to confess to a morbid obsession with the stock market and debate on the solution to the problems of the US economy. It is, as many of you know who read this, like some kind of bizarre nightmare. I think of watching “The Waltons” as a teenager—stories of a epoch in America I could never imagine—like ancient history. Are we really going to go through the tribulation of a Great Depression again? What will that mean for those of us living outside the country? What will that mean for charitable giving that supports our mission? It is stranger to hear about the declining economy in the US as I am watching signs of economic improvement in Burundi, driven by a time of peace unprecedented in the last 14 years. Of course Burundi is by UN indicators the poorest country in the entire world, so there is room to grow, I imagine, even in bad economic times.


So this week has had us tuned into Skype, Facebook, The New York Times on the web, and email quite a bit. But life here has not be uneventful either. On the home front, our au pair, Denise, left this past Monday. She had administrative and accounting qualifications and I think had been hoping to find a job in that field. We did not think it was likely she would succeed as work is hard to come by, but she did. (We were happy for her despite our loss.) But that leaves us without a child care worker. Oddly enough, this has not been a great hardship, as Oren is in school every morning, and we have been taking turns being at home with the kids in the afternoon. By adjusting our language lessons slightly we have been able to cover the week between the two of us. We will see how long we can keep this up. For the time being, David can come with us to the office in the morning, but that may change sooner or later.

This week was a bit slower than last week at work. We are still tidying up our database as a few late plans and final reports are straggling in, and we are writing memorandums of understanding for grants this year. Zachee has been in charge of that.

We also have received confirmation that all of our searches for new positions in MCC Rwanda/Burundi have been filled. By next September we will have 5 more workers than we do now—two new service workers in Kigali seconded to Friends Peace House, and three one year positions to build capacity with partners in Burundi. The workers in Kigali will be here for 3 years and they are a couple. We have been finding a place for them to live when they get here in May.

We have been enjoying life away from work this week as well. We returned again on Thursday night to Khanna Khazana, the amazing Indian restaurant I wrote about before, this time with Zachee, Bridget and Tim. We had a great evening out and it was good to see Oren and Timmy getting on so well. Oren will even cautiously use some French like “Viens, Viens.” When he wants Timmy to follow him. Generally Oren has been showing some willingness to try to speak French and does greet our staff and friends in French with little or no prompting.

Another breakthrough! Oren told me, when I picked him up from school on Wednesday, that he now likes to go! That was quite a surprise considering we spent the first 2-3 weeks literally forcing him to go and leaving him off in the class screaming for us not to leave. Mdme. Cecille is very strict, but I have to say her method seems to yield some positive results. She sent home his binder (a collection of his year’s work to date.) It had about 40 pages of pictures he had colored, lines and circles he had drawn, paintings, numbers, connect the dots, and numerous other preschool skills. His work was actually remarkably good. I had no idea he could color in the lines so well, or complete a picture without losing interest.

I think the reason he likes school is because he is starting to make some friends there as well. He likes to see them and I know several of them speak English, so eventhough the teacher does not speak English, he can still find people to talk to.

Another amusing Oren story: When we were last in Rwanda I decided that, though he was a bit young, I would buy him his first Tintin book. For those of you who don’t know about this comic book series written by a man whose last name is Herge, you can look it up on the internet. It is a series comprised of around two dozen books about a boy named Tintin, his dog Snowy, and other interesting characters, notably a hard of hearing professor, and a salty sailor named Captain Haddock. The series is de rigeur for third culture kids (boys and girls) because each adventure takes place in a different part of the world. The comics were actually created in the 1940s but the adventures do not seem dated. However, some of the social norms of the day seem a bit politically incorrect to us now—particularly the amount of smoking and drinking that are part of the scenes of many episodes. Captain Haddock is notably a heavy drinker, and his imbibing often leads to hilarious mishaps. (Snowy is known to have a weakness for spilled whiskey as well.)

The episode I bought for Oren, one of my favorites, was Tintin in Tibet--A story where Tintin must journey to Tibet via Nepal to try to rescue a friend who has been in a plane crash. He encounters many things, Buddhist monks, Sherpas, yaks, and even the Yeti (Abmoninable Snowman). To my amazement, Oren loved it! He has had me read to him about 10 times, and often looks at it himself. He particularly like Captain Haddock and often quotes him saying “Billlons of blue blistering barnacles and thundering typhoons!”

His love of Haddock is not without complications though: On Tuesday,Oren and Rebecca were at a play date at another missionary's house. Rebecca gave Oren a glass of water and he asked her loudly, "Mommy is this whiskey?" All she could do was splutter for a moment. She told him, “No definitely not, whiskey is not for little kids, I would never give you whiskey, even mommy and daddy don't like it, it's yucky.” But he came back with this. "But I like whiskey because I like to be drunk!" Unbelievable! What bad habits missionary kids can pick up from their parents! He seems to really identify with Captain Haddock for some reason, and gets a big kick out of all the silly things that happen to him.

Fortunately this is not the only influence Oren is getting. At Bible study, following the play date Oren saw me reading the Bible and wanted to do so as well. He got his kids Bible out with lots of pictures and started to look through it carefully. Rebecca asked him what he was doing and he said, "I'm reading the Bible, trying to understand the message, trying to understand what it means for me." The story he spent the most time on was how David fought Goliath. He certainly says interesting things and never ceases to surprise us.

On the weekend, not having TV, movies, computer games, or even regular internet access, we find ourselves doing other activities heretofore nearly forgotten.
1) visiting—Usually friends from church with kids. The Carr’s with the trampoline is the number one choice
2) going to the pool—Today David took his first swim in the kiddie pool with Rebecca
3) Reading—right now I am reading a French novel about Haiti called Le Crie du Oiseau Rouge and a book about the history of violence in the region called When Victims Become Killers.
4) Playing Caricsonne—a fun game where you build a map and try to take over territory, cities, farms, roads. Oren usually plays with us and last for about 30 minutes of the game. It is fun to play an ‘adult’ game with him.


So that is where I will stop for now. I need to be up to be the worship facilitator at church tomorrow. (non-musical) Thanks for all prayers about Oren’s and David’s health. They both seem to be over their earaches as of yesterday.

Earaches in Kigali

I can't believe it is already Sunday evening here and I have not posted my blog entry. It has been a very full week and that explains why. We did have the weekend off, as we just came back from Rwanda on Friday, but we really needed the time to try to unwind from all we have had to deal with.

By the way, for those who read that it was my Birthday last weekend, but did not get to see a picture of the cake....there it is in front of Zachee and Bridget (who were at my party). Since Oren designed the cake, (Mommy baked it) it was in the shape of a steam engine and coal car all covered in M&Ms. Needless to say, Oren ate most of it himself this past week. He really does have a sweet tooth and misses the availability of candy at home. (I don't miss the excessively easy access to sweets at home for him or me!)

As I mentioned above, we were back in Rwanda this week. We had quite a few logistics to plan for a conference in March, as well as finding a home for a new MCC couple who will be service workers with Friends Peace House, one of our partners in Kigali. We were able to leave Tuesday morning since Oren had the entire week off from school. (It was a Mardi Gras holiday.) He, of course, was thrilled not to have to go. I was glad we were going as a family, eventhough that does create complications for meetings, but I figured we could handle it. We were also looking forward to an adventure. We knew that the government, in collaboration with a Chinese contractor, had been working on a new road that passed through Kayanza province and up to Kigali. We were hoping this would be a faster route, and we were excited about finding it and trying it out. The start of the trip was promising. The kids were good and we left by 10 am. We found the new road, and indeed it was complete and we felt like we were the only car that new it existed. This road goes through some really gorgeous country in Burundi, it looks a lot like Montana--big country with high mountains and wide vistas. The border had brand new buildings set up for processing dozens of people at a time, but we were there alone. (Honestly it was creepy in a Twilight Zone kind of way, like we had accidentally arrived into the future by taking a wrong turn on the map.) We got through very quickly. The only problem we encountered was a severe thunderstorm along the way, but we managed to push through it without losing too much time.

We got to the guesthouse before 4pm which was record time! We were really excited about the new road and felt like all this was a good omen for a really pleasant stay in Rwanda. We were glad to be back in the Africa New LIfe Ministries guesthouse as well, where they treat us like family and have good internet access to boot...

Here is a picture of David chilling in one of their hammocks in the front yard.

..Then we noticed that Oren was not well. We were upset to discover that he had a pretty high fever. This was particularly worrisome because he had had recurring fevers in the past week and we had hoped he was over them. Apparently he was not, and we were nowhere near our doctor in Bujumbura. I did not fancy trying to track one down in Kigali.

We gave him tylenol and sent him to bed, and hoped he would be better by morning. He was, and we started our day's activiities, shopping, banking, meetings at Friends Peace House and by mid afternoon Oren was sick as a dog. We were supposed to have dinner with a missionary couple but had to cancel. Oren's fever was 104 that night and we were worried. We gave him more tylenol and I sent out an email listing his symptoms to all of our doctor friends in the US. The next morning I took Oren to find a clinic in Kigali. We were told there was a fairly good 7th Day Adventist one nearby. We found it that morning and met the doctor. He did bloodwork right in the office, and diagnosed him with an ear infection and prescribed amoxycillin. They sold it right at the clinic. I was relieved to have a diagnosis and treatment. I paid the bill which was 4000 rwandan francs, about $7 US. It is hard, being from the USA, trying to get used to how cheap healthcare is here. I just had a doctor visit, blood work, and antibiotics prescribed and filled for $7!! In the USA that would have been Doctor $150, blood work $200, antibiotics $50 = $400. (I should mention the sad reality that $7 is still out of reach for many Rwandans.)

We had a big day planned ahead and we hoped Oren would be well enough. We were going up country in Rwanda to visit some of Friends Peace Houses' programs. They had a women's group and prisoner reintegration program in Byumba, the highest city in Rwanda. It was a beautiful one hour drive and Oren did fairly well. There we had a long meeting with some women and former prisoners who were benefitting from these programs. It is always inspiring to hear their testimonies. These programs combine development and income generating activities with peace and reconcilliation objectives, and really builds the confidence and self esteem of participants. The women's group does knitting, embroidery, as well as food storage for income generation, and also had a small collective savings club. They are comprised of survivors of genocide, and women whose husbands are in prison for crimes of genocide. Not a likely group to work together, but they have built strong bonds together, forgiven each other, and set an example to their community. Here is a picture of us with them. Felicite, holding David, is the leader of this group. They loved having our whole family come to meet with them.

Oren did pretty well through most of the visit, then began to deteriorate by early afternoon. We headed back to Kigali, then went to a nearby internet cafe to Skype our family. (As an aside I should say how much we are thankful for Skype. It is so good to be able to talk to family that way, especially when we can use the camera with the voice. We had the chance to use it in quite an extraordinary way last week. Rebecca's Dad is going to have some pretty major surgery on Monday. There was an annointing service for him last Saturday at his church. We were able to participate through Skype and really felt like we were there with everyone in the room. We prayed and read the Bible, it felt like a technologically divine miracle. )

Back to Rwanda: We headed back to Bujumbura on the new road on Friday morning and got back in record time again. Oren was already doing better as well. We were feeling good about what we had done, and I even got to go to capoeira that evening. We were happy the worst of Oren's illness was over as well....

Then David started to cry unceasingly that night. After a sleepless night trying to console him, we took him to the pediatrician at the Rainbow center on Saturday, where lo and behold, he had an ear infection! So now both boys are on antibiotics. David is still feeling pretty bad.

So we have been lying low. Rebecca had to stay home with David from church this morning, so I took Oren alone. Our missionary friend Simon was preaching so I really enjoyed that. Later in the day we went over to the Carr's to let Oren jump on the trampoline.

It was an interesting week. I wrote to several people individually by email to talk about culture shock. It has been my observation, that having 2 children is a far bigger life adjustment than any cultural adaptations one has to make living in a third world country. When you have one child, you can maintain some semblance of your childless life, retain at least a modicum of time to yourself. With the arrival of #2, that is all gone. Parenting is our career at this point, although we still show up at our job quite frequently.