Christmas in Bujumbura

The traditional Christmas morning family photo taken of us by Jodi.




I feel like we passed an important landmark in our time here in Burundi. This was our first Christmas here! We have been here a year and a half now, but last year we spent Christmas in the US after the birth of David, and returned here just after New Years Day. So what is it like? --you may wonder.

That is a bit of a challenge to answer as there are some similarities, but I cannot say whether that adds to or subtracts from the strangeness of it all. Burundi is a Christian (mainly Catholic) country, so there is a recognition of the season--Advent preparations, etc. Burundi has also borrowed many European traditions including the arrival of St. Nicolas and Christmas trees in many homes in Bujumbura. In shops one can find a Christmas tree on display, and on the street corners men hawk decorated plastic Chinese Christmas trees that they carry around over their heads. (Real pine trees are illegal to cut in Burundi because of problems of over-harvesting them in past years.)

There is about all of these preparations though, the evidence of poverty. The scrawny artificial trees on the street are mainly decorated with pieces of colored foil, and the offerings in stores do not differ from any other time of year. Then there is the heat. I am realizing how so many of our Christmas carols (like The Holly and the Ivy, Deck the Halls, Jingle Bells, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear, even Silent Night) imply a coldness about this time of year, and though I played carols frequently throughout the last week, it just felt anachronistic, like I was having Christmas in the middle of summer.

This is not to say we did not have a really nice Christmas, but it was certainly different in the way it felt. I have often lamented the extreme commercialism and ever lengthening shopping season that precedes it, but a completely non-consumerist Christmas left much to be desired as well.

One thing I will say, is that things did not slow down work-wise quite as much as I had anticipated. It seems that people were working most everyday right up until Christmas eve, and even Christmas Day from what I could see.

On Monday, we had planned to take a much needed day off and it began well enough when we took Oren to his swimming lesson and had a swim ourselves. I had to do some business in town with Nathan, then had language lessons in the afternoon. Tuesday was another work day as well primarily taken up by bill paying.

I will remind you all that paying a bill in Bujumbura involves going to each company and paying a cashier. There is no online banking, or even mailing a check with a statement. So withdrawing cash, then paying the electric bill, phone bill, garbage collection, post box bill will take most of the day. We also were making fairly regular trips to the Immigration office this week to get new visas for the SALTers before they left for a week’s vacation in Tanzania. This is always a stressful process and the complete disorder of the immigration office does not inspire confidence that passports will be processed on time, or even found at all, once they are surrendered to the immigration officials, who always seem extremely put-out by even the most normal requests and inquiries.

Wednesday was a bit better. There was less to do as far as work and I had the opportunity to do some Christmas shopping. This was really the first occasion, and since we were having an MCC staff Christmas party that evening where we had selected Secret Santas, I was not shopping a moment too soon.

The party was a really nice gathering that evening and was probably the most Christmas-y feeling event of the week. We had decorated the house with the meager supply of Christmas paraphernalia we had on hand. One item worthy of note was a gingerbread house made from a kit. This was brought out by my parents when they were here several weeks ago. It has become a tradition for Oren to build one and we had assembled it Tuesday night.

One thing I will say is that gingerbread houses are meant for a dry winter climate. After building it Tuesday night, we found, on Wednesday morning, that the carefully decorated candy-covered roof, had melted and poured down the sides of the house because of the humidity. After that we stored the house in the freezer until the dinner party on Wednesday. It made a very nice centerpiece for our dinning room table that night.

Oren is someone who loves to build a gingerbread house as well as eat it. It took a lot of convincing, to get him to save it for at least 24 hours. (He was ready to eat it after it was built Tuesday night, and then begged to have it for breakfast on Wednesday morning.) Normally I would have wanted it saved longer, but because of the melting problem we did take it apart and eat it for dessert on Wednesday during the party.

I think it was great for the SALTers, the Ressler-Horsts, and Jodi to have a team Christmas gathering. (Jodi had come down that day as well to spend Christmas break in Bujumbura.) It was the first opportunity for Nathan and Lara to meet her. We had a fun evening singing Christmas carols, eating, chatting, then opening our Secret Santa presents. The kids had a lot of fun playing together around the Christmas tree as well.

Thursday, Christmas eve day, began with a bit of work. I had to go over and meet a landlord to sign a contract for a house that the Nathan and Lara found to live in! We are all breathing a sigh of relief that they have a place to live now, although they will move in after the New Year.

Oren and Rebecca also worked on making some batches of cinnamon rolls to give away as gifts (another Sack family tradition.) Oren loves to cook, especially baked goods so really enjoyed helping mommy do this. Later that evening we our family went with Bridget, Zachee, Tim and Jodi to a ‘Lessons and Carols’ service at the Anglican Cathedral in town. We then had dinner together at Khana Kazana afterwards. Maybe this will become a family tradition here—Indian food on Christmas eve.

Friday morning, most everyone slept in because of the late night out on Thursday. Oren was excited when he did get up though and it was hard to convince him not to open all his gifts before Mommy and Jodi woke up. He was thrilled to find a stocking full of candy canes and chocolate on the wall. We had also set up his little wooden train set around the Christmas tree to his delight. (He does not consider any Christmas tree complete without a train going around it.)

He and David got some very nice gifts, coloring books, a push toy, and a large snake shaped pillow that he had admired when he saw one that was owned by Jal (Nathan and Lara’s son.) (This was a locally made handicraft that Rebecca was able to find on one of her shopping trips.) David did not really understand what was going on, but he did like to play with the various and sundry things that were opened, especially things that belonged to Oren.

We spent the rest of Christmas day relaxing around the house until about 4 in the afternoon. We had been invited to an American Christmas party hosted by one of our American friends who had a classmate in Oren’s school. There were about 30 of us gathered, many from the embassy. The family had rented a bouncy castle for the backyard and there were about 15 kids present. The kids enjoyed playing together while the adults chatted on the terrace. We remarked this was probably just about every American in Burundi. Someone observed that while many Europeans went home for Christmas, most American had stayed as it is considerably further to get back to the US from here for what is quite a short break as far as school and work.

The party was enjoyable, Astrid and Travis’ family was among the invited guests as well as the Ressler-Horsts. This was not, however, a gathering a missionaries in general. Among the offerings that evening was turkey and cranberry sauce provided through a service to the American embassy which had them shipped from South Africa.

We had another relaxing day on Saturday, although much of it was spent by me preparing calendars for our extended family featuring pictures of all of us over the year. This has become a tradition in our family for me to make this. Fortunately our parents had DHLed a dvd of photos of everyone else to us, because I did not have pictures of everyone here as we have seen each other much less this year. Rebecca was working on a sermon as she was invited to preach on Sunday at our church. We did go to the park in the afternoon for a bit of a break during the day, though.

It was really good to hear Rebecca preach on Sunday. This is the first invitation she has had to do so at our church. She gave a powerful speech about peace-making based on the text in Luke about the Angel coming to the Shepherds and announcing the birth. The passage was a reminder of God’s restraint in his choice to bring us ‘peace on earth’ through the birth of a baby, rather than enforcing it with his army of angels. She pointed out that it would seem that for God, the ‘means’ to peace are as important as the ‘ends’ itself, and that ‘peace through strength’ will never succeed in accomplishing its end. True peace-making requires us to follow the example of Christ, even to the cross. “Many people have willingly sacrificed themselves in a ‘just war’ but until we are willing to lay down our lives for a ‘just peace’ we will not experience God’s shalom.” (to paraphrase one of her points.) I will see if she can post a transcript of the sermon next week.

The sermon was very well received here, as there is really not much preaching that introduces Anabaptist peace theology here. In fact, most every sermon I hear ends at the gospel message, the evangelical call to accept Christ as our savior, but never seems to go beyond that. Consequently, I fear that many Christians here are not very spiritually mature. There is a great challenge here to provide teaching to Christians about what it means to follow Christ as a disciple, AFTER one has accepted the call.

We went to the beach Sunday afternoon then had dinner with the Ressler-Horsts at the house where they are housesitting.

It is now Monday morning and we are getting ready for a ‘village live-in’. That is we are going up to Cassien’s village upcountry as a family to spend 3 days there. I will let you know how that goes next week. Wish us luck!

A Muddy Visite Sur Terraine and Reflections on Peacemaking

David is now a toddler, and also very keen on helping with the housework whenever possible.



I hope this will be the last entry for a week or so which begins by noting what a busy week it was and how difficult it is to begin writing. The truth is, I fell into bed, completely exhausted while putting David down about 8pm. But now it is 2AM and I am wide awake.

I am happy to say that Sunday was a good day of rest for us. We did go to our church in the morning where I was the worship facilitator, followed directly by a trip to the beach. The afternoon we went to the English fellowship and sung many Christmas carols during worship time. It still does not feel anything like Christmas in terms of weather, but I am beginning to get into the Christmas spirit.

The past week’s busyness was mainly due to the visit from our regional director Mark Sprunger. He arrived this past Sunday, (the same day we were returning from Rwanda) and stayed until Friday evening this week. We had a lot of opportunity to talk to him about our programming and the challenge of keeping continuity in another year of diminished giving at home which necessitates deeper cuts in our budget here. (MCC giving is off about 12% this year.) He did have some good advice and made some helpful suggestions about strategic planning in the year ahead.

The bigger part of his visit though, was spent meeting our partners. On Monday, I took him to meet Onesphore of Moisson Pour Christ, before my language lesson. Then we had a big MCC team gathering for dinner at our house for all of us located in Burundi. This included the SALTers the Ressler Horsts, Zachee and Tim (Bridget was in Sudan), and us. We had a nice evening and even drew names for a secret Santa party later this week.

Tuesday morning was the start of a 3 day roadtrip. Because of Oren’s school, we decided that I would take Mark around and Rebecca would stay home with the children. We began early in the morning by heading south. We went in a convoy of 2 cars led by Cassien and another person from Help Channel. Besides Mark and I, Nathan and his family were going as well. The plan was to see some tree nurseries in Makamba, near the border of Tanzania, then some other nurseries and plantation in Rutana. We would stay the night in Rutana.

Help Channel, many of you may remember, runs a Food for Work program in which beneficiaries plant trees as part of a reforestation project in exchange for maize and beans (about a kilo of each per day.)

The drive south began well enough as we headed toward Nyanza Lac, which is quite a scenic ride along the coast of Lak Tanganyika. We even saw a hippo basking in the Lake as well as many fishermen at work. When we got to Nyanza Lak we headed East off the paved road toward the Tanzanian border. At this point the weather took a turn for the worst. A large storm was brewing (as it is rainy season), and I was hoping it would not be a problem for our Landcruisers on a muddy road.

We got to the first nursery site, which was located near a very large UNHCR refugee camp set up for returning refugees from Tanzania who were awaiting repatriation. This is a huge problem in the south as many fled Burundi as early as the 1970s and their land has since been given away to others. The return has been a cause of much land conflict which can turn murderous without intervention from others to find a non-violent solution.

The nursery looked small but had about 50,000 tree saplings in it. Most were eucalyptus for planting in the govt. granted land for reforestation, but there were also other trees, like grevaria that are given to beneficiaries to plant in their gardens and farmland. It was interesting to hear about the struggles of maintaining a nursery. I was also quite surprised to hear Cassien complain that there were several unscrupulous partners of UNDP who were receiving huge grants for reforestation, who would bring UN monitors to this nursery and represent it as their own. One even offered to buy the nursery outright from Help Channel. I suggested to Cassien that he put a sign up.

This is one thing I do like about MCC programs. Because we are a relatively small mission, we, as country reps. are able to monitor our projects and make sure that the money given is being used in way it was granted, and much has a direct impact on the lives of beneficiaries. Sadly, a lot of relief money granted by large donors ends up in the pockets of just about anyone but the needy, vulnerable people who it was intended for.

When we finished our tour, we continued on our way to Makamba for lunch. By this time the storm hit and driving became quite difficult on the muddy roads. At one point we had to get and change the hub locks to 4 wheel drive on both vehicles. We did get to Makamba and had a nice lunch at a guesthouse run by Cassien’s sister.

From there we continued on to Rutana and stopped at another nursery where we had the chance to talk to many of the beneficiaries in the community about the nursery. Many students also proudly brandished their school books that they had received from Help Channel, thanks to a container sent by MCC, of school kits.

We got to our guest house by evening, which was very cozy. There was even a fireplace which we all huddled around as a rainy night up country can be quite chilly. We had a very good Burundian dinner then turned in for the night.

The next morning, after a cold shower, Mark and I parted ways from Cassien and the Ressler-Horsts. We were headed to Gitega and then on to Burasira to see Jodi and stay the night at the seminary. The drive seemed straightforward enough as we were back on the paved road to Gitega, although I had never been on this particular road myself. We arrived in Gitega mid-morning where we had a very full day of visiting. We started with our partner UCPD who does peace-making and community development in a nearby commune. Jean-Pierre, their representative described their work to this very under served community which is not really on the ‘beaten path’ as far as places where a lot NGOs are working. Mark really appreciated the fact that MCC is at its best when it can be supporting work in places where others really are not present.

After talking with UCPD for about 2 hours, we headed to MiPAREC, our large partner who has set up peace committees all over the country. We had lunch with Levy, the legal rep. who told us about their programs. We left them and went down the road a bit to UCEDD, the organization that runs the Hope School for the Batwa. We talked to Beatrice, who with her husband Innocent (both Batwa) founded and run the school. She talked to us about the successes and challenges of this project.

By about 4 pm, completely mentally saturated from meetings, we headed down the 2 hour dirt road to Burasira to see Jodi and the Hope School. Because of the heavy rain, though, the road was really bad, as slippery as I have ever seen it. We had to 4 wheel it the whole way, and even then had some struggles to keep from going off the road.

It was good to get to Burasira and see Jodi. We had dinner at her home and conversation was much easier than the official tone that we adoped at meetings with partners. Jodi also talked about the Hope School and the challenge of her role as capacity builder.

We went back to the seminary around 10 pm and turned in for the night. We were up early on Thursday, with another cold shower, then 6am prayer at the seminary. We had breakfast there then went with Jodi up the Hope School to meet the principals and see some of the classes. Most of the students were gone for break, but we did find two classes that were still in session. We went in and greeted them and they sung some songs for us as well.

We left Jodi mid-morning so we could drive back down to Bujumbura and get back before my ballet class at 3 pm. The drive was still bad down the dirt road, which I think gave Mark and appreciation of just how remote Jodi is in her work at that school. He really felt that this program was an example of MCC at its best.

We did back to Buj. on time to teach the last ballet class of the semester. It was also good to see Oren, David and Rebecca again. Apparently, while we were gone, David decided to walk. Rebecca described how, on Wednesday morning, he was on the porch, and stood up with a small rock in his hand. He threw the rock out in front of him, then walked over to get it. He picked it up and repeated this about 6 or 7 times. (A little walkers training program he devised for himself.) I was sorry I was not there for this event, but have enjoyed watching him perambulate about the house on his new toddler legs. He does not talk yet except a couple words. (The first official word was ‘duck’, Oren’s was ‘up’)

Friday was Mark’s last day in Burundi. We took him to the airport about noon, only to have him call about 3 to say the flight was delayed until 1 in the morning. Zachee went and got him, then I picked him up and took him to a conference I was going to, hosted by one of our partners. It was about the role and responsibility of Christians in the Political process. Invitees were people in government, for a dialogue and debate. Mark and I set next to the former vice-president of the country. I had a talk with him before the meeting and asked what he was doing now. He said nothing, jokingly, and asked if there might be a job for him in our organization. (Actually he is a pediatrician who work with children with AIDS). Also in attendance were leaders of rival political parties who happened to be Christians. It was interesting to hear them discuss the role of the Church in promoting a peaceful electoral process.

We took Mark to Khanna Kazana for Indian food (he had done a stint in Bangladesh so he loves Indian food.). Then went home and watched an episode of the #1 Ladies Detective Agency before driving him back to the airport around midnight. This time he did get off.

Saturday was less work but not a day of rest as we had several social engagements. One was Timmy’s birthday party, held at the Rainbow Center, and the second was a Christmas pageant at our church. We dropped Oren off at the Birthday, where Zachee and Bridget and had rented a big air castle, then we went on to the Christmas pageant. Although it was all in Kirundi, it was great to see the familiar sight of children dressed as wise men, shepherds, angels, sheep, and the Holy Family, acting out the nativity scene.

As a final note I will mention a thought shared by the pastor at the English fellowship this week. He was talking about Christ as our peacemaker with God and quoted the beatitude to us: “Blessed Are the Peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. “

He pointed out that it does not say Blessed are the peace lovers, or even blessed are peaceful people or peacekeepers. He reminded us that the word is peaceMAKERS, that is the activity of making peace, which is a far more challenging call then just avoiding conflict ourselves. He called on us to be peaceMAKERS not just peacekeepers, in our countries, our cities and our FAMILIES. May you all take the opportunity this season affords to be peacemakers in your workplaces, and homes. Remember HE is our peace. Merry Christmas.



Bonus Photo: One of the sights on our field trip. I am always trying to get a good photo of these women that balance 3 clay pots on their head. This one also had a baby on her back!

Preparing for Christmas and Business as Usual in Kigali

The fact that I am starting this blog entry at 10:30 pm this Sunday, is indicative of how busy we have been this past week. Today was a travel day, returning to Bujumbura from Kigali. It was a long trip because we made a stop by the genocide memorial at Nyamatta, AND then we met a bus at the border, which slowed our crossing, going through customs and immigration considerably.

There were 8 of us traveling in our jam-packed Land Cruiser. The three SALTers, Brandon, Robyn, and Yolanda, along with our family, and Travis Withrow (of Astrud and Travis) were all in the car. The SALTers were going to have a chance to see Kigali, and Travis tagged along to do some Christmas shopping for his 5 daughters.

Coming back we were loaded down with the roof-rack piled high with Christmas presents. The car probably bore some likeness to Santa’s sleigh in the book “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”.

We arrived in Bujumbura at 4 pm, just in time for the beginning of the English fellowship and Oren’s Sunday school. The timing was particularly important because we were meeting our Area Director Mark Sprunger there. He had arrived earlier in the day and Zachee brought him to the fellowship. We are hosting Mark here this week so he can see what our program is doing in Burundi.

That was the culmination of what was a very busy week, and next week promises to be no easier. But it was not all work and no play. We have been getting ready for Christmas here, and unlike Halloween, we have been making a real effort to prepare the house in some ways for the event. There has also been reflected in complementary activities by Oren’s school, our church, and even some places where we shop, where Christmas trees are appearing,

None of this comes close to the feeling of the post-Thanksgiving Christmas season in the US, but it is nice to be able to experience some of the preparation that typifies my experience of this time of year. I think what is most conspicuously missing is cold weather and snow. I thought I would ever say I miss it, but I really do miss the change of the season, and decorating a pine tree feels a bit strange in warm weather.

Oren is getting excited about all of this and really loved decorating the Christmas tree. (I mentioned last week that I had found an artificial tree left by our predecessors that I had cleaned up.) I was glad to find that we had brought enough of a small collection of ornaments to decorate it, and I even got some lights from the Chinese import store here.

Last week St. Nicolas came to Oren’s school. (that should be read with a French accent.) St. Nicolas has a white beard but is considerably thinner than Santa, he wears a cardinals mitre hat, and travels with a companion wielding a large Bible. Oren also told me that he speaks only French. There was a large celebration at Oren’s school for his arrival, then St. Nicolas went and visited the classes of the preschoolers and gave out candy.

Apparently, from the description of one of the parents, the distribution was quite interesting. St. Nicolas had a big list of all the kids (naughty and nice) and called them up 1 by 1. He read the name from the list and the child would come up, then he would read something about the child’s behavior, like “You are very helpful with the teacher.” Or “You color well, but you fight to much with your classmates.” Everyone received candy, but apparently the naughty and nice stuff is taken pretty seriously by St. Nicolas.
Besides preparing for Christmas, we have been trying, without much success to find a good housing situation for the Ressler-Horsts, our new service workers. We spent some time looking on Monday through Wednesday but did not find anything good that would work for a permanent situation. We did find a house-sitting opportunity that looks promising for a month, and I think they will take it for the time being (beginning this Wednesday). The problem, I think, is that in the last 6 months there has been a large influx in the expatriate community that is renting houses and pushing up the cost of rental property considerably beyond our planned budget.

Nathan and Lara’s family were able to enjoy a bit of time to themselves this past week, though, because our family was out of town in Rwanda from Thursday through Sunday, as I mentioned earlier.

We had a car full going up because the SALTers asked to have an opportunity to go up and see Kigali, and Travis hitched a ride as well to do Christmas shopping for his 5 daughters. The trip up was smooth and uncomplicated none-the-less. We left at the end of Oren’s school and got up there by about 5 pm.

The SALTers stayed with Ruth and Krystan, Travis stayed with friends, and our family stayed at our favorite haunt, the Africa New Life guesthouse. The staff there is always happy to welcome and keep an eye on, Oren and David.

Our purpose for going up this time was to have a round table discussion with our partner, Friends Peace House, as well as other donors that support their programs. We are making an effort to coordinate our support more effectively. It was an interesting discussion and I hope, helpful for the way we do our funding next year. For us this is a particularly crucial issue because, with the Global Financial crisis, our funding has continued to drop and we need, once again, to be looking at way in which we can strategically pare down, rather than expand our programming. This prospect is not appealing, but it is a reality. We are hoping that things will change sometime after next year.

Our time in Kigali was generally pretty tightly scheduled. We had the meeting, banking, visiting partners, and spending some time supporting Ruth and Krystan. So it was not exactly a restful week. The one evening we had nothing scheduled in Kigali was Friday. We finished our day about 5:30 pm and were at the guest house deciding what we would like to do. We were considering our different dinner options while Oren and David played in the living room. We had about decided on pizza and getting the kids to bed early so we could have time to talk, when Oren, who was playing on the couch, suddenly fell forward onto the coffee table and let out a scream. I looked and saw he had struck his head on the edge. As I expected, when I picked him up, was that he was bleeding profusely out of a large gash in his forehead, something that would definitely need stitches.

Rebecca and I looked at each other and new immediately that the decision about our family outing that evening had been made. We would be spending it at the King Faisal hospital emergency room. We held a towel on Oren’s head and loaded him in the car. We were fairly calm because we knew the drill very well after the experience 8 months ago with his broken arm in Kigali. We drove to the hospital and took him into the emergency room. I saw that it was quite crowded so I carried him in making his blood covered face and hair obvious so he could be helped first. He did get right into a room.

The whole process from start to finish still took about 3 hours, and we returned home about 10pm. Oren had 3 stitches in his forehead under a dressing. I had had to hold him down for the stitches as the anesthetic was just something that was sprayed on, not injected. He could definitely feel the needle going in and out for each suture. He was very brave through it all though, and did get ice cream after we were done, so it was not all bad for him in his estimation. He also seemed excited about the chance to show off his big bandage to everyone he met, and to his friends at school this week. I was pleased that an ER visit in Kigali still runs about $12.

We are anticipating another busy week with Mark Sprunger here and I will probably be doing a lot of driving in rural Burundi between Tuesday and Thursday. I am looking forward to some time off during Christmas week.

Goodbye Grammy, Hello Ressler-Horsts

David welcomes his new friend Ella to Burundi and introduces her to some of his favorite activities.



I feel like I was just here composing last Sunday---probably because this was such a busy, event-filled week that the days seemed to fly by. This is also the second week where I feel so exhausted this Sunday evening that I am daunted by the prospect of finishing this entry tonight. I am really more of a morning person, although Oren tends to get at 5:30 am with me if I do get up then.

We had a very narrow gap this week, (one evening) between the departure of my mother on Tuesday, and the arrival of our new service workers, the Ressler-Horsts, on Wednesday.

I am happy to say that both of my parents got home safely. We took Grammy to the airport Tuesday morning after dropping Oren off at school. She emailed us to tell us she had a problem-free trip back and even did a bit of sightseeing on her stop-over in Nairobi (where they had lived in the 1980s).

We enjoyed our Tuesday evening as the one supper in the week where did not have any visitors.

On Wednesday work was interesting because I participated in a large conference organized by World Vision and World Relief which brought together leaders of all the major church denominations. I mentioned this last week, as part of an effort to have the Church in Burundi can be a voice of positive change in the country. Since the majority of the population in Burundi professes to be Christian, there is a real opportunity here. On the other hand, for the same reason, if the election process disintegrates into violence, the church would own some of the responsibility for failing to act. I feel that this is a time of testing for the church Burundi, and there are many here and abroad that are praying that it might rise as a strong, prophetic voice at this historic time in Burundi.

Wednesday evening was the real event for us though. I went to the airport to pick up the Ressler-Horsts, Nathan and Lara and their two children Jal (6) and Ella (1). When I arrived at the airport the plane was there already and people were exiting. Eventually I saw Lara and Jal come out to tell me they needed some more money for visas. (The price had gone up recently—fortunately I had it.) Then a security guard asked me to come in to help them.

When I got in I could see why. Between the for of them they had about 30 bags, including, strollers, child seats, etc. It was quite amazing! It did remind me a bit as well of our own family’s arrival a year and a half ago. With the help of 4 porters we loaded up the car, including the roofrack. (I was thankful it was not raining.)

It was not until we got home that it was discovered that three of the carry-ons, that had been stowed in Dulles had not arrived in Bujumbura. But it was after 10pm when we got home and we decided to deal with that the next day.

Fortunately our house is big enough to temporarily accommodate two families and life here the past few days has not been too difficult. Jal and Oren enjoy playing together, as do David and Ella.

Beginning Thursday, we continued our house-hunting, which despite much effort to find something before they arrived, has not been fruitful. I think the biggest problem is that Bujumbura is changing. Many more foreigners are arriving and the housing market is rising. We could not find anything comparable to what Rebecca and I have (or had before our move) for the same price. We did know that we got our house at steal, but now we have a better idea of just how good a price this is. We will be continuing the search this week.

We are also orienting them this week in other ways. We have taken them on sightseeing trips of the city, they met Cassien at Help Channel, where they will be seconded. Help Channel has very generously made a vehicle available to them, so they do have their own car. They have also paid a visit to the Ecole Belge where Jal will very likely go to school. Oren has had several friends over this week whom Jal has met, most notably Timmy.

On Friday evening we had a team gathering for all of our workers, SALTERS, and Zachee for dinner to greet and welcome them. It was a nice evening and everyone seemed excited to have them here.

The SALTERS seem to be doing very well, and were back again on Saturday morning as I have been offering to teach a yoga-stretch class on Saturday morning on our front porch. Nathan joined us as well, despite jetlag. I enjoy doing this and I have heard from several other individuals who want to be part of this. We will see if this activity grows in the future. It has been a good team-building activity in my opinion.

Saturday afternoon, we, in true Burundian style, went out and visited quite a few friends and introduced the Ressler-Horsts around. We had an afternoon gathering of our regular group of Saturday missionary families at the house of Thomas and Naya. It was a very nice time and gave Jal a chance to meet some more kids at the Ecole Belge.

Sunday we went to church in the morning, then took the new family to the beach at Club du Lac Tanganyika. Despite the rain, and the fact that they have introduced a small beach using fee, it was a nice afternoon and we all ate pizza and fish briochettes under a large umbrella by the pool in the rain.

We went to the English fellowship in the afternoon where I led Sunday school that day. We were also able to get some leads there for housing for them. Among our options now is a temporary housesitting situation which would take some pressure off of finding housing in the next 2-3 days.

Hopefully things will continue to go well. We have a very busy week coming up involving a trip to Rwanda, and a visit from our area director Mark Sprunger. He will be coming from Nigeria.

Bonus photo: Oren has been really into drawing. We found at the end of Kung-Fu Panda video a little tutorial on how to draw the characters. Oren was enthralled and spent a lot of time drawing ‘Monkey” step by step. I was quite surprised how well he did as a 4 year old!