A Big Surprise for Rebecca

Rebecca doing some stretching during the 5 hour layover in the Brussels Airport.  Only 8 hours more to go!


Usually when we are back in the USA I do a modified writing schedule, posting about every two weeks, but I feel obliged to get something up as soon as possible since there was quite alot of exciting activity surrounding the weekend of our arrival and I don't want to miss any of it.

One of the reasons I need to unload a bit is because I have been harboring a big secret for several months and was finally able to unveil it.  It was, in fact, something that I had been concealing from my wife and the pressure to keep the lid on it was becoming more and more difficult!  (drum roll)  The truth is, I had created a secret email account and had been communicating clandestinely with many people in the past few months... the subject was... her 40th Birthday!!  Yes, I managed, long distance, to successfully organize a surprise 40th Birthday party for her on the weekend of our arrival in the US!

This was no mean feat, and truth be told, I had a major co-conspiritor in this, that being Rebecca's mother Jean Sack.  She was the logistical anchor for this caper, which involved getting a place to meet and helping to coordinate the arrival of the many out of town guests.

If any of you read the last blog, you might have noticed that Rebecca's actual Birthday was our second to last day in Burundi and we were quite busy trying to get out of the country.  Nonetheless, I feared I might have drawn suspicion to this scheme in just how lame that 'party' was.  I have to admit, I did not do a very good job of creating a 'cover' party on the actual day, but rather begged off by saying that trying to have a party on the evening before our departure would be a bit too much.  We did have our SALTers over with some pastries, but it hardly counts as a celebration of a milestone year.  Somehow, Rebecca accepted this, probably because we were both feeling the pressure of leaving, and did not give me too much grief for being such a 'lame' husband.

The delayed surprise did mean that I had been waiting with considerable anticipation the fruition of my secret plan.  But let me back up to lay the groundwork to our arrival at Charter Hall on Friday where the event took place.

I last posted on the evening before our departure for Burundi.  I had picked up the SALT volunteers from Rwanda and we spent the last several days debriefing them and packing for our departure.  Somehow we did manage to stay a bit ahead of the game and we left the house in good order for our house sitter Jodi Mikalachki.

We continued to keep the kids in play school even up to the day of departure because we were leaving in the evening.  This gave Rebecca and I the opportunity to do very good prep for the departure, not only with regard to packing and making sure we had the right gifts for friends and family at home, but also to take a morning swim and have devotional time on the day of departure.  It was a nice way to begin the last day of departure for a month.  I realized at that moment that this is something I will miss about leaving.  This morning routine has been a life saver for us when we can have it.

We did more packing in the afternoon and ran several errands related to paying bills and banking.  In the early evening we had everything packed and loaded into 2 cars.  Jennifer brought her car and Felix drove ours.  Janelle, our 3rd SALTer was actually brought by her host family, which was good since there was barely enough room for all of us and our luggage.

We got to the airport and said our last goodbyes, Janelle's host family was there in force with the immediate family and a number of aunts and uncles.  After a tearful departure we went through the ticketing, immigration, and customs to the departure lounge.

The plane landed after dark and to board this gigantic Brussels Air A360 is quite an experience.  We, as usual have to walk up the 2 story gangway and it feels like entering a brightly lit cruise liner.  The cool clean classical-music-ambianced interior seems very incongruous with the sombre impoverished exterior surroundings.

We settled into our seats for the 10 hour flight overnight.  Unfortunately the kids were pretty squirrely on the first leg and before David fell asleep we made quite an effort to keep him entertained and not fussing loudly.  The dinner  was served very late that night and both kids were quite hungry.  We were also disappointed that there were no kids movies on the personal entertainment center.  Mercifully boredom finally gave way to sleep.  The seats did not recline in any way convenable to sleep for adults but I did manage to doze for much of the flight.

We arrived in Brussels the next morning and had a 5 hour layover in the airport.  The kids did enjoy running around in it and riding the seemingly endless moving walkways.  We boarded a United 777 for the last leg which was a considerable improvement in terms of reclining seats and kids entertainment.  Both of them were willing to sit and watch movies for about 6 hours before getting bored and agitated.  We did take turns entertaining them for the last few hours to Dulles.

We arrived in Dulles and moved very quickly through the airport to find Papa Dave and Grandma Jean (Rebecca's parents) waiting for us.   We loaded the minivan they had brought and headed to Baltimore.  Sadly, because it was rush hour this took nearly another 4 hours to get to my parents' house which was our first stop of the evening.

Arriving and having a Birthday for Oren is a tradition we have had in past years since the cousins and Grandparents miss his Birthday on June 29th.  Grammy Bunny (my mother) had prepared a party with a dinosaur cake, balloons, napkins, and invited Miriam and Gabriel their cousins over with Paul and Gwendolyn (Rebecca's brother and sister-in-law).  It was a great party and a great way to begin our time here.  The cousins were ecstatic to see each other and Oren and David were very happy to be back in these familiar surroundings with many familiar people, games and toys they had enjoyed in years past.  It was also a treat for them to be together with all 4 grandparents on their first evening back.

We left after 9pm to drive the 20 minutes back to Dave and Jean's house (Rebecca'a parents).  It was actually good the kids stayed up this late because it helped them adjust to the 6 hour time difference.  David slept until nearly 6 but Oren woke up at 4 and started working on one of his dinosaur excavation projects he got for his Birthday.

Friday the kids did some blackberry picking and apple gathering in the morning with Grandma Jean and then baked some bread into the shapes of dinosaurs.  By mid afternoon we left for Charter Hall.  This is a retreat center partly owned by Rebecca's parents on an estuary of the Chesapeake Bay, AND the site of Rebecca's surprise Birthday.

Fortunately going up there is a normal part of our visits home so Rebecca did not suspect anything.  She had even invited a couple of her friends from College to join up there not knowing that they were also advised of the surprise party.

When we got there her friends Amy and Adam were already there from Tampa with their 2 kids.  (These are the college friends she was expecting.)  I had given up on the idea of having everyone there ahead of time to jump out and say 'Surprise!' so the surprises really unfolded over the next several hours.

The first unexpected arrivals were a contingent from Poughkeepsie New York.  Members of our old small group, Don and Rosaura with their 2 kids and Jeff and Wendy showed up.  Rebecca's jaw dropped when she saw them and at that point we told her that this weekend was organized in her honor.

We had dinner together the first evening (Friday), and as bonus Amy and Adam led us in the jewish Shabbat blessing to begin the weekend's festivities.  It was during dinner though that one of the biggest surprises of all showed up.  That was Zachee, Bridget, and Timmy!  They were very close friends in Burundi who are now living in Toronto.  They drove down for the party.  I don't know who was happier to see them, Rebecca or Oren.  But when Oren saw Timmy his face lit up like I have rarely seen, a mx of shyness and thrill.  Timmy was his very best friend in Burundi for years before they left a year ago and Oren has never fully replaced Timmy with a new best friend in the past year.  They immediately began catching up and leading games for the other kids that were there (by now a large group.)

Because of jet lag we did not stay up on Friday evening, but on Saturday morning we got up and at Rebeca's request I led a morning yoga stretch class on the dock.  Many of our friends joined and the weather was perfect for it.  (We are lucky because it had apparently been beastly hot up until the day we arrived in Baltimore, but it has been almost cool since we have been here.)

After breakfast several families took a boat trip.  I was impressed that several of the kids, including Timmy and Oren both took kayaks out and paddled along with us by themselves.  (The parents were in canoes).  They did have to be towed back, but we paddled several kilometers to a railroad bridge.

When we got back, other guests had arrived, many from the Baltimore area including folks who knew Rebecca as a child in Bangladesh and Maryland, and another set of College friends who Rebeca sang with.  (Mike and Margaret and their 3 kids.)  At this point, with several folks from her college madrigal group (Christopher Wren Singers) Rebecca did have the chance to do some singing with them of old favorites.

There was much swimming and visiting in the afternoon and in the evening we had an enormous Birthday cake, a slideshow of Rebecca's past and the presentation of several gifts.  Among the major ones was a memory book with many pictures and letter sent by friends from her past.  (I had organized this through the secret email account, but Jean printed and compiled it in Baltimore.)

The Poughkeepsie group thrust Rebecca into the 21st century with a Kindle book reader.  This is actually a very practical gift for us in Burundi since she does love to read and books are heavy to travel with and not readily available in Burundi.  She has already loaded it with North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell.

On Sunday we began the day with a worship service all together.  It was very nice to share together some songs with Rebecca playing the guitar.  We particularly liked one from the Mennonite Sing the Journey book called 'Rain Down'.  Rebecca did say a few words about how overwhelmed she felt in being loved by so many people over so much of her life that would make the time and effort to be with her to celebrate this occasion with her.

We began packing and getting ready to go midday and did some final photos with different groups of friends.  I am including many photos here and have a link to a picasa web site here.  (Rebecca's 40th Charter Hall) for anyone who wants to see more.

We left in the early afternoon and returned to Baltimore where we are currently staying at Dave and Jean's house.  This week is full of doctors and dentist appointments for all of us but we will be leaving again Friday for a vacation with my family on North Carolina's outer banks.

I probably won't post again for several weeks, but look forward to seeing friends in Poughkeepsie, Akron, PA, and elsewhere in the days ahead.  Back in Bujumbura August 22nd.

Bonus Photo:  Most of the group that was there are in this photo.

A Birthday, Anniversary, and Two Roadtrips

Our SALTers, Annie, Bethany, Janelle, donning African prints on their last night in Burundi.

Despite my tiredness this evening I am committed to getting this last post up before we get on a plane tomorrow evening and head out for our four week break in Baltimore.  I am, thankfully, at this point, back in Bujumbura at our house and have spent the good part of the afternoon cleaning it and getting it ready for our departure.

Our two SALTers from Rwanda are also here with us now, as I had picked them up on Sunday and returned with them on Monday.  Tonight we had all 3 SALTers over with Jennifer Price and Felix to celebrate a last meal here together.  It is hard to believe they have been here for an entire year already.  Or maybe it seems like they have been here for far longer.  Time is very elastic when one looks back over the recent and distant past.

Having guests over for dinner also gave us a good excuse to celebrate Rebecca;s Birthday this evening!  Timing is not perfect for this event as we are trying to get everything done before leaving, but this is a milestone year.  We had a nice dinner and Jennifer had brought over some amazing pastries and mini-cheesecakes from a very chic Belgian patisserie.  It was as good as any Birthday cake. 

I think we will celebrate both Oren and Rebecca’s Birthday with family on the night we arrive in Baltimore.

I mentioned shooting the rapids last week, and I guess now we are sort of in a pool at the end, but I do want to recount a bit the last 6 days that have brought us to this point. 

I believe I left off last week in Gitega, where I was playing host to our area director and US International program director.  Mark Sprunger is the former and Ruth Clemens the latter.  Ruth came with her husband Jonathan and daughter Hannah and got a whirlwind tour of Burundi. 

Having someone come for a 3 day visit and trying to show them as much of our program as possible is a challenge.  We do try to select to give a good cross section of our work.  We startedon Monday morning with a visit to our big food security partner Help Channel that does a food for work program involving reforestation.  This is where Jennifer Price is seconded.

After lunch, we left for Gitega on Monday afternoon and met our peace partner MiPAREC in the early evening.  Jonathan and Hannah took a tour of Gitega with Felix while Ruth, Mark, and I met with our partner.

We stayed the night in Gitega, The next morning we met a partner that does community development called UCPD.  They had a new technical education program supported by MCC in a nearby commune and we took a 45 minute drive out to see their activities.  We were able to see some of the trainings in action including a sewing workshop, a masonry class and a carpentry workshop.  It is always humbling to see the extent to which all of these skills are manual and not what it might be in our country.  There is no Home Depot, or power tools, or electricity for that matter.  The sewing machines are all pumped by foot, and all carpentry is done by hand tools, including planing lumber to make planks.  (You cannot really buy a readymade 2X4 or 1X8, you usually have to make it from some rough long cut logs.)  The kids, though, seemed serious and grateful to have a chance to work.  Most had to leave school because they could not pass the 6th grade national exam.  They found themselves out of work with few prospects.  We are hoping this program will give them a marketable skill that can be used in their community.

Joid's house

In the afternoon, we picked up Innocent, the director of UCEDD, who runs the Hope School for the Batwa.  We went with him down the very bumpy washboard road to Nyangungu where the school is located.  We arrived in the evening and got rooms at the Seminary in Burasira where we planned to stay the night.

Jodi Mikalachki, our former service worker who still lives in the area, very graciously offered to invite us all over for dinner.  So we went over to her house in the evening and had a very nice time visiting with her.  She is a great resource for experience in living and working in the context and had some stories to share about working at the school as well.

We slept well in the seminary despite the cold weather, and the ice cold showers the next morning.  It was very quiet there as the seminarians are all on summer holidays right now.

Welcoming ceremony

We walked up, after breakfast, the one kilometer hill to the school.  It was actually remarkable to see how much the area has changed.  The road at the bottom is being paved and will soon be a major route.  This certainly detracts from the quaintness of the area, but will probably do wonders for commerce, especially for some of the small farmers. Hopefully even some income generating activities for parents of the twa children who attend the school.  We walked past the construction and up through the Batwa quarter to give Ruth and family an idea about how the twa live and work here.  It is very evident that they are extremely impoverished, but there are also some encouraging signs like some good farming techniques, and even a few huts with a tin roof.  We also saw many samples of the gorgeous pots that are made by the women in the village. 

Although school was out, our visit t the school was somewhat fortuitous.  On the morning we went up, the grades from the national exams had just come back.  There are national exams at 6^th and 10^th grade.  In order to continue into 7^th or 11^th grades, they must pass the tests.  Success rate in Burundi are notoriously low compared to our ‘no child left behind’ mentality.  Typically a school will be able to get 40 percent or less to pass. 

Meeting with parents and taachers at the Hope School

The Hope School blew us all away this year by having a success rate of 62% in the primary school and of the 11 tenth graders 7 succeeded (4 boys, 3 girls).   Three of the boys were batwa.  Even more impressive to me was a young man named Alexandre who is a twa and began school in the nursery school Hope School opened  (It started as a nursery school).  He continued to advance each year after that as the school added a grade each year from 1st -10th grade.   They added the 10^th grade this past year.   He graduated, the first and is the first and only one thus far to come through from the beginning, and he is looking at going into a premed program for the superior cycle of secondary school.  (The French system is somewhere between highschool and junior college at this level.)  If he succeeds he could be eligible to go on to University.  In my view, this could be a huge encouragement for that community to see one of their own go through the Hope School and go on to medical school. 

Our group did see the school, despite the fact it was not in session.  And we were greeted by a group of parents who did some traditional Batwa welcome dances for us.  After that they joined us in a classroom where we had a meeting with parents, teachers and students who had come to see us.  We had a very interesting exchange talking about the rewards and challenges of the school.  I encouraged the parents there to see us as parents as well, rather than donors as we discussed the challenge of educating our children.

3 Graduates, Alexandre is on the right.

Alexandre, the young boy who finished 10^th grade was there and I was able to ask him a question:  "Alexander, you and your classmates told us in our last meeting that the biggest obstacles that you face to succeed in school were 1) hunger, and 2) lack of light to study at night.  Despite these obstacles, you succeeded to finish all the way to 10th grade.  To what do you owe your success?"

He answered humbly, "There is only one reason for my success.  And has been by the grace of God, who has helped me succeed."  

Innocent added that certainly that is true, but that he should not discount his personal perseverance in the struggle succeed in school.

After the parents meeting, about noon, we headed back to Gitega to drop off Innocent and then headed back down to Bujumbura.  It was a long day of driving and we were happy to get back to Buja in the early evening.  

Us with Felix, Ruth, Hannah, Jonathan.

Thursday everyone was leaving.  Ruth and family were heading to Bukavu to see the MCC DRC program and Mark was going back to Nigeria.  I did manage to beg off driving Ruth and family to Bukavu as I was completely worn out, and Felix offered to take them for me.  That was also good because it meant that I could work during the day and have the evening free to celebrate Rebecca's and my Anniversary (our 9^th).

Jennifer Price offered to babysit the kids and we were able to go out to dinner at a restaurant called La Palmaraie.  We had a very nice dinner together and enjoyed the short respite before the final push.

Rebecca who had been home with the kids the whole time and holding down the fort now had to go into high gear.  She was preaching this past Sunday, and was given a topic, in our reconciliation series, to deal with the question of justice and restitution.  She took time on Friday and Saturday to prepare, although we did take a bit of time off Saturday afternoon to swim with the kids. 

Saturday evening we went out to eat again at an Indian restaurant Tandoor because we had to have a brief business meeting with someone from MRDF (Andrew Edwards) who works with one of our partners.  We had a nice chat and the Indian food there was not bad at all.

Sunday Rebecca preached and really hit the nail on the head.  She talked about justice and restitution from the point of view of the offender and the victim.  She used the story or Zaccheus and made the point that while the offender may offer restitution freely, it is not a prerequisite for grace nor forgiveness.  Christian forgiveness, even for the Christian victim needs to come, not conditioned on restitution, but as a free act.  (caveat: This may take a great deal of time, of course.)

She also challenged the church further to seek out the offender and not just the victim.  The church community needs to reach out to support both victims AND offenders.  Jesus was certainly an example of that.  She gave the example of someone who is beating his wife and how the community must respond both to protect the wife, but also to bring the man into a place of accountability and work to bring him to a place of repentance and restoration.  (The mistake that is made is to think such problems are merely between a husband and a wife in Christian community.)

The sermon was a big challenge for the church here because ministering to victims is normal here, but the idea that the sinner (the offender) should be sought like a lost sheep is a very strange idea.  Excommunication is a common practice here for any number of small infractions so the idea of working to restore a fallen member is quite foreign to most people here.

Sunday afternoon I took the car and headed back to Rwanda.  I was heavily loaded with a basket of fruit that easily weighed 90 pounds.  We had bought 2, one for the host family in Rwanda and one for the one in Burundi.  Rebecca was going to a dinner on Sunday evening in Burundi with the latter and I was going to go to a dinner with the Rwandese family. 

I got to Kigali about 6 pm and met Bethany and her host mom and dad about 7pm.  They were all very worn out as a result of the day's festivities prior to my arrival, but custom really dictates that we share a meal, so we went out to a restaurant.  We asked what they had ready so it would not be too long a wait and they told us brouchettes.  But despite their assurances, the cooking time took a full hour, so we did not leave until about 10 by the time we were done.  It was the right thing to do, but none of us were completely up to it given our exhaustion.

I spent the night at a guesthouse then went back and picked up Bethany then Annie at the house on the church compound.  There were quite a few farewell wishers including all of Bethany’s students from the technical training school (Mwana Nshuti).

We drove back to Bujumbura without incident and arrived Monday afternoon.  I had intended to start the blog then but was too wiped out and fell  asleep quite early.

It is now about 11:30pm and we have a big day tomorrow, although we do not fly out until about 8pm.  We will be traveling back with the 3 SALTers, just the way we came a year ago.  We are a bit ahead of the curve with packing and housecleaning for once.  Hopefully we can stay that way up until we leave.  We will send the kids to play school tomorrow so they will not mess up the house again. 

Prayers for a safe journey home.  Will post again in a week or two.

Bonus photo:  Our SALTers a year ago when we met them at Dulles.  

Shooting the Rapids

David, completely beat after returning home from Kigali.



If I was going to characterize these last 2 weeks as rapids on a river I would say they are number 4 at least, and we are paddling down them in a kayak using every ounce of strength and focus to keep from being capsized.  Even taking a moment to try to write this at 4 in the morning feels like snatching a brief gasp of air before being pulled back into the raging flume.

I don't exactly know how we ended such a busy year with such a tremendous flurry of activity, but that is exactly what has happened.

I am calling this year end for several reasons even though it is July. One is that we did in fact arrive in July of 2008 so the 18th, our day of departure for homeleave marks the official end of our 4th year and beginning of our 5th year here. But also it feels like Rebecca and I have generally used the time back in the US to review and evaluate our priorities and set new goals and ways of working in the coming year.

We went into last year knowing this would probably be our hardest year, but it is surprising how relentless the work seems to be especially at the very end.

For me this has been because of the extensive amount of travel upcountry and into Rwanda that has been necessary. I will go out and back from Bujumbura every single week in July until we leave on the 18th. Driving upcountry at all is treacherous and takes a toll mentally and physically. We do try to limit our visits to partners to twice a month. But we have had to forgo that limit this month.

This cascade of travel began last Sunday when our family left after church to spend a week in Rwanda. We had several reasons to be gone this long, one reason was to see partners, but the second was to meet our area director Mark Sprunger in Kigali as he was flying in late Sunday night. The day we left was actually Burundi Independence day (50th).  We had some concerns that we would have difficulty traveling because of closed roads,  butthe main activities were actually planned for Monday so we missed most of the problems of traffic jams and closed routes due to parades, etc. by leaving on Sunday.

We had seen quite a bit of preparations for parades with soldiers marching in the Ciy. For those of you who have missed the opportunity to see parades in small third world countries, they do not resemble Macy's Day much, but feature mostly marching brigades of armed soldiers, military equipment, armored vehicles, helicopters, etc. This year was Burundi's 50th anniversary so it was a big one. One nice thing to see was the extent to which the city streets were cleaned up, curbs were white washed, statues and monuments were repainted, flags were hanging on every street light. It was quite an improvement.

I believe I mentioned in last weeks blog that was posted from Kigali, when we got there, that Mark arrived about 3 in the morning on Monday and I got him at the airport. Interestingly, Rwanda was also celebrating its 50th anniversary of Independence, and Monday was a holiday so we were not really able to do any work. We did do some shopping for things we can't get easily in Burundi and then spent the rest of the day meeting with Mark and briefing him on what we would be doing with him during the week.

We actually had two main activities, one was to visit a refugee camp where our partner the Friends Church is intervening, and the other was to participate in a 3 day strategic planning meeting for an annual event called the Great Lakes Initiative, sponsored by Duke University that we participate in every year. With the kids with us in Rwanda we again used our divide and conquer strategy with me leading the refugee camp visit and Rebecca taking the work responsibility for the GLI meeting.

On Tuesday Mark and I, along with 2 of our partners from the Friends Church made a 3 hour trip to Kigeme refugee camp in Southern Rwanda. This is not the same refugee camp I had visited several week ago in Northern Rwanda but is connected. The previously mentioned camp was in Northern Rwanda right across the border from Goma. That was in fact a transit camp for new arrivals, but the one in Southern Rwanda is a place where the Congolese refugees arriving from Goma will ultimately be brought for long term care and protection.

Perhaps many readers have heard about the uptick in recent months of violence and instability in Eastern DRC with the defection of a tutsi militia called the CNDP from the Congolese army now calling themselves M-23, who have destabilized the region. At this point they have effectively routed the army, many of whom have fled to Uganda and have moved in as close as 10 miles from the city Goma.

There are more than 13,000 refugees that have come over to Rwanda in the past 2 months, most Kinyarwand speaking Congolese who feel threatened by the Congolese army themselves. They are being relocated south to the new camp little by little and during our visit there were about 5000 there already, and arriving at a rate of about 500 per day by UNHCR truck. (loaded more like cargo than people as we saw several passing us on the road.)

I have to say, in our visit to the newly set up camp, things looked quite neat and orderly. There were thousands of UNHCR tents in neat lines, with latrines every few hundred meters, health stations, etc. I am sure by the time there are 13,000 living here for several years it will not look so good, but it is clear the UNHCR is trying to be well prepared.

Generally all work done by other NGO's in the camp is coordinated by the UNHCR according to the capacities of the actor. Some deal with health, sanitation, maternal care, child care, schooling, etc. The Friends Church will be providing conflict resolution training and trauma healing workshops as these are quite necessary in a crowded camp with traumatized people.

Mark, myself and our 2 colleagues from the Friends Church met with the Rwandese local authorities and UNHCR reps at the camp and discussed our partner's intervention. We also took a tour of the camp and interviewed several refugees. One family invited me into their tent. It was actually one of the newer UN tents that looked kind of like some kind of white polar exploration tent. It was fairly roomy until you consider that it sleeps a family of 8 and all living and cooking supplies. It was pretty much bare except for a couple of cooking pots and a mattress. It is hard to believe this will probably be their home for many years.

It is an odd thing to see this 'tent city'. All the orderly white tents make it seem like some kind of gigantic scout jamboree. Some of the refugees who had been business people have already set small booths selling various things, others have their sewing machines out making clothes. It is difficult to imagine that this will become a town with schools, a governing body health facilities, counseling, some income generating activities, etc. It is even harder to imagine oneself in this situation when one sees it.

There are at least 2000 children even at this early point. Many followed us around and asked us for things like balls or other things to play with. At this point, nothing like that has been provided, hopefully Save the Children will be setting up its activities soon as they will be providing things for kids to do here.

We returned to Kigali the same day which meant about 6 hours of driving. Actually we had a bit of unexpected car trouble in Kigali when we got back in rush hour and had to ascend a very long steep hill in creeping traffic. My transmission started to overheat so we had to pull over to let it cool before we could get back to our hotel. Not a major problem but delayed our return until about 8pm.

On Wednesday we had a plan to move to a different guest house in another part of town where the GLI strategic planning meeting was taking place. Although it was a bit inconvenient, it was well worth the effort as we were being hosted by GLI who paid for our room and board.

We settled in at the new place, a guest house owned by an NGO called ALARM that does work training Christian pastors in leadership and community development. There were about 4 people who had arrived from Duke including Father Emmanuel Katongole (who I have written about in previous blogs). There were also other stakeholders from Burundi, Rwanda, Kenya, and Tanzania. Meeting began on Wednesday evening and there were morning and afternoon sessions on Thursday and Friday.

There was a great deal of discussion about the mission, vision, and support of the Initiative in the years to come and who would be taking on responsibilities for its continuation. It has been perceived as a valuable convening point for Christian leaders of influence in the region from Sudan to DRC. It is based on the idea that as leaders are transformed individually, they will transform their communities. It has been a forum for lament (regret) as well as renewal. One of the challenges is that while this work seems extremely valuable, its impact is hard to measure in any kind of metric way. This makes support from NGOs somewhat difficult as measurable results are often a criterion for support. Among the discussion topics was how one might be able to measure impact through follow-up with past alumni.

I, of couse, was getting all of this second hand as I was on child care duty. The property at the guest house was quite big so we did some exploring, played frisbee, did water colors, and watched movies while Rebecca and Mark were in the meeting on Thursday.

On Friday, we went to a playground in the morning. I would say it was almost an amusement park, near the center of town. It had several rides including a choo-choo train and a merry-go-round. The most impressive feature, though, was a gigantic bouncy kingdom. It was 60 feet long and 40 feet wide and had numerous thing on it including a castle with a bridge, tunnel, and many other features. It was the highlight of the park and the kids played on it quite a bit.

Friday evening the meetings ended and we headed back to Bujumbura with Mark on Saturday morning. We were back on Saturday afternoon and had a quite dinner at home. It was honestly a huge relief to be back. There were several reasons for this, one is that Kigali was really cold, especially in the mornings. I should note that although it is the dry season here, the weather is actually colder this time of year because Rwanda and Burundi are south of the equator and this is our winter. By cold I mean it is in the low 60s in the morning, but that feels cold to us. I know that there are heat waves in the US at this time of year, so it might be hard to imagine us freezing over here in what probably feels like air-conditioning there, but we are pretty acclimatized to the mid 80s temperature that is normal here during the day most of the year.

The other problem is that we have all been sick in one way of another, mainly colds and sinus infections, although David has also had a bout of diarrhea. It is better to be sick at home then traveling where do not have our medicines and other conveniences on hand.

Sunday morning was back to work again as instead of going to our church with Rebecca and the boys, I took Mark to one of the emerging Mennonite Churches in town. (Mennonite Bretheren) as the pastor there has been begging me to come and see how they are doing for quite some time. Although MCC has no formal obligation or relationship to the church, I do go from time to time as a courtesy. Also it was a chance for Mark to see what was going on there.

Interestingly, the Tanzanian Ambassador to Burundi was also there as he is Mennonite and goes from time to time. One reason I am a bit uncomfortable about going is that it does reinforce a somewhat misguided desire by the pastor to court mzungus and reinforces their belief that until a church has some kind of official 'white' backing an presence it is not really legitimate. It is hard to break this mentality, especially when it is coming from an African who is explaining it to you in all sincerity and treating you like a guest of honor. We try to explain that the church is legitimate because it is a gathering of the community for worship here and does not need to have any mzungu stamp of approval or support to be vital and a place where God is present. Unfortunately there needs to be a lot undoing of neo-colonial evangelical ideology before many Christians here (especially pastors) will accept this.

On Sunday afternoon we had the arrival of our next set of visitors. Ruth Clemens, MCC director of International programs for the USA. She came with her husband Jonathan and 15 yo daughter Hannah. Mark and I met them at the airport and brought them to our house. (Oren and David graciously gave up their room and new bunk bed.) It was great to see them since they also happen to be members of our home church in Baltimore, but also opened the next chapter of responsibility for showing her the work in our program as this will probably be her only visit during our time here as reps.

We began on Sunday evening by inviting our team members from Burundi to meet her for dinner. We prepared a big spaghetti meal and put 2 tables together in our dining room. We were 12 together with Felix, Jennifer, Janelle and Yolanda joining us. It was a very pleasant evening as we do like to get together with our team. We all went to bed early though shortly after it was over as we have been feeling more and more exhausted after each day.

Monday almost felt like a routine in that Rebecca and I got up early and took the kids to summer school. (it is being offered at the Ecole Belge to kids who are hanging around for the summer.) We even went swimming after dropping them off. But the routine ended there as we began our meetings with Ruth and introductions to partners.

I took Ruth and Mark to Help Channel while Rebecca took Jonathan and Hannah for a tour of the Central Market. At noon we picked up the kids and went home for lunch, then Me, Mark, Felix, Ruth, Jonathan, and Hannah headed upcountry to Gitega while Rebecca stayed home with the kids. I am writing this blog in Gitega early Tuesday morning but will post it on Wednesday evening when we return as there is no internet here. I will talk about the events this week in my next post, the last, in Burundi before we leave.

I do have one more trip next week to Rwanda before we go to pick up the SALTers, so please pray for us to be able to keep up the decent 'through the whitewater rapids' to the end of the run without tipping over. Either way, I will let you know.

Kids Week: Oren's 7th and the End of School

David's class had a facepainting day in the last week of school.

It is getting past 9pm here in Kigali and I have made a vow to get this blog out before I fall asleep.  This seems especially important because we will be in Kigali for the week and the activities here have little or no connection to what happened last week, so I want to make sure I can write about them separately.

We are now finished with the kids school and just 2 weeks away from our 4 week homeleave.  I am trying not to count the days, but truth be told, I have been experiencing the now familiar ‘compassion fatigue’ phenomenon where you just feel a bit too invaded by need and desperate requests for help that begin to swallow you up.  I feel a real desire to scream and beat the obdurate beast of poverty with a stick.   But of course that never works. It might cower momentarily in a corner but springs back out at you the minute you let down your guard.

Oren and M. Mai Violaine his teacher.

For those who have had compassion fatigue, you know what all that means.  All that to say, we are looking forward to a chance to step away and reset a bit.  The remaining days will hopefully pass very quickly because our schedule in them is just short of insane in terms of travel and work.  We will be going to Rwanda at least once more, maybe twice, and doing an extensive tour of rural Burundi as well.  The reason for all this activity has to do with a visit from Mark Sprunger our Area Director, followed by a visit from Ruth Clemens (and her husband Jonathan and daughter Hannah).  She is the program director for MCC USA.  She is also a friend so we are happy to host them, but it does mean a lot of driving around to see our projects.

David and M. Balthazar, his teacher.

Finally, in the last days before we leave, I will go back up to Kigali to get Bethany and Annie, our SALTers in Rwanda who will accompany us back to the US (with Janelle) as that will be the end of their term.  The logistics behind all of this is understandably stressful, not to mention the continuous driving up and down the treacherous route from Buja into the interior. 

I was reminded of that again yesterday when we drove to Kigali.  You really have to be a very good defensive driver in order to avoid a wreck each time you go, because being a good driver is not enough.  There are times on each trip that you have to make evasive maneuvers to avoid a car, truck or bus coming at you in your lane.

Oren and class at the zoo.

But we are here in Kigali, arriving yesterday evening about pm.  Mark Sprunger arrived from Addis about 2 am and I was voted to go get him, so I have felt a bit out of it all day as a result.

But I will save some of the news for this week for a later date because last week was really quite full and needs some space for elaboration.

It was, in fact, the last week of school for the kids, and also the last quasi-normal week for us until our return from the US in the fall.  What I mean by quasi-normal is that while we did not do any traveling, it was not without its complications.  It seems that the last week of the Ecole Belge is really play time.  The kids each had various field trips and special activities which required unusual pick-ups and drop-offs that kept us running around most days.  It was particularly hard because these were not coordinated between the kids so one day Oren’s class would be going to the zoo and the next day David’s class went over to his teachers house.  

Oren and classmates, last week!

It was complicated but we did manage to get them to everything and there were some really great results as well.  On Wednesday,  for instance, I was very proud of Oren for advancing a rank in karate after failing at the past attempt about a month ago.  He actually really practiced and he looked really good to me doing his Kata’s for the class and his Sensei. 

What really struck me and made me happy was his own sense of achievement, and even seeing him have an ambition to achieve in karate.  I feel like the his lack of language comprehension that created such an impediment for him at the beginning of the year has been overcome and this has allowed him to understand what he is trying to do in the class.  He will get a second yellow bar on his belt before we go home for the summer. 

Thursday was another day of accomplishment for him as he got his report card and Rebecca went in for a teacher conference.  He has shown a lot of improvement in French comprehension, and did very well on his reading test.  Math continues to be his real forte though and he did very well in that. 

dinosaur piniata

The teacher did confirm that he continues to be stubborn in certain ways, but that he had made great strides in language learning.  I still marvel that he can read a book in French better than he can in English.  (It is interesting hearing him read an English book with all French phonemes.  He complains that English is not spelled right.)

Friday was the real highlight though.  It was Oren’s Birthday and it was really a full day’s celebration that actually began Thursday afternoon when he made chocolate cupcakes for his class and iced them and decorated them.

Dinosaur tag, David is 'it'.

What we did not know is that by Friday, so many of the kids had left that in the entire school it seemed there were only about 50 out of 600, and only about 3 in Oren’s class that day.  They still had fun and they shared the cupcakes with kids in other grades who were around. 

While the kids were at school and Rebecca was at work I was busy preparing the house for a party including clearing out the living room, making a piniata and generally cleaning up.  Rebecca has ordered a cake and finished off the decorations on it with some plastic dinosaurs (It was a dinosaur themed party).

We also reserved a bouncy castle for 3 hours.  (Submitting to the cultural requirements of kids’ Birthdays here.)  We made a ton of food and decided to have fresh lemonade as the main beverage.  Marceline and Odifax harvested about a bushel of lemons off of the trees in our yard and made several gallons of lemonade from  them. 

Guests started arriving about 3pm, and although many of his school friends were already gone, there were enough friends around to have a pretty big party.  Among the guests were Emily and Rebecca (Kirsten’s daughters), Astrid and Travis’ family (Noni, Zoey, Davine, Yaida and Jasmine), Naja brought Elias and Aviaja, there were some friends from Sunday school as well, Janette brought her sons Samuel and Josiah, and Joy and Jessie’s son Zack came.

I think they all had a lot of fun.  They played dinosaur tag, and a parachute game where they had to sit on the floor with their feet underneath it and had to try not be ‘eaten’ by the creature that was underneath.  Oren opened his presents with the group and then we had a long piniata breaking activity followed by cake. 

Fortunately Marceline stayed around for the whole party and helped serve and clean up. 

People headed home about 7pm.  It was a good time for kids and adults.  We did say some goodbyes as several were on their way out that week for the summer or for good. 

We were pretty worn out by the weekend and laid low most of Saturday.  Oren really did not want to leave the house, but wanted to play with his presents all day.  He really got exactly what he wanted… a dinosaur poster, a solar system poster, an anatomy book, a Spiderman game, a lego kit, and some smaller toys that he really loved.  I think either Rebecca tipped some people off or else other parents just knew what 7 year olds love.  (He is really into science these days and dinosaurs.)

bouncy castle!

David also had a good week despite having a cold.  He really enjoyed the Birthday and wants to know when his Birthday is coming.  His school class did some fun activities including face-painting one day, and on the last day of school he was invited to his teacher’s home to play in her yard and have lunch.  He did seem to do well this year in school although he is not speaking French yet. 

Both of the boys are really looking forward to getting back on the big airplane to Baltimore.  They are here in Kigali with us this week.  Hopefully Rebecca and I will be able to tag team them successfully in a way that allows us to get their work done. 

Most of the Birthday pictures were taken by Marceline.  For more Birthday pictures go to my picasa site on this link: Oren’s 7th