Oren preparing his two best toys, Alfie his spelling robot, and Cruncher his robot dinosaur, for our big moving sale.
Sunday afternoon.
Rebecca and Oren are upcountry on a trip to Buta. This is a sight where a group of Catholic
seminarians, Hutus and Tutsis, being educated together in a theology of unity
made the choice to die together rather than be separated ethnically by a rebel
group that attacked and ordered them to do so.
Rebecca will add a bit more on that next week,
particularly our decision to have her go up there with Oren (while she led a
pilgrimage with partners of the Great Lakes Initiative.) We felt it was important for him to see this
since he is old enough to understand what had happened and why.
This leaves David and I at home and for the first
time in what seems like weeks, we are actually alone in the house. He is watching a movie which has finally given
me time to get a few reflections down about the past week.
These last several weeks are as intense as we have
ever experienced in terms of being overburdened with responsibility along with
some very exciting arrivals of friends and others we want to see. Trying to sit down and write can seem
oppressive when you are trying sneak in a moment right before bed in which you
crash without so much as bathing, thoroughly exhausted.
It probably began this past Friday when we had a
huge moving sale to get rid of much of our furniture and other items. Oren and David had helped organize this, and
each had their own table of their toys to sell.
(They were going to be able to keep their money and buy stuff in the
US) Oren was definitely a hard-core
salesman. It was however, hard on them
and we had a few meltdowns in the process, but that is to be understood I
suppose as the try to process what is happening.
Last Saturday, though must be preserved for posterity. It was officially the last
folk dance we were hosting during our tenure here. We did four this year and since we arrived we
have usually hosted about one per quarter.
They have become very popular, particularly in the ex pat. missionary
community and we wanted to be sure that the word got out well in advance of our
plan to host one.
This one did not disappoint and we had a very large
number in attendance including most of our service workers, the new Reps, a
majority of our expat. friends, with newcomers to boot. We especially happy to have some our
Burundian members of our small group there as well.
The dances went well, and it is interesting to even
see an evolution of skill over time. We
have settled into a routing of alternating line dances with different folk
dances, mainly squares and cotillions.
But we did have a new hora and ceilidh (the Dashing White Sargeant).
Before the last dance we took some time to do some
speeches to say farewell and explain the significance of the dances to us in
terms of knitting together our community.
I read something I had written in a blog 2 years ago (May 2012), to
describe the experience we have had of dancing together here. I am putting that quote in below:
David doing Cotton-Eyed Joe |
It is at
the time of milestones that one feels inclined to reflect on the passage of
time, or in the case of living here, the passage of community. I can say
now as an International worker who has been in the same place for 4 years, the
meaning of the word 'community' has evolved for me. Rebecca and I are
very intentional about creating community around us. We did so in
Poughkeepsie and Baltimore and we have done so here as well. The
difference is that an expat community is somewhat unique. It sometimes
seems like a very intensely-colored fabric---a scarf or stole that is being
woven together at one end as rapidly as it is fraying and disappearing at the
other. At any moment it will be the same length as any other moment, but
the pattern will be entirely different.
And so it
is with our communities here. I marvel at how fast they have changed over
the years and yet seem at every moment to be in some way stable. There is
on the front end of the scarf the continual welcoming and inclusion of
newcomers and simultaneous heart-felt Adieux for
friends who are leaving for good at the back end.
One is
only a newcomer until someone else newer arrives, then the first newcomer
begins to take on roles of responsibility in the community and its sustenance.
At nearly 4 years Rebecca and I find ourselves in the company of a very
few people who have been here longer than us. There are a few 'senior
statesmen' life-time generational missionary families and a few expats who have
married Burundians and now call this home, but by and large we are the
oldtimers here. I realize that as time passes we will near and eventually
find ourselves at the unraveling end of the scarf and the threads of our lives
here will fray away leaving a continually mutating communal pattern making and
unmaking itself here in Burundi as people come and go.
The
tradition of doing a folk dance was one we inherited from a missionary family
named the Carrs. They hosted a Scottich Ceilidh from time to time which
was a lot of fun. We inherited the house and the tradition of holding
dances here. Their particular favorite was “Strip the Willow” which for
us Americans became the “Virginia Reel”. We usually end our parties with
this one, and it seems to fit aptly the community I described above that makes
and unmakes itself--continually progressing forward and unraveling at the end.
There is
also something unique and mysterious about a community that dances together,
especially this kind of structured social dance based on dancing figures and
interacting with almost everyone. It goes beyond what happens in
conversation or sharing food. I wish I could say what it is that is
special, but it seems to be such a ritual expression of what community is--a
vibrant changing, evolving pattern of relationships that create and dissolve
themselves in the perpetual rhythm of living in the moment---the present
experienced, instant by instant. The steps don't change in the Virginia
Reel but new dancers join each time we dance it here, often barely able to keep
up with the unexpected shift of unfamiliar patterns, while the more experienced
ones encourage them along in the routines that are as comfortable and
instinctive to them as a well worn path.
Needless to say, we did end with the Virginia Reel after our speeches (and counter speech in the Burundian style- delivered aptly by Simon Guillebaud, one of the ‘mutamas’ of the ex pat. Community.)
Afterward we did dance the Virginia Reel together and it
felt particularly significant dancing with Rebecca as my partner down the line
of people and back off the end. Each
lead couple finishes by making a sort of bridge which everyone passes under
leaving the leaders at the very end and a new lead couple to take control of
the dance.
We had a feast together and at the end, many of the
missionary families and service workers stayed around to pray for us. As usual, the dance ended and everyone was
gone by 9pm leaving us time to clean up before bed. I admit, I like parties that do not go too
late into the night these days.
Because of the dance, we have had many service workers around. Melody was down from Gitega and Julia and
Teresa were down from Kigali. We had a
full house. Jennifer and Matt were also
around quite a bit with them as well.
Our service workers are very easy to host though so there were no
complaints.
Sunday was a surprisingly quiet day and Rebecca and I were
actually able to take a nap in the afternoon while the kids played. We needed the rest after the party the day
before.
Stoner-Ebys meeting UCEDD in Gitega |
The week was a continuation of orienting the Stoner-Ebys and
we took some time to introduce them to partners in Bujumbura, and give them
some history of our work in the region. The previous week I had taken them to Gitega where we had met our 3 partners and two service workers there.
Tuesday and Wednesday of this week were particularly significant
orientation days as a donor named Robin Wilde who heads the Foundation for Hope
in Africa, a co-donor to the Hope School, was in town. He wanted to do some strategic planning at
the school, but also meet the new MCC Reps. to see if they could coordinate
some of their Hope School projects with MCC.
I know him quite well from previous trips here, but I wanted
him to meet the new Reps. so we made arrangements to go up the Hope School
together. We left Tuesday afternoon.
Pastor Wilde had brought his associate Roger, and the Stoner-Eby’s brought
their youngest son Luke.
It was exciting to me to be bringing everyone up together, (the Stoner-Ebys for
the first time.) We stayed the night at
the seminary. The priests and nuns were
happy to see us and insisted that Rebecca and the kids make one more trip up
before we leave town. We met Innocent
there that night and had some meetings about the possible construction of
classrooms for the superior cycle of secondary school.
Wednesday morning we went up to the school and were greeted
by drummers, dancers, a drummed skit, and many welcome speeches. It was a great day. We inspected the many completed projects, the
water catchment system, library, solar power, etc. and found it all in working
order.
We heard that there were 20 students sitting that day for
the national exam to go on to secondary school.
We met with the teachers and directors and talked about strategic
priorities. (Luke took this opportunity
to play football with some of the other kids who were kicking around their
plastic bag constructed soccer ball. (They only use the real ones during school
hours to protect them.)
We left Wednesday afternoon after having a big meal together
at the Seminary. It is very symbolic
here to share food as a sign of solidarity and the gesture, was much
appreciated.
We got home on Wednesday evening. The end of the week has had its share of new
challenges as arrivals for a final conference hosted by Rebecca begin to
arrive. We were able, however, to have a
meal with Simon and Lizzie Guillebaud this week. (Can’t remember the day.) Lizzie made a very tasty curry meal since we
were all lamenting the demise of Indian food in Burundi. (Actually knowing that the good Indian
restaurants are closed will make departing a tiny bit easier.)
I also did have a special lunch with Oren at Café
Gourmand-the best Belgian patisserie, in the Southern hemisphere. We have found the kids are starting to act
out a bit in strange ways and we are having a lot of conflict between
them. We sense that this is due to some
sub-conscious anxiety about all the upheaval they are seeing around them as the
house begins to get packed up and sold off.
They are particularly hard on each other, so we are trying to do things
separately with them.
Oren finished his first week of exams and has one week
left. He seems to be on top of his
reviews and we are praying for the best.
The end of this week has included some visits from special guests including Melody's parents and Yolanda (our service worker from last year) She is here doing research for her dissertation and joined us for yoga and Saturday morning. (I will add a picture to this post soon.)
Rebecca will be back in a few hours from her pilgrimage and
her return will be welcome. I am no
longer great at the bachelor life and many things are not being done, or
missing from the fridge.
We are nearing the last month of our time here, but will say
more about that later. We still have to
survive next week!
Bonus video, excerpt from little girls welcome dance
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