Road to Rwanda-----Walking Home, part 2, the next morning.

 Sequel to yesterday's post about the little girl asking for money.  This morning when I was waiting for my ride, two young men (older teenage/20's) walked by.  One of them said, "Hi." I answered, "Hello." The other young man, rubbed his stomach and said, "I am hungry."  I put a disgusted look on my face and waved my hand to tell him to go away.  The first young man said, "That is rude, isn't it?" I agreed.  We talked for a bit about how rude it was and that he needed to tell his friend.  By this time the second young man had walked on a few steps and was laughing.  I assume there was no hunger involved.  And although I may have supported the cultural norms, and stopped some other musungu (foreign white person) from being bothered and helped the gentlemen see that it was inappropriate, .....but I can't help wondering how it possibly shared Christ's love.

Road to Rwanda----Walking Home

 When we are living cross cultural, one spends a great deal of time trying to figure out just what to do in certain situation.  As I walk the mile home from school every day I see well over a 100 people on the road. (Rwanda is one of the most highly populated rural countries in the world, probably the highest in Africa.)  A few times a week, someone comes and walks with me for a ways.  Sometimes we talk in English, and sometimes in another something else....which I do not understand, but the exchange is nearly always pleasant.  Today though a little girl was sitting beside the road.  She was about 11 or so and had on a school uniform, although it was quite old and ragged.  (Rather unusual because Rwandas dress exceptionally nicely if they can.)  I would assume she is poor, but the country does take care of its citizens so I assume she was not starving and she did not look like she was.  She saw me as I passed and said, "Give me money," in English.  This is a phrase we hear fa

Road to Rwand----Wildlife

 We have spectacular birds here.  As I walked home yesterday, there were two green parakeets at my feet, not a foot away, eating beside the road side.  There is an irridescent large ibis who feeds on our common green space at school.  A few days ago as we stood outside in a circle for morning devotions. there was a brilliant red bird with a black stripe on his wings matching the red flowers on the tree he was crawling around in. Every morning we wake up to the screeching of what we assumed were crows.  It sounded  like crows. But we finally saw them flying and squawking.  They are medium sized, long billed, long necked ibis, flying over head. This particular pair has a nest we can observe high in the tree as we wait for our ride in the morning.   But we also have other wildlife, not that we have necessarily seen them yet.  Of course, there are the mountain gorillas, which bring thousands of visitors per year ( maybe per month) to our town.  But there is more.  As we were reading "

Road to Rwanda---Weekends

 A long-napped Sunday afternoon.  I have continued to be pretty tired every day, but it is some better.  We are enjoying ourselves.  Saturday afternoon we spent 4 hours playing "Chicken Foot", a domino game with 7  other ladies.  It was at a gorgeous brick home built by a missionary who has since moved to another field.  It has about 5 bedrooms, and a small guest house.  When you look at these buildings (including the school's magnificent buildings) they are absolute miracles.  I was told this beautiful brick home and the land it was on cost about $80,000 USD.  And to think that each of these thousands and thousands of bricks were hand made.  The speed of construction here is also phenomenal.  I  am used to endless delays in any building project, but the work force here seems more than willing to put in the time and effort.  To finish off the Saturday evening was a meal made by the Zimbabwean friend.  It is nshima and relish that we enjoyed in Zambia 40 years ago: a corn

Road to Rwanda----Don't Quit!

  Don’t quit!   That was part of the pastor’s message this morning in church.   He was citing Ecclesiastes 3 where 28 different “seasons” we may meet in our lives are listed:   “A time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to reap.”   But at no point does it say that there is a time to quit.   Wow!   I needed that.   It was only a flashing, passing thought, but Friday afternoon, I thought, “I just want to go home!”   I think I have not really had that thought flash through my mind since about the first few months in Quito about 45 years ago, 1976.   It just is not something I think or feel.   And the thought was born after such inconsequential things. I have broken 3 staplers in 2 weeks.   (I think they were broken when they came to me, but regardless,) I cannot seem to find a working stapler, and I use staplers. Then the hard wooden desk chair that I had for the first week gave me horrible back aches after about 20 minutes of sitting on them.   I substituted a plastic cha

Road to Rwanda-----Kwita Izina

 Kwita Izina is the name of the Rwandan celebration to name the baby gorillas who were born in the past year.  Yesterday was the day.  There are huge groups of tourists and officials who arrived in Musanze (our location) to travel up into the mountains for the naming ceremony.  This year there are twenty babies born to about the 1,000 surviving mountain gorillas.  Rwanda is very conservation minded and jealously protects its gorillas, both for ethical reasons, but also because it is a major generator of funds for the economy.  There are many tours, hotels, etc. around our area.  What a wonder to live in a place this close to these majestic animals.