Finally Home!

I'm not even sure if anyone is still reading this.....but I thought I would do one last post to let everyone know that we are indeed home after the most horrible travel experience of our lives! We hit delays at EVERY airport we stopped. We were promised hotel vouchers to spend the night in Ethiopia because we arrived there at around 8pm Monday night and our connecting flight did not leave until 10:30 Tuesday night. It took 4+ hours, but our team leader was finally able to secure us a hotel for the night. Go Kevin! It was sometime after midnight when we finally arrived at the hotel and we were all very pleased with the accommodations. We put our stuff in our rooms and then went down to the restaurant for dinner (at 1am!?!?) The next day we decided to just stay put in the hotel for the day and rest. We just didn't want to take the chance of getting a flat tire or something crazy that would delay us in Ethiopia any longer. We all so desperately wanted to just get home!. So at around 7pm our shuttle arrived to bring us to the airport. It was POURING rain. The roads were not designed to handle such a thing. They were completely flooded. There were MANY cars and vans and busses lining the streets all stalled from trying to get through the rivers that had developed in the roads. I wasn't sure we would make it to the airport. I think we all started praying...."Please Lord, keep the engine dry...get us to the airport on time." We made it all the way to the airport ....almost....there was a round about that we needed to go around to bring us to the terminal and there was another bus stuck in a deep river of water! OH dear. It was still pouring and we had to try to turn the bus around with about three other vehicles surrounding us, but our driver was a pro and he got us as close as he could to the terminal and we just ran into the airport. We thought we had finally made it and we were on our way. We were, but we had no idea what was ahead. We left Addis Ababa on time and arrived in Rome on time as well. We were prepared for a 1 hour wait on the runway while the plane refueled. But then the crew could not find the right wrench ...yeah...they told us that! then they had to change the tires and they only had 1 tire and they needed to get one from another airline which would need to pass through customs and they said it would take a very long time. They kept us on that plane for over 5 hours! SERIOUSLY! No food and pretty much no service. All the flight attendants were hiding behind a curtain in the back and would not come out no matter how many times we pushed the button. It was so frustrating. Finally after 5 hours they let us off the plane and gave us a voucher for a meal in the airport. We went to redeem the voucher...I tried to get a slice of pizza with it and they said it was only redeemable for a pastry. GREAT! We waited another 3+ hours in the airport till we could get back on the plane for a 9 hour flight to Washington DC. We had already missed our flight out of Washington so we knew there was a possibility of not getting home Wednesday. Needless to say we were all so tired and depressed. We left the home of our missionary friends at 2pm on Monday and it was looking like we would not get home till Thursday at this point. We arrived in Washington at 4pm Wednesday afternoon and at 7pm we were still waiting for Ethiopian airlines to get us our boarding passes and luggage tags for the new flight scheduled to leave at 10pm. After 3 hours of terrible service where they basically left us standing in an area and kept leaving the desk over and over again...we gave up on Ethiopian and walked up to the ticket counter of United and got our boarding passes ourselves. We got some dinner and then just waited to board the last plane on our crazy journey home. We landed at 11:43pm in Manchester, NH. We probably had to wait about 40 minutes for our luggage to come through since there were 3 flights that landed at the same time and only one crew! Finally we left the airport 12:30ish and headed home. We got home at 1:30am Thursday. I can't tell you how great it was to sleep in my own bed next to my best friend. Thanks for following our journey. It was amazing and I would do it again in a heartbeat...the amazing things we experienced were worth the arduous journey home...but I don't think I'll fly Ethiopian again. God bless!

Last full day in Rwanda

We went to Pastor Pease’s chruch for sunday morning service and had a great time there again. She is one of very few female pastors in Kigali and it was neat to be in her church and support her in an area that doesn’t always embrace her. At 2 o clock, Kayla went with part of the team to go see the latest well that was dug as a result of the funds that were raised by Grace Capital Church. Some of you may remember that Kayla did a pancake breakfast last year to raise money toward this effort. It was pretty cool that she got the opportunity to see the fruits of that labor. Some of the women and children that use that particular well were there so they got to interact with some of the 3000 people who now have clean water to drink! How cool is that?!
I went to the orphanage again for a visit. I was able to meet with the Mother Superior and show her the recent pictures of JP and how he has grown. She did remember us and him. That was cool. But the rest of the visit was bittersweet. Good to interact and shower some love on the kids, but hard too for lots of reasons.
I stopped at a downtown market after as I was looking for a few specific things to bring home that I couldn’t find at the local market. Sunday night we had our final team meeting and it was a really good meeting. We all got to share and be honest and brainstorm how we might do things differently next time. All in all the trip was remarkable with not much room for improvement but in hindsight we found areas where we should have done more planning ahead of time.

Umuganda

Not sure if I spelled that correctly but the last Saturday of the month in Rwanda is called Umuganda. It is when no one is allowed on the streets (in cars) between the hours of 8-12. Each person in the community is to report to their community director in the morning to find out what the "chore" is for the day. It is often related to fixing the roads, or trimming back trees and bushes, things like that. We opted to stay on the property of our missionary friends and help them do some projects around the house. I helped Rich organize his storage room for all the equipment and medical supplies for the different ministries that they do. It was uneventful except for the huge rat that was hiding in there and ran out. fortunately I was outside the storage room at that point and I just heard Robin yell and then the dogs went crazy! I guess it was a pretty big rat. I'm glad I didn't see it myself. YUCK!
Later in the afternoon we headed out to the same village to do another outreach there. We were actually surprised to see that there were about the same number of people there as last night. The children were all waiting in the church building. We divided them into groups and did crafts with them....simple things, like paper airplanes, stickers and crayons to decorate paper plates and balloons. They had fun and when it was time to start the worship we had all the kids line up and as they left the building we passed out toothbrushes and a small treat to everyone. Once the music started my buddy and dance partner from the night before found me and led me into the crowd. I knew it was one of my last opportunities to dance with my African friends so I danced until the music stopped even though my body was saying "stop". We showed a Veggietale video and as it was nearing the end we felt a few raindrops so we had to kick it into high gear and get all the equipment packed up before it got wet and ruined. It made our goodbyes very fast and for the most part it was ok but my friend Diane came up to me as I was getting ready to jump in the vehicle and she pointed to herself and then to the car. She wanted to come with me. OUCH. I had to say "oh yah", which means "no" in Kinyarwanda and while I have said this phrase many times this week...this was different and hard. All I can do is pray.

Friday

We started our day by going to a church that has a ministry for some of the street boys around Kigali. The young boys are placed in a home with a house mom in charge. The older boys are trained with some remedial skills to get them ready for schooling. Once they show that they have potential to succeed in school they are provided with the school fees so that they can begin or continue their education. They just had one of their boys pass the national exam and will go to university. He wants to study journalism.
They have formed a soccer team that competes in various tournaments and Bow school district donated some of their soccer jerseys for these boys. I wish I had video of their faces and could record the cheers that erupted when we showed them the jerseys. It was really cool to see their appreciation. We set up stations where we were going to do crafts with them, give them new underwear, and provide some basic medical attention. The director of this ministry was then trying to organize the boys into groups to determine who was in need of medical attention and so she asked who needed to be seen and 80% of the hands went up. Then Rich (our missionary friend) told the boys that he would be the one providing the medical attention and not all these beautiful girls. Then he said, "So who now needs to be seen?" About 50% of the hands went down! So funny!
I helped Rich with the medical stuff and Kayla helped with the craft station. We had the men of the team distribute the underwear we brought. You would think that giving out underwear seems a little odd....but to these boys it is a luxury...when you have a little bit of money and you are hungry....you will buy food and live without something so basic as underwear.
After lunch we went to visit with some local widows that survived the genocide and hear their story. I think that Pastor Kevin captured Beatrice's story so well...so I highly recommend you go to his blog and read about this amazing woman and see for yourself the wounds that she has endured. Go to www.kevintwombly.com and click on the link to his blog. It's worth it. It's powerful!
We ended the night with an outreach. We arrived at a church with a large field on the property. There were at least 100 people there already...mostly children. It was not long before the crowd grew to about 300. We started with them leading us in worship on the field beside the church. We had brought microphones a projector and a screen and keyboard. All the children wanted to dance with us and it was a blast! so much fun to dance with them and share their joy...it was contagious! The low point of my day came when Moses called me over to pray for a young girl who told him that she has no where to go. Both parents had died and she was in an orphanage and a couple came to adopt her, but once she arrived home with them, they only wanted a house girl and they mistreated her. So she is now on the street and she just knocks on different houses each night asking for a place to sleep. It was awful. Again, I am overwhelmed with a feeling of helplessness.....what really can I do? I can't just take her home with me as much as I might have wanted to! So I do all that I can. I pray with her and for her and I trust that God will protect her and give her a HOME, not just shelter for a night. Moses gave her his contact info and he will try to follow up on her. Her name is Diane. Pray for her!

Thursday in Rwanda

Our day started out by visiting a home of 10 boys that live together with a house mom and they are all street boys that have been given a place to live. We brought crafts and spent about an hour just doing crafts with them. They loved it. So did we! They were full of smiles and hugs.
We then made our way into the downtown area of Kigali to meet with our sponsor children. To be honest I was a little nervous. I wondered if it would awkward...if he would be shy...if he would speak english....if we would sit in silence and just smile....I just didn't know what to expect. It turned out to be a really special time. Aloys is a very sweet, polite and kind boy. He had a quiet demeanor about him but I wouldn't say he was shy. He asked Kayla and I lots of questions about our family and schools etc. Brayden had written him a letter hoping to start a pen pal relationship and Aloys seemed happy about that and even wrote him back a letter for me to bring home with me. He is doing very well in school and wants to be either a doctor or engineer someday. His favorite subject is math and he also really liked biology...makes sense. We spent the last 1/2 hour sitting in the hallway of the Nu-vision office in a circle with all the sponsor kids and teammembers. We played name games and another "circle" game and it was really fun to see the kids come to life and smile and we all really connected. It turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the day! When we were ready to leave, Aloys, Kayla and I joined hands and prayed over him. He is such a sweetheart and I am so so glad we had the opportunity to meet him.
Then after lunch, a few of us went back to Mama Clementine's to bring her some chicks so that she can raise them and then sell them and be able to provide for her 8 children. I could not believe how good the kids looked....when we were there earlier in the week the babies had conjunctivitis and lots of congestion. the congestion was still there....but their eyes were clear and they were so playful and had lots of energy. The tiny one, Divine, was so stinkin cute. We filled a water bottle with small stones and made a rattle for her and once she got the hang of it she just walked around shaking that bottle and handing it to everyone to take a turn shaking it. She was so cute. Got lots of pictures again.
We had a great team meeting last night and then a movie night for those that were not too tired! A really good day in Rwanda!
I will post pictures later....they take forever to load!

Safari Day

Kayla writes
Today we woke up really early and got ready to go on our safari. On our way to the park Jonathan had to go to the bathroom so we had to stop at some random persons house and ask if he could use the bathroom. The woman graciously let him in and even offered some of her plants for toilet paper (he didn’t take her up on that offer). When he got back into his car I just kept thinking how that would’ve never happened in America. And I was just thinking how different we are compared to the people here. We always expect the worst in people. But that’s another topic all together. It took us 2 1/2 hours to get to the park and even before we entered the park we started seeing animals. We started to see zebras, gazelles, and antelopes. We had to take 2 cars because there were so many of us. The tour guide came into our car and was telling us all of the different facts about all the animals we saw. The first animals we saw were water bucks and gazelles. The roads were so bumpy!! But it was so much fun!! We kept having to go off the road to see all the animals. Then we saw more zebra and antelope. There were so many zebra and antelope and gazelle!! Then we went off the road again saw a HUGE herd of water buffalo!!! It was kinda scary because we were so close and there were so many of them!! Needless to say we all stayed in the cars! All throughout the ride we kept seeing 3 warthogs and we kept trying to chase them and get a picture of them but they ran so fast it took us so long before we could get a picture of them! Kevin was trying so hard to get a picture of them and our tour guide was like ok lets get back on the road now and Kevin wouldn’t listen and was trying so hard to get a picture of them. It payed off! Then we saw GIRAFFES!!! I was so excited!! My life is now complete!! The first time we saw them there were 2 adults and 2 babies! They are so pretty and it is so much cooler to see them in person and up close without a fence between you like at the zoo. But we couldn’t get too close because we didn’t want to scare them off. Then on our way back our tour guide asked if we wanted to see them again so we turned off the road again and found 6 or 7. After we saw them and took pictures we got back on the road and just for fun Kevin tried to hit all the potholes and go through all the puddles. It was fun!! When we got back to the main office we had lunch and headed back home. On our way home, we threw candy (bon bons in kinyarwandan) out to all the little kids we passed by. We started handing out water bottles to some of the kids too. There was this one boy who was filling his water jug with water from a stream and the water looked awful so we stopped and gave him water. He looked so confused but definitely very grateful!! It was an amazing day!!

Day 4! Busy. Hard.

After breakfast we packed up gift bags for the children at the local hospital. We put in crackers, bananas, candies, toothbrushes, toothpaste, and stickers. When we arrived at the hospital we were greeted by the staff and they welcomed us with traditional Rwandese protocol. Introductions, words of gratitude for coming and time for the "leader" of the team to express our gratitude for being welcomed, etc. We then participated in their chapel service that many of the nurses, doctors and some patients come to. One of the teen girls, Kyla, gave the message and the other 4 girls performed a worship song.



They all did a great job. It was a really great service and I was very moved by their worship. It was interesting because pastor Kevin asked me before the service started if I had anything I wanted to share and there was a verse floating through my head but I told him...maybe after. The verse was the one about not growing weary in doing good. I felt like they work so hard and maybe they must need to hear that as an encouragement...but after watching them worship I realized that the message was more for me. In my life I often allow my circumstances to make me weary and it definitely has an affect on my worship. The Rwandese are amazing, they are so resilient. These believers do not allow "life" to affect their passion and energy when they worship. It's inspiring! These people always teach me something!
After the chapel service we went into the pediatric ward to give the gift bags to the children and pray with them. There was one little boy probably about 2 1/2. His name was Jimmy. He was so cute. He loved the stickers. When I would put one on his pant leg he would giggle. Then on our way out we handed out some stuffed animals to each child. JP had a small "brown" doll with nappy hair. I brought that one to give to someone and I just knew Jimmy needed to have that doll. When I gave it to him he giggled and grabbed hold of it and held it to his chest ...it was precious! At this point, Moses, our translator came in and said, "I need you to come with me to pray for a child, you will not believe this." I followed him into another ward and tried to prepared myself for what I might see. Moses was deeply troubled and I could only imagine that I was about to see a horribly injured child. We arrive at this bed with 2 women and 2 children. One child was sitting on the bed, the other was a TINY TINY baby being held by a woman that I assumed was his mama. Moses explained that this baby was born about 2 months ago and the mama died in childbirth and the child was left with noone. The woman that was holding him was a mother of another patient that was just showing compassion to this boy and holding him. This little one was beyond TINY and Moses just kept saying..."please pray for him...this is terrible....he has noone." To be honest I was speechless for a few minutes and I asked to hold the baby and I could barely talk. I just started to cry. I finally found some words Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future." I prayed that he would know a mother's love even though his mother is gone. I then started to lose it. I continued to pray that he would thrive and grow to be a strong man of God one day and that his circumstances right now would only prepare him for a bright future. I handed that baby back to this woman and Moses and I left the building in silence with tears streaming down our faces. It was hard. By the time I got in the car I wept...you know...the ugly cry...! Moses and I just cried for about 5 minutes straight. Here's a picture of Moses worshipping at the church service later that evening. I love this picture for some reason.



We had lunch at Afrika Bite..a local restaurant..all you can eat buffet of African food. I can't really even remember how anything tasted I was still a bit numb from the Angelo experience.
Next stop for the day was the orphanage. I had with me Kayla, Taylor, Liz, Kyla and Kathy. We brought hundreds of stickers to pass out to the kids to play with them..but the nuns said no...I guess I can't blame them..that probably would have been a pain to peel all the stickers off their clothes and the younger ones may have just eaten them...so we just sat on the steps and let the kids tackle us with hugs and attention. I learned to not wear any jewelry and not to chew gum. My necklace got snapped from my neck and the gum in my mouth was quite a distraction and kids were almost sticking their fingers in my mouth to get to it. Lesson learned! The head nun was not there at the time so I would like to go back to show her the scrapbook I made of JP from gotcha day to now.
We arrived home with about 10 minutes to spare before we needed to be at the next event on our schedule. We were speaking at another church and Kayla shared a word with this group. She did such a great job. I was so proud of her. We did not get home until a little before 10:00pm. I was pooped...yet I got a second wind again and was up till 2am...oops! Here's a picture of Kayla with her interpreter.