1000 hills are alive with the sound of music

I asked a very cool guy the other day if he had ever seen The Sound of Music, and he said, "Oh, maybe once, or twice....or fifteen times." :) So my guess is most everyone out there who reads this blog has heard of the VonTrapps, and remembers Kurt ("I'm incorrigible!"). And of course you know that the musical was based on the true story of the VonTrapp family who escaped Nazi-occupied Austria during World War II.

Well....Kurt's grandchildren live in Montana now (you might be interested to know that Kurt's name wasn't actually Kurt, it was Warner. And Leisl was Agatha in real life. Or so I was told last Saturday night). Kurt, er, Warner's grandchildren have also ably carried on the family legacy and form a singing quartet that now performs all over the world.

Last Saturday night, I was hanging out with some friends here in Kigali, and who should walk in the front door, but the VonTrapps themselves! They have been in Rwanda for a few weeks, and they are good friends with a roommate of some of my friends. They were scheduled to sing the Rwandan national anthem the next morning at President Kagame's Council meeting, so they rehearsed for us a little bit....it was great! And then they broke out into a chorus of "The Hills Are Alive..." No kidding. Thank you, VonTrapps, for making our evening so memorable....