bold prayer

I wasn't sure when I would blog next, but I have 2 hours of internet time here at the airport (yay!). I am en route, checking my email at Washington/Dulles (after a 16+ ride in an EthiopianAir jet...whoa, what a trip!). Thank you for your prayers...

And speaking of prayer, I just picked up an awesome email from my friend Janet that I wanted to share with you. This story was written by a doctor who worked in South Africa.

(Isaiah 65:24 'Before they call, I will answer')

"One night I had worked hard to help a mother in the labor ward; but in spite of all we could do, she died leaving us with a tiny premature baby and a crying two-year-old daughter. We would have difficulty keeping the baby alive; as we had no incubator (we had no electricity to run an incubator).

"We also had no special feeding facilities. Although we lived on the equator, nights were often chilly with treacherous drafts. One student midwife went for the box we had for such babies and the cotton wool that the baby would be wrapped in.

"Another went to stoke up the fire and fill a hot water bottle. She came back shortly in distress to tell me that in filling the bottle, it had burst (rubber perishes easily in tropical climates). 'And it is our last hot water bottle!' she exclaimed. As in the West, it is no good crying over spilled milk so in Central Africa it might be considered no good crying over burst water bottles. They do not grow on trees, and there are no drugstores down forest pathways.

"'All right,' I said, 'put the baby as near the fire as you safely can, and sleep between the baby and the door to keep it free from drafts. Your job is to keep the baby warm.'

"The following noon, as I did most days, I went to have prayers with any of the orphanage children who chose to gather with me. I gave the youngsters various suggestions of things to pray about and told them about the tiny baby. I explained our problem about keeping the baby warm enough, mentioning the hot water bottle, and that the baby could so easily die if it got chills. I also told them of the two-year-old sister, crying because her mother had died.

"During prayer time, one ten-year old girl, Ruth, prayed with the usual blunt conciseness of our African children. 'Please, God' she prayed, 'send us a water bottle. It'll be no good tomorrow, God, as the baby will be dead, so please send it this afternoon.'

"While I gasped inwardly at the audacity of the prayer, she added, 'And while you are about it, would You please send a dolly for the little girl so she'll know You really love her?'

"As often with children's prayers, I was put on the spot. Could I honestly say, Amen ? I just did not believe that God could do this. Oh, yes, I know that He can do everything, the Bible says so. But there are limits, aren't there? The only way God could answer this particular prayer would be by sending me a parcel from homeland. I had been in Africa for almost four years at that time, and I had never, ever received a parcel from home. Anyway, if anyone did send me a parcel, who would put in a hot water bottle? I lived on the equator! Halfway through the afternoon, while I was teaching in the nurses' training school, a message was sent that there was a car at my front door.

"By the time I reached home, the car had gone, but there, on the veranda, was a large twenty-two pound parcel. I felt tears pricking my eyes. I could not open the parcel alone, so I sent for the orphanage children.

"Together we pulled off the string, carefully undoing each knot. We folded the paper, taking care not to tear it unduly. Excitement was mounting. Some thirty or forty pairs of eyes were focused on the large cardboard box. From the top, I lifted out brightly colored, knitted jerseys. Eyes sparkled as I gave them out. Then there were the knitted bandages for the leprosy patients, and the children looked a little bored. Then came a box of mixed raisins and sultanas - that would make a batch of buns for the weekend Then, as I put my hand in again, I felt the.....could it really be? I grasped it and pulled it out - yes, a brand-new, rubber hot water bottle. I cried. I had not asked God to send it; I had not truly believed that He could. Ruth was in the front row of the children. She rushed forward, crying out, 'If God has sent the bottle, He must have sent the dolly too!'

"Rummaging down to the bottom of the box, she pulled out the small, beautifully dressed dolly. Her eyes shone! She had never doubted!

"Looking up at me, she asked: 'Can I go over with you and give this dolly to that little girl, so she'll know that Jesus really loves her?'

"That parcel had been on the way for five whole months. Packed up by my former Sunday school class, whose leader had heard and obeyed God's prompting to send a hot water bottle, even to the equator. And one of the girls had put in a dolly for an African child - five months before, in answer to the believing prayer of a ten-year-old to bring it 'that afternoon.'"

God bless you all today. I think my favorite part of the story was the prayer of the little African girl. "Lord, you know tomorrow will be too late because that baby will be dead. So please send the water bottle this afternoon." It reminds me how sometimes God wants us to reason with Him, not for His good (He already knows all about the details/whys/wherefores of our needs) but to ultimately increase our own faith when we see Him answer our prayers. :) Hope you enjoyed as much as I did. Talk to you again soon.

murabeho for now...

I have been out of town and really busy this past week...I keep meaning to post pictures from the community health worker evaluations from two weeks ago, and other things, but haven't had time!!

But this is just a quick note to let you know that I'll get back to blogging after a two-week respite; my sister is getting married in South Carolina next weekend, and so I'm traveling over there for the wedding! (Congratulations, Alice & Mark!! Yay!! I can't wait to see you!!)

Then Victor's brother is getting married the following weekend in CA (Congratulations, Pat & Patty!!), so I will get to celebrate with his family as well as see my friends (can't wait, on both accounts)!!

If I can, I'll post along the way....otherwise I'll get back to you when I am back in Kigali. "Murabeho" (goodbye) for now....

a blog makeover

WOW.

My good friend Starshine (starshinereport.blogspot.com) updated the look of her blog a couple of weeks back, and I loved it!

So, since imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I thought about updating the look of my own blog.

I know what you're thinking: what "look"? I definitely had the plainest blog on the block. I know. I have to confess, I have TRIED to make design changes and upload photos, etc., onto the homepage of my blog, ever since I got here. I don't know if it's a bandwidth issue or what, but I have never been able to make a single change, even after waiting for over an hour for a photo to load. So I gave up, resigned to my low-maintenance (read: boring) white background.

Then I saw Starshine's blog, and thought how nice it would be to add some color to mine....but promptly dropped the idea because I didn't want to waste any more hours waiting for photos and backgrounds to squeeze through the bandwidth.

However....I did shamelessly ask Starshine if she would give my blog a makeover too, and much to my delight, she accepted! Graciously! And this is the result!!

Starshine, thank you for brightening my blog, and my day....you are wonderful!! :)

spotted on CNN

I've been in Kibogora over the weekend, working on a grant application for a project we have going there. I'll post more about that later, but in the meantime I saw this article as a featured headline on CNN and wanted to share:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/05/15/amanpour.rwanda/index.html

The headline was, "Woman befriends husband's murderer's wife, murderer"

I would be interested in your thoughts...

gate of hope ministry - lay counseling

Back in February, Baraka's ministry, Gate of Hope, sponsored the first of a four-phase lay counseling training program here in Rwanda. The purpose of the training is to equip local Rwandans who are working with children with tools to help address trauma and other psychological and emotional issues that children might face here.

This past Tuesday, along with the Vice President of Gate of Hope, it was a total blessing and privilege to help "open" the second phase of the training. It is not so common in the States to have formal "openings" and "closings" of events and workshops, but here in Rwanda it is the standard modus operandi. Depending on the event, "openings" usually consist of a few formal statements of welcome and short speeches to welcome the participants; "closings" usually entail distribution of training certificates or participation certificates, as well as accompanying short speeches and encapsulation statements. The formalities lend an air of importance to any event, and are expected by all.

Here's a photo of Baraka and the Vice President, as Baraka was officially opening the training:



I shared briefly about how friends back home at Ev Free were praying for the group, and had been praying for a long time for both the physical and emotional needs of Rwandans, particularly for those who have been traumatized. Gate of Hope ministry is, in many ways, an answer to these prayers! I also told the group how encouraged I was that they were willing and able to be equipped to help break cycles of destructive emotional pain in the lives of children in Rwanda. Baraka is helping to build the capacity of these lay counselors to interrupt these cycles of pain with important Truths: the Truth of God's love, the Truth of the inestimable value and worth He places on each and every life, and the Truth of His healing and forgiveness.

Here is a picture of, from L to R: Louise (from the Child Development program at WR....you'll recognize her from the pizza party postings a few weeks back!), Domatille (a facilitator in the training), and Baraka (leader extraordinaire):



Baraka has been working really really hard to organize the training and make it the very best it can be, so that the group of attendees (17 people in all) will leave with honed skills to meet the emotional needs of the children with whom they work. Thank you for your prayers for her during this week; the training will end tomorrow (Friday). During the morning I took some video footage of Baraka, and one of the things she emphasized was that this type of counseling work really has to be empowered by God Himself, for true healing to occur. So she is thankful for your prayers! Here is a picture of (almost) the whole group of Rwandans being trained (and I snuck in the photo too):

scratch paper

At the office today, Melene wanted to make some notes on a piece of paper.

"I need some....what do you call this....to make notes on?" she asked as she reached into her desk for some scratch paper.

I knew she was asking me to clarify the English term, so I replied, "Scratch paper."

Melene offered one of her priceless quizzical looks. "Scratch?" she asked. With furrowed eyebrows, she asked, "How do you spell that?"

I spelled it for her and then made a scratching motion on a mosquito bite (an actual one) on my arm. "Scratch," I repeated.

"Ah!" she nodded thoughtfully for a moment, familiar with the word in that context. And then the quizzical look returned. "Hmm. Scratch." She didn't say anything more, but I think she was wondering why we would ever call it scratch paper. I never thought about it -- and I suppose that 'scratch' is somewhat of an odd word choice for someone who's not a native English speaker.

Just an example of one of many odd-but-fun little conversations that color our days here together! I have my moments of quizzical looks too (like the hyena weddings, for instance...oh, and spelling! Kinyarwandan spelling is a mystery to me, with all of these silent 't's and 'd's).

Advertising is another. There's a huge billboard (for, uh, beer), on the drive from the EIP office to the WR office. "Hehe Intoyoka!" it proclaims in bold letters, with golden beer coloring the entire three square meters of the board. I know that "hehe" (which is pronounced "hey-hey") means "where," because one of the first phrases I learned that has come in totally handy, especially in the villages where nobody speaks French, is "Hehe wese?" (hey-hey way-say), which means, "Where is the restroom?" In the village, this has to be interpreted by the villagers as "Where is the pit latrine?" but it works. Anyhow. I asked Melene what "intoyoka" meant, and she said, "Thirst." My puzzled look prompted further explanation, which is, in a nutshell, that "Hehe Intoyoka" is slang for "No thirst!" or "Where did your thirst go?"

These kinds of things are a fun part of cross-cultural experiences, though; they remind me of what a many-splendored world we live in, with all of the nuances and intricacies of what we term as "culture." There are difficult moments too, of course (some of which I would relay, but I never quite know who is reading this, and I don't want to offend anyone). Shoot me an email if you'd like my take on the dark side of cross-cultural experiences.... :) Honestly, though, it's fun most of the time.

On to other topics, I had a fantastic time yesterday witnessing Baraka begin the second phase of her training of lay counselors....I'll post photos shortly....

nothing is impossible with God

A few posts back, I shared an email forward, about....well, about how difficult conditions in Africa can be.

Well, today I got another email forward, this time from my sister back in the States, who received it from her almost-mother-in-law (3 more weeks!).

I enjoyed the story (thanks Lauretta, and Alice!), and wanted to share it here with you.

NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD

"Have you ever felt the urge to pray for someone and then just put it on a list and said, 'I'll pray for them later?' Or has anyone ever called you and said, 'I need you to pray for me, I have this need?' Read the following story that was sent to me and may it change the way that you may think about prayer and also the way you pray.

"A missionary on furlough told this true story while visiting his home church in Michigan 'While serving at a small field hospital in Africa , every two weeks I traveled by bicycle through the jungle to a nearby city for supplies. This was a journey of two days and required camping overnight at the halfway point.

"On one of these journeys, I arrived in the city where I planned to collect money from a bank, purchase medicine, and supplies, and then begin my two-day journey back to the field hospital. Upon arrival in the city, I observed two men fighting, one of whom had been seriously injured. I treated him for his injuries and at the same time talked to him about the Lord.
I then traveled two days, camping overnight, and arrived home without incident....

"Two weeks later I repeated my journey. Upon arriving in the city, I was approached by the young man I had treated. He told me that he had known I carried money and medicines.

"He said, 'Some friends and I followed you in to the jungle, knowing you would camp overnight. We planned to kill you and take your money and drugs. But just as we were about to move into your camp, we saw that you were surrounded by 26 armed guards.'

"At this, I laughed and said that I was certainly all alone in that jungle campsite. The young man pressed the point, however, and said, 'No, sir, I was not the only person to see the guards, my friends also saw them, and we all counted them. It was because of those guards that we were afraid and left you alone.'

"At this point in the sermon, one of the men in the congregation jumped to his feet and interrupted the missionary and asked if he could tell him the exact day this happened.

"The missionary told the congregation the date and the man who had interrupted told him this story: 'On the night of your incident in Africa , it was morning here and I was preparing to go play golf. I was about to putt when I felt the urge to pray for you. In fact, the urging of the Lord was so strong I called men in this church to meet with me here in the sanctuary to pray for you. Would all of those men who met with me on that day stand up?'

"The men who had met together to pray that day stood up. The missionary wasn't concerned with who they were, he was too busy counting how many men he saw. There were 26!

"This story is an incredible example of how the Spirit of the Lord moves in behalf of those who love Him. If you ever hear such prodding, go along with it."

recent events

I've been trying to post these photos all week long, but have had a difficult time with our internet connection! Usually I don't have too much of a problem, but this week it was verrrrry slooooow....

Anyhow! Here's just a taste of life here in the past 10 days.

On May 1st (time flies!!) it was Labor Day here in Rwanda (I heard it was Labor Day in China too, so it makes me wonder if there is some connection, only because there was a heavy influx of Chinese laborers here building roads, about 10 years ago). Anyhow. It was Labor Day, so it was a holiday, and Baraka stayed the night at my home this time (remember last time I went to her place). Then in the morning, we had a group of our ex-pat friends over for fun and french toast. Most of these ladies are working in an NGO or as teachers at an international school.



(Check out the maracuja juice, otherwise known as passionfruit juice, on the table....people drink maracuja juice here like we drink orange juice in the USA).

Another event of the past week was that Erica, my researcher buddy from Johns Hopkins working in the child survival program, left to go back to the States after being here for eight months! She laid the groundwork for a lot of the research methodology that I will be using when my own project begins, so I am thankful to her for that. And I will miss her friendship! Here's a photo of the child survival program staff, at her goodbye party (from L to R, back row: me, Erica, Melene, Eliane, Clemence; front row: Josef, Bernard, Laurent). Rose, the child survival program director, took the photo.



As a final goodbye to Erica last weekend, we took her out to dinner at a local Rwandan place. Here's a photo of our friend Natasha eating a common local dish, "ugali", which is ground-up-then-steamed cassava (manioc). It reminds me a lot of a big ball of tofu. It doesn't taste like anything and is best with salt and sauce; in that way it also reminds me of grits, only it's usually not eaten for breakfast and it's a lot stickier!



Last Tuesday, I was out in the field all day for a community health worker evaluation session....I'll post more photos soon of that trip....it was really interesting. And last night (Saturday), Kigali was one of about 100 cities all over the world who participated in "Pangaea Day," which you can look up on the net if you like. Essentially there was a simultaneous broadcast of 24 short films and performances from all over the world, in an effort to promote world peace. It was nighttime here, but I have a shot of that as well that I'll try to post soon....I think the Kigali community felt honored to be on the guest list.... :)

interesting website

A quick post:

Someone alerted me to this website today. It's one of the best websites I've seen giving detailed and up-to-date information about Rwanda. Hope you enjoy!

http://www.rwandagateway.org/

fwd: a local call

I wanted to share this fwd I received in my in-box a few days ago, from a Rwandan colleague in the child survival program:

"Three individuals of American, British and DR-Congolese nationality die in an accident and end up in hell.

"After some time the American, wanting to know if bin Laden was finally caught, sought the opportunity to make a phone call to America. The devil accepted, and as soon as the 3-minute phone call was completed, he charged the American 3 million USD. The American pulled out his cheque book and paid his debt without raising his eyebrows.

"The Brit in turn sought the same favour, to ascertain the health of the Queen Elisabeth. The devil accepted, and as the 3-minute conversation concluded, he charged the Brit 4 million pounds. The Brit was quick to pay.

"Then it was finally the turn of the Congolese man. Although hesitant because he was a man of few means, the Congolese still decided to seek permission to call Africa to receive news of the continent. Satan accepted. So the Congolese began a long telephone conversation during which he learned that a civil war raged in the DRC, that Rwandans continued to make the law in the east, that Ruberwa and Mbemba were 2 of 4 vice-presidents and Junior Kabila replaced his father, while AIDS rates continued to rise across the continent. He learned that the Congolese were facing only a facade of peace while famine and locusts were rampant in Burkina Faso and Mali, just like in Niger, the same it is every year, etc. ... etc. ... etc. ...

"The conversation finally ended after three hours! The Congolese hardly dared to look at the devil, and stuttering, asked him the price of the phone call.

"The devil, dispassionate, answered: Oh, for the three hours it will cost you three dollars.

"Surprised, the Congolese asked, But how ..... how .... how can this be?

"The devil replied: Well, Hell to Hell is a local call!!"

A little taste of African humor. But it's not really so funny....not really. Thank you for your prayers for this continent and its people, that God would bring peace out of strife, light from the darkness, calm from chaos.... Thank you! :)

2005 revisited

It was a privilege to be here in 2005 with an awesome group of people from Ev. Free; we had a short service trip, where we helped to construct homes for widows, and we also visited local churches to help minister where we could.

One special Rwandan person on that trip was Fidele, who drove one of the vehicles that our team used to get around rural southwest Rwanda. His dream was to go to seminary and help plant churches.

Well, it is a joy and privilege to report that, nearly three years later, Fidele is in the midst of seminary (while holding down a full time job and raising a pretty large family at the same time) and is part of a small group of leaders from the Apostolic denomination who have planted eight churches in Rwanda in the past 18 months.

I went to visit Fidele's family last weekend (they live very close by!) and nearly all of the Apostolic church-planting team happened to come to Fidele's house at the same time! So I met them all. Here's a picture of us in Fidele's yard:



Then on Sunday, Fidele invited me to one of the eight churches, way outside of Kigali (two mutatu rides and a moto trip, to give you an idea). It was so much fun, a very interesting experience, and a very lively church. It reminded me of 2005!



Of course, as you can imagine, the eight churches have many needs. Thank you for your prayers for them as they have started these churches on minimal resources and are praying for God's provision for their needs.

go badgers (rwanda edition)

It happened that UW-Madison Spirit Day coincided with Africa Malaria Day (April 25). I saw on an alumni email update that UW-Madison was holding a photo contest for Spirit Day, and there were prizes for, among other things, the "Badger furthest from the UW campus."

While I may not be the furthest Badger from the UW campus, Rwanda is still pretty far from Madison. So in the hopes of winning some unknown prize, I asked some of my verrrry nice colleagues to pose for a photo outside the Kirehe Health Center last Friday, where bednets were being distributed for Africa Malaria Day (see post below). Go Badgers!



From L to R are: Naissan (Care Group leader in Kirehe), me, Clemence (assistant to WR's Director of Programs), and Leonard (child survival program Manager of Quality Assurance). It's hard to read the signs, maybe, but they say "Africa Malaria Day: Kirehe, Rwanda" and "Badgers: 1; Mosquitoes: 0." Please notice that I am wearing red (a requirement of the contest). And yes, I am a nerd. But you know that already.

I mentioned that the woman in the hat in the previous blog post is Ashley Judd, who attended the event and was greeting the children. Here is proof that the woman is, in fact, Ashley Judd (and not just a woman in a wide-brimmed hat):



And then, here are some of the children...the real future of Rwanda!