African Style

Because who wouldn't want a pair of Obama Jeans?

Northern Uganda here I come!

So we have this thing called practicum where for a month we are assigned to a cite in either Uganda, Rwanda or Ethiopia. We got to apply for our top three choices and......

I'm going to Kitgum!

Yes, you may think "Northern Uganda, isn't that the unsafe part of the country?" Well, at one time it was unsafe. The LRA (Lord's Resistance Army) ravaged the area a few years ago- but they haven't been anywhere in Uganda in the last 3 years. (They are now in the Central African Republic... but that's another story that you can follow on BBC if you so desire). Basically Food for the Hungry wouldn't send me there if it was even the least bit dangerous so don't worry.

So yeah, kitgum. There is place there called the New Life Center. It's like a rehabilitation center for women who were abducted by the LRA to be raped, impregnated and terrorized (the LRA was last there 4 years ago). The girls have been released or have escaped and this center is a 12 week program for the girls (many who are young mothers to children from LRA soldiers) to be able to reintegrate themselves into society. Many of them come home to no living family and are traumatized so rehabilitation is extremely important. I have no idea in what capacity I will be working there but it's like an internship so I'm ready for anything.

Check out more: http://fh.org/work/africa/uganda/newlifecenter

I'm thrilled that God has given me this opportunity and I'm excited to see how it works out. I leave for practicum at the end of September! I know this is where God wants me to be and that is by far the most comforting feeling ever.


I'll let you know more when I find out! As for this week... it's my last week of normal classes in Rwanda which is strange because I feel like I just got here! (We don't leave the country for 2 more weeks though).


Oh and today's my birthday and I can think of no better way to spend it than in Kigali, Rwanda.

Kibuye

So we went to Kibuye this weekend and I could go on for days about it but I'll spare you and try to keep it short.

Drive there:
I don't think I've ever been on a windier road than the one we took from Kigali to Kibuye! It wasn't bad though, I've learned to put complete trust in whoever is driving us because each time I swear we are going to die. One interesting thing was that we passed like 30 UN vehicles that were parked on the side of the road that were apparently going to be taken into the Congo. We also passed what looked like a refugee camp which was actually a camp for Hutus that participated in the genocide. They do lots of community service around the country which is cool, good way to use prisoners instead of just making them rot in a prison cell.

So we got to Kibuye (which is situated on the beautiful Lake Kivu) and the first thing we did was jump into the lake and swim to this little peninsula! It was fabulous, the water was so refreshing and it was great to be out of the city. Oh but being in Africa we figured we probably should try to keep the water out of our mouths, but that lasted all of about 5 seconds. As Mallory said "We're all going to get parasites for sure!"

The next day was perfect: I woke up at 6, went to the little beach and read my bible while swinging on a wooden swing until I got the motivation (from Aryn) to go swimming. So I woke my roomie, Christy, up and we swam :-) After lunch we went on a boatride that was out of this world. We went to this island where we son thousands of bats (see below) and then hiked to the top. Oh and we could see the Congo (which is arguably one of the most dangerous places in the world right now).


This morning (Sunday) I woke up at 5:45, met up with Mallory and Noel and went down to the lake. There's a hotel across our area of the lake and we kept talking about how cool it would be to swim there. So we did :-) It took about 45 minutes to get there but it was such a great swim!

This is where we swam^^

Anyhow, Kibuye was amazing. You should all go there next time you're in Rwanda. I also found out what site I'll be at during our 4 week practicum! I'll write more on that later!

These are all the kids from Messiah! ^^^

Me - 3, Mosquitoes - 0

PS. I've been here 3 weeks and I have had zero mosquito bites. That's got to be a record.


And I'm sure I just cursed it.

The Walls of a Church should not have Bullet Holes

I have no feeling right now. I allowed the first genocide memorial to affect me. I allowed myself to feel the sadness (for the most part). But we went to two more today and while I took in the immensity of the sites, the bones at the sites and the clothing remains at the sites, I was unable to feel any emotion beside pure awe. The walls went up. I have no emotion to write about so I'll just put up some pictures I took. Feel for yourself.

A church's pews should have people in them. Not the clothes that the victims wore on the day of their death...

The Sacristy of a church should not be filled with stacks and stacks of bones.









Skulls should not have weapons left
or hammer holes in them.

























The Virgin Mary should look over joyous people, not a massacre.




















An alter should have gifts, not weapons.

No Church should ever look like this one.






(I spent about an hour trying to get the layout of the pictures right but no such luck. Blogger is not user friendly. Sorry).

Some Things I've Discovered

• Cars and motorcycles will not slow down if you are crossing the road. In fact, they will probably speed up.
• If someone calls "sista sista" they are neither imitating the Disney tv show nor confusing you with one of their family members.
  
• You're paying too much if lunch costs you more than 2,000 francs ($3.57).
• If someone at the market says they will give you a good price for an item - you're still going to pay the mzungu price.
  
• Nobody cares about the NFL.
• My feet will never again be clean.
• Aerobics class will have more men than women in attendence.
• You never know when you'll be walking down the street and you'll spot a man peeing in the corner.
• The locals will laugh when you attempt to speak their language.
• I am not cut out to have 15 children because the amount of dishes to do are outrageous!!
• Many bathrooms will not have toilet paper (bring your own).
  
• African Tea is amazing.
• Pineapple here is a million times better than pineapple at home!
  

Not always fun. But necessary.

I am finding it impossible to comprehend that one human being has the psychological capacity to kill another human. I know that there are instances of murder (even mass murder) everywhere but it's easy to blame the random instances on insanity or pure hatred for another person. But how is it possible to be human and take the lives of so many innocent people in separate occasions? People that were your neighbors last week? How could you possibly kill the children that your kids played with? How does this happen?

We went to the Kigali Genocide Memorial yesterday. There are almost 300,000 people buried in mass graves on this rather small plot of land. 300,000. I can't comprehend that many lives and it's only 30% of those who died. Each one brutally murdered. It wasn't a bomb that wiped them all out. Each one had its own killer and story.

The thing that got me the most was the children's memorial. I can understand that children are murdered. It happens But we look at those murders as ironic cases of insanity. But how were so many people able to do that? To look at a small child and then end their lives. And not just kill them quickly, but make them suffer before they finally died of loss of blood or some other cruel end.

They had a whole area for the children that died. Including this child one below. But the ones that got me most were this 7 year old who's last words were "mom where should I run?" and another who was killed by being stabbed in the eyes and then head. First off, imagine the human beings that could do that to each of them. And second, think about the mothers who had to helplessly watch before facing their own death.

Everyone says we're supposed to "process" experiences like this. But I'm not even sure how you process something like that. I'm not completely sure that you can.







On another note, the sketchy tickets that we bought for the football (soccer) game worked. We lucked into front row seats at about the 45 yard line. Nice, I know. Rwanda lost 1-0 to Egypt but it was an amazing experience. I think everyone should go to an international football (soccer - for you Americans) game at least once in their lives.