Urukundo means Love in Kinyarwanda, the native language of Rwanda.
Urukundo is also the name of a home for children without parents in Rwanda. Urukundo was opened by a woman named Mama Arlene Brown. Mama Arlene opened Urukundo for children who were left orphans after the genocide. Urukundo is not considered an orphanage because it is also a school for all the children in the town, and families of the town work in the school as well. Rwanda is closing down orphanages because they feel it’s been so long since the genocide that there shouldn’t be orphans. Mama Arlene and everyone at Urukundo is fighting for this home and still trying to expand. The next project they want to do is make Urukundo a High school as well.
You can learn more about Urukundo from hopemadereal.org
Benita and Jacob holding Mama Arlene’s Hand while walking the older kids to school.
Me and my team with the children that live at Urukundo.
Our team was blessed with the opportunity to stay at Urukundo, help out in the classrooms, day care, and nightly devotionals. Above all we were blessed to get to know the children, the staff and all the love surrounding Urukundo.
Each child has their own unique story and personality. It was so great to get to spend time with these little ones. We were able to walk them to school in the mornings, eat lunch and dinner with them, play games with them and then enjoy nightly devotionals with them. We were also each able to share in devotional on different nights. However, these children know their Bible Stories!
These are the 2 teachers and one of the classes I was able to sit in on for the week and help out.
The children in the day care. They go to school in the afternoon.
Dakota walking a few of the children to school.
Claudine Me and Johnny
Me and Soso.
Me and Benita
Saying goodbye was hard, but we know God has more in store for us in Ethiopia!
