written Jan 5th 2012
What in the world are you doing over there?
Well here it is, a new year and I wanted to fill you all in on the going-on’s of my race these past few weeks.
We’re now in Rwanda, and it’s so incredibly beautiful here. I thought since genocide had happened in the last 2 decades, that the country would still be war-torn and in ruin. But it seems that because of the support of other countries in the last 15 years, the country is booming with possibility. The main roads are mostly paved, there are street lights, high rises, electricity, and a general traffic pattern (lines on the roads and such). This new engineering-boom rests amongst lush rolling hills and beautiful gardens complete with banana trees, palm trees, and tropical flowers. It’s simply beautiful. In fact on my last few skype calls home, people have commented on the beautiful noises the birds make. It’s a little piece of paradise!
We’re staying in a suburb of Kigali, the capitol, called Remera Cabeza (“rem-air-ah Ka-peeza”), and only a 20 minute drive away from coffee shops, malls and banks. And by malls, I mean department stores that include grocery stores that have pop tarts, camembert cheese and canadian smarties! It’s wonderful! You don’t see these types of things on the race very often. It’s odd how ridiculously big of a smile comes to my face upon recognizing these ‘home-lie’ things.
Our contact this month is one of my favorites. His passion for his ministry and his genuine love for his church are so impressionable to me! He also is such a generous man! He’s doing great things here, and starting some great projects/ initiatives, and also has ideas for the future.
So now on to the team… what have we been doing?
Well it’s go, go, go over here. Our first week consisted of preaching in the mornings and in the evenings at church, and three times on sunday. We even met up at night around 9:30 for a bible study/ testimony time. the days were filled with listening to peoples stories, meet-and-greets, church and a lot of preaching!
This week is even busier for me. Breakfast is around 8:30 and we’re out the door by 9:30 to head to church. Inside the church the team is painting a mural of a mountain scene. It’s based off Isaiah 2:2, where it says that the mountain of God will be established as chief among the mountains and all nations will flow to it. I usually paint until 12:30-1pm, then book it back to the house for lunch, and head out the door again to teach two hours of piano lessons at around 2 o’clock. Then come back to the house to prep for preaching in the evenings. As a team we all take turns taking on a night and leading night-church. After around 7:20pm I have the evenings off, where we usually have team time and feedback, and then eat around 8:30-9pm. Discuss the day, and then off to bed to start all over again. It’s great to find purpose again, and to feel like i’m actually being productive.
Well, gotta go paint!
