Rwanda + some -CDB

Wow its been so longs since we've updated this, everytime I was going to get around to it our internet conked out on us!! So lets catch you up to speed on whats happening now. In the last couple of weeks we have gone 2 church with some of the babies, the first week was a success and the babies sat quitely for the sermon or slept, but our second try yesterday didn't work out as well, the babies where all restless and one little boy, Sam, decided he would like to preach instead, so he spent the whole sermon comentating uncoherently :) thus we made an escape a little early to save from distracting the entire congregation.

Went to pick up our visas, and figuring I better check the expirey date on them as a volunteer got sent home a month early with 10 days notice. I checked our expirey date, and wouldn't you know it they expired on the 20th of March. This isn't a huge problem as we were already planning on going down to Botswana to visit Luke Saffarek, but now we have 4 days that we must figure out where to go to spend, we have decided to head down to Tanzania and spend a couple of days in Zanzibar and from there fly to Johannesburg. In the end it will all work out.

A couple of the Norweigens moved in with us first Lina and Tone for about a week, it was great to have some company back at Suubi and Lina, Tone and I did a little bit of excersing, jogging and such, but this heat makes it alot more crazy as we are now just coming in the hot season. But I should probably get in the habbit of it I suppose :)

On Jan. 22 we worked the morning shift, then after work we went down to the main road to catch a matatu and as we where waiting we where swarmed by several Ugandans, one asked Amie if she was married to which she replied yes and showed him her "wedding" ring, he then asked me if i was married and i said yes. He then persisted to ask Amie if she had any friends because he wanted a wife just like her and was wondering if any of her friends would be interested in meeting him, to his disapointment all her friends lived across the ocean. He then persisted to ask her for her phone number and I eventually just dragged her away telling him her husband would be jealous. After that we got into town and went to the church for a service, during that weekend they had a revival sermon, it was so good, just praising God, it was great, my current favorite song at the moment is Our God is Love by Hillsong. So anyways enjoyed the sermon, and then we went to have supper at at pizzeria with a bunch of volunteer, after we had finished our pizza we took taxis down to the bus station. As we where standing by our taxi grabbing out our bags some guy grabbed a plastic water bottle from Amie's back pack, well i don't know why but 2 guys started fighting over this, and a couple of the girls almost became injured innocent bystanders, but everyone was able to avoid the flailing fists and quickly get into the bus station, all this because of a plastic disposable water bottle!! Apperently Ugandans hate stealing, so this out break b/c of someone stealing is a fairly common occurence. Hoped on the bus and spent the next 10hrs on the bus, except for our 4am boarder crossing and random stops for gas, where some of the girls got out to use the washroom, 1 was a hole, the other was a corner in the yard, and the 3rd was lets just say not the cleanest of washrooms, thank goodness I didn't need to go :) Got into Kigali Rwanda at 7am Rwandan time, now apperently there is a time change between Rwanda and Uganda, this we did not know so we are still thinking that its 8am, we went to the hotel, had breakfast and then took the local motorbikes called Motos, they are extremly safe, helmets are a must and also unlike Uganda they will only take 1 passenger. We went to a church where the head pastors are from BC affliated with PAOC, they weren't there that weekend, but had given me the information about the church via email. So we where sitting in the church at what we thought was 10am wondering why the church was so empty, Amie and I took a walk and where looking at bullitin boards and met 2 Rwandan guys who invited us to their young adults sunday school class, we where so confused and didn't understand when it was if it was currently 10, and eventually figured out that it was only 9am, so we all decided to join them (btw 7 of us came to Rwanda, 4 Norweigens, 1 NZ, and the 2 of us) It was alot of fun getting to know them, and participate in their class as they began to learn about the fruits of the spirit. After the service the church invited us as first time visitors to join them for some refreshments and a chance to talk to some leaders of the church, we felt so welcome by the entire church body, as the young adults welcomed us into their class, as people came up to us during the sermon to welcome us and as the pastors met with us, it was awesome. Spent the rest of the day relaxing.

Warning this is PG
Monday we woke up early as we had a tour planned to visit some of the memorial sights. It was a very sobering experience to be in the churches where tutsie people had gathered expecting to be protected in the church and where killed in the church. The church no contains alot of the clothes of people killed in the genocide, exactly as they where found, the roof contained bullet wholes and blood stains, and the wall had imprints of where they through babies at the wall, it was so sad. They had mass graves in the yard which we where able to walk through, so sad, and just brings what happened to life. After visiting another church set up very similiar we had lunch and then went to the genocide museum. As we walked through the museum we where loaded with information, a couple of things that stand out to me was how the rest of the world just stood by when they had the power to stop what was happening, when the genocide started the UN pulled out when one of the commanders asked for more men they refused, the world sat by as thousands of people where killed, and this didn't happen years ago, it happened merely 15 years ago. Another thing that stuck out was the heros of the genocide, one lady was assumed crazy, so she used that to protect many refugees by scaring away soldiers, the sacrfices people made to risk their own lifes is so phenomenal. The saddest part of the museum was the last part of the museum called the children's room, there where pictures of kids, a little bit about them, how old they where, their favorite food, best friend, favorite toy and sometimes their last words, and allways how they died, it was so heart breaking!

After the museum we went out for supper and then sat on the patio and watched the moon rise. On tuesday we where planning on going to Hotel Rwanda and relax but it wasn't exactly hot, so we walked around town, checked out the craft market and went on a Moto ride. It was sad to leave Rwanda. Rwanda is an amazing country that has come so far in such a short amount of time, the streets are clean, there is no corruption, traffic laws are obeyed, its Africa with a huge dash of the westren world (western prices too :). ) Had an uneventull bus ride back to Uganda and where able to get dropped off at Suubi on the way, so at 4am we made our way back home and enjoyed a little sleep before heading downstairs back to work.

Thursday Tone and I went to Bbira for our last soccer practice with the girls, we played a game and had some guys join in, it was alot of fun, hot but still fun. Unfortunatly we won't be able to keep it going now that school has started the kids have a full day during the week, and we aren't able to get the weekend off to do it then, and we don't have a whole lot more weeks left untill we come home. After soccer we had a volunteer meeting and then Lina and Kristine came back to Suubi with us for the weekend. Work has been good, and all the babies are more or less healthy. Saturday we had another volunteer move in for the next couple weeks and slept on the roof in our own little mosquito net :) and woke up to see the sunrise which was spectacular. After work on Sunday we came into town, when to a concert at church put on by the young adults, it was amazing the singing and dancing, Africa is covered with a much less slutty versions of Beyonce!! After the concert we went back to Buziga for the night, hung out with all the other volunteers playing Mafia and psychiatrist then woke up early and talked to my brother and Cody.

We are heading into town pretty quick to see my babies and head to the craft market and get groceries. Not alot exciting happening in the next couple of weeks, but after that we head to Kenya for the elections, please keep that in your prayers as africa is errupting with troubles of presidents refusing to step down, Egypt, Tunisia, and Ivory Coast. Please pray that the same does not happen in Uganda. As for Sudan, the final verdict of the voting that happened in the begining of january gets released this week, so pray that that goes peacefully. Please pray for continued health for us and the babies, and as we are planning our trips that that all goes well and doesn't stress us out.
God Bless you all
- Christina

January 15 - AKM

We're now half way done our trip. The next 2 and a half months are going to fly by so fast. It's amazing to look back and see all that we've done so far.
Thanks so much to all of you who keep us in your prayers. We are all much healthier now.
Had to say goodbye to our Australian room mates here at Suubi. Jen and Anita went back home and Lucy has gone to Gulu village for 5weeks. It's sad to say goodbye to friends and now its very empty in our home, just Christina and I. Two of the Norwegians, Tone and Lina, are moving in on monday though. The girls doing soccer have missed it for the past few weeks. Mostly due to it being the kids' break and its hard to get everyone together. Suubi soccer has been cancelled due to school starting up soon and there won't be anytime for us and the kids to get together. Kind of sad that didn't work out. Hopefully in the future more sports can be set up here. Keeping Bbira soccer going atleast until school starts again though. Once school starts we'll see if there is a time that we can still keep it going.
Nannies have specific babies now. Before it was just all the nannies taking care of all the kids. Now its better for the babies because the nannies get to know their specific kids and can tell more easily if something is the matter with one of them.
Had to say goodbye to my favourite little girl, Ella, on Thursday. Her family came to take her back. I'm glad she gets to be with her true family, but still its very hard for me to let her go. When this trip is over its going to be so hard to say goodbye to all the kids knowing that we might not ever get to see them again. Same day Ella left, I had to go into town with some of the special needs kids to do phsio at the International Hospital Kampala. That helped keep my mind occupied. It was cool to get to go in with the kids. We'll see if I get to do that more often. Christina might possibly be going into town next week with Anita. She has a clubbed foot and is getting surgery done. Please pray that the surgery goes well for her.
Today Christina and I made a treck down to the Equator. Met the Norwegians down there. We can now officially say we've been in the southern hemisphere. There wasn't too much there to see. Some craft markets, cafes and of course the line of the equator. Was lots of fun hanging out there though. Planning a trip to Rwanda next weekend. We'll be going with the Norwegians and Andy.
Sudan finished its voting sometime today. Hopefully we will find out more information on the situation there tomorrow. Please keep Sudan in your prayers. We'll try to update you guys updated on all thats going on here.
-Amie

Happy New Years -CDB

Well the hustle bustle that never really stops even to pause not even for Christmas here in Uganda. Nothing got blown up which was a huge answer to prayer with all the threats circlating around at Christmas time.
The babies are great, a couple weeks ago everything got turned around. Most of the babies here at Suubi moved down into the village and we have had oppertunities to go and visit them from time to time. A bunch of the babies from bullrushes moved here, there are about 30 babies here now and 10 special needs kids. It just makes Suubi that much better with all the kids (well not quite) that we've built bonds with over the past month are now here with us at Suubi. We are both loving it out here. The kids are all older 9 months at the youngest up to 2 years, so its alot of fun playing with them and seeing them laugh.
Christmas Eve was fantastic!! Spent the day with the norweigens back at our old place, we had each had a secret santa which was alot of fun and we had alot of laughs. Then got into a taxi at 8:45 and what should have taken us 1.5hrs ended up taking 3hrs the trafic was so painful. Christmas day we had an early morning working with the babies, it wasn't anything special, but it was nice to spend the day with them. Then we started making supper for some of the volunteers, the 4 norweigens (Amy, Lina, Tone, and Kristine), the australians (Jen, Anita and Lucy) and one guy from NZ (Andy). The dinner was good, we tried to have a traditional but this is africa lol... we had bought a ham but left it back at Buziga on Christmas eve, which we didn't notice until 6pm as we where going to take it out, so we improvised and made speghetti. It all worked out in the end and had alot of fun playing cards and chatting.
This week Amie and I have been struggling with being sick, right now Amie's feeling better but I'm hopefully at rock bottom and will be ready to get back to work on Tuesday, thankfully we have tomorrow off to just chill.
On Thursday we went into town to do some much needed grocery shopping, unfortunatly we skipped soccer this week as we were not feeling well. But before we went shopping we walked up to bullrushes and visited all our old babies, I love Suubi, but for those babies I would move back to Kampala.
New years eve we spent at Buziga and enjoyed dinner and games with 11 other volunteers. We went up to Cassia Lodge, a resturant on the hill with a view of the city but didn't get in because you needed reservations, even though we had asked a week ago and they said that we didnt. So we ran back to Buziga just in time to catch the last little bit of fire works from the balcony at the house. We then stayed up playing games and went to bed, then had a skype date with the lovely Carly... and welcomed in New Years with her back in Canada.
So apperently the babies are all feeling better, after a week of cranky babies that is quite a relief!! Please pray for continued health for us and the babies... also keep Sudan in your prayers as they are voting to split or not in the next week. So pray that a war doesn't break out there, and for the ivory coast which is at the beginning of a genocide.
We hope you all had an awesome New Years!! Thanks for keeping us in your prayers
-Christina