Land of a Thousand Hills: Adventures with Ethan, Part 1

I'm gonna try my best to document my adventures with my bro on here! Ethan, I might need your help remembering things! I should have journaled more. But it's too hard on a dirty, bumpy bus with chickens and goats cluttered all around you! Ethan, I think you should write at least one "guest" blog entry, from your point of view. k!

So, the first few days Ethan was here, we hung around Kigali and he got to see a little bit of "my world." But what do you think we did first? Of course, we immediately unpacked him and opened all the Christmas goodies. I now am stocked with an abundance of skittles and starbursts and chocolate! :-) Here's a pic of Ethan opening his giftcards. It was fun opening gifts together. Thanks fam!

No, honestly, the first thing we did was hop on a moto and head to the orphanage to play with the kids! We caught motos from the airport, cause his bags hadn't arrived yet, so we grabbed a quick meal at Bourbon, and went to Home of Hope. I so wish we could take pictures of my precious kids so I could show you how beautiful they are! We played with them, gave them piggy-back rides, and sang to them. Then Ethan went inside a dimly lit room and we helped feed and spent time with the mentally challenged kids. Some weeks, the nuns won't let you in this room, but I'm so glad Ethan was able to see these kids and just hang out with them. During playtime, when the other kids come outside, these kids are never allowed outside of this dark room. On occasion, you can coax the nuns into letting you carry them up to the screen door, so they can look out on the sunlight! These kids almost always break my heart, and I think it was the same for Ethan. Hard. Often times, when I'm allowed in that room, I'll just walk over to some who are lying in this crib in the back and just massage their tummys and legs, and see them smile in response. They love and crave stimulation! And sadly, they hardly receive any.

I took Ethan to eat at all the local and fun ex-pat restaurants too while we were in Kigali. A lot of the local ones in my area have been bulldozed down in the last few months, to make room for new development. It's been sad. No more cheap and delicious goat! Even the one that I took Ethan too was razed this week! Ethan says he lost weight during our trip...I definitely gained...I told him I'm not used to eating out all the time anymore! :-) But not to worry, I've had a visit from my nasty friend, e.coli, this week, and all is back to normal again. ugh. That's why I've been slow bloggin.' Not fun.

Anyway, Ethan had a fun introduction to African transportation. I think he enjoyed the motos allright, (I love them!), but for some reason, when he was here, we had bad moto luck. We had one run out of gas, one have a blow-out, and on New Years Eve, when I was riding with my cute dress on, I hear a super loud banging noise, and then the moto just rattles to a stop. I jump off, and look, and half the side of the moto had fallen off right there in the road! Of course the driver took it all in stride, and said, no worries, no worries, and started pulling out all these random tools. (this is normal, by the way.) He told us to wait until he fixed it, but Ethan's moto driver who had come back for me didn't look too pleased, so I just flagged down another one. Poor guy. But all in all, motos were awesome! You feel completely free, swerving in and out of traffic, down and around hills, going faster than everyone else, overtaking semis...it's awesome! The real challenge this trip was not the motos...it was the buses! I'll write about them later on!

He got to visit my school, and my classroom. Here are the Fruits of the Spirit Christmas trees my kids made, hanging outside. I took him on a run through my favorite village, and he enjoyed getting mobbed by the children shouting, mzungu, mzungu. Usually, theres only a sprinkling of kids, but school was out, and we interrupted a soccer match, and then were just immediately flooded with hugs and High-fives and handshakes and about 50 kids running behind us. Those are my favorite runs! Such joy! We spent one sobering day, touring the genocide memorial. I know he wasn't looking forward to it, but so glad he did it afterwards. It is really a must for anyone coming to Kigali. I think it helps you understand the history, and the places you will walk and people you will meet, and it really puts things in perspective for you, whether you're coming to stay like me, or just coming for a few days. We got to spend some time visiting with my friend, James, at his coffee factory, but sadly it was raining too hard that afternoon, and most of the factory was closed for the holidays, but he still got to understand a little bit of the coffee business here, and how it gets back home to Starbucks!

I also took Ethan to my favorite Rwandan buffet restuarant, called "Karibu." That means "Welcome" in Kiswahili. Karibu is the Rwandan K&W, but it's all outside. The lunch buffett is $4, and you pile your plate as high as you can (sometimes we have contests), and you eat until you tap out. When you come to Karibu, let it be known, it should be your only meal of the day. But this time, with Ethan, there were no contests. We didn't pile high. We were polite and we just enjoyed our big lunch of matoke, goat, pasta, potatos, spinach, yams, and tons more. The night before leaving for Uganda, we enjoyed pizza at New Cactus, which has the best views of Kigali at night. My friend, Mary Elise, from Texas, joined us. She's Catholic, but we still love her! :-) She's here as a Salesian Lay Missionary, and she lives and works on 27-acre farm, right outside of the city. She lives with over 150 reformed street boys, and is the first woman to live there at the site! They call her mom. You can check out her blog here. http://www.maryelisemission.blogspot.com/ Her experiences on the farm remind me a lot of my experiences with the girls at Wema in Mombasa. I met Mary Elise at the orphanage, and before seeing Kerry and I, she hadn't seen another mzungu for 3 months! She is now estatic to have friends that she can get away with and process things with...it's so necessary! And she keeps us laughing!

Finally, on the morning of the 22nd, we woke up at 4:30, got a taxi, and barely made our Kampala Coach bus, headed across the border to Lake Bunyonyi! At the time, Ethan was complaining and thought Kampala Coach was a dirty, po-dunk bus, but two weeks later, he was praising them left and right! Ha! :-) Stay tuned for more Adventures with Ethan. Next up is the border crossing, and Lake Bunyonyi, my fav place!