Just a Day at Home!

Innocent started school yesterday!  After 15 years of being out because he was not financially able to finish his High School,  he jumped back in yesterday ready to finish. Of course, we had to take our back to school pictures!

Note baby Barney by his side!

He will go to school M-Sat. 4-8 and will take his exam in Nov!  Talk about the joy of seeing one's heart's desire come to pass. Innocent's prayers are being answered!  It is so great for him and his future!

Today i decided to stay home... even slept in... but when i got up Innocent was trimming our checkerboard driveway... with a machete and hedge clippers. Here is the result.

BEFORE....

AFTER!
He loves to work hard... Already he has about 5 hours in
and he is about 1/2 done.   Quite a difference though.
We are all preparing for the rainy season.. which will begin soon!

This morning I took some time to work on a blog page from last Sunday... but this afternoon
I weeded most of the time.  Rob and Henry Skyped but our connection wasn't very
strong...  And then Michelle sent an email and as i was typing to her..

 THIS BIRD JUST FLEW IN AND SAT ON THE ROOF--
CATTY CORNERED TO OUR HOUSE. 

Regular Photo

 Zoom--- right profile! 

Zoom --left profile!

I need an African bird book!

So, as i sit here ready to close i look up and see what the sun is doing on the hills...
I must show you... or try to.  Everyday it looks different but today is particularly pretty. 

 Far in the distance

 A little closer view

Zoomed from our Office Window

Since I was on the balcony outside our room snapping those other pictures, 

I thought I'd introduce you to our backyard neighbors.

They are 2 house boys (without a house). They watch the property,

live in the little metal "house" on the left on the other side of our wall. 
(You can just see a little bit of the roof).

The path is what is significant!  It leads from the house to the water pump. 

The guys take their bird baths there, do their laundry and brush their teeth. 

We are always yelling back 'n forth when we see each other.  

The other small path leads to the gate... 

where the guys sit during the daytime--one in a red cap! 

This picture is the view from our patio on the first floor!

Every afternoon around 4 o'clock... a bird sings so loudly
that I always try to look for it.  But i can never see this bird....
until today!  I have never heard a bird sing like this.. It is SO Loud!!

 

So i watched him... He flew away but then came back and 

started warming up.... He started his warbling...

slowly, gradually, calmly...

AND THEN....
                           

                         HE HIT FULL THROTTLE AND LET LOOSE!  NO WONDER

      HE IS SO LOUD... HE REALLY HAS A BIG- "LITTLE" MOUTH FOR A BIRD!

 WHAT A SPECIAL SIGHTING!

                                                 So, last but not least...  

"Creamsicle" showed up to top off the day. 

She has a nest in the front hedge so maybe there will be some little creme pops soon!

It was a great day at home!  Do i miss this much in Pittsburgh when I'm not home... or is
it just all too familiar and i don't notice?   Stay home someday, look around your place and let me know what you think?
Thanks for letting me share a great day with you! 

Inspire Africa... A Live TV Show Taping

This was quite an evening.  The Rugege's invited me go to the Finale and Live Taping of this New TV show about East Africa.  Well, it is about East Africa's Brightest students competing to see who would win $50,000 to advance inspiration in African young people to be entrepreneurs, business owners and advance the minds and economies for these countries. Contestants were from Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, and Burundi --all East African Countries.

There is more to tell about this evening than I understood.. BUT I do know that at the beginning they introduced a man named Graham Powell from Cape Town, South Africa. 

He is a very successful business man but at the beginning they played a video of him giving his Christian Testimony of how the Lord changed his life.  He was given the vision to start praying for Africa but then....

In February 2002 Graham Power had a second vision. This vision had an even bigger challenge: The whole of Africa was to gather in a Day of Repentance and Prayer, changing Africa to become a “light to the world”. Eventually, Africa was to invite all the nations of the globe to unite in this move of transformational prayer.

www.globaldayofprayer.com/history.html

This web site can really fill you in.. but to date... 227 countries have joined this day of prayer.  This man is sold out to Jesus and is having an incredible ministry and the Lord is changing Africa.  

I needed to introduce you to him because of what happened at the end of the show. 

Anyway.. this is the way it began... Can you imagine this in America?... A secular show being sponsored by someone like Graham Powell?  It was fabulous.  There was another 29 yr old, Nelson Tugume, who started the show...a is highly successful Ugandan business- man who was the host.  

This was the backdrop for the show and the stage.
 It was held in a ball room at the Serena 
Hotel.

They showcased native dancers from each country!
I don't know which ones were from with country but it was something else.

These were the Ugandan dancers... Their dance was most hula like.
 Their hips could really roll and their little short grass skirts below their
waists never stopped shaking! ha! 

Drummers in the background and a choir dressed in white on left, sang and
played for all of the dance troupes.

Yet another female troupe.. very graceful...

These guys were stealth!  Maybe we'd call this industrial dance.  

But these boys stole the show!  They were so terrific! 

Check out these long white wigs!   They kept bending down and flipping
their hair over and when they did--- i got this....

 I think they look like they were all just filled with the Holy Ghost on Pentecost!
We were sitting way in the back of this ball room and my camera wasn't using the flash for this 
night portrait!
You will some day see this blown up on a wall in our house... I love this picture and the energy in the room --well, it was like they were on fire..  They brought the house down.  

After the 13 week show and videos showing teams of students trying to succeed with their given challenges ( just like "You're Fired")...they were down to the last three!  A Dr., a teacher, and a software engineer....  The girl in White is from Rwanda and was so humble and sweet.. The one in orange and the Dr. on the end were Ugandan.  After 2 1/2 hours of interviews, asking the other contestants who should win, etc... they were finally ready to announce the winner.  The man with the microphone , Nelson was the guy who created the show.

BUT WAIT.... They called all the contestants to the stage and the host asked Graham Powell if he would pray for all of them.  Pray for the winner and all those who didn't win..and for the future of East Africa and her young people.  So, there it was on National African TV.... Stunning to say the least, coming from our culture of Political Correctness.. What a sight to be seen.  These people will be blessed, no doubt the Lord will honor their boldness...

THEN they announced the winner.. It was Clarisse from Rwanda!  She certainly seemed to be the deserving one to me... but i was just a spectator. Here is what the paper said...

John Isingoma, Ultimate Media

Clarisse Iribagiza a youth entrepreneur from Rwanda has won 50,000 dollars prize money by Inspire Africa entrepreneurial contest.

Iribagiza was declared winner yesterday during a live TV grand finale event held in the Rwandan capital Kigali. She beat two other finalists, Manuela Pacutho and Davis Musinguzi both from Uganda.

The winner was voted on the account of her leadership skills and her brilliant ICT business idea of an ICT entrepreneur’s incubator to help them to grow their businesses in the field.

Iribagiza said that for her the prize money unlike her competitors was to finance an already existing business not to start a new business idea.

Inspire Africa is brain child of Nelson Tugume a Ugandan entrepreneur aged 29 years with a passion for young business people.  

So.... yet another 'inspiring' day in Africa.  Every day i think something will be routine.. and then something like this comes along!   Welcome to Africa!  It's a BIG country!  

Christ's Church Rwanda on Palm Sunday!

Transforming communities by transforming lives!  Sound Familiar??
This is the church we are attending most of the time.

At 9:25 there were about 50 people there and at 9:35 the place was packed!
Wait, is this really Hebron in disguise?

The church from the side

The Pastor did all the palm decorating from flowers and trees in his yard.

This is the Pastor and his wife.  They are dear folks but will soon
be leaving to return to the States.  All the staff at the church  (i believe)
are self-supporting.  Amazing sacrifice to start a church.
They came from Oklahoma. 

 This is the Coffee Shop... right in the front lobby. This
would be a nice addition to the Barclay vision. Coffee, Cocoa and Tea
are served all morning by the girls.  

Got there early enough to hear the worship team and the new contralto voice. 

  Full house today!

 

Guess kids are the same all over the world!

 The kids leave for Sun. School...just as the sermon is about to start. 
The youth pastor preached this Sunday and one thing he said was that this
was the only recorded time in scripture that Jesus rode on anything, except a boat. 
Yet he said of the donkey.."the Lord hath need of him."  What are the implications?


Next Sunday, since Bruce will be in Omaha, I will be attending the African church with Innocent early in the morning and then we will return to worship with our church family here at Christ's Church for the later service.  But it won't be like being with our very own church family!  We do miss you all so much!
Have a blessed Easter celebrating the resurrection of our Lord!
  

Other Faces of Akagera National Park --Part II

                   And now a few more faces from the Park 

        and even ones on the road!

Mr.Water Bull with his herd of Mrs's!

Another beautiful one!  

This is a family of Warthogs!  They are really scared of people!

 Caught this one before he knew we were near.

The Twins!  They kept approaching us!

Two more faces of different stripes!

This face was a little too close.

These faces couldn't have been close enough
Leaving the Park and along the way home... kids came running to say hi!

Turns out they wanted our plastic water bottles but we didn't have enough to
go around!  Aren't these faces sweet?

Some faces had horns!

This face had to be exhausted!  What a load!

And then it happened!

Right next to this little village... we got a FLAT tire.  

I think some of those rocks that we'd been driving on were a little hard on the car.... 

This little village was so picturesque!

     It all seemed so quiet....

but then the kids started coming and coming to see what was going on!
These are the faces i will remember.

                  Laurance and I didn't know exactly know what to do while Jean

                    changed the tire...or how to talk to the kids...since only a couple 

                       spoke only 2-3 words of English and we didn't know Kinyarwanda.

So, we got out our cameras and showed them all the pictures of the animals.
We would say them in Eng. and they would tell us what they were in Kinya.
A whole crowd of people of all ages actually gathered around, but we
just took pictures with the kids!

After we finished the pictures and were ready to go... they all hugged us.
Each one took a turn!  It made me cry... to have such a great connect with these
little ones in 20 minutes.. plus.. it really made me miss my grandkids!
(However the one in front holding my camera case... looks a little suspicious!)
They would have all gotten in the car, if we would have let them. Even one of the adults
asked if he could accompany us to Kigali.  He said he wanted to ride with us because we were interesting people... He did speak some English....

But the driver said no!

So, we came home with just us and wonderful memories of a great day
with all of God's creations.  But my favorite creations were the kids at the end of the day!