So, this week was a little rough for me….I saw my first night at home…ALONE. Russell had to go down to Kigali for some meetings on Monday and had to overnight there for more meetings on Tuesday, so I was left all by my little bitty lonesome. Now…I normally love being by my little bitty lonesome…all kinds of advantages to that, under normal circumstances….peace and quiet, getting take-out from wherever I feel like it, or better yet…dinner and a movie out with the girls, having control of the TV clicker and watching NOTHING but HGTV or the Food Channel, and I can spread out in the bed with 10 pillows, if I want. You know…don’t want to do those things day in and day out, but nice when I have the opportunity.
Being by my little bitty lonesome here in Rwanda, I found, is just a TITCH different. Will give you that it is still peaceful…BUT..no “take-away”, no peeps, no movies, no TV, and only four pillows. Ok…so still nothing to really complain about. I left my office and walked the quick 3 min. walk home before it got dark, as not to scare myself into a tizzy right off the bat (although our trusty night-guard, Kiza, was waiting on me – coming early to serve and protect), and I was thinking I could whip up some guacamole and use my Skype to at least call all my peeps, ya know, catch up a little. SOOOO….got in the door…got all comfy in my jammies…bout to head to the kitchen when boom…LIGHTS OUT…no power and in turn…no internet. Ok, I think….it will come back on in a few…it usually does….ummmm…NOOOO…not until sometime in the middle of the night…that’s right…sat here IN THE DARK all by my little bitty lonesome. And folks…when it’s dark here, it is DARK!! Finally gave up and went to bed at seven, with my iPod, which was, thankfully, fully charged, and watched “French Kiss” for like the forty-seventh time….I guess I got to go to the movies after all!! One thing we are learning….always be prepared for the power and/or water to go out at ANY time…it’s just the way it is!!
Woke up Tuesday morning to our new best friends, the marching band, feeling HORRIBLE….I mean, HORRIBLE….I was sick, sick, sick. Not sure what caused it, probably will never know…it couldn’t have been the dinner I ate, since I didn’t eat any, but suffice it to say, my tummy was in a tailspin. OK…crank into gear and start one of the 15 medicines I brought for just this occasion …no African juju bug is gonna get the best of me!! So, I’m lying in bed…under tent (mosquito net)…feeling horrible…listening to the marching band play that same song for the fifty-third time that morning, when all of a sudden…BOOOOMMM….a CANON goes off….SERIOUSLY…the loudest canon (probably because I was closer than I have ever been before) you can imagine....I know now my ticker is in perfect condition, otherwise, y’all would all be eulogizing me bout now! It scart me almost to death!! At least I will be prepared on graduation day, which we now know is June 16th….hallelujah, Jesus!!
It took me most of the week to get over the African juju bug, but by Friday, I was feeling well enough to go back to work….I hope that’s the last we see of that little feller!!
I’m also making itty bitty progress at the hotel….it’s a process and I’m just going to have to be good with that. I’m figuring out that God is teaching me patience through teaching the staff at Ishema. He’s tried before, but being the hard-headed thing I am, it’s not worked out so well…maybe this move to Africa is what I needed all along!!
I have included this week, more photos…this time of the inside of the house, with the new furniture. Still have to get rugs, but all and all, it’s working well for us. Still waiting on the new beds, but hopeful they will be here this week. I also included before and after photos of the bathroom. You see, up until yesterday, we had NO shower curtain…it’s a French thing and since Rwanda was colonized by the French/Belgians, I guess they passed on that little bit of cultural knowledge. So, as you can see the bath is stuck on one wall...one side has no wall, the other has a window…so how do you mount a shower rod to put up a shower curtain…answer is..you don’t…you hang it by string from the ceiling onto a mahogany dowel that Russell cut with his Leatherman Tool…you should have seen THAT! Tools are on the way this week with friends coming over, but a lot of good that did us yesterday!! BUT…as you can also see, the shower curtain is up and worked beautifully this morning…THANK GOODNESS!! Russell has a tendency to shake off like a dog at the end of his shower, so the whole bathroom ended up soaked. Problem solved!! Russell says he submitting this design to the French Patent Office next week!! Now we just need to figure out how to mount the shower head….right now, we have to juggle, holding the shower head, and everything else we need to do in the shower…I’ve learned to wash my hair one handed….THAT’s a process as well…
Also included are photos of Russell’s assistant helping Christine and Kiza get started on the Rosetta Stone for English, which is also teaching them basic computer skills. For a more detailed story of Ronald, check out Russell’s blog… www.musanzeinc.com. And, my beautiful pink rose bush just outside our living room window, the washing machine on the back porch, our garden, which includes beans, almost ready to pick and corn that has tasseled out already, as well as a couple of our Little Tykes Play kitchen, complete with our water filter. All water we drink, brush teeth or cook with gets filtered through this filter….that’s how we keep the African juju water bugs away….
This week, we have friends from Little Rock coming for a visit…so excited to see familiar faces…don’t think we’ll tell em about our new best friends…the marching band…we think it best they find out for themselves….I hope their tickers are in tip top shape, too….till next week….God Bless!!
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