imbabazi

thank you sam for taking all the pictures HERE.

we drove here after attending church. there are two pictures of the outside of this God-filled place. you remember the church service, right? the one where we danced? now you remember and you have a smirk on your face, i just know it.

secondly, a rotten dog is a rotten dog regardless of where he or she lives. this one happens to be 'prince' and he abides in rwanda, thank you very much.

again, like scenery, garden pictures aren't quite the same as being there - but i know my sisters will enjoy them as they adore all things gardens. so pam and deb, enjoy :)

this was the other orphanage we had the privilege of visiting. this one used to house over 600 orphans. i think they are now down to around 100 with many of them actually attending a boarding school. the new plan for imbabazi is to continue housing all the current kids until they graduate without adding any new children. i guess the long-range goal for rwanda is to place children in foster homes and the imbabazi board has decided to support that goal. the hope is that the beautiful grounds and facilities will be converted into a technical school. a gentleman named jeff r. is joint-leading the orphanage and properties. he has only been here a few years and had no intentions of taking this position - until he was in the position and knew it was what God had been preparing him to do.

the lady who opened the orphanage many years ago was named rosa carr. to say she had a green thumb is quite the understatement as you have seen for yourself. from what i understood, they started off growing a plant called 'pyrenthrum' which was found to be a natural insecticide. soldiers who had lice slept in the garden and discovered that all the lice had died when they awoke. could i make something like that up? honestly, i think that is what jeff said. sooo pyrenthrum was grown and processed with the oil being sold. then synthetic insecticides came about. but with the rave for natural products, pyrenthrum is making a comeback. and if i have this information all messed up, forgive me :)

there is a picture of a little grass shack where the night watchman sleeps. gotta love it!

they cut their grass with hand-held tools. i'm talking perfect.

it started pouring. and it never let up. did i tell you we were there in the rainy season? so what do you do with a group of teenage boys when you can't be outdoors? you get out construction paper and markers and you draw. and you make paper airplanes. and you teach them tic-tac-toe which they'd never heard about. it didn't take much to please them. not at all.

we spread out the goodies we had brought and the Lord saw to it that we had a shirt and shorts for every boy. and flip flops. and school supplies. in a couple of the pictures, are jill (the trip organizer -- a feat in and of itself :) and a favorite friend named claudine. claudine came to the states a few years back to have her leg amputated due to bone cancer. she now has a prosthetic leg and is doing wonderfully. her brother adrien is standing next to martha's red suitcase. martha is my church friend who went to vietnam with me and loaned me three suitcases for this trip. and then i gave one away. so what did she say when i told i gave it away and would be giving her one of mine back instead? "aw, just keep 'em all. won't you be needing them for china?" there aren't enough marthas in this world. back to adrien. he pulled me aside and asked if he could have it after we had taken everything out. he needed one to use as he goes back and forth between boarding school and the orphanage. tell him no? yeah, right.