Don't look down!!!

Hello again…so as you may already know, Sarah and I recently took a little trip to Uganda over the New Years for a short vacation getaway.  The schedule – raft the one and only Nile River and then bungee jump over it.  The trip was great and unfortunate it wasn’t longer.  But, we did have a great time.  The trip started off a little odd though.

 

The day before our departure we had to book our seats and I was given a choice of every seat since nobody else had yet booked.  I asked the man working the booth if there were any seats that had more leg room than the others as Sarah and I are both very tall.  He assured me that every seat had the same amount of leg room.  We left Kigali around 5:30 in the morning which would put us reaching Kampala around 3 in the afternoon or so.  And, when we boarded the bus and sat down, I couldn’t help but notice that I had picked the two worst seats in the bus.  I mean, I couldn’t even put my legs in front of me.  They had to be up on the back of the other seat, over on Sarah or out in the isle which is what happened most of the trip. 

 

The other interesting thing is that my bladder just decided to stop doing its job and didn’t want to store anything.  So, not 10 minutes after we left, I had to pee like none other.  Unfortunately the Uganda/Rwanda border was only little over an hour drive.  Once we reached the border, I in a very quick manner showed myself to the restroom…or room with a small trench in the floor that everyone shared.  Also, just to be safe, I used the restroom again on the Ugandan side of the border before we left for the remaining 6 hours of driving.  It seems that day my bladder was dysfunctional because not 10 minutes after leaving the border I had to go again and there was no stopping for quite some time…not to mention the roads in these parts are not the smoothest.  I began looking for every opportunity to get out and go but the bus never stopped.  Finally a few hours later the bus stopped to let people get some food.  I ran out and asked where I could use the bathroom and some locals pointed in one direction.  As I walked over to that direction I saw nothing but the front yard of somebody’s house.  At this point…there was no stopping it…something had to come out or I was going to spontaneously combust.  Luckily I found some tall grass measuring about 3 feet wide by 4 feet tall…I’ll take it.  I am pretty sure that day…some local Ugandans got to know this tall skinny white boy more than they wanted to but to be honest with you…I didn’t care.  Sadly, there was another instance like this a few hours later but in situations like this, pride just seems to go out the window. 

 

Anyway, we made it safely to Uganda later that day.  The next day on New Year’s Eve, we joined a group of about 25 others for a day of rafting on the Nile.  Sarah and I were the only other Americans besides one other couple.  Everyone else seemed to be from Europe.  I never new the Nile had such huge powerful rapids.  We hit several class 5 rapids that day and ended up out of the boat, floating down the river in the rapids many times…but every second of it was amazing.  There were even several class 6 rapids that are illegal for companies to take people down…something about people dying and what not.  There was even a point when we all got out of our boats, walked around a humongous class 6 rapid and then put the boat back in on the smaller class 5 end of the rapid.  It was an exhilarating and action packed day.  That night we stayed at the campsite in the dorm rooms the rafting company owns.  It seems that the bed bugs particularly enjoyed my skin that night because the next morning, New Year’s Day, I had well over 100 bites up and down my arms and down my back.  Fortunately, I don’t seem to itch at all with the bug bites here so it didn’t bother me one bit.  As of today, they are all finally gone.  Anyway, we also did the bungee jump the next day which was pretty amazing…145 feet suspended over the Nile River…what a feeling.  I once again found myself asking the question right before I jumped, what is it inside of us that makes us want to do these crazy things?  Anyway, I am glad I did it and I would recommend this trip for anyone visiting East Africa. 

 

Later that night, we hopped on the midnight bus back to Kigali and 10 hours later, we were back in Rwanda.  All in all…great trip…just a little too short.  Next time I think we will have to make it a little longer. 

 

December Birthdays and Anniversaries

Hello All!!! I am so sorry that we've delayed in posting these. We most definitely did not forget but it just seems that December FLEW right past us without ever posting anything. So this blog is completely dedicated to anyone that had anything in December. :)

 

December 1st-Happy Birthday Aunt Sheila. We hope it was marvelous.

December 4th-Happy Birthday Aunt Mary. I hope you're feeling better than you were when we spoke.

December 10th-Happy Birthday Mom...I love you and hope your day was amazing!

December 20th-Happy Anniversary JC & Crystal. 14 years-congratulations.

December 22nd-Happy Anniversary Mark & Melissa. 19 years-keep it going.

December 25th-Happy Birthday Roger. Hope your day was special.

December 27th-Happy Birthday Blake.

December 30th-Happy Birthday Mom #2! We love you and hope your day was amazing!

December 31st-Happy Anniversary to Terry & Penny and Nanny & Papaw. I hope all of you have wonderful days and that your anniversaries were a wonderful way to end the year. Nanny and Papaw-I hope that you guys know I didn't forget your anniversary. I thought about you the whole day and although we were in Uganda and couldn't call I wanted to let you know I love you both so much and you're such an inspiration! Penny & Terry...hope you weren't in the hospital on your anniversary and if you were...take a vacation to celebrate your 29 years.

 

We love you ALL so much.

 

 

More updates on life to come just as soon as we get internet to upload the pics. The internet here WON’T work when it comes to photos.

 

 

Randomness

                                                                                                           

Jarod here. So, once again it has been a while since we have written…sorry.  It seems that lately not too much has been going on so I will see what I can conjure up. 

Oh, first of all, yesterday I was inside while Sarah was outside trying to soak up some rays of sun when I suddenly hear her say in a very much concerned/freaked out voice, “Jarod come here now.”  It seems that during her tanning session one of our little mouse friends decided to share the mat with Sarah and then ran across her leg.  When I made it outside I saw the little dude hunkering behind some nearby rocks.  The little guy and I had some words and end the end…it is sad to say…but, he is no more.  I am not one for hurting animals but when it comes to them keeping us up all night running in, around and all through our house making all kinds of noise…they gots to go!!!

I don’t know if we have mentioned this in any previous blogs but our organization is in the process of starting an Eco-Lodge here in our village.  There is still much fund raising to be done before any real construction takes place but recently the money was raised for the land and it is in process of being purchased right now.  The land is a beautiful 6 or 7 hectares, maybe bigger (I think a hectare is quite bigger than an acre) which basically consists of two mountain sides.  Once of those mountains overlooks the beautiful rain forest while the other overlooks the village with views all the way to the picturesque Lake Kivu…some 30 – 40 kl away.

However, there have been people living on that land for many years now and since the lodge will be built where they now live…they have to move.  This may sound unfortunate for these people but I can assure you, this is God send for them.  Some of these people are living in the worst houses I have yet to see in all of Rwanda…6 or 7 in one house…not to mention the goats, guinea pigs and rabbits they share it with.  As you can see from the picture of the house (which has 7 people living in it and not including the many animals) these are not the best conditions to be living in. 

So, these people are very excited as they will be getting a rather large chunk of change, especially by Rwandan standards to rebuild further down the mountain and closer to town.  With the money given to them for their land and house, they will be able to build a house 2 or 3 maybe 4 or 5 times nicer than their previous one and also purchase a good piece of land to farm on which as you probably know is basically the only source of income for our village.  If you don’t have land here, you don’t have anything.  Let me relate that to American standards…not having land would be like someone not having a job, car, phone, etc.  But, since giving a Rwandan 2,000,000 francs (roughly 4 thousand USD) at once can lead to bad things: a lot of banana beer purchased for one, it being stolen from thieves, as Elise our counterpart always says, “they can eat the money and have nothing left,” their money will be deposited into a bank in the Sector office and small withdrawals will be able to be made.  I think it will be good for everyone.  One thing is for sure, I am happy to see these families get a nicer home for themselves…especially because we know many of these families well as they are some of our sponsored children.

Umm…last but not least I will leave you with a funny story.  So, a month or so ago we were sitting a wedding when I notice an old man sitting across the way from us.  I could not but help notice that he looked just like a chimpanzee.  I didn’t say anything at first but as I kept looking, his facial hair around his mouth, expressions, everything kept drawing me back to that thought.  I told Sarah and she instantly agreed.  So, we decided to ask Elise our Rwandan counterpart, “what does that man remind of you of?”  Without hesitation Elise said, “A chimp”.  He said, “We even call him chimp” and then he proceeded to tell us another interesting story about the man.  Elise told us to look at his hand.  He said that several years ago a chimp came to his field to steal some crops and the man tried to fight him away but the chimp grabbed the mans hand in his mouth and bit off his thumb.  As we looked over, sure enough, the man was missing one of us thumbs.  Anyway, I thought that was interesting so I hope you enjoyed that story.   

I think that is all I have for now…if there is anything anyone would like to know or anything you would like us to write about while we are here…just let us know.  Email or Facebook us and we will be happy to do that.  I wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  Be blessed! 

Jarod

So much to be thankful for.

Man. It seems that so much has happened this week that I want to write about! First of all…Happy Late Thanksgiving to all of you. I hope that you had amazing feasts and wonderful time with family or friends. Jarod and I had a wonderful thanksgiving! There is a volunteer here from New York and I cook up a scrumptious meal for the 3 of us. We had deviled eggs, mashed potatoes, cabbage salad, cinnamon glazed carrots, pork and a YUMMY pineapple upside down cake. I cooked ALL of this on my camp fire stoves. I tell you…I’m becoming quite the little betty crocker. J My nanny will be proud. 

Then, we went to Kigali to spend some time with other Peace Corps Volunteers. It was the best thanksgiving we could have asked for complete with homemade sweet rolls, pumpkin and pecan pie and MANY other fabulous dishes!!! We ate so much AMAZING food that I literally thought I’d die of fullness. I laid on the floor for like an hour recovering. It was heavenly. We also had unlimited internet and hot showers. It was the perfect relaxing time. We talked to our families on skype and the phone…it was just more than we could have hoped or asked for.

 Today, our health center finally treated kids for worms!! It was so wonderful to be a part of it. Jarod and I handed out 391 pills for worms to children aged 6-16. We (our health post nurses) also probably treated between 100-200 children aged 0-6 with worm medicine, vitain A supplements, and the polio vaccination. It was so wonderful. We have it again tomorrow and Thursday. It feels so nice to be helping change childrens lives. I felt like we were making a difference today by giving out medicine. These children have worms so badly with generally no access to worm medicine…it was a breath of fresh air for us.                                   

Also, I wanted to list some books for a good read. Jarod and I have read many books while being here and I definitely recommend them!

·         A Thousand Hills by Stephen Kinzer (Rwandan/Kagame’s History)

·         We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families by Philip Gouravich (Rwandan History)

·         In the Kingdon of the Gorillas by Bill Webber and Amy Vedder (Rwandan History) DEFINITELY A MUST!

·         Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder

·         Dead Aid by (forgot her name but it something like Mambosa something)

·         The Blue Sweater by Jacqueline Novogratz

·         Shaking Hands with the Devil-documentary

·         Sometimes in April-movie

We’ve also been reading just random books and I finally read Wuthering Heights! It is a classic written in the 1800s. I loved it. Tragic but good.  We’ve read many more but they would probably be boring to you guys.

I know it’s the last day of the month but I forgot to do November shout outs! So…

November 9^th Happy Birthday to my little sis. 20 years old!! Also Happy Birthday to my father-in-law Terry. Jarod and I hope it was awesome! November 30^th, my bestie….Julie. Happy 26^th-as everyone told me…it only goes down hill from here. J  We love you guys all so much and hope your special days were wonderful.

Ok…I think that’s all for now. I hope that everyone is feeling the Christmas spirit and listening to their Christmas music. Jarod and I have been rocking out for a while. We love you all and thank God you’re all in our lives!! Until next time…

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11-23-10

 

Hello everyone.  I hope this blog finds you all well.  I seems it has been several weeks again since I have written, so I am due.  Anyway, nothing too exciting has been happening in our world…as Sarah mentioned in a previous blog…the crazy and awkward things just seem to be part of life now and not worthy of writing about.

 

Let’s see…our house lady, Louise, has now successfully made it past the Bermuda triangle time line (which is 1 ½ months) where the other 3 girls disappeared.  She has made it almost two months.  We really like her and she seems to enjoy being with us as well.  And, as far as we know, she has yet to steal or lie to us…sounds like a keeper! 

 

So, the other day I was sitting by a lady I have met a few times while she was holding her little baby.  I remembered she told me last time that she had six children so I said…how are your six children?  She responded…I have 7 now…then looked at the 2 month old in her arms.  I began to ask her questions about the little one and soon she said, do you want to take him?  Just to make sure I heard her correctly I asked her to repeat several times…I heard right.   When I said I don’t think we can do that right now she then asked…what do you want…a boy or girl…I have several of each?  I laughed and told Sarah who was standing a ways away what the lady was telling me.  I told her that 7 kids is a lot and that it must be tough to raise that many children.  She then proceeded to tell me that she wants to have 5 more…12 in all.  I told her that it would be very difficult to feed 12 children don’t you think.  She said, I have many sweet potatoes (which is pretty much the only thing many children eat…enter malnutrition).  I told her that it’s not good to eat just sweet potatoes…the kids need other things, specifically protein.  She didn’t seem too concerned and told me that she also had beans planted.  I would like to say this kind of story is rare to hear in our village but unfortunately…it is more of the norm.  But, at least I got a free child out of it…just kiddin…or am I???

 

In other news, our first real Holiday away from home is coming up.  I don’t things will be quite the same seeing as we are 10,000 miles away from our family.  We plan on going to visit a friend in Kigali for Thanksgiving who has an oven and so we’ll be able to cook some food at least close to real Thanksgiving food.  We are pretty pumped about that.  Christmas on the other hand…not quite sure what we are going to do there…that’s still a ways away…or at least it seems.  Oh, we are planning on going to Uganda over New Year’s and going white water rafting on the Nile and then crapping our pants before bungee jumping into it…that should be fun…not the crapping our pants part…it seems that is just part of the experience.  We will be going with two other PCV’s from Rwanda. 

 

It seems there is not much more to talk about…I think I am boring myself just trying to think of things.  So, this is all I got.  Happy Thanksgiving to everyone…eat lots of turkey, stuffing and all that other great holiday food for us.  Take care and be blessed!

 

 

Jarod