The Simple Life

Last week, I had the most amazing day with my friend Tom Allen and several other visitors that were in town. We started off the day by visiting the Musanze Cave, which is a deep rocky cave outside of Musanze inhabiting millions of little bats, who did not seem too pleased with their visitors. We also had several little Rwandan “tour guides” who accompanied us along the way. The cave required pretty strenuous climbing over mounds of slippery rocks, and several of these boys were barefoot and had no light of their own to guide them. We saw bones in the crevices of the cave, which we presumed to be human remains from people hiding during the genocide.

Here is a picture of us with some of our "tour guides".

Coming out of the cave...

It is a great feeling when you walk into a remote village in the middle of Africa and all of the children come running towards you, yelling your name and greeting you with big hugs. It is kind of humorous because Virunga Lodge is an upscale African resort (that costs around $1000 per night) where we like to go for dinner, but our favorite part of going there is to visit the locals. I saw the same boys that had walked 3 hours to send me an email the previous week, and this time they tell me that they had walked the 3 hours (each way) again to come visit me at Sonrise on Sunday. I had no way of knowing these kids were coming, and they don’t really understand the concept that just because I work at Sonrise doesn’t mean that I am there all the time. Talk about feeling guilty! I promised these boys that if they came back this week, I would definitely be there.

We hike past the village for a couple hours all the way down the mountain to the lake, accompanied by about 30 kids. Tom pulls out his flashcards, and we have mini English and Math lessons on the side of the mountain while we are waiting for the boat to come take us across the lake.

The first boat we got in quickly filled up with water….we decided this probably wouldn’t be a good idea.

We pile on the next boat, along with my favorite boys, to go across the lake to visit a nearby island. Once we get to the island (which is really more like a small mountain), we hike all the way up and come across a mud hut school in session. This Primary school had no running water, no electricity, and only three teachers to teach all of the students. We go into the classroom and Tom performs a quick English lesson to a lot of really stunned students, who were shocked to see white skin in the middle of this remote island. Next we go into a home of one of the locals, and I look up to see probably about a hundred children trying to get a glimpse through the windows and doors. As is custom here, we are asked to say a blessing on the home before leaving. So we all gather around, hold hands, and Tom prays for this family and the rest of the village. Below is a picture of our new friends gathering on the bank to wave goodbye.

My sweet friend Elie....as he has told me several times, "I am so happy you are my friend."
The boat takes us back across the lake to Virunga mountain, and as we are getting closer, the mountain seems to be getting steeper and steeper. We literally hike straight up the mountain, in a single file line and on a barely-there path no wider than six inches. I am not afraid of heights, but there were several times which I looked down the steep mountainside and thought to myself….”if I even barely stumble, if I take one wrong step…..this could be very bad!” At one point I looked behind me to find a line of children winding around the path as far as my eyes could see. Whenever I started to think how exhausted I was, I just looked down at the little girl who was about two years old, barefoot, and not even at all affected….and re-evaluated my thoughts.

We end our day by eating at the wonderful Virunga Lodge and dining with some very interesting people who were staying at the lodge.

This was an amazing, exhausting, adventure-filled, unexpected day….but, then again, I have come to have no expectations about what my days will hold here in Rwanda. I must quote my friend Tom here, as he wrote on his blog about this very same day: “I strongly believe that we should live “intentionally”, and not simply “sleepwalk” through life. HOWEVER, I also believe that if we squeeze life too hard, insisting upon every last drop, we can choke it to death. Life is very good. The best of my life here in Rwanda is VERY simple. I feel very privileged and blessed.” Enjoy the simple things in life!