Thursday was a lot different than our first day of the other camp because we kind of knew what to expect. The kids in this camp were from age 18 to about age 27, compared to the other camp of ages 12 - 17.
We arrived like the other days to some worship, and we were then greeted and introduced to the kids. A lot of kids had cell phones and were taking video of us sometimes.
Tyler went up to do the same teaching about the Holy Spirit as he had done for the last camp. This time though, he had a different translator. I had heard about Gad from the Patch kids and they kept saying everything would work out better when he got here. And it did. Tyler loved teaching with him translating, and Gad was great at making it understandable for everyone.
Still recovering from sickness, I was up in the guest house for a lot of the day, so that was disappointing.
Doug, who was really awesome and stayed at our room while I was sick on Wednesday, planned out a skit that we did for the older kids. It was a story of a boy who turned away from the Lord, and it was a great example of how no matter how much you mess up, God can get us out of our mess. I wasn't a part of the skit, but I thought it was a really neat way to communicate without words to the kids.
We left the next day back to the Kings Conference Center in Bujumbura, and did a little souvenir shopping, and learned about the value of money. It was fun bargaining with the people at the market, and walking out of the shop to try and get them to lower the price of a painting from $50 to $15.
The trip home was a huge blur and I don't really remember anything until we got to Washington D.C.... I was exhausted, but happy when I saw that first Starbucks sign in the airport, and I got a Caramel White Mocha Frappuccino :)
We had 8 hours in D.C., so we took a shuttle to see all of the important buildings, to get ice cream, and walk around comparing the roads, people, and everything else to Burundi. It was way more humid than Burundi though, which was kinda ironic. Africa or USA, you'd think Africa was hotter, but it wasn't in our case.
When I got home around midnight of some day of the week, I enjoyed the ability to fine tune the temperature of the shower :)
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Tuesday + Wednesday, Last day of camp/sickness
The power has been out, and the wifi doesn't work when it's out, so this might be late
The second (and last) day of camp was a lot like the first day, we got there to some worship and joined in. As usual, it was filled with joy!
Tyler finished talking to the kids about the Holy Spirit, and I again thought they were paying attention really well.
We then split the kids up into 3 groups and rotated games. We had 7 frisbees at one station, 100 kendamas at another, and the station I was with played tag. At first it was difficult to explain the game without a translator, but Gloria came and did a great job of explaining. We played link tag, and everyone was laughing the entire time!
We worshiped again with the kids and then worshiped with two of our songs again before heading out to lunch.
It was delicious!
Before everyone was done with lunch, something amazing happened. I asked Denise if it was possible for me to play the piano alone for a little bit. It turned out that the guy that unlocked the door for me too get into the building let in all the kids as well, so it ended up being a concert! I met the guy who played the piano normally, and we had an awesome conversation.
We got back to the building and listened to quite a while of teaching the kids about their health, and how to prevent Malaria, STDs and HIV/AIDS which brought up a lot of good questions!
After that, the man from yesterday came up to teach the kids in Kirundi. Again, I didn't catch a whole lot, but he was talking about sexual sin. It was amazing how many confessions there were, and we prayed over them.
We went into some more worship and praise, because you can never have too much! Our team did "Everlasting God" again to which everyone was dancing!
The night ended with a long time of different kids leading worship. And when we announced that we would be passing out their gifts, they cheered!
We went a while passing out notebooks and returning smiles while the music played in the background. Everyone was worn out, so we went to a great restaurant called Helena to top off the late night.
The next morning I woke up at 7:45, ran to the bathroom, and threw up. It was a terrible day of the worst sickness that I don't want to explain right now, so if you have any questions just ask me when I get home! Just know I'm all better now.
The second (and last) day of camp was a lot like the first day, we got there to some worship and joined in. As usual, it was filled with joy!
Tyler finished talking to the kids about the Holy Spirit, and I again thought they were paying attention really well.
We then split the kids up into 3 groups and rotated games. We had 7 frisbees at one station, 100 kendamas at another, and the station I was with played tag. At first it was difficult to explain the game without a translator, but Gloria came and did a great job of explaining. We played link tag, and everyone was laughing the entire time!
We worshiped again with the kids and then worshiped with two of our songs again before heading out to lunch.
It was delicious!
Before everyone was done with lunch, something amazing happened. I asked Denise if it was possible for me to play the piano alone for a little bit. It turned out that the guy that unlocked the door for me too get into the building let in all the kids as well, so it ended up being a concert! I met the guy who played the piano normally, and we had an awesome conversation.
We got back to the building and listened to quite a while of teaching the kids about their health, and how to prevent Malaria, STDs and HIV/AIDS which brought up a lot of good questions!
After that, the man from yesterday came up to teach the kids in Kirundi. Again, I didn't catch a whole lot, but he was talking about sexual sin. It was amazing how many confessions there were, and we prayed over them.
We went into some more worship and praise, because you can never have too much! Our team did "Everlasting God" again to which everyone was dancing!
The night ended with a long time of different kids leading worship. And when we announced that we would be passing out their gifts, they cheered!
We went a while passing out notebooks and returning smiles while the music played in the background. Everyone was worn out, so we went to a great restaurant called Helena to top off the late night.
The next morning I woke up at 7:45, ran to the bathroom, and threw up. It was a terrible day of the worst sickness that I don't want to explain right now, so if you have any questions just ask me when I get home! Just know I'm all better now.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Sunday + Monday, Joy is too little of a word to use in the description
Sunday was church day, we went to a church in Bujumbura where we were welcomed as guests and brought up in front of everyone. The worship took up most of the 3 hours and it was filled with joy! The music, everyone was in harmony and knew the song, even the kids were singing and dancing. Matt was at first taking video from his seat, but then someone grabbed his arm and told him "Go! Go up there!" and from then on he was with his camera right up next to the pastors and with the choir! The service went by like crazy! We left right after on a 3 hr car ride to Gitega on a curvy road with an amazing view of the vast, rolling hills with a flourishing green color.
Our hotel is great quality, and they are trying their best to make us comfortable by playing Christian songs at dinner, and thoroughly cleaning our rooms! We take up 9 out of 10 of the rooms at the hotel.
Anytime I've said was the best day ever of my entire life, just ignore, because today now took that position. We were sat in front of the building where the 400+ kids were worshiping, but we then moved to sit with the kids during Tyler's speech and the hug machine, which was a skit we all took part in. The kids were very happy to have us be there. Afterwards, the students took the kids outside while some stayed inside to ask questions for the adults. We started some dances like the Macarana and Hokey-Pokey to teach the kids and they circled around. After a little bit, Spencer got a grapefruit sized ball that we started a soccer-passing-circle, in which half of those kids participated or watched. We went inside for worship and Tyler's speech about the Holy Spirit, which got a lot of responses from kids who kneeled in between the benches.
We had practiced a skit that used two people, one being the legs and head, and the other being the arms who's head was covered by a blanket. Jacob (Jr) and Doug (pictured below) did the skit as one person, and Francesca and Amy did the other. Videos will be shown later of the actual skit, but since I unexpectedly took Jacob (Jr)'s place in the skit, I didn't get any video.
I cleaned up the shaving cream and toothpaste back at the guest house where we had dropped off our stuff and took a break playing UNO (Super Man Edition)!
I walked back to the center and a guy was teaching the kids in Kirundi. We had translators nearby, but I didn't catch much. The message definitely had an impact on the kids.
Brittany then did a great demonstration that made the kids laugh about eating and keeping your body healthy, doing dance moves and motions to help kids remember what the fruits and vegetables are good for (like eyes, muscles, heart...). The kids had great fun with the motions, and we joined in as well.
We ate lunch. Not much else to tell about that except that Africa has these amazingly good lemon-lime-pineapple?-grapefruit? flavored Fanta that I didn't get at lunch since they ran out, but who cares; the lunch was delicious anyways :)
We got back to some more worship, which you have to keep in mind that Burundi worship is nothing like America worship (it's even better :), and continued on with Tyler's teaching.
Then Brittany came up again to talk about the spreading of germs. She put green sparkles all over her hand as the translator described how germs are little bugs that cause sickness. Team members were called up and greeted, shaking hands with Brittany as they were turned into a sparkly mess to show how germs spread. You continued to see the occasional sparkle throughout the rest of the day.
To keep the kids entertained, we did the Hand-Washing dance, which we all didn't know and later found out Brittany made up on the spot. It was a great hit, especially with the Burundian drummer on his drumset!
After things calmed down, I suddenly heard my name, and looked up. Brittany asked if I would like to play the keyboard. What did I say?? YES!!! I went up and there was a little bit of awkward silence as I changed the sound from clarinet, to strings, and finally to piano. I started to play a tune that was kind of up beat to match the mood, and I was suddenly more comfortable when the drummer joined in! It fit perfectly together and the kids loved it.
I sat back down, happy to be off of piano withdrawal, when it just so happened I was up there again. This time though, it was an actual song, and Tyler played the guitar, while Spencer played the drums. We played "Everlasting God" and worshiped through our ways.
The kids seemed at first taken by surprise, but then joined in quickly. We had them all dancing, Matt (who left his camera on the table), Francesca, and Katie on the mic singing, and their talented bass player playing along. At that moment, I felt like I knew one of the reasons why I was here. The joy in the room was not only overflowing from the faucet, but flooding into the rivers, breaking through dams, and capturing everything in its path, which happened to be everyone in the room. We were later asked to do it again tomorrow.
Just as I was thinking it was all wrapped up in some nice wrapping paper and a bow, the beat started again, but this time it was from the Burundian kids and band. Almost our whole team was dancing with the kids, who grabbed our hands and danced like I never had before. The joyful attitude displayed from these kids was unbelievable, and the room with the open doors and about 12 open windows got so hot that we followed the kids outside to cool down. The happiness lasted me all through and after the bus ride home (which I keep accidentally calling our hotel room). We were all talking about it in the bus, and now we are preparing for tomorrow!
Our hotel is great quality, and they are trying their best to make us comfortable by playing Christian songs at dinner, and thoroughly cleaning our rooms! We take up 9 out of 10 of the rooms at the hotel.
Anytime I've said was the best day ever of my entire life, just ignore, because today now took that position. We were sat in front of the building where the 400+ kids were worshiping, but we then moved to sit with the kids during Tyler's speech and the hug machine, which was a skit we all took part in. The kids were very happy to have us be there. Afterwards, the students took the kids outside while some stayed inside to ask questions for the adults. We started some dances like the Macarana and Hokey-Pokey to teach the kids and they circled around. After a little bit, Spencer got a grapefruit sized ball that we started a soccer-passing-circle, in which half of those kids participated or watched. We went inside for worship and Tyler's speech about the Holy Spirit, which got a lot of responses from kids who kneeled in between the benches.
We had practiced a skit that used two people, one being the legs and head, and the other being the arms who's head was covered by a blanket. Jacob (Jr) and Doug (pictured below) did the skit as one person, and Francesca and Amy did the other. Videos will be shown later of the actual skit, but since I unexpectedly took Jacob (Jr)'s place in the skit, I didn't get any video.
I cleaned up the shaving cream and toothpaste back at the guest house where we had dropped off our stuff and took a break playing UNO (Super Man Edition)!
I walked back to the center and a guy was teaching the kids in Kirundi. We had translators nearby, but I didn't catch much. The message definitely had an impact on the kids.
Brittany then did a great demonstration that made the kids laugh about eating and keeping your body healthy, doing dance moves and motions to help kids remember what the fruits and vegetables are good for (like eyes, muscles, heart...). The kids had great fun with the motions, and we joined in as well.
We ate lunch. Not much else to tell about that except that Africa has these amazingly good lemon-lime-pineapple?-grapefruit? flavored Fanta that I didn't get at lunch since they ran out, but who cares; the lunch was delicious anyways :)
We got back to some more worship, which you have to keep in mind that Burundi worship is nothing like America worship (it's even better :), and continued on with Tyler's teaching.
Then Brittany came up again to talk about the spreading of germs. She put green sparkles all over her hand as the translator described how germs are little bugs that cause sickness. Team members were called up and greeted, shaking hands with Brittany as they were turned into a sparkly mess to show how germs spread. You continued to see the occasional sparkle throughout the rest of the day.
To keep the kids entertained, we did the Hand-Washing dance, which we all didn't know and later found out Brittany made up on the spot. It was a great hit, especially with the Burundian drummer on his drumset!
After things calmed down, I suddenly heard my name, and looked up. Brittany asked if I would like to play the keyboard. What did I say?? YES!!! I went up and there was a little bit of awkward silence as I changed the sound from clarinet, to strings, and finally to piano. I started to play a tune that was kind of up beat to match the mood, and I was suddenly more comfortable when the drummer joined in! It fit perfectly together and the kids loved it.
I sat back down, happy to be off of piano withdrawal, when it just so happened I was up there again. This time though, it was an actual song, and Tyler played the guitar, while Spencer played the drums. We played "Everlasting God" and worshiped through our ways.
The kids seemed at first taken by surprise, but then joined in quickly. We had them all dancing, Matt (who left his camera on the table), Francesca, and Katie on the mic singing, and their talented bass player playing along. At that moment, I felt like I knew one of the reasons why I was here. The joy in the room was not only overflowing from the faucet, but flooding into the rivers, breaking through dams, and capturing everything in its path, which happened to be everyone in the room. We were later asked to do it again tomorrow.
Just as I was thinking it was all wrapped up in some nice wrapping paper and a bow, the beat started again, but this time it was from the Burundian kids and band. Almost our whole team was dancing with the kids, who grabbed our hands and danced like I never had before. The joyful attitude displayed from these kids was unbelievable, and the room with the open doors and about 12 open windows got so hot that we followed the kids outside to cool down. The happiness lasted me all through and after the bus ride home (which I keep accidentally calling our hotel room). We were all talking about it in the bus, and now we are preparing for tomorrow!
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Saturday - another day of rest
We took time this morning to talk about the kids camp we are running in a few days, and we played games and practiced skits to get a good idea of what was going on.
After eating lunch we went to try and see some hippos and alligators in our new bus. We weren't going to a zoo, it was in the wild. Though we only saw some hippos in the distance, we all had a great time taking photos and talking :)
We got back 15 minutes before we were having dinner at Bishop Buchiniordi (spelling?). We met at the bus to find it was rescheduled for 7 instead of 5. Meanwhile, Spencer caught a baby gecko that was in our room and we fed it fish crackers and ants from the bathroom. I played some card games too.
We passed a pretty bad car accident, the first I've seen here, on the way to dinner. The Bishop was very nice and he had a lot of his family there too. The food was better than any restaurant, and it got better in the candlelight when the power went off!
Back at the hotel, we discussed tomorrow's activities and what God has been teaching us. We are leaving to go up-country tomorrow after attending a 3 hour church service!
After eating lunch we went to try and see some hippos and alligators in our new bus. We weren't going to a zoo, it was in the wild. Though we only saw some hippos in the distance, we all had a great time taking photos and talking :)
We got back 15 minutes before we were having dinner at Bishop Buchiniordi (spelling?). We met at the bus to find it was rescheduled for 7 instead of 5. Meanwhile, Spencer caught a baby gecko that was in our room and we fed it fish crackers and ants from the bathroom. I played some card games too.
We passed a pretty bad car accident, the first I've seen here, on the way to dinner. The Bishop was very nice and he had a lot of his family there too. The food was better than any restaurant, and it got better in the candlelight when the power went off!
Back at the hotel, we discussed tomorrow's activities and what God has been teaching us. We are leaving to go up-country tomorrow after attending a 3 hour church service!
Friday, July 20, 2012
Expect the Unexpected
Today we met three of the sponsored widows, two of them were sponsored by our team. We were planning on meeting four, but something went a little differently than planned... We drove a pretty far ways away from our hotel and our bus got stuck* right outside of the third widow's house (just around 3:45). The two wheels on the right were stuck deep in two ditches, which I thought was amazing that they were a perfect distance away for both tires to get stuck. Nobody cared at all though! There had been like 30 kids chasing th bus yelling, "White People!!!" in their language, so we played with them after meeting the widow. It was obvious they had never had a bus full of white people get stuck in a ditch in their neighborhood! We immediately gathered groups of kids by doing the hokey pokey, taking pictures, playing catch, or taking French lessons from the kids who spoke it. None of them spoke hardly any English.
When we pulled up in the bus and felt that sinking feeling to the right, kids were waving at us and talking and laughing about us. The kids obviously never saw braces before. One boy waved at me through the window and smiled, so I waved and smiled back. He abruptly went back to a straight face and stared at me. After a while I figured out what was wrong, and I pointed at my teeth and taught them the word, "braces" with a thumbs up to let them know it wasn't any weird American disease and everything was fine (I have no clue what they were thinking)! The smile returned as they they whispered to to eachother and burst out laughing!
The teenage and adult boys were really nice and helped try to dig out the bus, but the two tires were wedged pretty far down to the point where the bus almost touched the ground.
As they worked, I went around and attempted to communicate with some kids. There was such a variety of heights and ages!! After we were waiting for 2 hours or so, I found a boy that spoke some English, about my age. He asked if I spoke French, and I said no, so he communicated in English, saying stuff like, "What's your name?" "United States President Obama?" "Football? (soccer)" and "We are a family" to which he pointed out his three other brothers. Jacob and I gave them the thumbs up as we made out names like "Obama", "Rihanna", and "Justin Beiber", and Katie even caught a boy singing a JB song on video!
After drawing in the sand* and playing catch, it had been a good while and the sun was almost down, which meant it was almost 6:00. Two cars came to pick us up since it wasn't safe to stay at dark. It was a sudden ending to our adventure, because we were rushed over to the cars right when they had got there. Spencer and I were shoved into the back trunk of the first car and waited a while, but we ended up getting a seat in the second car white a lot more space in the back.
As we left, kids spotted out water and were making gestures that they wanted it, yelling, "Kinju" as running alongside the car. There wasn't anything we could do about it.
It got dark really quickly, and the car ride was longer than the way here because of construction projects and detours. The cars were tightly packed together and horns honked way more often than in the US. We got back thanks to some great drivers, and I know everyone still thinks our bus driver is a great bus driver. I'm glad no one was blaming him for anything. We got back around 8:00, and ate chicken and rice, telling stories about the day with the power generator on in the background.
*video on Facebook
When we pulled up in the bus and felt that sinking feeling to the right, kids were waving at us and talking and laughing about us. The kids obviously never saw braces before. One boy waved at me through the window and smiled, so I waved and smiled back. He abruptly went back to a straight face and stared at me. After a while I figured out what was wrong, and I pointed at my teeth and taught them the word, "braces" with a thumbs up to let them know it wasn't any weird American disease and everything was fine (I have no clue what they were thinking)! The smile returned as they they whispered to to eachother and burst out laughing!
The teenage and adult boys were really nice and helped try to dig out the bus, but the two tires were wedged pretty far down to the point where the bus almost touched the ground.
As they worked, I went around and attempted to communicate with some kids. There was such a variety of heights and ages!! After we were waiting for 2 hours or so, I found a boy that spoke some English, about my age. He asked if I spoke French, and I said no, so he communicated in English, saying stuff like, "What's your name?" "United States President Obama?" "Football? (soccer)" and "We are a family" to which he pointed out his three other brothers. Jacob and I gave them the thumbs up as we made out names like "Obama", "Rihanna", and "Justin Beiber", and Katie even caught a boy singing a JB song on video!
After drawing in the sand* and playing catch, it had been a good while and the sun was almost down, which meant it was almost 6:00. Two cars came to pick us up since it wasn't safe to stay at dark. It was a sudden ending to our adventure, because we were rushed over to the cars right when they had got there. Spencer and I were shoved into the back trunk of the first car and waited a while, but we ended up getting a seat in the second car white a lot more space in the back.
As we left, kids spotted out water and were making gestures that they wanted it, yelling, "Kinju" as running alongside the car. There wasn't anything we could do about it.
It got dark really quickly, and the car ride was longer than the way here because of construction projects and detours. The cars were tightly packed together and horns honked way more often than in the US. We got back thanks to some great drivers, and I know everyone still thinks our bus driver is a great bus driver. I'm glad no one was blaming him for anything. We got back around 8:00, and ate chicken and rice, telling stories about the day with the power generator on in the background.
*video on Facebook
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
14 hr flight from DC to Ethiopia
It was very long, but the spacious Boeing 777 had touch screens on the back of each seat that had music, multiplayer games and movies, and a charging spot for your phone... We passed Italy and didn't end up stopping there like we thought. It was -50°F outside the plane at 37,000 ft and we were going about 600mph at average.
Washington DC was a nice break. We were there for around 5 hrs, had breakfast and played with kendamas.
Everyone wishes we were there now!
Washington DC was a nice break. We were there for around 5 hrs, had breakfast and played with kendamas.
Everyone wishes we were there now!
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