The Real Deal (February 2009)

 

Saturday was our last day of ministry in the African bush.  It was a typical day, starting out with a 30 minute walk (exercise), a breakfast of fruit, toast, or eggs.  Then our host wanted to take us to a “hotel” that was “nearby” so we set out down a road in the desert.  After a 45 minute hike (an African’s version of nearby!!), we arrived at a small oasis settled up on a hill overlooking the valley.  It was really nice, though unexpected for being in the middle of nowhere.  The manager treated us all to a soda, being a muzungu (white person), leads to special treatment in Africa!  Then luckily we were provided a ride back to our ministry site.

Lunch consisted of rice, beans, and cabbage. Three of us spoke at “seminar”, which is really a church meeting/service under a tree with speakers and lots of dancing, singing, and worship. This lasted a couple hours. Afterwards, I joined the wives in the “kitchen”, a mud thatched building, to help cut up onions and tomatoes for our meal of macanda (sp?), beans and maize. After supper, we set-up for film ministry. Each evening, we start out with African worship music videos, that we get a huge kick out of.  It’s so much fun to dance with the Africans and pretty much make a fool of ourselves!! Then someone shares a message before we start the film.

                                     

This night, we showed the movie “Hotel Rwanda.”  I had already seen this movie several years ago at home, and it was a hard movie to watch then. But to watch it amidst the African people and knowing that Rwanda was so close, made the experience so much more real.  “Hotel Rwanda” is a heartbreaking movie about the genocide in Rwanda in 1994.  People were searched out and murdered because of their family heritage and the rest of the world was oblivious or pretended not to know that such a tragedy was going on.  I sat between two young girls and didn’t try to hide the tears streaming down my face.