Rwanda 2017 | Day 11, 12, and Traveling Home

We’ve officially hit the one year mark of our 2017 Rwanda trip and I’m here with the FINAL post. I know, it’s ridiculous how long it’s taken me but life is just so darn busy these days. If I just had one day, with no interruptions, I could get a TON done but until then you get post that a year late. 🤦🏻‍♀️ In case you need a refresher, this is where I left off with days 9 and 10!

Wednesday | October 25th

Day Eleven:

Our last day of work and a very good day.

Cory’s fever broke in the middle of the night and he woke up feeling like a new man. Unfortunately, Greyson woke up gravely ill. We had lots of things to get straight that morning in anticipation of leaving the next day so we had some fears that guys wouldn’t have much time to work, but we later learned that as long as we’re doing what God called us to do, we have nothing to fear. Will we ever learn to trust this from the beginning?

We all drove to Gahanga together, but Dorian, Keneth, Baker, and I left soon after we arrived in order to visit a young lady whose sponsor asked us to visit and check on her. The guys immediately started finishing the mudding on the inside of the house.

Poor Greyson and his roll of toilet paper.

On our way to visit this sponsored child, we had to pick up her cousin at the school in Gahanga so that she could show us where she lived. This is totally a thing in Rwanda, by the way. We just stopped at the school, found her, and she got in the car with us. Can you imagine if things worked this way in the States?

At the girl’s home, there was a tiny little driveway over a ditch. I was driving and I have awful depth perception, ya’ll. I just knew I was going to miss it and get the big Land Cruiser stuck in the ditch. I thought it was funny when Dorian made a comment about how she had just closed her eyes and prayed she made it the day before and I had done the same! I should clarify that the places Dorian and I were driving were in just one village and we didn’t have to drive on typical Rwandan roads. This will probably be the only time I drive in Rwanda because it’s not for the weak!

We got to the girl’s house and as we were knocking on the door, it started pouring down rain. We had battled rain the whole trip but I think this was the heaviest downpour we had been in, yet. Kenneth ran back to the car for my rain jacket (even though I told him not to!) and we hunkered down inside, trying to wait out the rain and just visit. The rain was so loud on the tin roof, we couldn’t even hear each other speaking, even though we were sitting right across the small living room from each other.

We also visited this sweet girl in 2015 and it’s always amazing to see how much these children change. She told us this trip that she loved doing “tricks” and after she changed, she showed us some very cool contortionist tricks she was able to do. The sound in this video was the rain!

I was truly in awe of how much the area going in to Kane had changed since 2015. When we first started traveling to Rwanda, it was all woods and now there are houses, a huge factory, and a cricket stadium.

Meanwhile back at the house under construction, the guys were greeted by the hired carpenter–together with him and the fellas that had been helping them all week, they were able to install two interior doors, one exterior door, and two windows in the house. This house had no interior doors and no windows except for a phone-sized hole in the wall. The exterior door was also in poor condition and offered little protection.

The guys were temporarily chased inside by a big ol’ gullywasher rainstorm, but it passed quickly and the guys hanging the door never skipped a beat.

While the guys continued to work, Josephine, a lady that lives in the community, started preparing a goat and potatoes that we had purchased to feed the village. Jordan helped butcher and prepare the goat. As an animal lover, I know this hard to think about and see (if you have a weak stomach please scroll past), but many of these people haven’t had a full meal in days or weeks and they look at animals/food very differently than we do here in the states.

After the home visit, we headed back to meet Jadeau so that he could drive us to Kinyinya. On the way to meet him we stopped at the school to find Viannie and give him the money we owed him for the goat and potatoes he had bought that morning. Jadeau took us to the church in Kinyinya and Josephine and Michaiah met us there. We had another great session with the girls’ group discussing their self worth and how to respect themselves, after which we handed out toothbrushes and toothpaste to them.

Dorian and I really enjoyed this time with the girls and loved hearing the questions they had for us. This is something we would really like to develop further in the future.

Josephine had a meeting she had to get to so we took Michaiah with us back to Kane. She and Baker instantly became friends on this trip as Baker loves the attention Michaiah gave her and Michaiah loved sharing Baker’s treats! I hope these girls are lifelong friends!

I feel like I say this every single post but I will never get tired of the views this country offers. Pictures truly will never do them justice but I’m gonna continue to share them because I love them!

When we got back to Kane, Cory and Keneth had gone to buy mattresses for the home they were working on and food for one of the families we sponsor. Joel and Donnie were working on putting the windows in the house and Jordan and Greyson were working on the goat.

Since this was day three (or four?) of working at the house, the muzungus had attracted a crowd who would watch as they worked and even helped with things like washing their hands.

While we waited on the goat and potatoes to be done, we had the beginning of our celebration with plenty more dancing to come afterwards.

A few bits and bobs and the house was 90% finished! The rest had to be done later after the mud cured.

We gave out toothbrushes and toothpaste to the entire village, then fed everyone (roughly 110 people) roasted potatoes and goat kebabs (known as brochettes, a classic Rwandan food).

I had to get my mean Mama voice out a few times because a few people got pushy but Jordan stepped in and helped with “crowd control.”

He also led a demonstration on how to use the toothbrushes.

We weren’t sure if we were going to have enough food by the time we started handing it out, but God provided us with just enough for everyone to get a brochette and potato.

It is always one of my greatest pleasures to serve these people. They always serve us so fiercely why we are there so it is truly an honor to get to serve them a meal.

After the meal, we had a big celebration with lots of traditional dancing and music.

We said our final goodbyes before heading back to the house.

Look at her chubby cheeks! I’m gonna need my baby back ASAP.

We were joined for dinner by our old friend Gaudence, a welcome visitor and someone who has loved us since Cory’s first visit to Rwanda. She was so excited to meet Baker and brought her the sweetest gifts. By the time the visit was over, though, half the weary-worn team was snoring in bed.

We were so happy we got to see our sweet friend!

One more day. Cue the tears!

Thursday | October 26th

Our final day in Rwanda was a little hectic, as it normally is, but we had all day so we tried to fit as much in as possible. Note to selves, don’t do this! It made for a very tiring day and not the best way to start almost 40 hours of travel. We had already pushed ourselves very hard on this trip with very little down time or rest.

We started the day doing our shopping. We knew of a good artisans’ co-op downtown but when we drove by it, it had been demolished and something else was being built in its location. Jadeau, one of our other drivers, knew where the co-op had been relocated to. Great! We were excited to still support these women. Except where he parked us and where the co-op was located were about 3 miles apart, uphill, and through a busy street where distributors where dropping off truckloads of supplies. To get through was nearly impossible. When we finally reached the shopping center, there was parking all around it and we were all seething under our breaths. HA!

We weren’t planning on buying ourselves any souvenirs but someone handed Baker this baby and she absolutely wouldn’t let go of it. Looking back, I am thankful that we have something we can always remember her first trip from!

Also looking back, why did my child not have shoes on most of the trip??

Just so happened that the shopping center had an ice cream place and since we were all still dying from our trek from the car, we got slushies to help us cool down! Check out those massive straws too. We definitely saved a few of those.

We headed to our favorite co-op to finish our shopping. We have gone here every year and it can be a little overwhelming with the vendors trying to pressure you in to shopping in their store, but it’s never busy and not nearly as overwhelming as other markets. Most of them will accept a polite “no thank you.”

Like I said earlier, we dealt with a good bit of rain this trip since we there at the end of October, which is the rainy season. While the rain was a hindrance at some points, it was pretty cool to watch the storms roll in.

We also stayed in houses rather than hotels and it worked out really well and something we will continue to do to save on the cost of boarding.

This poor girl did so well our whole trip. I was honestly worried about how she would do but she blew us out of the water with how well she did the entire trip, flights and all. The last few days though, something upset her stomach and we dealt with massive blow outs. So massive in fact, that we had to find bigger diapers while we there to get us home and hopefully avoid a huge mess on the flights. By God alone, we found size 4 Pampers at a store near the house we were staying. It was the only size they had, so God must have felt bad for us especially after the incident we had on the last day. I won’t go in to full details but Baker was in just her diaper, sitting on a marble floor playing. We knew that she had a dirty diaper by the smell but we were waiting on her to finish before we changed her. We got carried away with packing and didn’t realize Baker was scooting across the floor.  As you can imagine, it was quite a mess as she left “skid marks” all over the floor.

Our favorite place to get coffee (and one of the coolest buildings in Rwanda) has been shut down and moved but, somehow, they let us in to get coffee that was still left here. This always happens to us! In 2015, it was after hours and dark, and we were able to get in to buy coffee. We don’t question it though because we love our Rwandan coffee, no matter what we have to do to get it.

Our last stop before heading to the airport was to visit our friend Josiane. You’ve heard me talk about her multiple times and we are so thankful that our church has continued to support her after sharing her story back in 2015. She asked us to visit where she was living and we were all in shock at how far down in a valley she lived and how far she walked to school every day. It is always a rude awakening to see how willing these students are to get an education and how so many people in America squander away the opportunities.

We drove for what felt like 45 minutes down a narrow, curvy road and then parked and walked the remaining distance because the road became too small for a car.

Josiane was overcome by emotions when Joel told her that she would continue to be supported and be able to go to college.

We also made sure to thank the family she lived with because when we met her in 2015, she didn’t have the best living situation. We are thankful that this home welcomed her in and helped her finish school.

By the time we got back to the house, we had a quick meal with Josephine (Ben had to travel out of the country), and headed to the airport. Something new that we weren’t expecting was what we could only assume was a bomb detecter for the car but we had to unload everything out of our cars for them to do the search. When you have 14 or so pieces of luggage, this is not an easy task and they mixed our luggage with a few other people. It was a little stressful since we were on a deadline to get checked in.

And yes, Baker sat in my lap for the short drive to the airport. Car seats are not required in Rwanda and it’s just easier to have hers already packed up before we get to the airport.

Goodbyes are always emotional and one of the worst parts of our trips. These people are not just acquaintances of ours. Ben, Jo, Keneth, and their family are our family. It’s hard to go a year between seeing them but it has been easier over the course of our trips to know that we will be returning the next year. Tears are always shed though from most everyone.

Cory and I always get held up in this airport and this year was no different! Funny story (but kinda sad) but in an earlier post in Nyabihu you probably saw pictures with a Hulk Hogan doll that Cory had brought with him. While packing to go home, he just tossed it in one of the plastic totes that we travel with and zip tied it shut. When said tote went through the x-ray machine, the Rwandan version of the TSA stopped Cory to ask him what he had in the tote that looked like a child. It’s funny because it would only happen to us and one of Cory’s toys but sad because this probably means they have seen people try to get kids out of the country in a similar manner before. By the time we got checked in, our group was losing their marbles and getting tangled up in the ropes, falling over their suitcases (I’m looking at you, Jordan!).

Despite this picture, which was how we boarded and unboarded each flight, Baker did SO well flying. For some reason, we had to sit on the runway for an extremely long time before we took off and the air wasn’t on. One poor little fella got too hot and screamed for the entire time we had to wait. I felt awful for his parents who finally striped him down to his diaper and a sweet flight attendant brought him so cold rags. Baker was a little hard to handle in that time because she flew in our lap, but after we took off, she slept the rest of the flight. She actually slept for about 17 out of the 19 hours we were on a plane. You can’t beat that!

We had about a 4 hour layover in Brussels and if I haven’t said it yet, traveling with experienced parents made this trip so much easier on Cory and myself. It was perfectly aligned that Donnie, Dorian, and Joel were with us on our first time traveling out of the country with Baker.

Just in case you are wondering what it looks like to fly to Africa with a 15 month old, this is it! Blankets, headphones, sippy cups everywhere and one tired babe who was passed out in my seat.

She even slept going through the airport. I just wish I had a picture of her asleep on her daddy’s shoulder.

We finally made it to Dulles and our one hour layover got delayed to two but we were almost home!

We took over this area of the gate, used our bags to make a playpen for Baker, and waited until we could board. The whole trip, Baker was so close to walking and we so hoped her first steps would have been in Rwanda. She acted like was trying to walk at the airport and we all agreed if she took her first steps there, we would forever lie to her and tell her they were in Rwanda and not in the airport on the way home. Don’t worry, she ended up chickening out there too.

After almost 30 hours of travel, we were all pretty exhausted. I think this was the only time Jordan slept the whole time.

Back an hour later than planned, and still two hours from home, we made it back to the airport where our families awaited us. My parents drove their church van to get the majority of us home and by the time we got back in to town, it was after midnight. In case you are counting, that is almost 35 hours of traveling!

As always, we have to say a huge thanks to our families who helped us get home. My dad had to work early the next morning and was so sweet to take the time to drive us back from the airport.

I know this post is already a long one so I will wrap it up but I just wanted to comment on how different this trip felt to Cory and me. There are a slew of different factors that went in to us feeling this way including it being the first “big” team we took, having Baker with us, the fact that we worked NON-STOP for two weeks, the last one being the biggest factor. Never before have we been ready to get home from Rwanda but I remember on the last day just feeling ready to be home. Cory had a lot of stress on him because he felt the need to be everything while on the trip and really just put a damper on both our trips. This is not to say that God didn’t work in our lives while on this trip or that our group wasn’t fabulous and we didn’t have a wonderful trip, just left us with a feeling we had never felt before and one we didn’t want to feel the next year. Overall, this was an incredible trip and we accomplished some incredible things while we were in country. We were so excited to finally get to introduce our church to Rwanda and let it soak in to their lives like it has for Cory and me over the years!

Need to catch up on Rwanda 2017: 

Traveling, Arriving, and Day 1
Days 2 and 3
Days 4 and 5
Day 6
Day 7 and 8
Day 9 and 10

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