Kigali View

Today I went up to Juru Park, which losely translated means "the park above". It's up on one of the hills overlooking Kigali and is definately on of my favorite places. It's close to town, but far enough outside that you don't hear the noise of the city. It's the closest thing we have to an American park here, full of beautiful trees and flowers all year round, and from certain places on the hill you can get great pictures of the city. These are some of the shots I took today, and they should give you some small idea of how big Kigali is.

Jessica and Kalisa's Wedding

Thursday was the traditional/civil cermony for my friends Jessica and Kalisa. The matron of honor was Alice, Kalisa's older sister, and the best man was her husband Jean Pierre. These first pics are of the traditional ceremony.

Yesterday was the church ceremony for them, and again, Jean Pierre was the best man and I was the maid of honor. It was a lot of fun and a beautiful wedding!

Lake Ruhondo

Here are the pictures I said I would put up of our admin retreat to Lake Ruhondo. This first one is the one I told you about with my coworkers and the view we had from the guesthouse. The rest of the pictures...well...they kinda speak for themselves. :)

Doubly Famous

Here are some of the pictures I took Saturday night at the Kigali Hope Festival. This first picture is just to give you an idea of the size of the crowd...it was pretty amazing!!

My favorite part of the day was the concert by Nicole C. Mullen, but not just the concert itself. She was great on her own...

but my favorite part was when she made Gaby, one of the premier recording artists of Rwanda (and one of her biggest fans...and a friend of mine) come up on stage with her and sing 2 songs!

They were really incredible!!

You know, sometimes you want to be the one in the picture with the stars, but this time, I was perfectly content to be the one behind the camera, especially when it can make my friend this happy!!!

The resident of the President

So last weekend, we went to see the residence of the former president of Rwanda, Juvenal Habyarimana, which has now been turned into a museum. It was a really interesting afternoon. I expected to spend about 30 minutes and we stayed for about 2 1/2 hours.

We saw a lot of different things,

including the tree that he planted at the beginning of his time in office back in '79. We had to take a picture with it!

These are only a very few of the pictures we took, and for more you can look at my photoblog or at my pictures on Facebook, but I wanted to share a few on here.

This is what was left of his plane after it was shot down.

Bemused ramblings

One of my biggest weaknesses is keeping in touch with people when I can't see them face to face. I'm horrible about writing (which is part of the reason I force myself to send out weekly reports) and I'm so bad about not posting things on my blog. Part of the reason for that is that I prefer conversations to simply rambling. I don't just want to hear my own thoughts...I hear those all the time. I want to hear what others are thinking about things beyond the weather. I want to know people's thoughts, feelings, reactions. I think its a bit of a balancing act for me...keeping me grounded in the reality of day-to-day life rather than in the philosophical and at times bemused ramblings of my somewhat overworked brain.

Maybe that's why I like reading so much...it gives me an escape into the world of a different kind of communication, no matter the genre of the book. If the books involve philospophy or reading, or if the characters involved are obviously intellegent and thoughtful, so much the better. Maybe that's why I don't like romance novels...in my opinion they're a waste of good paper and ink. They're completely based on emotion and manipulation rather than thought, which frankly annoys me.

I like quotes, I like displays of intellegence (note I did not say arrogance), I like being able to see people and characters who are connected to reality and to each other. But not just the surface-level reality of work, school, home and events, but the reality of the essence of life, of the physical, emotional and spiritual connections that make each of us who we are. I like those who can see and interpret the difference between image and shadow, between abstract and concrete, between illusion and fact, between essence and allusion. The only problem is, those conversations happen most often for me within the pages of a book. There are very few people that I've found, here or anywhere, who are really either interested in or up to the task of having such conversations face to face. I have a few friends with whom I can converse, for which I'm very grateful. That is a very real danger for a bibliophile...becoming so engaged with the books that one forgets to have human interaction. Perhaps that is why I so much enjoy face to face converstations. Marcus Aurelius said "The true worth of a man is measured by the objects he pursues." May I pursue the best of the world, the best of people, the best of literature and thought, and more over, all of the God who created them all!

John D'Amour's Wedding

So most of you know that a couple weekends ago we went to our night guard, John's, wedding. I took some pictures there but most of them were too dark. However, here is one of him and his new wife Dative (Da-ti-va) coming down the aisle. And I couldn't help but put up some pictures of the girls and I all dressed up for the wedding! Though I'll refrain from putting up all the ones we took! :)

Don't we look good? And we have a great yard for taking pictures in!!