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Whilst this blog has come to an end for now, we've set up another blog for DT's work in Romania where Andy is visiting over the next twelve days, so do take a look at: dtromania.blogspot.co.uk - see you there!

Your friends at Damascus Trust.

If you are still with us, or arrived late to this blog, then here are a few photos from our recent time in Rwanda. Enjoy!

Back in Blighty.

Just a final note of thanks to all who have faithfully supported the team on the DT Rwanda trip this summer in so many ways; financially, with gifts for the schools and churches, words of encouragement and with prayer.  We are now all safely back home and have enjoyed a wonderful night’s sleep in our own comfy beds, without a ravine down the middle of the plastic covered mattress and missing the nightly tussle with the mosquito net.  I imagine today some of the watercourses of Britain may have acquired a tinge of orange temporarily, by a sprinkling of African dust as our washing machines have whirred away, in a vain attempt to return our clothes to their original colour.  

I’m guessing that none of the team will have started the day with either an egg or a banana as we resume our daily lives in a country of abundant choice.  So many of the items that we take for granted in our western homes, suddenly seem to be luxurious on returning from a trip to the developing world – a wonderful hot shower without having to collect a jerry can, a fridge to cool drinks, fully functional car door handles and car windows that actually close!  Though we may all be still marvelling at these ‘gadgets’ today, we know that in a couple of days time complacency will have set in once again, as we slot right back into normal life in Britain.  When returning to ‘the west,’ it is quite difficult to remember that the tough life led by our brothers and sisters in Rwanda, which we experienced as a snap shot in time, continues for them as a daily reality.  We will endeavour to remember them in our hearts and pray for them in their struggles, particularly when we find ourselves grumbling about pot-holes on our roads or a dripping tap in our comparatively palatial homes.

Accompanying us on our return flight were many refugees, dressed in winter coats and woolly hats, presumably in preparation for their new life in Europe.  They were all carrying the same plastic bags sporting the logo from the agency administering their resettlement.  We had been joined by a similar group of people on our outward journey, when we landed briefly in Entebbe, Uganda.  Judging by their expressions, an aeroplane appeared to be an alien environment to them and they clearly had no understanding of their allocated seating, which caused considerable confusion for fellow passengers.

At baggage reclaim we were relieved to see that our large collection of luggage had completed the journey.  Andy said a quick prayer as he took several suitcases of baskets and banana-fibre cards along to customs.  Thankfully after an expert official was called to deal with the goods to declare, Andy’s paperwork was deemed to be in order and we were ushered on our way without so much as a glance at the merchandise.

Contrary to all airport advice our cases were crammed to the limit with all manner of ‘other people’s stuff,’ mostly African handicrafts for resale to support the widows, but some destined for friends or relatives …. (ie lots of cute stuff for grandchildren!)  We had all discovered an Aladdin’s cave of African handicrafts on our visit to the Peacebuilding Healing And Reconciliation Programme (PHARP) in Kigali the previous day.  Run by a lovely Christian lady Julienne, the programme teaches young girls to sew in order that they can establish their own business to generate an income.  The girls train for a year and there is strict quality control of their work so that the products are produced at a high standard ready for the tourist market. As part of the training, the students have a time of Bible study and prayer together.  As they study, pray and talk together, reconciliation is taking place, wounds are being healed and a peaceful environment is established.  The teacher in charge of the sewing programme, shows the students how to follow and create patterns whilst also frequently checking the quality of their stitching.  This teacher was formerly a student of the programme.  Next to the sewing room the products were for sale.  The ladies of the DT team enjoyed the colourful delights of the handicraft shop, ‘oohing and ahhing,’ like wide-eyed children in a sweet shop!  Heather even went so far as to model a beautifully styled African dress, made by the students, which fitted her like a glove.  Meanwhile Andy was discussing the possibility of partnering with Julienne to source handicrafts for the new DT on-line shop.

After leaving all manner of African craft purchases back at our hostel, we headed out for the final debrief meeting at the Anglican Cathedral with the Archbishop, Pastor Samuel and another member of the development team. Afterwards, the rest of the staff team joined us for a farewell meal, which we shared together in the Cathedral’s conference room, dangerously near the room Eleanor had been trapped in during Sunday worship!  So we were vigilant not to get separated, or left behind a handle-less door!

The following day, our final day in Kigali, we headed into the frenetic city centre, buzzing with people and streets packed with little shops, whose wares were pouring out over the pavements.  We couldn’t resist picking up a few more African crafts and traditional rubber mop heads, great for cleaning hard floors.  The shop keeper obediently severed  the long wooden handles, from the mop heads, at our request, so as not to prove a nightmare in hand baggage.   At another hardware shop, Andy was drawn to huge wooden spoons, and then proceeded to bargain with the seller for a good price, which when converted from Rwandan Francs to Sterling, meant that he was in reality quibbling over a few pence! 

As Alan had stayed at the hostel, nursing a wobbly tummy, Eleanor had free rein to spend, spend, spend, with the result that she had to buy a new suitcase to stash her booty!  We treated ourselves to tea in a western style café to celebrate the end of our stay in Rwanda, and to fortify our bodies for the gruelling night flight ahead of us.  

Andy returned the dilapidated Land Cruiser to Brandon, with fuel in the tank to detract from the handle Isobel snapped in two and the glove compartment cover on the floor, which Alan had inadvertently pulled off!  Our many suitcases were piled up in a minibus, only to be unloaded again at a police check point on the way to the airport for the inspection of Rita, a malnourished, bony sniffer-dog.  Thankfully Rita was disinterested in African baskets so our baggage was reloaded and the journey to the airport resumed.  Airport security had been stepped up significantly since last year, with the addition of some typical African jobs-worth red tape, for instance, prior to entering the airport building, we had to queue at a desk, where an official collected all our passports in order to issue us each with a large important-looking blue card.  As soon as we had been given the card, we were then permitted step over the threshold into the building and having moved no more than 2 paces from the desk we were requested to hand over the blue cards to another official!  In spite of their large size and glossy appearance, these cards appeared to serve no purpose at all, other than to hold up the flow of pedestrians, by causing a queue and to create jobs for 2 employees, the issuer and receiver!  It made us all smile as we stepped from African soil into Kigali’s smart new airport to begin our journey back to Blighty.

Final thanks to Isobel for her writing of the blog, sometimes very late at night, with helpful suggestions from the team. 

Our praise and thanks to the Lord for giving us the opportunity to share time with his Church in Rwanda and for the many challenges and lessons they provide us with as the Church in the West. 

Thanks for your support and interest and if you would like to conitnue a link with Damascus Trust then please visit our web-site where you can sign up for various updates - www.damascustrust.org. Trips to India, Romania and Rwanda are planned for next year, so if you would like to join us, then please get in touch via the web-site.

Your friends - Alan, Eleanor, Heather, Isobel and Andy

Friday - we're back, safe and happy with a bit of tiredness thrown in.

Once we've got our breath back we'll be posting a final blog from our time in Rwanda this weekend, so please do come back to check it out.

A,E, H, I, A

Monday

With 3 ladies dressed like Arab sheiks, faces covered against the incredibly dusty road, (two of whom were joined by their noses to the same sarong!) the Land Cruiser ground up yet one more steep, rocky orange road into the hills outside Kigali, to visit the parish of Bumbogo.  The customary warm greeting awaited us and plates of boiled eggs, teeny bananas and bread rolls.  We continued to increase our girths, embarking on our second breakfast within a couple of hours.  The little humble home, as with many other pastor’s homes had some unusual items – probably gifts from muzungus, that they had no idea how to use!  This family had found an unusual use for those silly shower puff things that pad out gifts sets of ‘smellies’ at Christmas time.  Various coloured  ‘shower puffs’ were tucked into the corner of each arm chair in the living room, where we might place a cushion.  In other homes we’ve seen beach balls hanging from the ceiling as unique expressions of décor!

In the yard at the back of the house we were all intrigued by the truck a little child was playing with – deftly constructed out of a small jerry can with various plastic lids fashioned in to wheels – it looked surprisingly realistic.

The sound of singing became louder and louder from the nearby church, beckoning us - a most effective way of calling people to worship, in a society where the clock on the wall is often merely ornamental.  In the church we were greeted by most exuberant dancing, drum beating and those characteristic harmonious African voices.  After the usual introductions, each of the team shared with the congregation the blessings we have received during our visits to many Rwandan parishes.  We spoke of their warmth of hospitality, their ready smiles, faithfulness in tough times, and the freedom in their worship to sing and dance without boundaries.  One of the men in the church  responded by saying how saddened they were to hear that their brothers and sisters in England often felt inhibited to dance in worship, and they longed to come straight over to UK to help us dance and worship with our whole bodies.  On the other hand immediately after saying this, he continued by saying he was so overwhelmed by the fact we’d come all this way to visit them, he felt this was a great demonstration of our faith and he did not have the words to express his emotions.

After this time of sharing, Pastor Samuel asked the church whether they had any questions for us to answer.  We were then faced with some most unexpected thorny issues to which we had to respond immediately – questions with which the western church is continuing to grapple.  They commented that as the team introduced themselves, not one of us had a family of more than 3 children.  Even though they always smiled and clapped at the mention of any of our children or grandchildren they were questioning why the team had such small families, when in Genesis, God had commanded man to populate the whole earth.  Rwandans are certainly following this instruction with their large numbers of children. They questioned whether ‘family spacing’ was a principle that should or should not be used in the Christian community.  They then proceeded to tell us that they had heard about the acceptance of same sex marriage in the church in Europe and America and wished to hear our views on this!  

After this discussion, the congregation left the church, where Pastor Samuel and Isobel remained to have a chat with the headmaster of the local school.  He talked of the 1000 children in his primary school, which works in 2 shifts in order to educate this large number of children in one building – rather a heavy work load for the teaching staff, who work a double shift daily!  We handed them some gifts of school supplies, but a rather paltry amount, considering his number on roll!

The pastor’s wife provided a wonderful spread of lunch, finishing with their home grown passion fruit.  Having eaten so much passion fruit over the past couple of weeks, but seen none growing, the pastor took us out onto one of his terraced fields to see them.  Pastor Samuel commented that they weren’t flourishing because, ‘This area is suffering from a long period of sunshine,’ not a phrase commonly heard in England!

We arrived back at our hostel in Kigali just in time for an appointment with Gilbert, a businessman,  who expertly talked us through the issues involved in setting up a UK shop to assist the poor widow basket weavers of Rwanda.  After his in depth lecturing, we had all learned a lot about what constituted an expertly woven and dyed basket, and which were made by amateurs!

Once more we were invited to a meal at the American Pastor’s home.  Having mistakenly smothered ourselves in Deet, expecting we were attending a BBQ last time, and feeling rather foolish arriving high on repellent, we neglected to spray ourselves this time.  We were then greeted with the words we really didn’t want to hear, ‘Oh this time I’ve had time to light the fire and we’ll sit round the fire pit after the meal!  We survived and had a very enjoyable end to the day, drinking, chatting and eating chocolate cake around a fire pit.

Give thanks for an encouraging visit to Bumbogo parish; for the faithful ministry of catechists among the different congregations; for hospitality.

Please pray for discernment and wisdom for pastors when dealing with some of the social issues; for our planned visit to the Peacebuilding Healing And Reconciliation Programme (PHARP) tomorrow (Tuesday).

Sunday

We emerged from our mosquito nets at an unearthly hour to collect our jerry cans of hot water and have a wash in order to be ready in time for the English service at Kigali Anglican Cathedral.  It was lovely to find breakfast had been set for us on the brown lawn outside our rooms overlooking the city below, because our usual dining room had been overrun with the chaos of yesterday’s wedding.

We arrived at the Cathedral, at five minutes to 8am, just in time, we thought.  The place was entirely deserted and then the American priest, Brandon appeared from a back room to inform us we were actually 50 minutes early, none of us had checked the time!  As he greeted us, we apologised for being ridiculously early, to which he retorted, that this was a pleasant change as most of his congregation arrived, ‘ridiculously late!’  He apologised that the singing might be pretty poor as he had just received a message saying that his music assistant was detained elsewhere.  Little did he know that within the hour a visiting choir from Kenya and another from Uganda were going to join us unannounced for worship!  This sudden influx of visitors somewhat took the clergy unawares, when administering communion too!  Looking at the limited amount of consecrated bread and wine brought the feeding of the 5000 to mind!

Needless to say, the singing was fabulous!  The visiting choirs were in the city for a festival of East African choirs at the local stadium, and had decided to pop in to worship en route to the venue. 

Soon after the worship began, Emily the American pastor’s wife arrived with her 2 young blonde children.  She carried baby in a Western style baby pouch, but our eyes were drawn to 2 year old Elsa, who has spent most of her life in Rwanda, and in spite of her shock of blonde hair, clearly feels at one with the natives.  She entered the cathedral carrying her little plastic doll, strapped to her back in a muslin cloth!

After the service we all piled into an adjacent room for milky Rwandan tea with an aroma of lemon grass.  Brandon had brought along 50 samosas to share, but once more commented that he had somewhat underestimated the size of the early morning congregation.  Other church members had baked chocolate cookies and tea flavoured shortbread, so we enjoyed a veritable feast before filing back into the church for the Kinyarwanda service. 

We were ushered to seats on the front row of the Ugandan choir, so it was good to have a brief chat with them as of course they had to communicate in English as they were not speakers of Kinyarwanda.  The minister travelling with them, got up to share a few words of scripture in English, translated into Kinyarwanda for the majority of the congregation.  He began by turning to us and shared a very emotive few words thanking us, as representatives of Britain, for bringing the gospel to his country in the 1800s.  He talked of how many of the missionaries had perished from malaria in their endeavours to bring Christianity to Uganda, and that the church in Uganda, remains indebted to the British.  We found tears welling up in our eyes as he spoke.

After his words, the choir accompanying him were invited to sing a couple of songs.  Clothed in long robes of Santa-red with white collars, they formed a tuneful and colourful spectacle as they swayed in time to their gospel sounds.

It was extremely hot in the church so Eleanor went out for some air as she felt a bit faint.  Heather kindly asked after her, but Alan assured her that his wife was fine.  Unbeknown to any of us, Eleanor had sat down in one of the offices and been shut in as the door handles were missing on the inside.  When she realised she couldn’t escape, she went out of the other side of the office to a corridor only to have the door shut behind her once more and find again that another door handle was missing!  She was then well and truly stuck for the whole duration of a lonnnnnng Rwandan church service!

A choir of children sang to us before Heather was invited to the front of church to pray with them. Barely visible amongst the crowd of children, she prayed for them before they departed to receive their Sunday school teaching. Andy preached, about what it means to live with Christ as Lord,  with Pastor Samuel by his side as translator.  Throughout his preaching, whenever a verse of scripture needed reading aloud, a member of the congregation would always spontaneously stand to read, such an encouragement, when we consider how difficult it can be to cajole a member of the congregation to read a lesson in English churches, with a week’s notice, let alone an immediate request.  It’s so refreshing to see African worshippers, free of our British inhibitions!

Having discovered and freed Eleanor from her stifling captivity after the service, we resuscitated her with a second-hand bottle of water and a cola, snaffled from the church office! Heather was also looking a little peaky and had been nipping in and out of the service with alarming frequency, clutching her tummy and sporting a pained expression on her face!  Clearly the punishing African lifestyle was beginning to take its toll on the team!

After a mini kip back at the hostel however, both ladies were revived and ready to head out again to continue negotiations with the widows, who had brought their large collection of home made baskets into a local church for us to purchase.  After some discussions, tapping on the calculator and the scribbling of many lists, the ladies seemed to be happy and there were hugs all round as we staggered to the Land Cruiser laden with a variety of their attractive Rwandan baskets to take back to the UK.

Give thanks for the services; for the baskets bought for Ubushuti; for general safety and wellbeing of the team.
Please pray for final meetings and tying up loose ends; for visit to Bumbogo parish tomorrow (Monday).

Saturday

From early in the morning, there was great excitement in the SU grounds as a couple of marquees had been constructed on the bare earth terrace below our little garden.  The place was a hive of activity with people binding the guy ropes with brightly coloured fabrics and a florist busily creating floral arrangements – a wedding was afoot! Sadly, Andy, Alan and Eleanor had teaching responsibilities to fulfil at the pastors' conference (more later), so they had to leave Heather and Isobel to enjoy the wedding celebrations (as well as catch up with some team admin / note write ups).

Jacqueline, the manager of the hostel, dressed in a striking, voluminous traditional African red and black dress and was keen to tell us about the proceedings, so Heather and Isobel couldn’t resist the opportunity to stay home and watch a Rwandan wedding, whilst the rest of the team headed off to lead the second day of the conference.

Jacqueline had told us the wedding would start at 10am but true to form, by this time of the morning there were still swathes of coloured fabric being used to decorate the marquees, where crates of Fanta were being placed to warm in the sun, well before any of the guests arrived. As the preparations continued an incongruous blast of Country and Western style music interspersed with screeching Indian medleys issued from the amplifiers below.

Eventually the guests started to arrive to fill the two open marquees, which faced each other across the sandy yard. The guests were brightly dressed in a plethora of vibrant coloured robes, some traditional African prints and others more reminiscent of Indian sarees.  Two of the ladies, dressed in bright yellow and red matching outfits stood like bookends at the foot of the flight of steps down to the wedding location, ready to greet the guests as they arrived and to hand out gifts.  Jacqueline was very keen to explain all the proceedings and, shouted across to us when the groom’s party arrived at 11.30am.  The men were dressed in a modern equivalent of their traditional tribal costumes, so wore drapes of zebra printed fabric over their western white shirts, and carried carved walking sticks, those of the groom and best man being covered in goat skin, to signify the chiefs.  The groom’s and bride’s families sat in opposing marquees and then a very long discussion of the terms of the dowry ensued.  The head of each family held a microphone and negotiations over the giving of cows proceeded for an hour and a half.

Meanwhile one of the bedrooms adjacent to ours was buzzing with the activity of the burgeoning bridal party.  Heather reckoned that up to 100 people had been pouring in and out of the small room during the course of the morning and that about 50 people had squeezed in there at any one time!  This bedroom must have had Tardis like qualities as it was the same size as ours, which are not spacious enough for much more than our cases to be opened on the floor.

After over 2 hours of wrangling, it seemed that a bovine agreement was forged and finally the wedding commenced with a colourful parade of the bridal party issuing from the tiny bedroom.  The bride, draped in robes of salmon pink lace processed down the steps escorted by her brother.  Leading the procession were a group of ladies in pale lemon robes, and behind the bride, in yellow and white were a collection of ladies carrying beautifully decorated presents, smothered in ribbon and ruffled paper. 

The bride and groom seemed to be married comparatively quickly and the ring was place on the bride’s finger with their hands high in the air for all to see,  This was then followed by the ceremonial sharing of drinks.  Next the happy couple spent a long time distributing gifts to various members of both families, one we assumed, the bride’ father was presented with a cow boy hat on the end of a walking stick!  He dutifully then donned the hat for the rest of the ceremony!

The bride and groom were finally seated in a smaller ‘top table’ marquee to oversee the on going celebrations.  We were shocked when a man shouting and screeching burst onto the floor, dressed in what looked like a silver lurex halter-neck dress, reminiscent of a marathon runner’s space blanket, over a black shirt.  He was madly wielding a staff above his head and dancing around like a witch doctor!  The bride came out of her bridal canopy to join him, and he seemed to be serenading her!  Fortunately, Jaqueline came to our rescue to explain what on earth was going on.  Apparently it was all about naming the cow and providing some particular herbs to keep the cow clean!  After this peculiar performance another similarly dressed fellow continued the ritual - all highly entertaining!

Eventually a chef dressed in traditional whites appeared and led a team organising the arrangement of many dishes on a buffet. As the bridal party moved to collect their food an African choir, in vibrant bright colours, some with babies strapped to their backs, burst into swaying song to entertain the guests.  Their wonderful singing continued for ages whilst all the marquees emptied and then refilled, with guests carrying plates brimming with food.  The bride and groom’s ‘first dance’ could not have been more different to their western equivalent.  After ceremonially feeding each other with their first meal as a married couple they then joined the swaying choir for a boogie!  Kicking up quite a dust on the sandy ground, the bride and groom danced separately in their indomitable African rhythmic style.  The bride danced with the ladies of the choir, whilst the men gathered around in a circle and appeared to dance with their arms positioned as birds’ wings and stamped together as African cranes might perform in a sort of mating ritual!

We felt so privileged to have witnessed such a wonderful event, and though they must have been aware of our presence watching from our ‘balcony seats’ there were nothing but smiles and the bridal party were even happy to pose for our photos as the wedding came to a close in the heat of the mid afternoon.  Not only were we watching from above, but there was also a little crowd of local children, who had collected among the trees in ‘our garden’ and were joining in the dancing, holding a private party of their own!

No sooner had the wedding finished than the rest of our team returned from the conference. All had gone well with further teaching from Andy on refreshing our relationship with the Lord and more practical teaching on marriage and ministry from Alan and Eleanor. There was good interaction between pastors and opportunity for questions and comments which proved very useful. Alan and Andy managed to record interviews with the three pastors (and their wives) whose parishes are included in the SAP Programme and, from shared feedback, the conference was much appreciated.

After a quick drink and change of clothes, we headed off to negotiate with some local widows about the purchase of some of the baskets they make in their homes.  The ladies had laid out their handicrafts in the yard of Pastor Eugene’s home, so we took the opportunity to pop into see his lovely family of 6 children and his wife who was nursing her tiny new beautiful baby – another opportunity for the grannies, Heather and Eleanor to cuddle and coo over a cute bundle!

Please pray for: the healing of the Caesarean scar of Pastor Eugene’s wife; for the pastors and wives as they return to their parishes; for the sorting out of the baskets.

Give thanks for a good conference; for God's provision of our needs (food, hospitality, transport).