Sunday, February 8, 2009

Sunday evening musings

This picture shows how nice and straight and paved our roads are....I mean can't you tell by the way the car is tipped to the right that the road is flat? :P When our visitors were here last week, we went up to one of the more periphery areas called Kadutu to do some Focus Group discussions with mothers of young children and the Community Health Workers supposed to be serving them (obviously not in the same group...).


(As I think of things to write about, here's what's coming to mind...let's see where it goes)

Things I like:
- Singing and dancing to praise and worship at church (even when I really don't know the words)
- Learning new languages (still getting the hang of Swahili and starting to work on Lingala)
- Reflecting on heart issues and discussing God's work in us with best friends
- Watching movies while/and eating dinner with housemates
- Walking home through Bukavu on a nice clear afternoon
- Studying God's Word and seeking Him with our women's group
- New music with a good beat
- Cool fresh air coming through the windows at night
- Singing along to Caedmon's Call
- When new potential projects seem to be working out and getting God's favor!

Michael and Tom (our Director of Health Programming in DC) have been in Kinshasa for the past few days getting meetings with Ministry of Health and other somewhat big personalities, which is so God working since we weren't able to plan things well before they left. Nothing in Congo works out according to plan, so a lot of times we wonder why we even try...not really, we definitely need plans. But still, they're never ever set in stone! Anyway, I'm thankful for the way God is working even when we're not so sure.

Politically things are still calm here, but we really don't know what's going to happen. It looks like Nkunda's going and the Interhamwe that have been going back to Rwanda have kept things from blowing up. (Nkunda got arrested, but has anyone actually heard from him?? We're all sure he's watching the news from Kagame's couch...) We're praying that things don't get tense again, and hopefully no news really is good news.

Singing praise music on Sundays at church is not enough for me, so I thought maybe I'd join the choir at church. But my friend Elie, who also leads praise and worship at our church thought it would be even better if a few of us got together to sing...maybe we'll go around and sing for various churches. Imagine. I don't have a great voice, but everyone says I'll do fine :P So more on that later; we're planning to get together this Saturday evening on our balcony to sing!

Here are our three kittens that Mama Kristee is taking care of. Ok, we all love them, but she actually feeds them with a syringe and is teaching them to use the litter box....Sooooo cute though!
(as some of you may notice, there's a Mwafrika, a Muzungu, and a Metis ama Pointy :) )
From the left we have Dr. J, Simba, and Quinton. We weren't sure they were all going to live, but so far they're doing great!