Thursday

Today was another great day in Rwanda! When we wake up each morning we have an idea of what we will be doing, but it often changes as the day goes on. TIA, after all. (This Is Africa....picked this up from the Bowers family).

We started our day with breakfast at the hotel. Then we drove out of Kigali and into the beautiful countyside of Rwanda. To call this country the Land of A Thousand Hills is definitely not an understatement. The landscape was dotted with small mud houses and shacks, women and children carrying all kinds of things on their heads with babies on their backs, and many people carrying water jugs for miles just to get clean water for their families. Banana trees abound, with sugar cane and other crops also very important to the people who live there.

We made a couple of stops. One of them was along the Akegera River. It was in a beautiful valley, and its water flowed quickly. There we met several young girls carrying sugar cane on their heads and a boy on his bicycle. They were shy at first, but our POA was quick to win them over with her Kinyarwanda and contagious smile. We had some chewing gum and suckers we gave to them, and they were pleased enough to let us take their picture.

Our second stop was along a very bumpy road (on our way to a place we never did locate ....TIA). Our POA asked some ladies along the road if we could see their home. They said we could, so we all got out of the van and went to see the mud home of this family. They were cautious at first, but they too warmed up after awhile. There were some beautiful children there who enjoyed the rest of our gum, suckers, and Rice Krispy bars. One boy whom Chad gave a Rice Krispy bar said, "Thank you. I will remember this day and you giving me this good treat. Please come back and visit us again." So sweet.

We then decided to head back to Kigali since everyone was getting hungry and tired. We made it back in time for Cooper to have a good nap before visiting a grocery store and going out for supper. We went to a really pretty restaurant and ate outside on a veranda. We had tilapia kabobs that were delicious.

Finally we arrived back at our hotel where we gave Cooper his second bath. It's still his very least favorite thing we've attempted so far. He is clean, jammied, read books with Daddy, and is sound asleep on the bed.

Tomorrow we will take the kids to the pediatrician, pick up their Rwandan passports, and hopefully finish everything up at the U.S. Embassy. If all this happens, we should be able to leave Rwanda Sunday night. We still have a few fun things on our "to do" list, including delivering a lot of groceries to the orphanage, visiting our POAs home, and going on a mini safari. Signing off for tonight.

Heidi