Dear Family and Friends,
Now that we are leaving Gisenyi for Kigali tomorrow, we just discovered that an internet cafe is 2 minutes away from Simon Pierre’s. The boys are happily updating their IPods on the wireless connection here.
Yesterday morning (June 17) Jimmie, Chuck, and I went with Simon to visit Veronique. Since we went in the morning only Veronique and Nicole were home. When I visited Veronique last fall there were so many banana trees in front of her house that the house was not even visible from the road. Today all those tree are gone. Simon says that some kind of disease has killed most of the banana trees in the area. Even so, it’s still a gorgeous area.
What a joy it was to visit Veronique again-and to have the boys along with me this time. Veronique presented me with a banana leaf picture of a traditional Africa village with a mother and eleven children representing each of her children we have helped. She also gave me several banana leaf cards on which the children wrote beautiful personal notes in Kinyarwandan and English. She gave Shelly two large pieces of beautiful dark and light green and black fabric with traditional Rwandese patterns.
It’s been incredible to see how Veronique has flowered in her ministry at the Gisenyi Church and in her community. She makes beads in the bead project and helps out whenever anything is going on at church. Simon says Veronique is an evangelist and has led several people to Christ and is now helping them to grow in their faith. Simon says she’s like a doctor with her friends Josephine and Julienne, caring for them when they’re sick and encouraging them to take their medication and to eat well.
Right next to Veronique’s house is a strip of ground for sale that is 15 X 100 feet. Veronique currently rents this plot of ground to plant vegetables. The owner is asking $100 for this small piece of land. I asked Jimmie and Chuck if they’d like to give some of their remaining gift money to purchase this plot of ground and I think they are both going to kick in $50.
While we were visiting Veronique, we also stopped in to see Josephine. Both of them would normally be at Ndengera making beads, but since they knew we were coming today they stayed at home. Josephine has three children: Fidelinne (12); Amani (9); and Bonheur (7). Her husband died a few year ago, but not before infecting Josephine with HIV.
Ndengera is a foundation that the Gisenyi churched started a few years ago so that it will be better positioned to apply for grants from both Christian organizations and other sources. I asked Simon what Ndengera means and he said it’s like this: imagine a man walking down the road who is threatening to harm a child and the child cries out, “Help me! Take care of me!” Ndengera thus has the sense of helping the weak and the vulnerable, especially children. It is a perfect name for what they do.
I love Josephine like I do Veronique. She is a beautiful, vibrant woman, full of life and love. Like Veronique she is present any time something needs to be done at church. She has an ear-to-ear smile and is very gentle with children. But AIDS has progressed far enough in Josephine that she takes antiretroviral medication provided by the government. Because Veronique’s immune count remains high (it’s almost 1000 and Simon says 1000 is a normal immunity level) she does not need to take antiretroviral medication.
Josephine makes $60/month making beaded items, the same as Veronique and Julienne. The two room flat she rents near Veronique costs $10/month. It’s clean and has electricity, but is very small with a “living room” that the boys and I, Simon, Veronique, and Josephine could barely fit in. It is maybe 6X8 feet. She and the children sleep on the floor on grass mats.
Josephine was so sick two months ago due to complications of HIV/AIDS that she almost died. Her immunity level was down to 154. Simon says, “She was “really, really sick.” Josephine was teetering on the edge of death, but thank God she recovered. It’s not surprising that when Josephine is sick she gets depressed and cries to Veronique that she’s going to die. Simon is very proud of how strong Veronique has become. When Josephine despairs Veronique tells her, “Josephine, you’re not going to die. God is going to help you take care of your children. God still has many things for you to do before you die.” It is beautiful to see how God has completely transformed Veronique’s life from the pit she was living in a couple of years ago to the place of strong hope from which she lives today. She is a wounded healer to Josephine and many others.
Veronique and others from the Gisenyi Church slowly nursed and prayed Josephine back to health. As soon as she was able to return home, she wanted to start making beads again. But in order for her to make beads again, it meant that she had to walk the four miles to the Ndengera Foundation. Given that Veronique and Josephine live almost next door to each other, they walk together to work every morning.
Since the beaders and banana leaf card makers have started working together, they pool together their money to make a nice lunch. After Josephine came back from the hospital, they made sure she ate much better than she had before getting sick. She says that since she has come back from the hospital her immunity count is in the 300s and she has gained four pounds. Her biggest challenge now, says Simon, is for her to eat better on a much more consistent basis. Living on the knife blade of starvation, makes it difficult for the antiretroviral medication to do its job. We need your help in making sure that Josephine has better food to eat.
What affected me the most today was Simon telling me about Josephine’s immune count and illness from last fall. I had no idea how very sick she was until I came here. From the very beginning Josephine has been involved in the bead making project which we are calling Byiza Beads (Byiza is the Kinyarwandan word for beautiful and is pronounced “Beeza”). I can’t imagine losing her to AIDs. What a tragic loss that would be for her children and the entire Gisenyi community. It’s really hard when HIV/AIDS hits so close to home.
While we were still in Veronique’s and Josephine’s area, they took us to meet a grandmother, Asterie, who is caring for her two AIDS orphaned grandchildren-Gakwerere, a boy, who is 15 and a girl, Aliné, who is 13. The grandmother looks like she’s at least 80 years old. Every day the boy walks 5 miles to Goma, DRCongo to search for food to eat. If he comes back empty-handed, then there is nothing for them to eat that day. The house they live in belonged to the children’s parents, but 2/3 of the roof is entirely missing. They invited us to enter their house and look around. The house was virtually empty. They only thing we saw in the first two rooms, for which there is no roof, was a small mat on the floor that the grandmother and children apparently sleep on. We peeked into the last room and there were only a few cooking pots and a small stool on a dirt floor. There was absolutely nothing else. It was heartbreaking. I’ve seen a lot of things in my time in Africa, but nothing quite like this. Needless to say, the boys were as stunned as I was.
After this we walked up a hill on a dirt banana tree-lined path where we met another HIV positive widow, Fortuné Ntamukunzi (Simon told me that her name means “No one is my friend” in Kinyarwandan-a rather ironic name given her circumstances), that Veronique and Josephine care for. Fortuné has three children: Francine (14); Florence (11); and Immanuel (7) who is HIV positive. Apparently Immanuel contracted HIV/AIDS from his mother’s breast milk when he was a baby. Their house was only marginally more livable than the previous one. The roof was better here, but the overall house was far more dark and dirty. It reminded me a lot of the house Veronique and the children lived in when I first met her-dark, dirty, and desolate. Their house is also drastically in need of a new roof. The family is in desperate need of tangible hope. I saw despair written large on the mother’s weary face.
After visiting Veronique, Josephine, and the two families I just mentioned, we drove several kilometers down the road where we parked and then walked up a steep winding path to Julienne’s house. She wasn’t home, but two of her three children and Baraka were there. I had hoped to see Baraka (his last name is Cyuzuzo “Choo-zoo-z?”) while we were here, but I had really given up hope of seeing him again.
Apparently about a month ago some of his so-called family members kidnapped him from Julienne and took him back to their village. Even during the time Baraka was recovering in the hospital from the injuries he sustained when some horrible person jammed a stick through his right eye and out his right cheek, his family ignored him. He was of no value to them then, so why did they choose this time to interfere with him when Julienne was caring for him and he was recovering from his injuries?
When I saw three-year-old Baraka, I didn’t even recognize him. His hair has been allowed to grow out and his face was swollen out of proportion to the rest of his body due to rapidly increasing infection. Usually he talks and laughs, but today he was listless. I know this is gross, but I want you to picture him: yellow pus leaking from both his right eye and ear. He is a very sick little boy.
Two days ago Julienne went to get Baraka back from the same family members who had taken him from her. His so-called family members (aunts and uncles) took him back to their village because they maintained that the only reason that Julienne was taking care of Baraka is because she is receiving money from wazungu (white people). One of Baraka’s family members who kidnapped him from Julienne was even sick with tuberculosis. On top of that, during the time that Baraka was with them, they did absolutely nothing to care for him and his eye and ear infections grew increasingly serious. Simon says it’s as if his family was trying to kill him.
One look at Julienne’s place quickly disabuses any notion that she is being paid money to take care of Baraka. The house is crumbling and the roof has gaping holes in it. The roof is inadequately covered with tarpaulin and rocks piled on it to keep the tarp from flying away. The house is better than nothing, but only barely. Julienne told me that the rain pours through holes in the roof and creates a lake on the mud floor in the bedroom where she and the children sleep.
Baraka is not the only one who is sick. Julienne was going to be baptized on Sunday, but she has been bleeding from her nose and mouth due to complications from HIV/AIDS and didn’t want to make her problem worse. Like Josephine, Julienne has been very sick lately. Veronique, who keeps close tabs on both Josephine’s and Julienne’s health, told me that Julienne’s immunity count is only 131.
Once we saw lethargic Baraka with pus draining from his right eye and ear, we knew that we had to take him to the clinic. There is a local clinic that takes care of the 800+ children involved in the Ndengera Foundation. For $2400 a year the clinic offers medical services and medicine for any of the children who need it. When we took Baraka to the doctor today, the doctor wanted to know why he had not been brought in sooner. Simon had to explain the highly unusual circumstances to him. The doctor gave Baraka a concentrated shot of antibiotic today. For the next ten days he will need to go to the clinic two times a day to receive a high-powered dose of antibiotic. If this treatment doesn’t work, then Baraka will need to be taken to Kigali to undergo a Catscan and further tests.
After taking Baraka to the clinic, we returned later in the day to Julienne’s with three members of the Hawaii team. We needed to take Baraka home, but we also wanted them to meet Julienne and see where she lives. The Hawaii team has been busy building a wonderful playground at the Church, but they haven’t had the opportunity to get out into the community and see the kind of lives that many of the children who will be playing on the playground live.
Julienne was waiting for us when we drove up. As we walked up the steep hill to the house where she’s staying, she put her hand on her hip in obvious pain. When we arrived at the house she and the children are living in, she invited us in. Her house was completely dark with no electricity. As I stood in her living room waiting for my eyes to adjust, Julienne grabbed her only stool and two plastic water jugs for us to sit on. This is the extent of her furniture.
I told Julienne “God bless you” in Kinyarwandan and hugged her for several moments hoping that my hug communicated what words could not. One of the Hawaii team members also gave Julienne a big hug. The look on Julienne’s face as they hugged her was something I hope I will never forget. My lingering memory is of Julienne with her eyes squeezed shut with a look of pain, comfort, and longing for something better. Julienne’s prospects are very bleak without better care, nutrition, and healthier living conditions.
I love the way Celestin and Simon Pierre approach hunger, AIDS, and illness. They clearly believe that God is the one who cares for his people and meets their needs, but they have no illusions that deep-seated problems can be solved by prayer alone. Both Celestin and Simon Pierre believe and practice the importance of both prayer and action. I love what, Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits once said about this: “Pray as if it all depends upon God and then work as if it all depends upon you.” Prayer needs legs as well as heart.
I was reflecting today on how my approach to evil and suffering has changed over the years. I am no longer tempted as much as I once was to fixate on asking why bad things happen to the weak and the vulnerable, such as widows, single women, and children. Now my focus is more practical than theoretical. The question I ask most these days is, “How?”-How can I help the weak? How can I make a difference in a seemingly impossible situation? How does God want to bring life from death and hope from despair in this or that person’s life? I still often have more questions than answers, but I’ve seen God shine his healing light in enough dark places to trust that he will indeed make a way where there seems to be no way. I’ve seen this time and time again during my times here.
Simon pointed out to me a very nice house almost next door to where Veronique and Josephine live. The house is in better shape and has more land than Veronique’s originally had. Unlike Veronique’s house, it has electricity and has room for two families. Both Josephine and Julienne are in desperate need of a place to live that is close enough for Veronique to help them when they are sick. The place that Simon has found has enough land that another house can be built on it for another of the Ndengera workers or a large garden can be planted. The asking price for the house is $3400, but we’re praying that the owner will sell it for $3000. I strongly believe that this is another worthy project for which God wants to help us raise money. One of the Hawaii team members has already said that she wants to contribute to the project. How about you? J Let me know if you’re interested in contributing.
Please keep Baraka, Julienne, Veronique , Josephine and their children in your prayers.
Joe, Jimmie, and Chuck