It is hard to believe that in 6 weeks, Drew and I will be heading around the world to Rwanda for a month. We have spent the summer making travel preparations, and now we are getting to the final stretch. Since there is so much going on before we leave, I know that it is going to sneak up on us so quickly! We had a conversation to work out some of the logistics with one of the staff members from Humanity for Children the other day, and we are both getting so excited! Before I tell you a little more about some of the details, I guess I should back up a little and share how we got to this point (since we have been a little behind on the blogging front).
Last spring, as Drew was planning out his third and final year of residency, we both talked it over and decided to take advantage of one of his electives to do something adventurous and out of our element. We explored a couple of different options - Africa, Australia, South America, something stateside that is a little closer to home - but ultimately connected with a non-profit that is based in the states, but has been doing work in Africa for a few years now. Their main focus is on providing health care to children, but they also do some work in education as well. The organization is called Humanity for Children. You should check out some of their projects.
Through this connection, we decided to travel to a small city in Rwanda called Kibungo which is about 2 hours east of the capital city of Kigali. There, Drew will be working in a hospital with a couple other foreign doctors, and some local doctors providing care for women and children. I will have the chance to work alongside a Peace Corps member that has been there for a few months and is working in the schools. It sounds like I will be doing some teaching of English, but may be working on some other projects too. I think it is going to be so interesting for both of us, and I know that we will learn so much.
While planning for the trip, I have been doing a lot of reading and have learned so much already about Rwanda. For those of you who don't know much (I didn't), I'll share a little here (hopefully I will be able to share a lot here throughout the experience, especially once we are over there). And, if you have other knowledge to share about travelling to Africa, we would love to hear it! :)
Rwanda is a small country (about the size of Maryland) that sits on the equator in the eastern region of Africa. It shares borders with Uganda and Tanzania, as well as Congo and Burundi. It is very mountainous, and the climate when we are there this fall is supposed to be very similar to Seattle, so mild, gray, and drizzly (a welcome change from the desert heat!). They don't have a lot of the safari type animals that you usually think of when you think of Africa, but they do have mountain gorillas (which Drew and I are already making plans to try and see!) While some really scary things happened in Rwanda a while ago (did anyone ever see Hotel Rwanda?), the country has had a really successful reconstruction period, and is supposed to be one of the safest in East Africa now (so you can all sleep a little better while we are gone). While we are there, we will be living in a house in Kibungo with another American couple who are also volunteers (the Peace Corps volunteer I mentioned earlier) that we haven't met yet. Hmm..let's see what else have I learned so far....they speak English and French there as well as some Swahili and other tribal languages. Drew and I had to get a bunch of new immunizations, and I have had a couple nightmares about mosquitos the size of my head (especially since it will be a wet season there!).
The biggest challenges ahead of us for right now are figuring out how to pack for a month in 1 large backpack and 1 small backpack (for each of us), and getting the puppies to grandma's in Nashville. I am much more worried about the packing though, since Mary will be joining me for a road trip with the puppies! :) I will be taking a leave of absence from work, so I am getting things in order there, and we have our housesitter set, so now just a few more weeks and we will be on our way! :)
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