Burundi

I just returned home to Kampala after leading another eMi project trip. I had the privilege of traveling to Burundi to serve an amazing ministry called Sister Connection. Burundi is a small country just south of Rwanda and Uganda. Sister Connection exists to help impoverished Burundian widows and their families. Burundi has been left with thousands of widows since the Hutu/Tutsi war ended in 2007. Widows are not treated very well and many have been left homeless, jobless and extremely poor. The culture in Burundi has children living at home until they are married. This can make raising a family very difficult without a man of the house present. We heard the phrase, “I didn’t go to school because I was too hungry” a lot. Kids end up quitting their education to farm or find small work to survive.

Our mission with eMi was to masterplan a 20-acre property with a vocational school and retreat centre/youth camp. It's to be a  place where widows sponsored by Sister Connection can come for week long training/healing/counseling/worship and kids can come and enjoy a summer camp atmosphere in a safe place. The vocational school will mostly serve children of widows and will teach skills in carpentry, metal working, mechanics and other small trades. Kids that cannot go the academic route in school or were unable to attend school at all are often just left to slip through the cracks, which makes vocational schools so important.
The site was near the town of Gitega which is right in the middle of the country in a very mountainous region. Very beautiful and very amazing the kind of slopes the people are able to garden on.

The most excellent eMi Team

 Road to Gitega from Bujumbura

 Check out the farming plots on the hillside

 Each truck heading up the hill had some guys attached to it. Pretty sketchy.

 This is why they don't want to peddle

 Tea fields

 Another beautiful valley in the Burundi highlands outside Gitega

 Construction workers working on the dorm building at the Sister Connection site

 Sewing shop at Sister Connection

 Fetching water from a spring about a mile from the Sister Connection site. The spring was way down in a valley. A couple of us carried some jerry cans out and realized how hard of a job that is. Can't imagine making that trip several times a day everyday.

 Different size jerry cans for different size kids. The sad reality is that those kids will probably be carrying water from that spring for the rest of their lives. As they get older the jerry can gets larger.

View from the top of the Sister Connection site.

 We got to visit a previous eMi project in the area that has been built out. The homes are orphan housing for 8 kids and their new parents.

 A bus load of Bzungu (white folks)attracts a bit of attention in the remote villages

This is Jacqueline and her kids. A Burundian widow living in a remote village. One of the things that Sister Connection does for widows is provide simple housing. Jacqueline was overjoyed with her house that has a roof that doesn't leak and room for her children. 300 sq. ft house for 4  is actaully a lot more space than we have seen elsewhere.

First Methodist church built in the 1930's at the Muyebe Mission Station. This church was used occupied by rebel forces at times during the Hutu/Tutsi conflict from 1992 to 2007. Denise and Joy from Sister Connection grew up at this station so it was pretty cool to attend church where Sister Connection had some roots and history.

Some very colorful ladies outside of church. Hands like leather but such a feeling of warmth when they greet you.

I had some heavy hitters on my team that were a great addition.Chad Gamble former director of eMi East Africa and Steve Ulrich former director of eMi Canada. It was great to spend some time with those guys!

We produced a pretty nice plan in the end but were rocked by the joy in the singing and dancing from the widows we got to spend time with. We have lots to learn on contentment, joy and worship!

We stayed at a resort on Lake Tanganika on the last night. So nice to be able to lake swim and not worry about anything.....except the potential of hippo's.