For those of you that don't have facebook here are the links to the photos I have posted on there:
Switzerland -Part 1:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=1632&l=b5e98&id=508932531
Switzerland - Part 2:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2174&l=1cc0a&id=508932531
Switzerland - Weekend in Zurich:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2740&l=90ac8&id=508932531
Switzerland - Part 3:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2742&l=0ab31&id=508932531
Rwanda - Part 1:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=3278&l=2d172&id=508932531
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Rwanda - Update 3
Thank you so much to all of you who e-mailed and called me on Sunday (the 22nd), to wish me a happy birthday. (I am now 24!!!) Your love and thoughtfulness is very much appreciated and blesses my life so much. Here in Rwanda life has been keeping me busy. Last week we visited with 4 different ministries and a Returnee/refugee camp. All of them were such wonderful, eye opening and heartbreaking times for my teammates and myself. There are more details and photos on the team blog (www.crs2007rwanda.blogspot.com) if you wanted to read more about them.
This week is also a very full week with visiting another 3-4 ministries. This is our last week of visiting ministries and we will all be praying about the options and choosing what ministries we will be working in for the remainder of our 4 months here. Please join me in thoughts and prayers as I make this choice over the next couple of days. For those of you in the Toronto area, I just wanted to tell you about a movie that will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival. It is filmed in Rwanda and most of the scenes where it is filmed are places I have been and the actors in the movie are people that I know here. A lot of the actors are actually youth who are and were street children here in Rwanda. The director of the movie lives in New York and comes to runs a school here every year that is teaching some of the local youth about video production, etc. Many of the youth helped in filming the majority of the movie. The movie is called “Munyurangabo” and it is by: Lee Isaac Chung. Their website is www.almondtreefilms.com. The movie has been recognized with awards and nominations and has been shown at other movie festivals, like Cannes. If you happen to have the time to go and see it at the film festival, I highly recommend that you do. It shows very realistically life here in Rwanda.
This week is also a very full week with visiting another 3-4 ministries. This is our last week of visiting ministries and we will all be praying about the options and choosing what ministries we will be working in for the remainder of our 4 months here. Please join me in thoughts and prayers as I make this choice over the next couple of days. For those of you in the Toronto area, I just wanted to tell you about a movie that will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival. It is filmed in Rwanda and most of the scenes where it is filmed are places I have been and the actors in the movie are people that I know here. A lot of the actors are actually youth who are and were street children here in Rwanda. The director of the movie lives in New York and comes to runs a school here every year that is teaching some of the local youth about video production, etc. Many of the youth helped in filming the majority of the movie. The movie is called “Munyurangabo” and it is by: Lee Isaac Chung. Their website is www.almondtreefilms.com. The movie has been recognized with awards and nominations and has been shown at other movie festivals, like Cannes. If you happen to have the time to go and see it at the film festival, I highly recommend that you do. It shows very realistically life here in Rwanda.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Returnee/Refugee camp...
Last week the team went to a returnee/refugee camp. We drove for about 3 hours to get to it. It was a very interesting experience actually seeing a returnee/refugee camp in real life and not just seeing it as a video on TV. Refugees have really become a reality for us. The returnee/refugee camp we went to is rather small with only about 362 families. Most of the people living in the camp are Rwandese people who were living in Tanzania or people who had just set up a home out in the bush and were not surviving on their own so they were moved into this new community. The camp has only been open about 7 months. Some people are still living in makeshift tents, cramming all their kids into one which is rather small, but all the families have been given a plot of land to build a house on and a couple kilometres away is land that each family will be given land to start farming crops on. A lack of rain this past year meant that there wasn’t a good harvest for most people. A lot of the children have swollen bellies and other types of sores on them as well, but their smiles are still so beautiful. The refugee camp was developed by CARE International and is funded by CARE Germany and CARE USA. We were told the local government is helping the refugee camp as well. The biggest need the people have is more food and other water supplies, like bore holes, to be brought in. Also the children are having to walk 5km everyday to get to the closest school, so there is a definite need for a local school to be built as well as teachers to be brought in or trained locally. Once the houses are built on this camp the next step they will be working towards is helping the people with their land and teaching about agriculture, as well as teaching people trades that they can use to start businesses and help develop this community.
Rwanda - Update 2...
(writen on July 13th)
I am soon going on three weeks here in Rwanda, though most days it seems like I have been here longer. The people that I am meeting all have incredible stories and I am learning a lot form them. The majority of my Rwandese friends here on the base lived through the genocide. Their stories are often heartbreaking but the way they have come out on the other side still being so loving, and forgiving astounds me. We went to the Genocide Memorial with two of our Rwandan friends this past weekend. It is a very powerful place. It takes you through the years leading up to the genocide and what has happened after it. It even tells some people and children’s stories that both survived and were killed during the genocide.
This past week we have visited three ministries. We went to Compassion International, World Vision, Cards From Africa (http://www.cardsfromafrica.com/. Cards from Africa was a really cool place. They employ youth who are orphaned and now are the heads of households caring for their younger siblings. They pay them at a fair trade price and you can even order from them worldwide, online. Click on the link above to check them and their products for sale out.
This upcoming week we will be visiting a children’s ministry, an HIV/AIDS ministry, a street children's ministry, orphanages and a returnee/refugee camp. We will also be attending a wedding. The team and myself are continuing with the language classes and it is coming along slowly. Thank you so much for all your thoughts and prayers.
My mailing address here is:
Trisha Cullington
YWAM Kigali
Box 3159
Kigali, Rwanda
Our team has also started a blog. The link is www.crs2007rwanda.blogspot.com . I am the team’s communication person so I will be the one writing and posting all the blogs. Feel free to keep track of the team on there.
My phone number is 03027087. The country code is 250. Look online to see what other codes you have to dial.
I am soon going on three weeks here in Rwanda, though most days it seems like I have been here longer. The people that I am meeting all have incredible stories and I am learning a lot form them. The majority of my Rwandese friends here on the base lived through the genocide. Their stories are often heartbreaking but the way they have come out on the other side still being so loving, and forgiving astounds me. We went to the Genocide Memorial with two of our Rwandan friends this past weekend. It is a very powerful place. It takes you through the years leading up to the genocide and what has happened after it. It even tells some people and children’s stories that both survived and were killed during the genocide.
This past week we have visited three ministries. We went to Compassion International, World Vision, Cards From Africa (http://www.cardsfromafrica.com/. Cards from Africa was a really cool place. They employ youth who are orphaned and now are the heads of households caring for their younger siblings. They pay them at a fair trade price and you can even order from them worldwide, online. Click on the link above to check them and their products for sale out.
This upcoming week we will be visiting a children’s ministry, an HIV/AIDS ministry, a street children's ministry, orphanages and a returnee/refugee camp. We will also be attending a wedding. The team and myself are continuing with the language classes and it is coming along slowly. Thank you so much for all your thoughts and prayers.
My mailing address here is:
Trisha Cullington
YWAM Kigali
Box 3159
Kigali, Rwanda
Our team has also started a blog. The link is www.crs2007rwanda.blogspot.com . I am the team’s communication person so I will be the one writing and posting all the blogs. Feel free to keep track of the team on there.
My phone number is 03027087. The country code is 250. Look online to see what other codes you have to dial.
Monday, July 09, 2007
Rwanda - Update 1 ...
It has been almost two weeks since I have been here and I have become quite accustomed to life here in Rwanda. The people are wonderful and so friendly. I have got the hang of the “taxi park” in the local town nearby and can navigate my way into downtown which is an adventure all on it’s own. I have tried almost all the forms of transportation, including van/bus taxis, a bicycle taxi, motorbike taxi and even a motorcyle taxi. We have started language classes as well. Hopefully the team and myself will be able to effectively learn what we are taught. We will be having language classes for about an hour a day for the next month. Prayer is most definitely needed in the area of language studies.
The trip here went very smoothly, except for some major turbulence near landing. All the members of our team have now arrived in Kigali, Rwanda and presently as I type this we are experiencing our first African rainfall. It is absolutely incredible and I only wish you could be here to share it with me. This past week has been quite hot and dry (we are in dry season right now). We have mainly spent the week meeting the people on the base and exploring the cities that neighbour the YWAM base that I will be living on for the next 5 ½ months. Now that all the team has arrived we will be visiting different ministries and networking as we start praying about what ministry we would like to be involved in for our time here. It is an incredible opportunity to be given the chance to pick what ministry I will spend the majority of my time with.
We went to the Genocide museum on Saturday. It is an amazing and heartbreaking place to visit. I'll write more about it at a later date.
Prayer Requests:
1- Team unity and dynamics
2- Learning the language
3- Health and safety for everyone on the team
The trip here went very smoothly, except for some major turbulence near landing. All the members of our team have now arrived in Kigali, Rwanda and presently as I type this we are experiencing our first African rainfall. It is absolutely incredible and I only wish you could be here to share it with me. This past week has been quite hot and dry (we are in dry season right now). We have mainly spent the week meeting the people on the base and exploring the cities that neighbour the YWAM base that I will be living on for the next 5 ½ months. Now that all the team has arrived we will be visiting different ministries and networking as we start praying about what ministry we would like to be involved in for our time here. It is an incredible opportunity to be given the chance to pick what ministry I will spend the majority of my time with.
We went to the Genocide museum on Saturday. It is an amazing and heartbreaking place to visit. I'll write more about it at a later date.
Prayer Requests:
1- Team unity and dynamics
2- Learning the language
3- Health and safety for everyone on the team
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