Hills, Sunsets and Burundi Drums

Before I begin please let me reassure all of you out there who are concerned for our First Lady, Annette. She did spend the day in bed on Friday with an upset stomach but was restored to us on Saturday and we were once again a full team. Bosco prayed a wonderful prayer over Annette on Friday evening and thanked God for her. He spoke about how God fully intended  her to be in Burundi and part of our wonderful team and that she will leave here changed because of the experiences she has had and the people she has met. It was a lovely prayer and we are praying that those changes will be in all of us when we return home.

I must just tell of how Saturday started for the younger ones amongst us! We rose around 5:30am in order for Bosco to collect us at 6am for the weekly Sat am sports gathering on a field with the youth group from his church. He arrived at 6:45 (some of us by that time had thought about returning to bed but Lorna did her usual daily 'warm up' programme for us) and for almost an hour and a half we ran around either playing ultimate frisbee or football. Several other youngsters persumably from the neighbourhood came to join in and in usual Bosco style he gathered us all up at the end and encouraged us to join hands whilst he had a little "God Slot". We returned tired, orange and for some of us who had forgotton that maybe were not so young anymore, with aching muscles. When I complained that I could hardly walk later in the day Peter J said " Helen you should remember your age" ! Cheek. 

At 10:30 we were ready for our visit to some Waterfalls and an area of outstanding beauty where the Germans following the 2nd World War, tried to hide and eventually escaped to Tanzania. 

After leaving at 11:30 and travelling for the majority of the way on an extremely rugged and dusty road we arrived around 3pm. The first waterfall was in a rather shady wooded area and of course if it had been earlier in the day and in bright sunlight I might have been tempted to go in! However some had the admirable attitude of "Well you might never have this opportunity again" and Melody was first under the "shower" followed by Matt and Dan! We ate well that evening and had an early night, shattered form our long day.

On Sunday morning we headed to Bosco's church at 9:30 and enjoyed wonderful worship with the band, Amazing Grace being my favourite, but several songs we recognised. Our loyal translators were by our sides and other members of the congregation helped out too. Fortunately for them a lovely man who had been sitting beside me translated the main sermon. But boy what a job he had. The pastor preaching liked to move around a lot and spoke very fast and loud at times when passionately trying to get his point across - poor Suprice (?spelling) graciously followed him around and did an incredible job at translating. The pastor said it was very important for us all to listen to what he had to say and every few minutes asked us to raise our hands in the air and "Praise God" in order to make sure we were not sleeping! A new technique for St Mary's preachers maybe?!!  We were also asked to prod our neighbour from time to time and say "Wake up". Josh happened to be sitting next to the Minister of Defence! Despite leaving with a headache and sore ears it was a very good sermon. We left at 1pm!

Around 4pm we set off for the hills and arrived at a place where the Burundi Drummers were going to perform for us. The leader, a 79 year old man greeted us and told us of his country's history and that this was the place where the king lived and died. We saw the  enormous straw hut where his throne was and where his many wives attended him. He was well looked after! After we were shown to our seats and the procession of drummers began to pour into the arena dressed in colourful African dress with their drums on their heads. The rhythmic deep beats echoed all around the lush,green hills that  surrounded us and they entertained us with music and dance until the sun set, right in front of us. It was quite surreal and an experience not to be forgotten.

This morning Peter J, Melody, Annette and I went to Gitega to visit a goverment run hospital in the town. The outside of the building was deceptive as once we entered I was shocked to see the lack of facilities and dilapidated state of the wards etc. There were a few women in labour and many, many sick children, the majority suffering from malaria. However, despite the conditions,  there were nurses and doctors around in brilliant white coats, teaching sessions in progress and drugs available. One of the nurses explained that it is very hard to nurse these children without the necessary equipment such as stethoscopes, blood pressure machines and oxygen. A very challenging visit. More teaching from Peter J this afternoon in the health clinic. I feel very privileged to have sat in on these and whilst I have no desires to be a midwife have certainly picked up on Peter's passion that he has for educating in the developing world. So many conditions and situations are  preventable thus many deaths of mother's and their babies could be avoided.