Christmas Cantata

Our choir was fantastic! We had great turn out, and the mix of music was informal at the same time reverenced. I met so many new people; they seemed to be friends and family of choir members. We had about 100 people. I am praying that by next Christmas,our membership will be 100. After the cantata, we had a candle light service and refreshment. We made a circle along the wall, then lighted candles. While each candle is lighted up, we sang, then we touched the shoulder of the next person in order to make the complete circle (we could prayed or blessed that person we touched). When we made the complete circle, we walked to get back to our seat. The moving crowds with lighted candles were really neat to see from the sound booth. I took several pictures as people sang and walked.

I learned how to embed slideshow

Learning from children

It was a rainy Sunday. When I saw Tim and his little brother Chris, I was looking at the seat where Annabel sits every Sunday. I didn't think Annabel would be here since Jane and Al will not be at the church this Sunday. But she was sitting pretty in her Sunday pink dress. I turned my head toward to Tim to tell him to say Annabel is here. Before I open my mouth, I saw Tim was walking toward Annabel, then he gave her a big hug. His brother Chris followed him and sat next to Tim. If Annabel is his grand mother or he knew her before, this may not be anything that I would think about.

I was pleasantly surprised by Tim a few weeks ago when he wanted help Annabel to Jane's car. He seemed to be restless, and a typical 10 year old boy who has lots of energy. But when he helped her out, he was so gentle to her. I had to stop what I was doing, and watch those two walked out from the church. How kind and sweet he was to Annabel. Most kids, I thought, they don't pay attention to old people, even to their own grandparents. But I was wrong. Some kids pay attention to even to strangers. Annabel was a stranger to Tim. Sometimes, kids teach older people how to love others while adults just talk about it.

Reason for the Season--Born is the King of Israel

We decorated our house with Christmas lights and a rain deer on our rooftop. I love this
season, and this year is such a special year. We are so blessed to live on the same ground where our church is. It is so wonderful to see the beautiful church several times everyday. Christmas season started right after the Thanksgiving. We decorated the church and the parsonage. Last Friday (Dec. 1st), we went to Assoc. Christmas party, and on Saturday (Dec. 2nd) was our church party.

My favorite season is Christmas season. This year, my joy has been multiplied with so many many blessings. The first blessing is our church, the second blessing is also our church, and the third blessing is again our church. What a joy to serve God in this way! We went out for caroling Monday night (Dec. 5th). Last time when I went out for caroling was in Korea in 1969. What a joy to experience it again.

Driftwood Nursing Home visit

We sang hymns and old classics. There were about thirty people who are in wheel chairs. Some were singing along with us, some were sleeping during the service. It reminded me the time when my mother was in a nursing home. I am sure that no one here in this nursing home chose to be here. What can you do when you are struck by strokes, and no one to take care of you. How do you respond to this kind of event in your life? When they were young and healthy, I don't think they ever thought they would end up in a place like this. Surely I don't think that way now, but what do you do when you need full time care. I wanted to hug everyone, but I didn't. I went around and reached out my hands to those who reached out to me. Wouldn't it be nice if I could bring in children from a Korean church to sing and dance for them? Children can learn to serve older people, and these wheel chiar bound people can enjoy children's singing and dance.

Visiting Homeless Shelter on Thanksgiving day

We went to a shelter on Thanksgiving day. It was so hard to see their faces straight from the place where I was sitting. They avoided and I avoided their eye contacts. They look so tired and beatten from cold, rain, and sun. On my way out, I said "hello" to a young family, and baby waived goodbye to me. It is so hard to say "God bless you or Happy Thanksgiving" to those who are really suffering. What do you say when you see someone who lost all hopes?

Joyce played piano, Linda is holding cup cake box, Ken and Mike in the background.

Anna and Enyoung

I had a surprise visit--Anna and Enyoung visited us. I have been praying for two directees for several months. I need to give the names to SDI on Dec. 9th. Whenever I asked “how should I get directees”, Sister tells me, God will send right ones, just wait. Now I know what she is talking about. These two showed up at my doorstep and surprised me. The way God works is always amazing. These two young ladies are the ones God sent to my way as I am getting a training to be a spiritual director.

This baby is so cute. Every time I hear his laugh, I laugh too.

So cute.

Why can we laugh like this any more?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HttF5HVYtlQ

Baptism service

Baptism service--Jeri

We had a grand time on Sunday 19th. Two people were baptized and one person joined the church. What a wonderful day it was! We had a chance to keep two ordinances that Jesus ordained for the church to do. In the morning, we had a baptism, and in the evening we had a communion.

Burden and York are lifted

We have been moving since October 1st, and our aim was that we rent the Mill Valley house out by November 1st. But it didn't work out that way. We just sign a contract to rent the house on Dec. 1st.

Chris got the senior pastor position on Oct. 1st with FSBC. Since Sept 24th, we have been moving things out from MV to Sl every time we came to the church from MV. We rented a UHaul twice andd Ken and Al used their trucks to help us to move. Al went to the house several times and repaired rotten steps. I thank God for his talent and willingness to help.

Chris focused on moving and I focused on cleaning and renting it out. I advertised the house and many people came by, but no takers. I asked a man to provide me with his honest fee dback about the house. He (and also Chris) pointed out that we need to paint and update the house. After we moved our furniture, we started painting. Chris hired Stacy and John to help us paint. But the painting job was getting bigger and bigger so we needed more people to paint and also more experienced ones. I hired Luis and Milquin right off the street. They worked really hard also they were experienced painters. We paid them close to one grand for painting, but it would have been much more if we had hired a professional painter. The house looks really clean and nice.

Now we need to update the kitchen. Barry referred me to talk to Peter. I wanted to put new cabinets and floor, but I learned that we need more than ten grand. So, we will not have any new cabinets or new floor this time. Peter put a black granite counter top and fixed all plumming for three grand.

Chris painted steps and fixed things outside. I cleaned inside. It took almost for 2 weeks to clean. On November 18th, I had an open house. Six people wanted to rent the house, and they gave me a down payment. I think I put the rental price too low. But I am not sure if we charged more money, then we may not have an opportunity to choose the best from many applicants. We found a family; Vernonica and Nathan are so happy with the house, and I have good feeling that they will take care of the house.
\
Thank God we are done with Mill Valley house now. Our body and mind were at SL, but the unfinished business in Mill Valley pulled us from the behind, we could not run as we should and as we wanted. It was almost like I was running forward but my head was turned backward. it was a tough two months. Now we are free, it is over! We can’t wait to visit our congregation and start a real work that matters to us the most.

We are welcomed!

Pastor Installation--Nov. 5th

During the morning service on Nov. 5th, the church family welcomed us and gave commitment to support for the pastor. Lyman welcome Chris to the association, Jeanne (Chris’ sister) introduce her brother to this congregation and also tried to talk about him as his sister, Jane talked about the pastor search process, Al asked Chris about his commitment to the church, Jean prayed for Chris and me, then Craig talked about Chris as a friend and a colleague. Craig spoke so well; about teaching (Thursday Men’s Bible Study), compassion (SanQuintin ministry), and leadership (CASA ministry). I was told that 84 people attended the morning service. Jeanne came down from Portland, Valerie, James, and Jael came from Sacramento. Ted came form San Jose.

In the evening, Chris and I gave testimony. Chris showed pictures of our family, and he shared his three different time callings. The last one he answered. I shared my encounter with God, which I termed as my holy mountain experience. Lisa and Drew came, they want to come to our church from San Francisco, well we will see. Brian, Lili, Doo San, also Shirly from Chinese church came. Several area pastors came and welcomed him to the association. What a joy to serve our God with brothers and sisters in Christ.

My New Church Family

We moved from Mill Valley to San Lorenzo, well, almost. We spent last night for the first time at our new house. I slept on a couch, because our bed is still in our Mill Valley. Al and Ken came to the house at 6:30 a.m. We started early to beat the traffic at the toll plaza. We made pretty good time to get to Mill Valley house. Brian was there already. He came last Monday and also this Monday to help us. We loaded our bedroom furniture and computer room stuff, then came back to our SL house around 10:30 a.m. We finished unloading around noon, had a lunch from last night's party. Here is our Fifth Sunday Night gathering. Also we celebrated Al's retirement.


The secret is out. We love to eat.



See what we played. Look we are are singing and dancing, sort of. We sang "deep and wide" with motions. If that counts for dancing. Al is showing us what wide means, "This is Wide"

Can you guess the theme for tonight? Who says Southern Baptist people don't know how to have fun. We just don't get drunk to get a good time.

Moving

We rented U-Haul last Monday, and moved furniture. Brian and Doosan helped from Mill Valley end. When we arrived at San Lorenzo, Ken D, John and Roberta King, Carol, Don, Joy, Lisa, Joy's son Rufus, Don who cuts our lawn, Bob came. Don and Joyce's grandson came to help as well. What a great group to work with. MV house is getting emptied as SL house get filled. I ask why we need so many things. I really enjoyed this empty house.

Spritual Direction -part II

Oct 18th Mercy Center:
As we listen to each other's Holy Ground experience, we are told to pay attention to our inner thoughts, and notice what is happening within us. My partner shared his brother's death last week, his experience of witnessing his brother's passing from this world to the next world, he experienced the presence of Holy spirit, the comforter was with his brother and his family who were at the death bed. Watching his brother leaving this world and embracing the next world was so satisfying because there was such a peace and grace in that place. They all felt that the presence of God. As I listened my partner's story, I felt like I was right with him because the way he shared about his sacred experience. Then he shared another incident when he experienced God. He was walking on the beach one time; there was breeze, and he knew that was the breath of God. I can totally understand what he is talking about. I too had the same experience with breeze. I call it "God's breath experience".

I was going to share about my new church being a holy ground for me, but first I dovetailed on Bill's story of God's breath. I shared my Uganda experience. God's breath, morning breeze that I felt in that morning in banana field in Uganda, I will never forget. That was my encounter with God, my holy ground experience in 1998. I shared with my current holy ground that I saw in my mind tonight.

After we shared our experience with each other, we met in a large group again, then the facilitator asked about our dyad experience. People said "easier to keep going, became sacred as I tell the story, thinking about and telling about the experience made our experience sacred, trust" The activity took only 30 min. The next 30 minutes, the facilitator read Speech Therapist, how she saw God on the face of a handicapped child. She read it, and then asked what happened to the ST. There are so many great comments were made, as always, I learn a lot from my classmates.

Circle of Life
Spiritual direction is to be in God's presence, nothing is excluded, everything is important to God, assurance from God, God manifest himself. When we touch a person deeply, we touch God. When we have relationship with God whse name is "I AM"- it changed to I - thou relationship to I - I relationship. God is interested in my everyday, ordinary affairs. When I am with Him, my ordinary life comes alive. glory of God is human being fully alive.

Art of listening

Listen to others as though the person is speaking his last words. What a great warning or prompting. If I listen to Chris, Zach and Simon in this way, what would be like? We took a dinner break from 6 to 7 p.m. We had fish, salad, and soup. I sat with two other women whom I have known them since the first meeting last year. We convened at 7 p.m and continued with the listening experience. We broke up with a team of three and practiced Spiritual Direction. Frank was the director, I was the directee, and Louise was the observer. I told about my forgetfulness. I forgot totally about the last month homework, and I cannot even remember what was talked about last month. A few times, I had blacked out experience. Bill caught the word "scared" and asked me why I was scared. I was little agitated that I am not scared, but I am frustrated. It was amazing that Frank's question helped me to sort out the feelings of "scared and frustrated". Frank was very comfortable in his role as a director and I felt his empathy toward the directee was the key for me to open up. He listened to me, gave his undivided attention. I knew that because he was leaning forward to hear what I have to say. Louise debriefed and gave some feedback. We met as the small group, Bill, the mentor for our group debriefed about the today's lesson.

I learned a lot. I am so glad that I came.

Spritual Direction -part I

Thursday 18, 2006 at Mercy Center.

I am in a 3 year Spiritual Direction program at Mercy Center
We meet once a month, I am learning so much about myself and God, and my relationship with God. Tonight's topic was Holy Listening. We started out the session by singing "This is Holy ground, We're standing on holy ground, For our God is present and where God is... is holy" Sisters read sacred words by taking turn. In between the readings, we sang Holy Ground. As I get involved in this process of singing and listening to sacred words, I noticed myself that I was calming down and become more centered within a minute time span. As we sang, we were prompted to go to the time and space where we had an encounter with God. We were prompted to reflect on our Holy ground experience.

The text read (Gen 3) was about Moses and his encounter with God. God appeared in burning bushes. What is my burning bush? Moses took off his shoes when he sensed God's presence. Shoes have message and meaning. Taking off shoes has meaning. Moses took off shoes in the presence of God. When and where should I take off my shoes? Am I sensitive enough to know when and where? We struggle to be holy. Knowing when and where to taking off our shoes on the holy ground is not easy. When did I have that experience? I when I am in the presence of God. I am alive.

During the reflection time, I thought about my holy ground. With my surprise, I saw the parking lot of our new church, then the house and church. How cans the parking lot to be my holy ground? I might ask. How the parking lot can be the holy ground. The word "serve and love" Mabel, Ken D, Barbara D, Jane & Al and many members of the church showed up in front of me. Is God saying to me that at this space and time, I serve and love these people? I thought my duty is to reaching out to the lost, but somehow my assignment seems to be different than I expected and imagined. I used to think, "reach and teach" others about who God is the primary importance of my Christian duty.

From the first time we were called to this church, we never ask God why we are here at San Lorenzo, because we know that is what He wanted for us to be at this time. I am just thrilled that he included me in his work; I am so jazzed about our new congregation. God showed me my holy ground where I need to take off my shoes. As I take off my shoes at my house, I think about our church.

Once I saw clearly what is my holy ground is for now, I feel much better about our move. I was blessed tonight how God show my holy ground, where I will meet God everyday. My Holy ground at this time of my life is this place, right in front of me. The place, our church, where I will commune with God.

September CASA Report from Robina

The CASA-Rwanda house is busy as you can see the activities below. Please pray for the House Activity Director, Robina, as you can see her plate is full with many different ministries. I thank God for her faithfulness, creativity and hard work. Please e-mail Robina and encourage her as she toils in the harvest field.

The following numbers are people who are served by the CASA house during the month of Sept. Every morning at 5:30 to 6:30, there is morning devotion at the house every morning except on Sunday, and there is a small prayer closet where people can pray as they fast staying there overnight. The house is busy day and night, and the retreat rooms are booked solid with different Christian student groups. Students and mamas come to the house to get counseling; also pastors and evangelists stay at the house when they come to Butare to preach the Gospel to students.

SEPTEMBER 2006
Activity
By Robina

Morning Devotion

1st wk 206 people
2nd wk 107 people
3rd wk 83 people
4th wk 83 people

Prayer Room
1st wk 3 people
2nd wk 2 students
3rd wk 4 students
4th wk 2 students

Student Retreat
1st wk 36 students from GBU
2nd wk 14 students
3rd wk 8 students
4th wk 10 students

MaMa Counseling
1st wk 5 mamas
2nd wk 20 and above for two days seminar on “Lady at
home , Lady in the ministry”
3rd wk 2 mamas
4th wk 4 mamas

Student Counseling
1st wk 45 students due to deliverance service done a
pastor from kigali invited by GBU hosted by CASA 2nd
wk 7 students
3rd wk 4 students
4th wk 3 local people

Student Luncheon
1st wk 5 students
2nd wk 5 students
3rd wk 10 students
4th wk 7 students

Pastor Hosting
1st wk None
2nd wk 4 pastors
3rd wk 3 pastors
4th wk None

Helping Hands
1st wk 1 person
2nd wk 1 person
3rd wk 1 person
4th wk 1 person

Host guests
1st wk 1 pastor from kigali
2nd wk 2 ladies that were teachings the mamas
3rd wk 2 ministers from Mutara
4th wk None

Equipment check-out
1st wk 1 guitar
2nd wk 1 guitar
3rd wk 2 guitars
4th wk Wires microphones for one day.

Schedule activities
1st wk A talk on January Conference
2nd wk Work on the statute and annual report
3rd wk Talk on January conference
4th wk Work on the statute and annual report

Conduct monthly meeting
1st wk Small meeting for CFH Staff with Frank
2nd wk Small meeting with CFH Staff
3rd wk A talk to Pascazia and Scovia
4th wk 1 CASA Staff meeting with pastor Paul and
Pastor Musoni James.

Visit churches/homes
1st wk Visited 2 homes
2nd wk Visited 2 homes and one church
3rd wk Visited 3 homes with 1 church
4th wk 1 home

Robina --House Management
Supervise Pascuzia
1st wk As usual
2nd wk Measuring and sowing the curtains
3rd wk Curtain hanging
4th wk As usual

Supervise Jack
1st wk As accustomed
2nd wk As accustomed
3rd Curtain hanging
4th wk As usual

Maintain inside house
1st wk Bought new cartains
2nd wk As accustomed
3rd wk Curtain hanging
4th wk As usual

THE ABOVE IS THE REPORT OF ACTIVITY DIRECTOR.
Frank --Academic
Schedule classes
Teach classes
Available for students
Visit campus
Frank--Property Mgt
Pay bills-utility/phone/rent
Maintain Library books
Maintain Music Equipment
Maintain Electronic Equipment
Maintain house running

Hectic time

Willi came to visit from Rwanda. He helped us moving to from MV to SL, Chris, Willi, Simon, me worked all day long,packing,loading,unloading. In between, I check e-mail to answer inquiry about the house. Then I read my nephew, Josh's blog about what Not to do when we witness.


There are four aspects of evangelism that many Christians get wrong.

1. The Motive of many Christians for witnessing is simply guilt. They know the Bible tells them to, so every once in a while the guilt builds up enough for them to try to do something about it. Our motive should be compassion. We should be leading people to Jesus because we love them and want them to be saved from their sins. Without this motive, everything we do or say will simply be a clanging symbol.

2. The Goal of evangelism is not to win an argument or prove that you are right. The Goal should simply be conversation. God's love comes through us when we are in a relationship with others; not a competition. People can tell when you just want to win an argument rather than build a relationship.

3. The Perspective we should not have is that our interaction needs to bring a person to salvation. We need to understand that each person is on a Journey. And our job is to help them along. It helps if you picture a scale from -10 to +10, with 0 as salvation. -10 would be absolute hatred for God and +10 would be the best relationship with God that is possible. Now everyone can be charted on this graph. When you encounter a -7, your job is not to get them to 0. It's to get them to -6. That's what the Bible means when is says some sow the seeds, others water them, and still others reap the harvest.

4. The Response that you give to their objections to Christianity needs to be appropriate. There are 3 kinds of barriers to accepting Christ. Emotional, Intellectual, and Volitional. Emotional barriers are caused by bad experiences from church or Christians. Obviously the best way to deal with these is to simply demonstrate love to these people. Giving them statistics and charts won't heal their heart. Intellectual barriers are issues like science versus religion, or logical contradictions. This is where facts and figures can actually help. Someone who thinks that all Christians believe the world was made 6,000 years ago doesn’t need a hug. They need facts. And finally, every person has a Volitional barrier. This is simply a matter of God not having revealed Himself to them yet. There is nothing to do about this except to pray.

Changes

Death, changes in job, moving, these are considered to be a cause for a stress in life. We have to rent out our house, pack and move in this month. Chris changed his job. Father passed away. So I could expect why I am little frazzle these days. Moving is going to be little tough for me. Every time I look around our home, I already miss this place. We had a great time in this place. Here is the our house description that we put on Craigslist.


"Two level Marinview home in Tam Valley/Mill Valley. Large cathedral ceiling great room, dining room, hardwood floors, fireplace and a deck from every room. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, upper level: master bedroom, shower, walk-in closet, kitchen, living room, and dining area, Jacuzzi in the back deck. Lower level 2 bedrooms, a small office, kitchenette, with washer dryer in laundry room. Located in scenic Tennessee Valley over looking GGNRA. One month deposit plus cleaning deposit. Credit report required."

I also put some pictures.

Report from Robina

YES PASTOR,
I hope you are doing good.

Here is a short report of this week.

FELLOWSHIP

A Ladies two days seminar on the theme of: A lady at
home, a lady in the work of God. It is being given out
by Pastor Peace and Pastor Agnes both from
Kigali.(15th - 16th) and 24 ladies attended.

Medical students association with Ev Galikida from
Nigeria (14th-15th) with a theme: Back to the word.

Morning devotion studying, The authority is mine,
devil I am not afraid of you. By Robin and 28-30 old
people are turning up.

REGISTRATION

The next step is to check with other laws about the
rules to be followed in modifying the statute. This is
the 7th step out of 9 steps.

Pastor Paul is working on the action plan.

JANUARY SESSION

Tomorrow on 16th in the evening there is a meeting
with the GBU leader for futher information and to see
the next step.

Yesterday we met with three students and are willing
to volunteer in CASA when they are free.

One pastor who is the president of CNLS in Rwanda will
be a guest speaker in Jan session and he will
transport himself. He told me that he is willing to
help CASA as he can.

PRAISES

We are fine and pascazia is prayers with her choir for
two days.
jACK Is fine and his wife is helping during the since
pascazia is in prayers.

Be blessed.

New chapter

San Lorenzo church is going to be our home now. We will move to the church parsonage soon. The members of the church are older side, and I fell in love with them immediately. They remind me of mom and dad's friends in Longview. They are kind to each other, seem mature and dedicated Christians. From the first time we visited the church at the end of August, we were so sure that Chris was called to that church. But we didn't want to go faster than God. We followed the schedule that we set up before our Africa mission. We went to downtown FSBC, Nazarene, and CRC, while we visited San Lorenzo three times.

It was a long one month waiting. Every Sunday, I really missed this church. Our body and mind were at other church on each Sunday, but our heart was with this church. Whenever we talked about our ministry, our conversation came to this church. On September 24, 2006, a new chapter of our lives have started. There will be so many characters will be in and out and so many exciting events will capture readers in this chapter. I am so excited how God is working in our lives. In the past 2 years, we prayed, planned, frustrated, disappointed, and bewildered. So many times, I asked God, “why”. Now I understand those “whys”. What a pleasant surprise after the long wait.

I attended the senior Bible Study, and got to know more about the members. The oldest member is 91 years old, and I am the youngest. What I found is that how much energy they have. I truly believe that age is in one's mind. I totally enjoyed being there, and getting to know more about their life stories.

We went for a walk at Chabot Lake after a lunch, while the congregation was conducting a business meeting. When we were there about 20 minutes, Jane called and informed Chris that his is their new pastor. We are so excited about this church, and to see what God is going to do through this congregation.

Chirs gave wonderful sermons; morning one was about the requirement for Christian; there are three things God requires form us: 1. Act justly, 2. Love mercy, 3 Walk
Evening one was about: Roman 1:1; "Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus called to be an apostle. To be an apostle, I need to be a servant to Christ first. Learned about Dulos (Greek word for slave) and Lord relationship.

Winter Mission Trip

Some of you asked me about the winter, 2007 Africa mission. It is going to be a conference. Christian students from Rwanda, Congo, Burundi, and Uganda meet together and share what God is doing in each country, espeically focusing on campus ministry. Right now it is being planned, and once I get more detailed information, I will post here. Pasor Chris will take a mission team to Africa. They will leave on December 28 and come back on January 12th. More details will be posted later. If you would like to see what we did during the Summer 2006 mission, check them out at http://comeandseeafrica.org/pastmissions/mission2006/main.htm

Rose

DSC00814.JPG

I got this at the prayer mt.

Batwa family dancing

Burundi Visit

\

Triplets, seperated by birth.

Visiting Immaculate's home.

They may not have many things, but joy and happiness are abunndant. Immaculate's mother raised five daughters and a son by herself. She is a kindergarten teacher. Her children got scholarships, and they are all university educated.

Immaulate's mother and me.


Her house is filled with laughters, I just love to see them interact.

Electricity was out. I don't know how she prepare all these in dark, with coals. Rice, fried sweet potatos, chips, avocado salad, Ugari (Burundi traditional food).

Immaculate sings at her church

Is this goat going to hurt me?

batwa16

Goat and baby checking out each other.

Mama, a little boy is looking at me!

batwa15

Do you see how cute you are? A little baby discovered himself.

Visit to Batwa families

batwa13

Each year, we give 10 goats to Batwa families. Frank buys them at the market on the day we visit them.

Untitled

I just installed Flock, and testing if this is as easy as it says. 

Beautiful children of Butare

Kids at Ronina's church

NUR professors

NUR professors

Oleg, smile. Miss you all.

Princess of Rwanda

Princess of Rwanda

at Lake Tanganyka

lake tanganyka

This guy is singing about women. if you have a thin woman, she will empty your pocket, if you have a fat woman, she will empty your plate. Something like that.

How many can you remember?

DSC01399.JPG

Our Rwandan professors have almost perfect memory. Oleg, can you still remember them all?

Missing You All

DSC01396.JPG

I hope you continue to meet as a group, and create a learning community that will support each other. Remember our mantra for three weeks. Education is not "filling" students, but "igniting" fire in them for learning.

Dinner at IBIS

DSC01357.JPG

Brian at American Embassy in Kigali came down to Butare, and hosted a dinner at IBIS Hotel.

Gift from Batwa family to CASA family

DSC01769.JPG

Batwa people make clay pots for living. Nowadays everyone uses plastics,so they lost their jobs. This is a fire pit for cooking. Our Pascuszia uses it for cooking at the CASA house.

Is that me?

DSC01743.JPG
She is looking at a photo of her family (I took it last year and brought it with me this year). I wonder this is the first time she sees herself. What would that feel like?

Batwa Family

Batwa Family

I made friends with 10 Batwa families in 2002. Since then I have visited them once a year. This year, they visited me at the CASA house. They are looking at their children's pictures on a computer.

Waiting to take a group picture

Elena, Oleg, and Jarwhar

After the last session of the faculty workshop, we posed to take pictures. Elena and Oleg from Russia teach Physics, and Jawhar from India teaches Information Science. I, from America via South Korea, taught these wonderful professors on "Teaching and Learning with Technology".

Brand new Computer Science building at NUR

DSC01626.JPG

There are several professors form India at NUR. They teach computer science or information technology. I met several husband and wife team from India teaching at NUR. I was impressed with the new computer labs in this new building. Computer science students will use the labs, and I hope the rest of the campus community will have access to these labs.

Story Circle

DSC01790.JPG

For the Digital Story Telling session, each person wrote a story, and brought their story to the group. Listening Immanuel's story.