Snapshots of Burundi

Nothing that interesting has been happening around here. We are packing up our house and getting ready to leave. But instead of just writing about all of our stuff I decided to post some pictures of Burundi.

                                            This is the view from a balcony in Bujumbura.

                                        There is a hike you can take to Kibuye Rock where
                                        you get a bird's eye view of the village, and a bunch
                                        of Burundian kids following you.

                                                          Our pet chameleon, Buddy.

                                                          A boy and his chick, Pickley

                                                         

                                                                   Lake Tanganyika

Perspective Of A Third Culture Kid

Q. What is a third culture kid?

1. A third culture kid is a kid who is growing up in a different culture.

That’s what we are now, third culture kids. 

Some of the questions we get asked the most about Burundi are things like “ What was school like?” or “ What was your favorite part” and most of all, the basic question of “ Did you like it?”. The answer is YES!!!!!!! We all loved it there! What kind of kid wouldn’t love to run around outside all day with friends? Certainly not us! Burundi gave us a whole new perspective on life anywhere. This is an essay I wrote for a school assignment.

                                    Less is More 

    I never knew, but sometimes, less is more. When people are less fortunate, you learn to appreciate the things that you do have. I learned about that first hand.

   My family was working at a mission hospital in Burundi, East Africa, for nine months last year. We could only bring limited supplies, and most of our bins were full of resources for the hospital. We had to adjust to living with less.

   At first it was hard living without the things we were used to, but as time went on, we learned to appreciate the little things that we did have.

   Whenever one of our friends back in the U.S. would send us a package, we would be so exited about chocolate chips or colored pencils, even though normally we would just have those things instantly.

   I started to realize, the less we had, the more appreciative we were.

   In March 2016, Burundi was named the most unhappy country in the world, with Denmark in first. My family and I came up with the solution that they must have interviewed people in the capital, Bujumbura. Out in the country, where we were, people were very happy. The people in the capital know what they’re missing, but with no internet, no connection to the outside world, the villagers are grateful for the little that they do have. 

   This is an important lesson to learn. A lot of times, when people have many things, they don’t appreciate the small things until that’s all that’s left. Appreciate all your things, because sometimes, less is more.

Evacuation Vacation

Things have been getting messy this week in Bujumbura and we decided to leave early just in case. The airport was closed and so we decided to drive to Tanzania, it was a 2 hour drive to the border and we got visas very quickly. We drove for 1 hour and got to our guesthouse here in Kigoma. Its very beautiful and has Vervet monkeys and zebras that you can get very close to, and a beautiful view of Lake Tanganyka. The beach is beautiful and the water is a lot of fun to swim in with big waves and sandy shores. 

Today Dad and I drove 20 minutes to a museum about David Livingston, a famous explorer for the source of the Nile, and Henry Stanley and we got to stand in the spot where they met, and Stanley said the famous words " Dr. Livingston I presume?" 

We leave tomorrow and fly to Dar es Salaam, the capital. The plane route is from Dar we fly to Dubai, so we get to hit a new contnent, Asia, and from there to Switzerland, where we stay for a few days, and then take a train to Paris where we have a little vaca, and from there we take a train to Brussles and take our planed flight home. 

Taking a walk

Our little visitor

" Dr. Livingston I presume?"

Mommy and baby zebra at our guesthouse

Ibitaro, the hospital

Sometimes it is very fun or useful to live 5 minutes from a hospital, you get to go hold the new babies, see a boy getting a coin fished out of his throat, visit the children, and when my mom got a hairy caterpillar spick in her eye she just walked over to the neighbors house and our friendly eye doctor walked her to the hospital and fixed her right up.

The operating room 

The outside

Storage room

Safari

Our mission agency is having a retreat in Kenya this week and we decided to come a few days early to go on safari. 

When we flew into Nairobi we spent the night in a guesthouse and then yesterday morning we drove to a very small airport that is just for flying to safari and a few beaches. We took a very small plane on a 45 minute flight to the Masai Mara. We landed in a dry field where our guide was waiting with a jeep. 

As we were driving we spotted a mongoose, monkeys, impala(antelope), zebras, and the smallest type of deer, a dik-dik. 

We got to our resort called Entumoto, which means meeting place in Masai. They led us to our “tent”, which was more of a house including couches, beds, and bathrooms.

That afternoon we got to try shooting a Masai bow and we also went on a game drive, where we saw more antelope, African buffalo, Crowned Cranes, and a few other birds.

This morning we had breakfast at 7:30 and headed out at 7:45. As we were driving we saw 2 female lions eating a buck and a few miles away was a pride feasting on a zebra. There were about 5 cubs, a male teenager, and 3-4 full grown females.

After a little more driving we came across a tower(group) of giraffes crossing the road. We kept on driving through a field of dry grass looking for a leopard, which we did not find today but instead we found a very famous cheetah, Malaka, who’s from National Geographic and the movie Cats, with her cubs, who marched right in front of our car.

As we were watching, a parade of elephants walked right past us and the cheetahs, which was very exciting.

After this we stopped for lunch in the middle of an open plain, our guide packed a delicious picnic lunch. We drove a little more and then stopped at a pool filled with hippos and a Nile crocodile.

As we were driving back we stopped to watch more giraffes with babies eating.

 The other creatures we saw throughout the trip today were more zebras, warthogs with babies, hyenas, ostriches, baboons, gazelles, a Martial eagle, more mongoose,jackals,and dung beetles.

lion facts:

-females live to be 15 years old, males live to be 10

-males eat first, then cubs, then females

-when they catch prey, they eat the eyes first

-when they finish their meal they cover the blood so hyenas don't find it.

-the boys live with the pride until they are 2, then get kicked out to find their own territory 

Chick update

As we have learned, chicks are very hard work. After Hazel's death we watched the chicks very closely so they wouldn't get picked off by crows or hawks but they still managed to somehow disappear in other ways.

 While we were in Ethiopia Amber caught the first case of chickalaria ( chick malaria), as we call it, and was found lifeless the next morning. Boo wast taken away, while Anna was watching, by what she said was a hideous crow.

 Also, during our vaca the Cropseys got 3 little chicks, Cookie, Frodo, and Sam. Before we even got back Frodo caught chickalaria and had the same results as Amber. The day after we returned Sam was taken by a bird while Sammy was watching him, as for Cookie, she was fine until one day Elise came into school crying and announced Cookie was sick, and she was very sick. After school finished, Cookie had bit the dust.

Pickely is the only chick left and we all hope he survives and stays, as we nicknamed him,

 The Everlasting Chick!

Me holding Pickely and Mekdes eating sugar cane infront of our house

The feeding program

Today we went to the Yezelalem Minch offices and met our sponcer child, Redit, and our grandparents sponsor child,  Yabsira, we gave them some gifts and got to ask them a few questions about school and sports.

 Then we went to the feeding program,  run by Burtukan and Nesibu, and helped give the food out to the kids. They had injera, the Ethiopian bread, with a sauce and bananas.

The area is accualy a preschool with kids up to eight years old and we got to visit the rooms and the playground and play with the kids as well as give them plates of food. A lot of the kids wanted to shake our hands, give us a hug, or play thumb war with us. 

 All the kids were very nice and we even met another Mekdes there. 

We also got to see an Ethiopian coffee ceremony and watch the woman make the coffee and it smelled really good.