Camp Uible

My brother and sister usually live in Florida with their 3 kids. In the summer months they migrate back to West Virginia to farm, feed their horses, fix stuff in the old house, go to summer camps and about 42 other activities.

Their big arrival was last weekend (Memorial Day / Bower Annual Meeting / Barbecue Fest). However, they still had a couple of days of work to do back in Florida for which they were going to fly back down after the weekend. Liz and I agreed to have the nieces and nephew at our house until they returned about a week later. We are such good siblings!

Actually, their age 13, 9, and 7 and they're quite enjoyable and they have no problem entertaining themselves for a couple hours every day while Liz and I get work done and in the evenings it's game time.

It may not be the fall sweeps but the lineup so far has been:
Monday: attack UNO
Tuesday: Pirates (the role playing strategy game)
Wednesday: Jenga (with colored pieces and that color coded die that tells you what to remove)
Thursday: box game?
Friday: make kids paint our roof game?
Saturday: sell children off to travelling band of gypsies game?

(Stop it I'm kidding J&L :-)

Oh, and also throw in a couple trips to the park and Shrek 3....and some teepees.

Litigious Barbecue News

For my many barbecue fans here in the pan-handle.

Rwanda Presentation - Church Bulletin Jokes

Two Sundays ago my pastor at church comes up to me after the service and asks me if I'd be willing to talk about my Rwanda trip the following Sunday in place of her sermon. "No problem" I told her. Then she asks me if I'd talk at the 8:00 service as well as the 11:00. "uhhh, sure"

The only issue was that I knew I'd be out at the farm Saturday night and sometimes that means very fun, but late evening. That's OK. I totally blew off/slept through church the weekend of my birthday, so this would make up for it.

Pictures are no problem. I just stuck some of the better ones into a folder on my laptop and flipped through them using the church's projector. But what to say? I did my best and came up with an outline about what the experience really meant to me given what I had experienced. Essentially I had three messages for the congregation.

One: Be incredibly thankful for everything in your life now, especially as Americans.
Two: Do more to help around the world. It takes so very little to change people's lives.
Three: Have faith that even in the darkest times God is still with you.

It went over pretty well. I even stuck in a joke at the beginning like a good public speaker. I actually came across a couple good ones when I was trying to find something so I figured I'd deposit them here just for your amusement.


Bloopers in the Church Bulletin

1. The Scouts are saving aluminum cans, bottles and other items to be recycled. Proceeds will be used to cripple children.
2. Ladies Bible Study will be held Thursday morning at 10. All ladies are invited to lunch in the Fellowship Hall after the B.S. is done.
3. The pastor would appreciate it if the ladies of the congregation would lend him their electric girdles for the pancake breakfast next Sunday morning.
4. Low Self Esteem Support Group will meet Thursday at 7 PM. Please use the back door.
5. The pastor will preach his farewell message, after which the choir will sing, "Break Forth Into Joy."
6. A songfest was hell at the Methodist church Wednesday.
7. Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our church and community.
8. The eighth-graders will be presenting Shakespeare's Hamlet in the Church basement Friday at 7 PM. The Congregation is invited to attend this tragedy.
9. Thursday night Potluck Supper. Prayer and medication to follow.
10. The rosebud on the altar this morning is to announce the birth of David, the sin of Rev. and Mrs. Adams.
11. Tuesday at 4 PM there will be an ice cream social. All ladies giving milk will please come early.
12. A bean supper will be held on Tuesday evening in the church hall. Music will follow.
13. At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be "What Is Hell?" Come early and listen to our choir practice.
14. Weight Watchers will meet at 7 PM at the First Presbyterian Church. Please use large double door at the side entrance.
15. Please join us as we show our support for Amy and Alan who are preparing for the girth of their first child.
16. The Associate Minister unveiled the church's new tithing campaign slogan last Sunday: "I Upped My Pledge - Up Yours."
17. Don't let worry kill you, let the church help.
18. For those of you who have children and don't know it, we have a nursery downstairs.
19. This being Easter Sunday, we will ask Mrs. Lewis to come forward and lay an egg on the altar.
20. The service will close with Little Drops of Water. One of the ladies will start quietly and the rest of the congregation will join in.
21. Eight new choir robes are currently needed, due to the addition of several new members and to the deterioration of some older ones.
22. The senior choir invites any member of the congregation who enjoys sinning to join the choir.
23. Bertha Belch, a missionary from Africa, will be speaking tonight at Calvary Methodist. Come hear Bertha Belch all the way from Africa.
24. Announcement in a church bulletin for a national PRAYER & FASTING Conference: "The cost for attending the Fasting and Prayer conference includes meals."
25. Our youth basketball team is back in action Wednesday at 8 PM in the recreation hall. Come out and watch us kill Christ the King.
26. "Ladies, don't forget the rummage sale. It's a chance to get rid of those things not worth keeping around the house. Don't forget your husbands."
27. The peacemaking meeting scheduled for today has been canceled due to a conflict.
28. Next Thursday there will be tryouts for the choir. They need all the help they can get.
29. Barbara remains in the hospital and needs blood donors for more transfusions. She is also having trouble sleeping and requests tapes of pastor Jack's sermons.
30. During the absence of our Pastor, we enjoyed the rare privilege of hearing a good sermon when J.F. Stubbs supplied our pulpit.
31. The Rector will preach his farewell message after which the choir will sing "Break Forth into Joy."
32. Irving Benson and Jessie Carter were married on October 24 in the church. So ends a friendship that began in their school days.
33. Please place your donation in the envelope along with the deceased person you want remembered.
34. Attend and you will hear an excellent speaker and heave a healthy lunch.
35. The church will host an evening of fine dining, superb entertainment, and gracious hostility.
36. The ladies of the Church have cast off clothing of every kind. They may be seen in the basement on Friday afternoon.
37. This evening at 7 P.M. there will be a hymn sing in the park across from the Church. Bring a blanket and come prepared to sin.
38. Mrs. Johnson will be entering the hospital this week for testes.
39. The 1991 Spring Council retreat will be hell May 10 & 11.
40. Pastor is on vacation. Massages can be given to church secretary.
41. Please join us as we support Amy and Alan in preparing for the girth of their first child.
42. The Lutheran men's group will meet at 6 p.m. Steak, mashed potatoes, green beans, bread and dessert will be served for a nominal feel.
43. The rosebud on the altar this morning is to announce the birth of David Alan Belzer, the sin of Rev. and Mrs. Julius Belzer.
44. This afternoon there will be a meeting in the south and north ends of the church. Children will be baptized at both ends.
45. Thursday at 5PM there will be a meeting of the Little Mothers Club. All wishing to become Little Mothers, please see the minister in his private study.
46. Smile at someone who is hard to love. Say "hell" to someone who doesn't care much about you.
47. The service will close with "Little Drops of Water." One of the ladies will start quietly and the rest of the congregation will join in.
48. Next Sunday a special collection will be taken to defray the cost of the new carpet. All those wishing to do something on the new carpet will come forward and do so.
49. Attend and you will hear an excellent speaker and heave a healthy lunch.
50. The church will host an evening of fine dining, superb entertainment, and gracious hostility.
51. Wednesday the Ladies Liturgy Society will meet. Mrs. Jones will sing "Put Me in My Little Bed" accompanied by the pastor.
52. This being Easter Sunday, we will ask Mrs. Lewis to come forward and lay an egg on the altar.
53. The Rev. Adams spoke briefly, much to the delight of his audience.
54. A new loudspeaker system has been installed in the church. It was given by one of our members in honor of his wife.
55. The outreach committee has enlisted 25 visitors to make calls on people who are not afflicted with any church.
56. Ushers will eat latecomers.
57. The third verse of "Blessed Assurance" will be sung without musical accomplishment.
58. Next Sunday Mrs. Vinson will be soloist for the morning service. The pastor will then speak on "It's a Terrible Experience."
59. Due to the Rector's illness, Wednesday's healing services will be discontinued until further notice.
60. Stewardship Offertory: "Jesus Paid It All"
61. The concert held in Fellowship Hall was a great success. Special thanks are due to the minister's daughter, who labored the whole evening at the piano, which as usual fell upon her.
62. In the church bulletin during the minister's illness: GOD IS GOOD! Dr. Hargreaves is better.

And Our World Gets Bigger

In one of the good conversations I had this weekend, Jim and I were talking about Carl Sagan and his belief that we will definitely find other planets with life. I think Stephen Hawking has said that we will eventually head off to colonize other planets as a way of maintaining our species.

We're well on our way. Evidently we just discovered 28 new planets in just the last year. Star Wars is just around the corner. Now we just need more people to tune in to the light side of the force and start producing light sabres and cool space ships. Maybe even a gigantic Life Star battlestation. Of course, if we just carry our current society to other planets I wonder if we'll eventually end up with stuff like this:

Back To The Real World

Had a wonderful weekend at The Bower. It was really nice to spend it with family and friends. Though it is nice to be back home. I started going through blogger withdrawl.

If I ever hire a magician to come to one my parties, this guy is on the short list.

Soon To Be Nude No More

On Guy Kawasaki's blog yesterday he posted a bunch of pictures he took at Threadless headquarters. Looks like a fun place to work. Not that I need another T-shirt but I went ahead and bought this one. It seems like we end up having an impromptu 80's dance party at my house at least once a quarter. Next time I'll be prepared.

Financial News You Seek?

Yoda in today's WSJ.

Rwanda Recap Day 11

This was a bit of a down day. The coolest thing we did was go to a a barbecue. But this wasn't just your burgers-in-the-backyard kind of barbecue. This picture, I think, sums it up.

It was hosted by a group of women who all come from the same refugee camp school in Uganda. It's name was the Maryhill Girls School. The following comes from a letter they gave us:

MOGAR - Maryhill Old Girls' Association Rwanda

MOGAR is an Association of Rwandan women - Alumni of Maryhill High School, Uganda. It draws its membership (& strength) from women with diverse backgrounds - mothers, leaders in civil society, private and public sectors; committed to the well being of Rwanda's next generation.

It's really and incredible story. All the ladies were refugees in camps during the latest civil war. When the RPF came back into the country and took power all of these women ended up being serious power players in the new Rwanda. Now they are Ministers, Diplomats, Ambassadors and business owners and they attribute much of their success to the education they received at the Maryhill school. Now, they want to build a new school in Rwanda that will raise up the next generation of women leaders. I got a chance to meet several of them and talk about Rwanda's future and what still needs to be done. They were a most impressive group.

If you want to learn how you can help build their new school just send me an email and I can put in touch with the right people. As a group we donated on the spot and Maui Millionaires promised to match up to a sizable amount over the next couple months whatever MOGAR can raise.

American Civil War....Now With Lemonade!

Last Saturday we went down to Haymarket, VA to visit some friends from Charlottesville. We like to get together every couple weeks so we usually try to meet up somewhere in between and Haymarket fits the bill. It's a small town right off I-81. Just like the last time we went there, we had planned on doing some hiking in the national park. But as we were getting close to the exit ramp we noticed hundreds of cars parked in a field off to the left. Then smoke.....then horses....then boom! A cannon goes off! Nice!


Evidently, once a year Haymarket hosts a big Civil War Reenactment. I know that my friend is really interested in Civil War history and so we rush to our meeting place to let them know the exciting news. They didn't see all the activity off the interstate since they were coming from the southern side. We meet up, they agree to follow and we head into the park where we saw all the cannons and tents.

One downside. No pets. Our friends brought their dog so he would have to stay in the car. Unfortunately, the rifles and cannons were freaking him out as well so one of them decided to stay with the dog for a little bit while the rest of us went and checked out the scene.

We did see a few more shots get fired, but the battle was just ending and people were packing up for the day. Oh well, maybe next time. I did, however get to take a few pictures of some civil war era things. My favorite? The civil war era lemonade stand.




Since it ended as soon as we got there we did go hiking and of course it was great. There were actually people on the trail who were in the middle of a 100-mile race! They were about half way done when we saw them at about 4:00pm. That's incredible. Liz and I walked 39 miles over 2 days last year for the Avon Walk and I was looking like Frankenstein.

We found a nice spot to have lunch and then headed back to McDonalds to pick up our car. But before we decided to leave one another we grabbed some sundaes and fries and played a game of rummy. "H" won.

I Chase Cats...Is That OK With You?

A couple weeks ago when I was in Cincinnati for my grampa's 98th birthday I went through a bunch of old VHS tapes that we had in the living room when I was growing up. The tapes are all still there, though now they've been demoted to a closet shelf. One the tapes that caught my eye was an old "Best of Victor Borge." If you've seen him before then you know all of his bits. Here's one of his most famous, except Ralph joins instead of his usual sidekicks.

Rwanda Recap Day 10 (pt. 2 of 2)

We landed safely at the Gisenyi airport. I think there were 8 of us. The helicopter took off and we made our way to the airport terminal. I think a lot of flights take off from here to head into the Congo so I don't think it would be wrong to say it was an international airport.

Arrivals:


Departures:

Yes, it's the same building. And just to the right of the entrance....


Not exactly the kind of thing you really want to see at an airport but there you go. We hang out for a few minutes before Joseph from COOPAC shows up in this old school minibus. There was some sorting out to do with the airport officials. They were trying to give us a bill for landing in the helicopter. A few calls to the RIEPA guys and we were good to go.

Our first stop was the processing plant where coffee beans come to be processed and bagged for shipment overseas. The final product is still a green bean (not yet roasted) but they had plenty of roasted samples for us to try.

It seemed like a pretty small operation. I saw maybe 4 or 5 employees doing various things but mostly just staring at us.

Next we were off to the washing station. We loaded back into the minibus and headed down to the beach and got into these boats which kind of reminded me of the airport. Safe? Maybe not, but we didn't sink.

It was a beautiful ride across Lake Kivu for about 45 minutes. The most interesting thing to me was that we were the only people out there. Seriously. The ONLY 2 boats for as far as you could see and every way you look is an incredible landscape.

Then, just as we arrive at the washing station we are greeted by a couple traditional dancers with some children providing backup music and rhythm section.


We toured the facility which was very impressive. The cherries come in from all around the area and then are sorted by hand and washed in different stages. The husks are removed and the final bean product is sorted by hand again and set out to dry. Then it goes to the processing plant.

There are several different groups of women who are part of the cooperative. These groups are continually looking for support and very appreciative of any help they get. After we were finished looking at the technical side of the operation we went down to this kind of football field sized area near the drying racks. They had set up a tent for all of us to sit under and then different groups of children and adults came and performed for us. It was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Then they presented Liz with gifts which she gracefully received. Then we as a group gave out and distributed a bunch of toys for the kids. Again, beach balls were handed out and the party was on. Try to envision 200 people playing with beach balls like it's the most fun thing they've done all year. It was great.

Afterwards we boated back to the beach at Gisenyi and loaded back into the cars. No helicopter ride back to Kigali. That's ok. It's hard to sleep in a helicopter.

Shepherdstown

On Friday Liz and I went to go see Hot Fuzz at the Shepherdstown Opera House.

It's a shame that I still had not been there to see a movie given that I have lived out here for over 3 years now. It's this really old building with really old seats that luckily plays new movies. Their website also mentions live music.

I'm not a movie review guy, but I will say that it was funny. A lot of gore. A lot of smoking, drinking, fighting, shooting, murder and mayhem.....but it was still funny. It's not often you can see a cop jump kick a shotgun wielding 90 year old woman in the face and finding your self happily amused that he did it.

Inside, the theatre is really small. Seating capacity is probably only 100 people or so. And the seats are really stiff. Your butt is OK as long as it's a good movie with lots of action or at least hysterically funny. If you try to take a date there for a long chick flick they'd be carrying you out on a stretcher. But there were some nice touches.

Beer and wine sales, for example. 2 thumbs up.
Real butter melted on a hot plate for the popcorn. 2 thumbs up.
Movie that I'd have to drive for an hour to see anywhere else. 2 thumbs up.

Rwanda Recap Day 10 (pt. 1 of 2)

As hard as it was to top that last day, the next was right up there though it started off funny. First, a little background. Liz and been trying to communicate with a coffee co-op named COOPAC for several weeks before the trip. The charity/foundation arm of Women For Wealth was interested in making micro-loans through COOPAC and Liz wanted to organize a trip to come out and see their operations near Lake Kivu.

Since we had been in Rwanda, Joseph, who is the head marketing guy at COOPAC, had been trying to find out from Liz just how many people to expect on the visit. Liz's arms were somewhat tied because every time she tried to get up in front of our group to see who wanted to join us the group coordinators would tell her to wait until tomorrow so that there would be other things to choose from.

So the day before we are suppose to go to Gisenyi, we have the total number, but the problem is that we are suppose to be there at 10:00am. Not a problem, right? Except that it's 3 1/2 hours away. Solution? Helicopter of course! If we ride Airwolf we can still leave at 9:00 and make it in plenty of time. The only caveat is the weather. If it's raining or the clouds are too low, the bird can't fly. So it's a bit of a gamble. Liz wakes up the day were supposed to leave at about 5:30am and calls Forrest to see if the weather is going to be OK. "not sure" he replies. So we decide to go on the assumption that the weather will be fine and sleep in.

We got to the Serena at about 7:30 and eat breakfast. Forrest (or maybe Eric) had arranged for 2 SUV's with drivers to take us to Gisenyi. D'oh! We're going to be so late. Not to worry. The helicopter can fly, but just not yet. We will drive to Ruhengeri (about half way), and the helicopter will come meet us there at the airport with the rest of our group. We will all go visit a school and then they will give us a ride in the helicopter to Gisenyi. We should be there by 11:00. Not bad!

We packed into our rides.

and away we went. It was pretty uneventful, except that my cell phone had run out of minutes. I needed to find a Terracom store so that I could recharge some minutes. The problem was the fact that it was still before 8:00am and everything was closed. Oh well, we do have 2 other people in the car that have local phones so we should be ok. So we start heading out of Kigali. Oops, one more problem. One of the car is almost empty so we need to find some diesel fuel. No problem right? Wrong. We probably go to 10 different gas stations in Kigali and they are all out of diesel! Evidently this happens periodically and they are still trying to figure out some supply issues. (I think the hold up might actually be in Uganda.) The solution? Drive to the next town about 40km away and hope that they have gas at their one station. You have to realize that the entire country is build on these beautiful, but very large, hills. You are always either going up or going down. There is no level. I'm thinking that we are definitely going to be walking up some of them when we run out of fuel.

Alas, I was wrong. The one station in the next town did have diesel and we were back on the road.

Nothing eventful except that Juli almost got crushed in a stampede of people at the one gas station. She thought it would be a good idea to take her backpack full of toys out into the street and give some of them away to the kids. Total pandemonium broke loose. I have the whole thing on video which I will post another day. I did, however, take this photo once we were back on the road:


We got to Ruhengeri. Found the airport. Here's a picture of the terminal:


The helicopter arrived right on time with the rest of our crew and we all zoomed off to see a local school. It was called the Sunshine School I believe. There seemed to be a couple hundred kids boarding there and it is considered to be a tremendous success. Here are some shots from the school:

Then we hurried back to the airport to get on the helicopter which was way cool. We told our drivers to meet us at the airfield in Ginsenyi and drive fast! Oh, and did I mention that the entire back end of the helicopter was wide open?


The best part is we landed safely in Ginsenyi. You'll see why that's the best part in the next post.

Rwanda Recap Day 9

The next day was a busy one indeed. Most people in our group were headed off to the airport in the morning right after breakfast. They were going to ride a helicopter around the country and visit a couple different locations.

Myself, Liz, Tom and Christine had some other appointments set up so we did not make the trip. Our first stop was a 10:00am meeting with the U.S. Ambassador there in Rwanda. It was walking distance from the Serena so we headed off for our appointment. After getting cleared by the guard we were escorted into this little waiting room kind of like a doctor's office except packed with people waiting to try to get visas. There's also this big security window on one side of the room with a marine watching over everyone. Pretty soon we were ushered into the embassy and went through another super thick security door. We were informed that the Ambassador was not available, but that Danny, his economic guy (the same one that talked to us at the hotel), would be able to meet with us. Here's a picture of Danny:

Of course this picture was at the Serena since there are no cameras or cell phones allowed in the Embassy. We did have a good conversation with Danny. He was very frank and honest about the current situation in Rwanda. We asked him about some concerns we had regarding security and political stability and his answers were quite enlightening.

Basically...Rwanda is very safe and they are taking our advice seriously on how to rebuild their government. Reforms are happening, but there's still a long way to go.

We asked him about the growing ex-pat community there in Rwanda and what their needs might be to which he replied "Everything!" I think a little American style hamburger joint would really fly there in Kigali, especially after seeing how well Bourbon Coffee was doing after being open for only 2 months.

We rescheduled to meet with the Ambassador himself later that day (4:00 or so) and headed back out to the streets of Kigali.

Our next appointment was with the Governor of the Rwanda Central Bank. (same thing as our FED....well, not exactly the same but you get the idea) We talked about what it would take to start a bank in his country, both commercial and micro-lending. We talked about what the biggest needs were in Rwanda. For example, there are no long-term loans/mortgages for real estate. If you want to buy a house, you have to pay cash or borrow the money from a commercial bank that will charge 20% interest and only loan you the money for 3 - 5 years. Wow, that's expensive! Want to be a pioneer / extreme adventure entrepreneur? Take $10M to Kigali and start lending out money for 20-30 year loans at 10% interest. Get someone like OPIC to help manage the risk and hire someone who knows how to run a bank. You'd be the only game in the entire country that has a rapidly growing middle class.

I wish I had a picture, but the Governor had the sweetest office. It must have been at least 1500 s.f. with this nice outside balcony on 2 sides. We sat in the living room area on nice leather couches while discussing the financial hurdles he is trying to overcome.

Afterwards we get an interesting phone call. Kira (one of the coordinators for our group) called us to say that the President of the country would like to meet with our group at 1:00. Nice! So they cancelled the rest of the helicopter tour and we all convened back at the Serena as soon as we could. Luckily we were already dressed up from our previous meetings.

We all pile into this bus and head over to the Presidential compound or offices or whatever they call it. We were again put through security where they actually let us keep our cameras but not our cell phones. (I tell ya, all this no cell-phone stuff is really funny. I'm thinking about instituting the same policy at my house. "You're welcome to come in, but you'll have to leave your cell phone outside.")

Before we know it we are all standing around this large circular conference table that has maybe 20 or so nice leather chairs and each station has a microphone and a laptop. It's either a nice place to have a meeting or the most decked out LAN party setup you've ever seen.

We waited in this room for about 20 minutes. And then someone came in the room and we all stood up....false alarms. It was just one of his aides. We all sit back down. Williams, one of the RIEPA guys, who is with us and helped to set up the meeting, just says to watch him. If he stands, we should stand.

Another minute later, H.E. Paul Kagame walks in the room. He goes around the table and shakes all of our hands. He takes a seat and welcomes us. We all get to say a few words quickly about who we are and what we do here in the states. I thought about saying "I'm Cyrus Uible and I'm a blogger." just to see what his reaction would be, but I chickened out and just said something about real estate which is mostly what I do anyway.

After that Mr. Kagame told us about what they are trying to accomplish in Rwanda and what they are looking for from the outside investment world. Again, to be brief, he said that the world has given Africa over $500 billion in aid...where has that money gone? His country is not looking for aid, they are looking for investment. They want people to come to Rwanda to do business. Then David, our fearless leader, said a few words about what we are doing and 3 people got to ask questions including Liz. Way to go Liz! I don't even remember the question she asked. I just thought it would so cool that she was asking the President of Rwanda about something important.

The meeting lasted for about 30 minutes then we went outside to take this photo. Liz and I almost got cut out but you can still see most of our faces.


What a day. And it wasn't even over. Tom and I had an appointment to go back to the U.S. Embassy for our 4:00 appointment with the Ambassador. We rush back and get there either on time or a few minutes late. We are taken again through the security hurdles and we are in another conference room with the Ambassador. This conference room was not nearly as nice. More like something you would expect in a regular old federal building that didn't directly belong to Congress.

We asked the same questions that we asked Danny earlier in the day and got roughly the same answers with a different twist. Overall it was a good meeting. Another first for me personally. (meeting with a U.S. Ambassador overseas in his embassy) We then headed back to our hotels to wash up and get ready to go out for dinner. On the schedule was a place called Repulika. It serves traditional East African fare and at night becomes a popular night club. The food was excellent and we were all so excited about the day we just had. We talked and laughed and retold stories. I sat next to Ed and had a chance to really get to know him and what he was working on in California. Did I mention the food was excellent. See if this doesn't make you hungry (assuming you're not a vegetarian):


Yes, I do take pictures of the food I eat.

Stuffed, we called it a day. Tomorrow...more high adventure awaits. Coffee...Lake Kivu...and entire village comes out to greet us!

Rwanda Recap Day 8

First, some technical issues. I changed the site around last night. Dropped the burgers bit for the plain 'ole Cy Blog. Also, the old link should continue to work, but the new link is http://blog.uible.com

After settling in for the first of what ended up being 6 nights at the Hotel Gorillas, we headed back to the Serena Hotel for a morning prayer service headed up by Beverly Sallee. Then a huge breakfast buffet. Then orientation at 9:00.

The group with which we were travelling was suppose to include Diane Kennedy, who is one of the founders of Maui Millionaires as well as the author of several books. Late into the planning stages she found out that she would not be able to make the trip. Bummer. I know she and her son would have loved it. The plus side is that her other partner, David Finkel, who happens to be a friend of mine, would go and through Bevely's contacts they found this guy named Forrest who has led 10 trips of Americans to Rwanda, to be the coordinator for the trip. Forrest is the former youth pastor for Saddleback Church (Rick Warren - Purpose Driven Life) in California.

After some formal introductions Forrest begins to tell us about the country and what we will experience and the people we will meet. I was still drinking coffee trying to stay awake after such an awesome breakfast. I did get to sit next to Beverly for most of it and it was really fun to get to know her better. Plus, I really like the name of her philanthropic organization.

With the orientation over, a representative from the US embassy came over and talked to us a little about the country and all the investment activity going on. He basically said the country is very stable and very safe and that there were a lot of international companies coming here to look for opportunities.

After his talk it was time for a beautiful buffet lunch. (I'm really starting to like this place.) Then, we were off to the Genocide Memorial in Kigali. It was a much more tourist friendly place than the one in Gikongoro, but it was just as meaningful. This is a picture of a mass grave there followed by a stained glass window inside the memorial.

We go back to the Serena where we have a follow-up discussion with a minister of the Rwandan government named Antoine. In the post genocide era the Rwandan government has set up a Ministry of Reconciliation, whose main job to help the country move forward from such a terrible disaster. It was a very passionate and spirited discussion, but afterwards we were quite exhausted from such an emotional day. We headed back to our hotel to take a nap before the big dinner.

The organizers of our trip had set up a nice dinner at the Serena in the evening and had invited the President of Rwanda to come. The President's office informed us that he would not be able to make the dinner, but there would be several people at the minister level who would attend. (same as cabinet level here in the states).

I think I lucked out. I got to sit right next to David and Paul at a small table with the minister of foreign investment along with his right hand guy, a director named Williams. We had a really fun dinner discussing every aspect of investment in Rwanda. See their website here.

I talked a lot with Willams through the meal and by the end of it he was telling me that all I had to do was go out and pick the most beautiful spot on Lake Kivu that I wanted to build a vacation home on and he would take care of procuring the land. What service! Now that I've seen Lake Kivu, I may take him up on that offer. It's incredibly beautiful...and there's absolutely no one one it. Though I suspect that one day there will be many.

With full bellies, David made a speech, the ministers made speeches, and we headed off to bed dreaming about all the possibilities of doing business in Rwanda.

Rwanda Recap Day 7

We were staying the night in Butare at the Ibis Hotel. The actually had a very nice restaurant, though the service was pretty slow. But the whole idea here is not to be in a hurry. We actually had rented a large suite so Liz and I took the bedroom and Heather had the living room.

Again, we had an omelet, toast and coffee for breakfast and we decided to explore Butare for a couple hours and then find a taxi to take us back to Kigali in the early afternoon. We started off by walking down to a big Catholic cathedral. It's the largest such example in the entire country.

For the first time since we had been in Rwanda we saw a bus full of tourists leaving the church. There was also a university near by and the entire area had the feel of a college town...except dirt roads instead of nice paved squares and landscaping people using machetes instead of weed-wackers. As far as I know this particular church did not have a genocide massacre story though many in the country do. Butare, as a town, is historically known as an intellectual center and for the most part it escaped a lot of the war until the very end. It still felt that way while we were walking around with lots of students and teachers going this way and that. Much different than the hustle and bustle of Kigali or the very poor and agricultural feel of most of the country.

While walking back towards downtown we spotted the Hotel Gracia where Heather informed us that we had to stop. Gracia is her mom's name.

It was getting close to checkout time at the hotel so we headed back. There was a cool little music and video store nearby so Heather and I took the opportunity to buy some East African pop music. We had 2 artists that Mugenzi at World Vision had recommended and the girl at the store played us a bunch of songs and then burned the ones we liked. It was probably a copyright violation, but maybe that's just the way they sell music in Rwanda.

After getting our stuff together at the front desk of the Ibis we headed across the street to an arts and crafts co-operative that only sells items that have been produced by victims of AIDS. Here's a sample of our purchases.


I found a taxi driver through the hotel who would take us to Kigali. In the meantime we sat down for lunch at the Ibis. I ordered what I thought would be a hamburger but ended up getting a plate full of seasoned tartar. Liz and Heather both jumped when they saw it and in a unified voice said, "DON'T EAT THAT!" I don't like steak tartar here in the states so I definitely was not going to eat it in East Africa. I politely asked the waiter to take it back and fry it in the pan. It cam back to me tasting like a wonderful meat loaf.

We got in the car were quiet for most of the 2 1/2 hour ride back to Kigali. We were dropped off at the Kigali Serena Hotel (It used to be the Inter-Continental) and Heather began to arrange for her room. Liz and I made some phone calls around town to find a nice, but less expensive place for ourselves. We opted for the Hotel Gorillas which worked out great, was very comfortable, and saved us $200 / night. Good gorillas...

We showered up and headed back to the Serena to meet most of the other people who were going to be arriving from the States. It was all hugs and excitement as most of them had just gotten off a 12 hour flight. We ate dinner at the Serena and caught up with old friends while making some new ones. Tomorrow morning we have orientation back here at the Serena. It was kind of nice being able to get to Rwanda almost a week ahead of everyone else. I felt like we definitely had already been oriented.