Well, we are on the way to the USA, waiting to board in Kigali. And combining the friendly Rwandese and Cole is bound to end up with something like this photo:
Cole was showing the security officer something on the iPad, perfectly at home even though he is so excited about the trip that he spent a whole hour before we left the house in the vehicle.
Had to share this photo showing the new work surfaces finally ready in the SAFOA lab this morning – just in time for me to leave for the US a little while.
The last few days have been busy, not only with family preparations for our visit to the US, but also with field visits for SAFOA. Though the travel some days has been long, the scenery has been wonderful.
And even more exciting is seeing the SAFOA team taking big steps in capability. Here is a photo of Liliane in the hygienic wear at a recent small factory visit.
And here is one of her and Theogene explaining in Kinyarwanda the way to reduce risk by screening raw material, and the use of an aflatoxin test strip as part of that process.
The way they are carrying the work forward with people I could not reach myself is so exciting!
Such a fun evening tonight. Kaia has a friend over (this girl is a gracious guest and cheerful, undemanding company), and instead of all sitting in the dark staring at the TV screen watching a movie we have all seen five times, we just spent the evening together. Taco salad for supper, which they helped prepare, good table conversation, brownies for dessert. Then Twister (I won the Mom versus Dad round, proving that there is no justice in Twister since Samuel is more flexible and has better balance than I), charades, and a hilarious round of Telephone Pictionary. Our guest showed us how to make her family’s special lemongrass tea (delicious), then we all settled down while Samuel read us a chapter of The Hobbit.
Seems like time together now, for most of us, is rarely focused on people. We watch movies, or go places, or talk briefly about frivolous or mundane topics before adjourning to separate spaces with individual electronic entertainment — iPad, iPod, computer, video game, whatever. Evening time is often lost time, bleeding from homework to supper to tomorrow’s task list. But tonight we were all just people enjoying each other. (Oh, and I recently learned that this friend, whom we thought was moving, will be at school next year after all. Hooray!) Thoroughly enjoying the company of my kids and their friends is a blessing I pray never to take for granted.
Just no way with a camera to capture the glory this sky reveals, but want to share the attempt anyway.
Thursday morning I took my best negotiator in Kinyarwanda to Gakingiro- the place many folks fondly call “the sawmill.” It is THE place to go to have anything made of wood that is not fine craftsman furniture. There are multiple lines of open sided sheds where different cooperatives have their shops. A hundred saws, planers, routers, and other woodworking tools running at once – not a place to talk on the phone! You find someone you want to work with, choose type of wood and explain design requirements and measurements and negotiate a price and timeframe. Here is the draft I took for the base of the benches for the lab (tops will be of stone):
After that was done in the morning, I picked up SAFOA staff to go downtown for ordering lab coats and check out some alternate suppliers for lab supplies. Here they are being measured for lab coats:
And here is one shop that specializes in supplying schools with scientific “stuff.”
So many things to prepare in order to open the lab! At least some are easily measured to know when they are complete – so it was a good day.
Do you remember the story of the Israelites crossing the Jordan river into the Promised Land? Go told them that the priests should go first carrying the ark of the covenant, but not until the priests’ feet were already in the water was the flow of the river stopped – and that way at God’s command. Only when they demonstrated the kind of faith that put them into the water with no more guarantee than God’s word through the mouth of Joshua did God come through with the promised miraculous solution to crossing the flooded river.
I’ve been feeling a bit like the Israelites on the border, wondering how they are ever going to get everyone across the raging floodwaters. SAFOA has the MoU with RBS in place and some great first employees, but does not yet have the funding to purchase the lab equipment that allows us to deliver the quality of results needed to fulfill our mission. Going forward with some purchases now of small items using the last of currently available funds feels a lot like jumping into the river in the expectation that God is going to provide the additional funds needed to keep going until sales catch up with operational costs. If the additional funding doesn’t come through in time, we’ll be paying off employee contracts, shuttering the business, and making the trip back to the US out of personal savings.
Thanks to all for prayers on behalf of SAFOA. I look forward to sharing more about how God comes through in the nick of time!
