Ethiopia Part 1: Lalibela

Friends and Family,

The past 9 days I was able to experience the wonder, intrigue, and history of Ethiopia.  I took over 800 photos, which (much to your dismay, I know...) is WAY too many to post to this blog.  I do, however, believe this country is worth a few blog posts.  So as I sort through all of these pictures, I'm choosing my favorites and will do a series of posts to give you a glimpse into the beautifully diverse landscape of Ethiopia. 

Our journey began December 20th, with a 3 hour flight from Kigali to Addis.  I traveled with my good friends Kerry and Doug, who teach 1st and 3rd grade, and also happen to be married to one another.  Our first night was spent in Addis Ababa with a friend from Kigali who had just moved to Addis.  He took us to dinner at a great pizza place (it was pretty legit - no gouda cheese!) and then we crashed at his house.  We were back at the airport early the next morning to fly to Lalibela.  This town has a fascinating history.  I'll point you to this wikipedia article to learn more about it. Lalibela is famous for its rock-hewn churches.  What amazed me most was that these structures were hand-chiseled, from the top down.  These churches stood in the middle of deep holes, dug out of hard rock.  So incredible.

A woman praying outside the door to the church.  

Another door.

Old paintings on the ceiling, believed to be painted in the late 12th century.

Another beautiful door.

Door to a chapel about a 1 hour drive from Lalibela.  This church was built inside a natural cave.  The marble was transported from Jerusalem in the 12th century.

My favorite door.

A house up near the cave church.  Most houses look like this in the area.

Every place we ate, there was amazing juice - here is banana, orange and guava juice mixed together.  We enjoyed juice while playing a few games of rummy.

A mossy rock, overlooking the town and mountains below.

I can't resist the beautiful orange moss.  Reminds me of Lake Superior.

A narrow, underground passageway connecting churches.

More ceiling paintings.

A priest outside a stone church.

Notice the dip in the stairs.  It is said this wood wears down from all the years of people entering and exiting the churches. Amazing.

Lunch: lamb tibbis with injera and a pancake.  Delicious.

One of the more magnificent structures.

The view from St. George's church. (One of the most famous, most photographed churches in Lalibela.)

This is St. George Church.  You can see how they chiseled rock from the top down to build this.

Exploring.

Old paintings.

Wood, marble, and stone, all aging in a beautiful way.

As we walked among the rock and stone, faithful people came to pray in and outside of the churches.  I was particularly moved by the intense devotion displayed by people coming to pray.  We visited about two weeks before Ethiopian Christmas.  The second week of January, thousands of pilgrims will make their way on foot to Lalibela, from all over the country.  Some will walk for weeks.   

Although I know buildings are not in and of themselves holy, I am truly challenged and inspired by what these structures symbolize.  Over thousands of years, people have worn down a piece of wood by entering and exiting a chapel. They have spent countless hours on their knees, praying and trusting in God's provision and direction.  They have chiseled into stone, bit by bit, to create something beautiful.  I can assume not all motives were pure throughout this process, but I am sure many of the people working away at this stone knew they were creating a place for people to worship God.  I pray for this sort of devotion in our daily lives - that we can work, bit by bit, to let more light enter, to usher in God's presence, to create something beautiful.

Road Trip.

This past weekend, a group of friends and I headed out to Lake Bunyonyi in Uganda.  This was my first time actually riding, with friends, in a car, on a road trip while living in Rwanda.  And it was SO FUN!  Public transport definitely has its perks, but driving through the hills of Rwanda, playing good music, with great friends was just incredible.  (Normally, on busses, an obscene amount of Celine Dion is played...) 

Enjoy the pictures!

Isn't Rwanda gorgeous?  This is a tea field.  We passed miles and miles of them.

Bicyclists here are incredible.  Believe it or not, this is NOT the biggest piece of furniture spotted on a bike... 

Some of the hills are rather steep.  I often see people hitching rides on the back of semi-trucks.

Need a snack?  Pull over for some sugar cane.

Then enjoy... (but make sure you spit out the cane.)

Across the border, we reached Kabale, Uganda.  The piles are clothes for sale.

Here is Lake Bunyonyi.  So beautiful.

Dugout canoe: the primary method of transportation on Lake Bunyonyi.  (We took a motorboat as it was pouring rain and pitch dark when we arrived!)  Although, I have paddled one of these puppies before.  They are VERY hard to steer.  You tend to go in circles...

Fun out on the water with great friends.

Torey (one of my roommates) and I.

We visited Bushara Island, my favorite.  Mostly because there are towering eucalyptus trees and tons of gorgeous moss.  Look at this!

Nothing better than being on the water.

Beautiful color on the way back home. This is what many homes / buildings look like outside of Kigali.

Happy Thanksgiving!

It’s Thanksgiving weekend!  I hope you and yours are in the midst of a great weekend of community and togetherness.

I was happy to spend Thanksgiving morning with the wonderful group of students I teach.  We made a Thanksgiving Tree on our classroom wall, and I thought I’d share some the things they are thankful for.  I love their words!

I am thankful for cats because they are cute.

I am thankful for colors because they make other people happy.

I am thankful for God because He gave us life and He has the most power.

I am thankful for my baby brother because he keeps me company.

I am thankful for animals because they give us food.

I am thankful for water because it helps others breathe better.

I am thankful for birds because I love watching them.

I am thankful for fruits because they help you heal.    

I am thankful for Jesus because He died on the cross.

I am thankful for snakes because they protect sometimes.

After a shortened school day, I headed to a huge gathering (40+ people!) and ate some good food with even better company.  We even had pecan pie!  Amazing.

Missing you all back home.  Sending love from the land of a thousand hills!

Its been awhile!

To all the wonderful people who read this blog,

Its been awhile, I know.  Me, myself, and my camera have been rather busy with the first quarter of school, going back to Minnesota for the wedding of one of my very best friends, and coming back to Rwanda to roll right back into teaching.  

This first quarter of school has been good. I have a great group of second graders, full of life and energy.  My favorite quote from a student so far this year is (after getting new, bigger framed glasses on my trip home to the states): "Ms. Cullen, you look like a scientist!  No... you look old fashioned!"  And then, on Friday, one of my students from last year ranted: "Ms. Cullen, your glasses from last year are really SO much better.  I think you look much better with small glasses rather than these big ones."  I won't take their advice, I'm confident in my choice of frames (however I do feel a bit like a hipster...)

I live with five other wonderful women this year, some of which work with me at school, others manage a health study and run a home for street boys.  I drive a little scooter to and from school each day, soaking in the morning sun, mist, or rain, whatever the morning brings.  After school, I work with both children and adult language learners, tutoring them in English and developing friendships.  Most evenings I try to cook something, usually lots of vegetables that end up in a salad or stir fry.  Sometimes I make a smoothie with mangoes from our yard (that is, until I unintentionally set our power converter to the wrong setting and burned the plastic off of my magic bullet, which now is replaced with a hand blender whose voltage I don't need to convert!)  Life is good.  I'm happy here, although getting a taste of fall back home was quite the tease.  Call me strange, but I really do miss the cold weather!  

On to the pictures:

1) Taking a walk with the kids from New Hope Homes.  This is after we splashed around in a stream near their home in Musanze.

2) A campfire with our wonderful staff at KICS.  We had a great weekend retreat in September, and this was part of it.

3) Beautiful Rwanda colors: red dirt, green vegetation, solid rock.

4) Colors, again.

5) A gorgeous waterfall on the way to Lake Kivu for our staff retreat.

6) A fellow teacher ziplining across a stream.  This was all jerry-rigged by my headmaster and our PE teacher.  I didn't get a chance to try it, but it sure looked fun!
That's it for now, folks.  Sending love, from Rwanda.

Visiting kids in Kabuga and Musanze.

This school year started off with two last-minute public holidays.  One was literally the day after school started.  The other, this past Monday, celebrating Eid.  Now last year, when these random public holidays popped up, I'd go over to see the kids at New Hope.  Now, however, they live two hours away.  So this last Monday, I took the chance to go to Hope for Life Ministry, a home for former street boys founded by my roommate, Hilliary.  I'd been hearing about "her boys" for the last year.  Natalie and I scooted our way to Kabuga, a town just outside of Kigali.  Well, I should say Natalie drove her purple Scooty Pep+, a little 75cc moped, which looks a lot like the one I drive around Kigali (besides that fact that it is purple.)  We made it, and she did a great job driving:

 

Natalie and the boys made bread while I watched and took pictures.  Here are some of them kneading the dough.  Natalie is an absolutely fantastic baker and loves to share her love of bread with anyone.

I couldn't help but smile when I saw a huge rabbit hutch near the house.  They raise rabbits for eating, 

much like my old house on the north side of Minneapolis.  These cute guys will eventually make a great meal.

A hydro-geologist from the states was staying at Hope for Life.  Here she and some of the boys are building a composting toilet with cement. 

There were a few photographers in the group ready to take over the camera.  Here is my favorite shot one of the boys took:

**

Yesterday, my alarm clock chimed at 4:30am.  On a Saturday.  Yes, I'm a little bit crazy, but not really because the purpose of waking up so early was to catch a 5:30am bus to Musanze, where the kids from New Hope Homes now live.  I got there before 7 and knocked on the gate.  Everyone seemed to be sleeping still so I waited and took in the surroundings.  Currently, the kids are living in a rental home while the new house is being built.  The rental house is just a short walk from the bus station on the outskirts of town.  The countryside is lush, green and hilly, with dirt paths carving through terraced farm fields.  Beautiful.  After a few minutes, Manuel came to let me in with a big hug.  All of the kids ran out of their beds to greet me.  It was a great welcome.  I've missed them a lot over the past few months.  

Look at how cute the little ones are in their jammies, brushing their teeth:

We built rock towers.

I think Esther would have a blast at Artist's Point in Grand Marais...

Who can build the tallest tower?

After a lunch of cabbage, beans, and rice, the older kids and I hiked out to a stream I'd been hearing about all morning.  Donna and the kids discovered it a few weeks ago and it definitely lived up to the hype.  At first the kids just waded around, splashing a bit.  Five minutes later they were floating down the small rapids under the bridge.  So fun to see them enjoy the water.

To get back home, we took a different route which took us up and down a hill.  This area is just so beautiful.  Can't wait for the rain to show up soon and make the green even greener.

Much love from Rwanda,

Abby