On Saturday, Laura, Providence, and I went to Kigali again. We wandered around trying to find the Dancing Pots, a tourist attraction that involves dancing, pots, and the Twa, people of the third and smallest Rwandan tribe. We didn’t find it, but we did walk past some embassies and NGOs. By the cathedral, we met two small children who pleaded with us for money. “Ndashonje,” they said. “I am hungry.” On the streets of Kigali, the people begging are clearly doing so for a reason. We saw a man with no hands and no feet sitting out. I have never felt so dirty about charity as I do here. Laura agrees with me that you can’t feel good about yourself after giving away money like that. Those kids will still be hungry again later and that man still needs someone’s help for the most basic of tasks. It’s funny how giving charity can be dehumanizing, but it really can, both for me and for the recipient. Instead of uniting us a human beings, it just creates a stark contrast between my having and not their having, which is softened only a little if I ask their names.
On Sunday,
I did basically nothing all day. Actually, I cleaned up the kitchen and the back yard, did a “dance off the inches” salsa workout video with Laura, and read the first half of Genesis. I also have a copy of the girls’ Christian Religious Education text, which is actually from the Kenyan curriculum, and I am looking at it to see what they are learning. I also talked to Dad and Rachel. Happy Father’s Day, Dad!
I did basically nothing all day. Actually, I cleaned up the kitchen and the back yard, did a “dance off the inches” salsa workout video with Laura, and read the first half of Genesis. I also have a copy of the girls’ Christian Religious Education text, which is actually from the Kenyan curriculum, and I am looking at it to see what they are learning. I also talked to Dad and Rachel. Happy Father’s Day, Dad!
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