More Family Interviews....

Saturday was so busy! Again, we had many stations to get the sponsored families through. We were able to process 44 families. At the last minute, I was asked to do the family interviews for the video. I had 3 questions to ask: What would you like to say to your sponsor? How has life changed since you've been sponsored? and What needs do you currently have? Of course, this was all done through an interpreter (Cyprian was great!) and it was so inspiring to hear the answers! When I heard 'now we can eat meat and get food easily' or 'we had no clothing before' I truly realized how much the sponsorship had done for them!! They also get medical insurance so that they are able to take malaria meds, etc. A life saver for many. It was so moving. I was surprised how exhausted I felt at the end of the day...it was more draining than building the house! Katie Couric I am not!!

On Thursday, Manuel had spent the day helping interpret when we were with the Mutabaruka family. When we dropped him off, I could see he was nervous as he said to Ben, 'I just have one question, please. I have been waiting for sponsorship for 2 years, please do you know how much longer I will have to wait?' Ben had him write down his name so that he could look into it. The system they have in place for sponsorship is very good. The 'muzay' the older gentlemen in the community identify the neediest families. They all help each other, so when the neediest get sponsored it lightens the load on the whole community. Manuel's family (wife and 4 small children) were up for sponsorship! We thought, how great would it be to sponsor someone who we had spent a day with! Ben asked one of the GFR Rwandan staff if they could bring Manuel and his family to the building we were using on Saturday and we were able to tell them ourselves! It was such a blessing, really words cannot describe it! Even Manuel, who has pretty good english, was using Cyprian to translate because he was so emotional he could not come up with the english words. He did shake Guy and Ryan's hands and say 'my white brothers'! Manuel listens to an english radio station every morning and this is how he taught himself english. He works very hard and I'm sure that at the end of his 3 year sponsorship, he will have a good business going and will be helping others....a goal GFR sets for them.

Guy worked very hard ushering families from one station to the next, he kept things moving very efficiently! He's picked up several words in the native language, I was wondering what he was saying...they were different words than the ones I have learned!

Ryan was a big hit with the local kids! You can see the one buddy who he gave his Volcom hat to! At one point he had all the kids around him feeling his biceps!! They are used to seeing very thin arms, so his muscles were drawing a crowd...I'm pretty sure he enjoyed the attention! :)

Jeff helped out wherever needed....set up the generator, ushered families, did crowd control and of course, made friends with the kids! One lady wanted him to have a photo taken with her, but he declined, thinking that it may culturally mean that he was engaged to her or something! ha!

Today is Father's Day! Happy Father's Day, Dad! We will go to a church in town where local missionaries go, then either hang out at the pool at a local hotel, or go shopping at a local market. It's a day off, so I don't think I'll be posting again.

Tomorrow, we will build another house! Love to all, Pam