Drumming Lessons

Last Thursday afternoon, the hills around the Homes of Hope compound in Gitega echoed with the sound of drums. On a level patch of ground above the houses, a semi circle of Burundian drums was set up, surrounded by an excited crowd of Homes of Hope kids having their first drumming lesson.

We had watched the children admiring the drummers performing at the opening ceremony for Shammah Health Center, and a donation was provided to buy some drums for the orphanage and lessons for the children to learn. Drumming is such an integral part of Burundian culture; we felt it was important for the children to understand their heritage.

Drums used to be used to communicate messages such as times to sow or harvest, the coming of war or famine, and to celebrate or mourn the different events in life. Each message had a different drumming pattern, and could be heard across long distances.

The royal drummers would be used to welcome the king whenever he visited a new commune.

The drumming master showed the children how to stand and hold the sticks, and then guided them in a selection of rhythms. They were pretty good at picking them up, stopping and starting almost in unison with the guidance of a few cues and gestures.

It was a very successful first lesson, and we look forward to watching their skills develop as they continue practising. Maybe one day the children from Homes of Hope will be able to welcome visitors to their home with their own troop of Burundi drummers. 

Tour du Burundi

22 cyclists, 400 miles, 30,000 feet of  elevation...
Not a challenge for the faint hearted!
This is the Tour du Burundi; a 7 day sponsored cycle tour around our beautiful nation, the heart of Africa.

This year the tour is helping to raise money for two of our projects. Gitega International Academy (our secondary boarding school, which needs to build new dormitories before the next school year) and Shammah Health Center (recently opened, and longing to meet as many of the needs of the community as possible) as well as some other great projects taking place in Burundi.

The cyclists arrived from several different nations in the days leading up to the tour, including the USA, Canada, the UK and residents of Burundi.

After a couple of days to acclimatise to the heat, to be properly welcomed, and to try and recover missing luggage, we gave them a good send off last Sunday morning as they started the big adventure.

Sadly there have been cases of illness preventing some of the cyclists from riding every day, and one of the cyclists had a nasty accident and had to be taken for emergency treatment.

But apart from that, the updates from the team seem to be quite cheerful, despite the gruelling hills to climb!

On Day Three they arrived at Gitega Homes of Hope to visit GIA and Shammah Health Center for themselves. They also got to meet the children, who were very happy to welcome them.

The next few days take them up around the north of the country. Please pray for God's protection over them for the rest of their journey, and speedy recovery for those who were injured or ill.

We're so grateful for these incredible and intrepid cyclists who have given so much for the people of Burundi, and the work of Burundi Youth for Christ.
Imana Ibahezagire!

Opening Ceremony at Shammah Health Center

Today we have a Guest Post written by Rachel, a volunteer in the Head Office in Bujumbura

Five years ago, I used to live in the Gitega orphanage. When visitors came to visit, I would show them around the 3 kids’ houses and 2 classrooms of Future Hope primary school (all that existed at the time!) I would always finish the tour by taking them up the hill to see “The Clinic”. We would peer through the windows of the nearly-finished building, witnessing the dark interior rooms and rough unfinished floors, and we’d stand there and pray that one day the clinic would be open and patients would be treated there.

Saturday 5^th April 2014 was the official opening ceremony for “The Clinic”, now known by its proper name of “Shammah Health Center”

What a transformation!

The building now looks light, airy and welcoming; it is equipped with essential medical equipment, staffed by an amazing team, and had already seen nearly 400 patients in the four weeks since the doors had been opened to the public.

The day of the ceremony was an incredible experience. The morning was full of the hustle and bustle of staff and volunteers arriving, the decorators setting up tents outside the centre for the guests, beautifully decorated with draping folds of colourful fabric, and green foliage.

The children from Homes of Hope were incredibly excited, and eager to be involved. They enjoyed cleaning all the chairs that were arriving in batches by truck, and then forming a human chain to remove stones from the patch of ground between the tents where the drummers and dancers would be leaping around barefoot.

There was a huge team of people already preparing and cooking the food for the ceremony, and the famous Burundi drums were set up in a semi circle, the beautiful rolling green hills in the background behind.

The female staff and volunteers with BYFC were given traditional dress “imvutano” to wear for the day. It’s the first time I’ve needed help getting dressed for a while, but I didn’t have a clue how to tie and drape the fabric. Mine was a deep blue colour, and a little too long for me. It was originally tied high up, but gravity gradually pulled it down, until I started to get paranoid about tripping over it and falling face first whilst serving food to the honoured guests!

The ceremony was well attended, with some very important guests, including the Governor of Gitega and a representative of the Ministry of Health, not to mention teams from both the national television and radio channels.

If I’m honest though, I was just as excited about the hundreds of local people who turned up uninvited, attracted by the buzz of activity and the sound of the Burundi drummers echoing around the hills.

Oh, the drummers. They deserve a paragraph to themselves. The passion, the raw energy, the crazy leaps and somersaults in the air, the contagious excitement, it all makes them mesmerising viewing. Accompanied by the constant pounding rhythm, they danced, flipped and even crashed down dramatically into painful looking splits, which left the audience wincing in sympathy.

Much as I love my native British folk scene, I have to admit that we have nothing that compares to this.

There were speeches from all the important guests, there was food and drinks, there was a dance display from the children of Homes of Hope orphanage.

My favourite part of the day was at the end of the speeches when everyone was milling around and talking. Nadine (the Medical Director) went over to say hello to the crowd of local people who had come to see what was going on. One lady stepped out of the crowd and gave Nadine a huge hug. It turned out that this woman had come to the clinic a few days earlier with serious malaria. Having been treated by an IV drip, she had practically danced out of the hospitalisation room, praising God that she was healed, and telling all the staff that she would be back to celebrate with them at the opening ceremony. To see her turn up with the huge smile on her face, reminded me just how much of a difference this clinic is going to make to the local community.

It was an amazing ceremony, and a great opportunity to celebrate all that has happened here to get to this point. Shammah Health Center is going to make a huge impact in the neighbourhood, and I’m so excited that I get to be here as a witness. Look forward to more stories coming soon…

You can read the original article and more of Rachel’s writing on her Blog

The Real Heroes

Today we have a Guest Post written by Haylee, one of our volunteer teachers at G.I.A, who lives at Homes of Hope, Gitega

Homes of Hope, the orphanage where I live at, is truly a family.

It is not the kind of place most would picture when you hear the word “orphanage.” When I used to think about orphanages, I would picture something like the movie Annie, where the children are unloved and unhappy; living in a temporary home and waiting for a family to love them. 

But this is not Homes of Hope. This place is no temporary living arrangement, but rather a forever home. And when kids are rescued and brought here, they are embraced by a loving woman they call “Mama.” Yes, these mamas are the real heroes.

Currently we have 40 children living in 5 different homes at the Gitega Homes of Hope. Each of these precious babies has brothers and sisters to play with and a mama who loves them as if they have always been hers. 

These women are the real heroes because unlike me, they have devoted their entire lives to this ministry. They are the ones who wake up at the crack of dawn to cook breakfast, to wash all the kids’ clothes by hand, to comfort the child after a bad dream, and to tend to them while they are sick.

In a sense, my job here is 9 to 5. While I do a lot outside of my “working hours,” I have the option to take a break and have alone time. But a mama is never off the clock. They are the ones who have dedicated their whole lives to their jobs;

24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They are always available when needed, and happy to be of service. 

The most beautiful part about our mamas is not what they do but how they do it. I have yet to see them without a smile on their face, and no matter what time of day I catch them - they simply radiate joy. These mamas love their job.

I know that people like me make a difference here, but we come and go. We receive compliments and support in abundance while these silent servants are doing the most important job of all. So I’m not trying to say that my job here isn’t important because it is, and I love it! But I at least want to make it known who the real heroes are

You can read the original article and more of Haylee's writing on her Blog

Streams of Living Water!

We now have running water in Cibitoke Homes of Hope!

This has been a process that has taken several years, and we are overjoyed that water now flows freely from the taps in all of the homes and the Future Hope School.

The House Mothers are greatly enjoying ease of access to water which makes their days so much easier now they don’t have to carefully ration out one bucket to last all of their chores. No more carrying top-up water long distances back to the houses.

Having running water will greatly reduce other costs, such as petrol, as we will no longer have to drive the truck back and forth to the nearest water supply to fetch everyone’s needs. It also makes it easier to obtain water to boil to create drinking water when the supplies run out.

The children now all have showers in their homes and have enjoyed offering to do extra cleaning around as an excuse to use the magic running water! Although we’re sure this enthusiasm to help will wear off once the running water becomes more normal and less exciting!

The water came on Friday night. Everyone gathered around the outdoor spicket as we turned the water on for the first time. The children laughed, played and danced in the cool running water and then we all gathered around to pray and thank God for the blessing of running water.

We need to say a special thank you to Modeste, the YFC engineer, who returned to Cibitoke to help get this project completed. His hard work, dedication and extra hours he plugged in to make sure all the plumbing was correct and ready, have really paid off. He loves the kids here and even stuck around late into the night to be sure everything was working and to share in the joy with the children.

A huge thank you to everyone who has prayed and supported us to get to this stage.
The joy on the kids faces as they splashed around in the running water is partly down to you!
Thank You!

Day One at Shammah Health Center

Today we have a Guest Post written by Josh, one of our volunteers and Executive Director of Shammah Health Center 

Teddy - first ever patient at Shammah Health Center

Meet Teddy, the first patient ever treated at the Shammah Health Center. He’s 3 1/2 years old.

He had a bug in his ear. Literally, we flushed a dead ant out of his ear. He was a trooper!

He also had worms in his belly, and we took care of those too.

So one day I’ll sit down and write the book “How to Open a Health Center in Rural Burundi in 492,000 Simple Steps.” Or does that sound more like a screenplay to you? For now this post will have to do.

Nadine and I felt like throwing up we were so nervous this morning. Could you imagine? We had no idea what this day would look like…. would we get 3 patients? Would we get 300?

Turns out we got 17, and it was amazing.

Staff outside the center

In a bit of a funny turn, we had over 50 people show up for our first education session on malaria, but then we found out that everyone showed up expecting free healthcare. That would be just amazing, but that doesn’t jive with the word “sustainable,” so off they went. Hopefully everyone that attended the session was a little more educated than they were yesterday. Out of the 50 people, none of the attendees, nor any of their family members had mosquito nets. Hopefully we can get our net distribution program off and running soon!

Turns out though, there’s a good number of people looking for quality healthcare at an affordable price, so we were kept busy for rest of the day!

Trying to prevent the loss of this man's
hand by cleaning out infection

We treated several cases of malaria, one severe case in a young little girl, I did an incision and drainage procedure, we treated others for intestinal infections, etc.

It’s hard to describe the feeling we had throughout the day. An uncontrollable joy, just the thrill of having patients walking through our doors. Hearing babies cry, hearing people talking. The Shammah Health Center is ALIVE, people! Glory and thanks be to God!

This day belongs to each and every one of you, for all of the support, kindness and love you’ve shown us. It also belongs to all of the incredible and amazing Burundi Youth for Christ staff that have worked alongside us, who have been working long before we ever got here, and will continue to work long after we leave. Our center also have the best staff ever! A team full of life, who treat our patients with respect and dignity.

We had three patients who could only afford to pay a portion of their bills, each one a situation where treatment was desperately needed. So, we agreed to provide the care in the hope that the patients will eventually return to pay their debt. We’ll see how that goes as time moves on.

First ever blood smear for a malaria
test. It was positive!

It was incredible to see the systems, planning and training we’ve been working so hard on the past year pay off. We had great patient flow, the pharmacy my incredible wife organized worked like a charm, and we didn’t have a single hiccup the entire day.

I just need to say that I love my wife. She worked so hard, and what I view as a ridiculous obsession with organization and tidiness in our home, is exactly what I love about her work in the center. So much of what worked today was a result of her diligence, planning and thoughtfulness.

So, what does day two look like? Who knows!!!!! The one thing that comforts me so much in a time like this, is the fact that God knows. I’ve been wondering about, and praying for the first patient we’d ever treat at the health center for over three years now, since February 2011. Turns out it was little Teddy, but God has known that forever. He knows who we’ll see tomorrow, and the day after that as well. He’s planned it all for the ultimate good. He’s opened these doors, and He made Day One a story of success and encouragement.

He saved lives today. Pretty cool stuff.


You can read the original article and more of Josh and Nadine's writing on their Blog

New Shammah Staff!

After two rounds of interviews, we can now introduce you to the new staff at Shammah Health Center!

There were a few frustrations and delays in the process, which means that the clinic still isn’t quite open, as we’d hoped by now. But we believe that the extra time has allowed God to put together an incredible team of people, representing five different nations, all passionate about reaching out to the Burundian community with God’s love and quality healthcare.

We have Joshua and Nadine Guenther, (Executive Director and Medical Director of Shammah Health Center.) Josh and Nadine are both nurses from Canada, and have been in Burundi for just over a year, doing an amazing job to get the centre open. They will be working as nurses whilst managing the centre, and their plan is to slowly hand over responsibility to local staff over the next couple of years.

We are incredibly lucky to have them!

We have Zenon, our physician. A Burundian, he has extensive experience working with NGO health organizations, and Josh and Nadine actually first met him last summer in Uganda at the health workshop they attended there. Zenon has the personal experience working with the Ministry of Health that we desperately need, and he’s got a community health background and has a huge passion for growth and development.

We have Matabishi, our lab-technician. He is Congolese, married to a Burundian, and we were extremely happy to reunite him with his pregnant wife here in Gitega. Matabishi previously had a job working in the south of Burundi, work that separated him from his child and expectant wife. He has a great sense of humour, and is probably one of the most experienced and well-educated medical lab techs in the country! We are incredibly blessed to have him on board.

We have Vumilia, our chief cleaner. She was previously unemployed, trying to get together anything she could to support her three children. She is Tanzanian, married to a Burundian that she met working several years at a Burundian refugee camp across the Tanzanian border. A nursing assistant, she is experienced with healthcare and education, and has an extensive background in maternity. Her primary role will be cleanliness and hygiene supervision, health teaching and assisting with births.

We have Grace, a YFC volunteer from Uganda. Grace was trained in Public Health, but has spent the last year and a half working in different departments within Burundi YFC. Her language skills make her incredibly useful as a translator, and she’ll be helping with patient care and education programmes.

The current plan is to open Shammah Health Center’s doors to the public on Monday 10^th March 2014.

This will be followed by an official opening ceremony on Saturday 5^th April.

A huge thank you to everyone who has travelled with us on this journey to get the centre open. Please keep us in your prayers over the next few weeks:

• Please pray for all the staff as they learn to work together as a team, and get used to how things will be run in this new clinic.
• Please pray with us that there will be no more delays, and we can open as planned.
• Please pray with us as we continue to look for funding to supply the clinic with a sustainable and self-contained solar power system