Letter from Mushimiyimana

Your child Mushimiyimana Divine is greeting you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  She is doing well and her family.  She is studying well 

In Rwanda we have a lot of sunshine.  Our crops have dried.  How is the weather in those ends? 

She requests you pray for her and her family to have a good life.  She concludes by wishing you God's peace and God's blessing

She thanks you for the letter you sent her to tell her news of your family.  In Rwanda people do not live with animals.  My family was very much pleased to receive your letter.

Letter from Mushimiyimana

I was shocked that I got this letter so quickly.  They must have had her write it before she got my first letter because there is no way it could have gotten to her so quickly.  This is an Introduction letter in which she lists the names of all of the people in her family -- two parents and 8 children.  I will not repeat them!

She also tells me that

her favorite color is yellow
her favorite game is "tennis ball"
her favorite food is rice
her favorite toy is "a house"
her favorite Bible verse is Psalms 1:1 (Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,)
her favorite school subject is mathematics
her dream is to be a doctor

Message for my sponsor:  My family and I are doing well.
Question for sponsor:  Where do you live?  How are you doing?  What are your hobbies?
Prayer for my sponsor:  May God's peace and blessings be upon you.
Prayer requests from child:  Pray for me to do well at school and pray for my mother to get well, because she is sick.

This is the type of message that tugs at my heartstrings because I have no way of knowing how sick her mother is and how long she has been sick.  

Meet Mushimiyimana

I was sitting in Santa Barbara reading an article about how the bloody massacre in the war of Hutus vs. Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994, women have become the political winners.  It told about how things have changed and the women who have come to power and are working hard to make sure this sort genocide never happens in their country again.

I remembered seeing the movie Hotel Rwanda and how angry I had been that our country had deserted people, knowing they would be killed.

Even before the war broke out, I had a soft spot in my heart for Rwanda because of the mountain gorillas, which I wanted to visit but am now too old to ever make that difficult trek.

Suddenly, I wanted to sponsor a child in Rwanda.  I checked children looking for sponsors and found Mushimiyimana.  It was a match made in heaven.  She was an older child (those are always more difficult to place), she had been waiting for a sponsor for more than a year and what is more, her birthday was the same as mine (this makes my second "birthday twin," as Shallon, in Uganda, also shares a birthday with me).

And so without even thinking twice, I clicked the "sponsor" button and added her to the ten I already sponsored (and 7 that I just write to).  Today I received information about this little girl.

She's 11 years old.
She is attending school, where her performance is average.

Family Duties
Cleaning Animal care Carries water
Hobbies and Sport
Group games Jump rope Other ball games
Guardians
Father Mother
Natural Parents
Marital status of parents:	Now married
Natural parents are together Father is alive Father is living with child Father is supporting child Mother is alive Mother is living with child Mother is supporting child
Employment
Father/ Male Guardian is sometimes employed Father/Male Guardian is a farmer Mother/Female Guardian is at times employed Mother/Female Guardian is a farmer I look forward to getting to know her better.