Our First Visitors

Our first visitors were our friends, Mike and Heather, from our church in Indianapolis. They had planned an African vacation for this summer and just a couple of weeks before we left, they realized that they would be in Rwanda at the same time. In fact, they arrived in Kigali just a few hours after we did and we met them at the airport! They spent a couple of days tracking gorillas and then came to spend a few days with us at Kibogora. We're so glad they did!

While Mike and Dave connected all things electronic, Heather helped the girls and I clean and sort the schoolroom. It was really more the other way around! Thanks to Heather's organizational skills, our school room is ready to go.

Megan and Abby try out their desks.

Heather puts the finishing touches on a bookcase.

We all worked hard, but there was time for a little fun.

We all spent an afternoon at Kumbya, the place on Lake Kivu where we go to swim. It is about 3 1/2 miles from Kibogora.

On the way back we saw a group of these monkeys in a banana grove.

We also saw a beautiful sunset.

At Home At Kibogora

We are so happy to have the preparation and travel behind us and to be at home in the beautiful place that is Kibogora! Come and see where we'll be living this year.

A picture can't do it justice, but this is the view from our front porch.

Our lovely brickhome has four bedrooms, much to the delight of our three daughters. This is the front of the house which faces Lake Kivu.

Our 40 containers filled up our living room, but we got them all unpacked in one day. Yes, we really are using everything we brought!

This is Abby's room. Her window looks out toward Lake Kivu.

Dave and Kathy enjoy the same view from their room.

Our dining room.

Our kitchen.

You may have pictured us living in something like this, but as you can see, we are much more comfortable.

Preparing for Rwanda

How does one prepare to spend a year in Africa? This is a look at how it was for us. Those of you with more organizational genes than we have could certainly improve on the process!

First, we created chaos by emptying cupboards and drawers and closets.

Then, we put everything we wanted to bring with us in one room, but not very orderly!

We found suitable containers at Wal-Mart and Target, but, of course, no one store had the quantity we needed. A few trips of our own and several by friends and we had enough.

We didn't even realize how much help we needed, but fortunately our friends did. For several days our house was a flurry of activity as we all worked together to get the Frymans packed and ready to go.

We'd have never made it without these dear people and many others!

THANK YOU!

24 hours - 3 continents

It is amazing how quickly you can 'get away'. We left Indianapolis Mon 7/2 @ 12:30 PM. We loaded the plane with 39 trunks!! We flew first to Atlanta and had a close connection. Fortunately as we were getting on the plane we could see that our trunks were being loaded on the plane. That made us a few minutes late leaving Atlanta. The pilot came on and apologized for the late start because they had just loaded some extra cargo on the plane. We knew better but did not volunteer that it was our luggage that they were loading. In Washington we waited in a long line to get our seats on the plane going to Addis Ababa and again I asked about our luggage. "I'm sure they will get it on", said the man at the counter. Sure enough, we were watching them load the plane and there were our trunks. Unfortunately, they only checked our luggage to Addis Ababa which meant we had to claim our luggage there. This was the longest flight any of us had ever been on. We flew all night to get to Rome (2nd continent) and then flew on to Addis Ababa. Since we were only refueling in Rome we didn't even get a chance to get off the plane. After 18 hours in the plane we landed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (3rd continent) almost exactly 24 hours after taking off from Indy. Boy were we tired! Then we had to stay overnight to catch the flight the next AM to Kigali. The airlines put us up in a hotel overnight. But before we left we had to collect our bags and recheck them to Kigali. I asked one of the attendants and he just said, "follow me." He took me to the baggage claim counter and talked to the people there and they started handwriting out 39 new tags for the flight to Kigali. Not quite the same as pushing the print button 39 times like they did in Indy. Then we went to look for the trunks. All 39 were accounted for again! He had the baggage handlers put them on the belt and take them to the back for the next days flight. The attendant then collected my wife and kids and herded us to the bus to take us to our hotel. I don't know if we looked helpless or he was just one of those people God put in our path to help us along. It was probably a bit of both. The next AM we had an early 6 AM breakfast and we were privileged to have some of our friends who live in Addis Ababa join us for breakfast. Some friends to join us for a 6 AM breakfast! Then it was back to the plane for our next leg of the journey to Kigali. Once again we were assured that our luggage would make it on the plane. The flight to Kigali was short and only eventful for our carry on luggage. It would not fit under our seats and the overhead bins were full. While we were still trying to figure out what to do with the stewardesses the plane started backing out for takeoff. They took some of the luggage up to first class (too bad it wasn't us instead). When we got off we had to retrieve our luggage. Once again all 39 trunks were there and accounted for. The amazing part is that half of the flight did not get their luggage. Once again we were fortunate to have everything arrive as scheduled. Thanks to all those who prayed for our luggage to arrive together and intact.