Keepin’ it Real

This morning, shortly after breakfast, Sigfried graced us with his presence.  I realized it had been quite a length of time since we’d hung out with him, and it was awesome to have him back.  He stayed for hours and he provided illumination on a lot of aspects of Rwanda that we’ve been struggling to understand.  He’s always there for us, and I always love when he is around.

After he left though, it was just another work day.  There’s a lot to do, and we’re all extremely busy.  Kara is designing, writing, conceptualizing.  We take breaks from one project to go work on another, and that feels like time off.  Even when we eat, we’re talking about the projects, making new plans, discussing, analyzing, evaluating.  It never stops.  Or at least we don’t let it.

Finally Lama called for a real break, one that meant walking and getting out of the house.  Since we’ve eaten the exact same meal for three days straight, and it’s not a particularly good one, we decided to go out for dinner.  I can’t believe how much I am craving just a plate of beans.  Any kind of protein and no more starch.  Lama had some letters to deliver so that influenced the direction we went, so we went to St. Joseph.  While we were walking, The Professor (Sigfried) approached from behind and joined us.  He was on his way to meet with Bernard at UNATEK.  Knowing the nature of Rwanda and meetings, we told him that if it didn’t work out for whatever reason, he was welcome to join us at St. Joseph.

About three minutes after the three of us sat down at our table, Sigfried was there too.  We ordered food, he ordered Amstels.  He also had with him a DVD of photographs that he showed us, depicting his civil service in the reserve army in December.  I never would have guessed, or maybe not even believed it, but sure enough there was Sigfried in his army fatigues marching and exercising and assembling weapons.  Kara asked him if he would kill someone and he was adamant that he wouldn’t.

The three of us ordered a very simple, average meal each and somehow it cost us so much.  This is ironic because we’re so careful with our money and everything is budgeted and allotted for, so to have this ridiculously high priced meal out of the blue was a shock to all of us.  Essentially we prescribed to the “live and learn” methodology, and as a result agreed to never eat at St. Joseph’s again.  We had learned.

Back at the house we just worked and hung out and I distinctly remember enjoying myself.  Then from working together at the dinner table, we went to our respective rooms to work alone.  Then we went to our respective dream chambers.  I bet mine was the best.