Thursday - Mumeya

At 6 AM, Pastor John Rutsindintwarane and his wife, Robin, picked us up for the long, sometimes bumpy (what an understatement!) ride to Mumeya so that we could see the work that has been done on the medical clinic building project. Because a number of the members of the Mumeya Clinic Committee had been at World Vision in Kigali yesterday doing research, they were also crammed into the vehicle with us (it’s the African way!), along with a new keyboard and other equipment and supplies that were being transported to Kibungo.

As we neared the site of the Mumeya Clinic, it became a laborious 4-wheel drive through deeply rutted roads, but it was so worth it. The view was breathtaking. The mist shrouding the mountains in the distance brought a sacred sense of peace to the lush, tropical surroundings.

As we caught our first glimpse of the foundation that has been prepared, Joe and I were stunned by how large this project is. When the final phase of the building is done, it will be an 11,340 square foot facility with 37-rooms for the clinic and hospital. They are planning on utilizing solar power to provide energy, and will use a rainwater catch system (gutters that will direct the rainwater through a piping system into an underground tank) to provide the fresh, clean water that will be needed.

Even though the footprint has been set out for the entire project, we were impressed to hear that for now, they are focusing on building the first 2 rooms so that they can provide a delivery room for expectant mothers and begin to see patients and provide treatment for things such as malaria, respiratory illness, chronic diarrhea, hook worm, etc. The infant mortality rate in this area has been excessive because they are 30 kilometers from the nearest hospital. This community knows that one of the foremost benefits of opening these first two rooms will be the provision of care for pregnant mothers and infants, effectively reducing the number of stillbirths.

This dedicated core team has put in countless hours doing research and exploring options for building, equipping and staffing the clinic. They have met with the Minister of Health to talk about the medicine that the government will be able to supply as the clinic gets underway. In meetings with the assistant to the mayor, they have talked about the need for the district to provide nurses when the clinic opens. They are persevering in their fundraising efforts with some of their faithful supporters, including Community of Grace, knowing that they are approximately $25-$30,000 away from completing the first two rooms (of course the costs for materials continue to rise, so the construction costs get higher the longer they need to wait). It seems like such an attainable goal!

The community surrounding this clinic has fully committed to providing the labor that will be needed to make this dream come true. In Phase 1, they began the grueling project of gathering all the rocks from the area to break them into usable sizes. 4,796 women helped to haul the rocks and boulders off the mountainside and brought them to the site, where 6,003 men broke them into construction-size rocks. It took them 28 days to complete this process, which resulted in 5,400,000 RWF worth of rock for the project (5,400,000 Rwandan Francs = approximately $10,000 USD)

Phase 2 took 11 long days as they cleared the land with hoes (no bulldozers here!) so that it would be ready for the foundation. 2,875 men and 2,385 women worked on this part of the project, saving 2,630,000 RWF (approximately $5,000) in labor.

Digging the foundation was a 4-day back-breaking project, utilizing 219 men and 181 women, saving them 400,000 RWF in labor (approximately $735)

The next phase was building the actual foundation, and a huge burden for this project was fetching the water and hauling it all the way to the site. Volunteer labor saved 450,000 RWF (approx $827).

Planting trees around the site to provide environmental protection was the last part of the project they worked on before they ran out of funds. 300,000 RWF ($551) was saved because of the work of these dedicated volunteers.

While we were there, we were able to spend a bit of time with some of the kids that came to see the Mzungu. Joe delighted them by letting them see themselves through his video camera. There are over 10,000 children in this area who will be served by the Mumeya medical clinic once it is built.


Before we left, we had an opportunity to pray together for the success of this amazing project. The volunteers won’t cease until the project is complete, and they try not to be discouraged as they wait for more donations to come in to fund the next phase--hopefully completing the walls and roof of the two rooms to open the clinic.

On our way back to Kigali, we had an opportunity to stop in Rwamagana to see the site of the secondary school (junior high/high school) that is Robin’s “baby.” They have been blessed by some new development which has been built within the past year, where they will be able to rent space for 4-5 months until they have enough of their project completed so they may begin classes on their own site. School opens for S-1 (Secondary Education, first year, AKA 7th grade) in January, with the hope that they will move to their own campus in June. Elaine, a math professor from California who has taken a year’s sabbatical, and her daughter, Katya, have been in Rwanda since February helping to launch the school.

When we arrived back in Kigali late in the afternoon, we were met by James Mujinja, who is a second-year university student in Butare. We were so moved by his story, of losing his mother to malaria when he was just a little boy, of being cared for by a loving father until the genocide, and then losing his father and the rest of his family during the genocide and the war. As an orphan, he felt like he had no hope, until a family from California decided to sponsor him for his schooling. They kept in communication with him and encouraged him in his studies, and now that he is in the university pursuing his doctorate in dentistry, he has nothing but awe and wonder at the gift of love and hope that this family has given to him.

What a day!