So, how was your trip?

By Dawn McMullan 

Although I actually thought through this question, I’ve been baffled as I tried to answer it many times since Angie, Judy, Marti, and Jack returned Monday evening. Perhaps it’s because I’m dazed – from both the 37 hours it took from our hotel in Kigali to DFW Airport and the intensity of our nine days in Rwanda.

The best I can come up with, at least until we have time to process the experience and give our report the time it deserves, is that the trip was overwhelming in so many ways:

The sadness of a country still trying to recover from a genocide 14 years ago in which more than one million people were murdered. Although Rwandans seem to be moving on with an unimaginable grace, the genocide was never far from our minds, often as close as a head wound under the scarf of one of the orphans. She was attacked by someone who beat her with a board full of nails. She later found an abandoned baby hidden under a bush, whom she took in even though she was homeless herself.

The hopefulness of people who seem genuinely set on reconciliation, forgiving those who killed their children, parents, brothers, and sisters. As orphans celebrated moving into their new homes built by ZOE, genocidaires, as they are called, did community service time just a few feet away, finishing out a few of the adobe homes. The juxtaposition didn’t seem to bother anyone but us.

The helplessness we felt as we saw kids who had no shoes, few clothes, few regular meals. The smiles on each one of them, more genuine than any we’ve ever seen.

The amazement we felt as we saw children helped by ZOE Ministry who had been homeless a year ago and were now “food secure,” a new phrase we picked up that meant the children and their siblings were eating at least two meals a day and had enough food for the near future.

Here are some statistics, gathered either from locals while on the ground or from the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda or SURF (the country’s genocide survivor’s fund) while comfortably back at home with my laptop:

      • 9.3 million people live in Rwanda.

      • 1 million were killed in three months during the 1994 genocide, and more than 553,000 women were raped (63 percent of whom contracted the AIDS virus).

      • 1 million are orphans, most from AIDS or the genocide.

      • The country has 60,000 motor vehicles, including buses and motorcycle taxis.

      • The per capita household income in 2007 was $370.

      • 18 percent of homes have at least one mosquito net (as did our hotel rooms).

      • 70 percent of the population is 14 years old or younger.

One more statistic: Jack Soper took close to 2,000 photos during our time there. The rest of us took hundreds more. These will help tell the story in the coming days and weeks as we look less dazed, feel less overwhelmed, and decide what we as a church can do to help.

Greg Jenks, founder of ZOE Ministry, warned us that re-entry would be tough, that we would cry at seemingly unexpected times when we got back home. I haven’t … yet. Although I felt like I was only going through the motions as I spent $83 at Whole Foods for a meal of chili and a few basics, drove Noah to the rock climbing gym through 5 o’clock traffic on the tollway, and walked around my 2,100-square foot house with its hardwood floors, running water, and electricity.

The feeling isn’t completely new. Anyone who has gone to Juarez on a mission trip knows how convenient and comfortable our lives look when we get back. But I’ve never been overwhelmed by the difference. In my many years of supporting the Heifer Project, I’ve never actually seen a child who can go to school and eat because of a pig. Or one who can’t. Last week, I held hands with both (and touched said pig). That’s the difference. That’s why it’s overwhelming.

But, as difficult as it is, that’s why we went.