What Mark is Doing

I haven't really mentioned much about the reason we are here - to construct a Theological College. On the surface, it seems that not much is happening. However, Mark has been gaining some momentum as he has been getting out and meeting architects, builders, engineers and government officials. He has come across two things that are delaying the beginning of construction.

I'll let Mark will take it from here:

First Delay: Building Permits. Our colleagues here in Rwanda tried everything they could to obtain building permissions before we arrived but they simply did not have time to do all that was needed with teaching and caring for all the other details at the theological college. There is still a lot that needs to be done like having a local engineer do the structural calculations and drawings, application letter, print all the architectural and structural drawings on the correct size paper, to the right scale, and some of it in color (or colour as they say here) etc. etc. I am moving ahead as fast as I can (and in Africa sometimes it is not too fast).

Second Delay: The Department of Planning thinks we should purchase a bit more land around the current plot giving the new theological college campus a more logical shape. While it would be nice to have the extra land, it is expensive. After doing some work on this it seems like we may have worked out a solution to this problem. Please pray it is resolved in a way that is economical for the college.

And on the car shopping front:
Looking for a car has been, well, interesting. It is unbelievable the prices of cars in Rwanda. There are lot of reasons for the high prices, which really don't matter, but it does make things difficult. A pick-up would be helpful for the construction but they are in high demand, and they get a lot of rough use. I looked at two 4wd double-cab Toyota pick-ups that were both about $12,500, and both were junk. I might pay $1000 for one of them, but not $12,500. So, we may need to reconsider what to purchase.

I did find a neat double-cab Land Rover pick-up (I bet you didn't know they even made such a beast) that was only $5000, but I would need a tow truck to get it home (along with about 6 months of overhauling) - which wouldn't be the first time we've towed a "new" car home!!

Thank you for your prayers on these matters and we'll keep you posted.

Mark

On a different note, we started Kinyarwanda lessons today with Charlotte, our new language helper, today. She is nice and speaks English but not as well as Joyce. She also speaks Kinyarwanda slightly differently - kind of like the difference of someone from the deep south speaking English to someone from California: same language, different accent. Pray for us as we adjust to this change and that we will continue to progress in the language.