Congo - Getting ready/part of day 1

So....Hey!

It's know been quite some time since I last posted and some updates on my trip are WAY overdue (not to mention Christmas or New Years)! Quite a lot has happened since I last spoke with you all! For now I will share with you all about our twelve day journey in Congo and finally getting to wrap my arms around my new baby sister!

As I told you all before we were scheduled to leave LAX and fly into DC, then on to Brussels, and finally Kinshasa on the 30th of October but due to hurricane Sandy we had to leave the following day. We got up early on the 31st, said goodbye to our family and headed to the airport to catch our 8:45 flight.










This was the morning we left. I think my mom and I went to bed at 2:30am the night before and woke up at 4:30am. We packed and repacked, added and took out....it was kind of crazy :)

A not so nice looking picture of me before we left the house

A picture of my mom and I at the Dulles Airport

While in DC (waiting out our three hour layover) we met up with two other parents who were going to pick up their children from the same orphanage Ida was in and our in country coordinator, Julia, who was traveling with us also.

Finally after what seemed to be forever we all boarded the plane to Brussels, and then on to Kinshasa!

 

We landed in the Kinshasa airport at about 9:20pm or so and grabbed all of our luggage and squeezed into a sort of "taxi" and then headed for our hotel. There are no words to describe what I felt as we drove down the streets of Congo. A mixture of sadness and grief at the poverty and sadness of the state that these people are living in, but then there was also awe and wonder. Watching people everywhere burning trash on the sides of the roads (they do not have any other way to take care of their trash there) seeing all the people walking about in the streets in the midst of all the cars, taking in all the smells, all the sights, it was almost mesmerizing. How could a place like this exist in the world we live in? As an American I think we are very cut off and secluded from this part of the world. We have an idea about how life is and how life ought to be, we want or need this or that to give us satisfaction in life. We have no idea what life is like in places like Congo or North Korea. We have no idea that there is a good portion of our world that is very different from our own, who don't have the same luxuries as we do, who don't even have the basic things we call "necessities" but some of these "necessities" we have these people have never even had the privilege to hold in their own hand, let alone own.

 

 

 

This was the front of our hotel. We took this picture the next day. It used to be a catholic convent that was converted into a place for foreigners to stay (usually NGO's, volunteers, or adopting families)

As all of these feelings were whirling around in my head we were unloading the car trying to get every ones things sorted out and given to the right people (we were staying in the same hotel as the other two parents and Julia) and lugging up all of our luggage to our rooms. My mom and I packed one suitcase for ourselves for food, clothes, and medicines...etc and the rest of our luggage was donations to orphanages. Each one of those donation tubs weighed fifty pounds..... unfortunately we were on the top floor (they called it the third floor, but it was up four flights of stairs... ^_^). Finally everything was situated and my mom and I went into our room and shut the door. We began to sort through our own things, finding places for things to go. We didn't talk much at first, each of us just needing those moments of silence, but after everything was done we both sat down and began talking. We talked about the things we had seen, we talked about how we think the two weeks will go while we were there, our perspectives about the country, and, of course, getting to meet Ida the next day! After Face Timing with our family back home (the hotel did have wifi, but it was very sporadic as to when we would have a connection because power never stayed on for very long, so we were lucky it worked for us that night) it was about one or two am, we both got into bed and fell asleep instantly, happily anticipating the next day. (sorry, we were to busy to take photo's of this night)

We got up the next morning and were told by Julia that the two parents we flew in with were going to have their children brought to the hotel so they can meet them. My mom said she wanted to meet Ida at the orphanage and to be there and experience and see where she lived (they actually had just moved the kids to a new, better facility the day before we came) so we were told we would head out to the orphanage after the parents' kids were brought to them by our guide/translator/protector/friend PJ. We were so excited to see the other parents meet their kids as they were actually two kids we had seen a lot of in videos and photos we had gotten  and they are also good friends of Ida's, so we were tickled we recognized them and got to see them meet their new families! Finally we getting ready to head out but Julia came and told us that the US Embassy in Kinshasa said that Ida's visa was ready and that we could come and get it. So we decided to postpone our trip an hour or so to get her visa (which she needs to leave the country). 

Finally, finally, we got into PJ's car and headed down to the orphanage. It took us about 45 minutes to get there. The roads were all so bumpy you ended up smacking your face against the windows several times before we made it to our destination and not to mention that there are practically no rules for drivers in Congo, so cars are going every which way, almost colliding, then swerving at the last moment. But we did eventually make it to the orphanage.

 

We drove up into a narrow road way where the buildings were so close together the car could barely get through.   

 

 

 

This was our first view of the orphanage. The gate was just a few steps away from here.



       

More tomorrow!