In late February I was in Bukavu, in South Kivu province on the far eastern border of Congo.  Bukavu is a crumbling-and-growing little city at the south end of Lake Kivu and just across the border from Rwanda.  It is a suffering city in a gorgeous setting, with an almost temperate climate and abounding in both war and flowers.

I had a very special experience on Sunday, Feb 27, when I was able to participate in the first Run for Congo Women fundraising event held in Congo.  You can learn about Run for Congo Women at http://www.runforcongowomen.org/  I read about it because I like Nicholas Kristof's articles and editorials in the New York Times very much and he mentioned the young woman who started this project, Lisa Sullivan.  When I realized I would be in Bukavu at the time of the run I decided I just had to be part of it and, after a lot of emailing and even getting back on Facebook (!) I got in touch with Lisa and learned the details.

 

Sunday dawned chilly and rainy, but I sallied forth and got a motorcycle taxi to take me about 3 kilometers out of town to the site where the women were meeting.  Yes, I wore a huge helmet that I had to hold on to my head, and I had a shawl around me for warmth, but as we took off the rain started in earnest, and soon we were slipping and sliding along the hilly, rocky, muddy streets and I was drenched to the skin.  After what seemed like a long, cold (but exciting!) ride, we found a group of women huddled in the rain and decided this was the Run for Congo Women.  My very kind driver took off and left me in the mud.  After I got my bearings I joined the bedraggled crowd and listened to Lisa and her interpreter give a pep talk before the run took off.  She was surrounded by her "sisters," women  --  many of them Pygmy women  --  who had been raped and injured by soldiers and who are now in training programs run by Women for Women International.  

 One group took off seriously running and were soon out of sight.  I went back and forth, sometimes jogging with those out front, sometimes dancing along with the RFCW group, sometimes just walking and enjoying the beauty of the lake and the songs the women sang constantly.

 

  We set off in the rain but soon the sun came out and we were soon dry and warm again.  Most of the women from the Women for Women group stayed in a group, behind their banner, singing and dancing.  Lisa walked ahead with her special friend Generose, whose leg was cut off when soldiers tortured her.  Both of them had so much mud on their shoes that they took them off and walked barefoot. 

   

 

At the end of the run we gathered at a nice spot along the lake for speeches, dancing and a snack.  I talked for a while with a group of police women, who at the beginning of the race were deliberately solemn and distant, and by the end of snack time were dancing and chatting with everyone.  There were a couple men police officers, but the mayor had ordered that only women officers should accompany the run.  Lisa read out all the messages of good will sent from sponsors in the US and in a bunch of other countries. I also hooked up with my friend Thérèse Mayoto, a Mennonite woman from the little Mennonite church in Bukavu.  She works for Women for Women International and is one of the skills trainers for women that come through their programs.

 

 

As I was walking along, someone called out, "I know you!" and there was my old friend Marie-José and her daughter Pearl!  between)  Marie-José and I both lived at the guest house in Kinshasa for a time in 2006 and got to be good friends.  Her son goes to TASOK and knows Rose from the years she was here, and her daughter Pearl was just a tiny girl the last time I saw her.  Now M-J is a sub-mayor of Bukavu and responsible for a large area of the city! 

 

After the run was over, she invited me to come home with her and Pearl.  On the way we took a tour of the area she is responsible for, all over the steep sides of one of the huge hills over-looking the lake.  She showed me the big ribbon she has to wear for official events and to marry people (she does a lot of that).  Also showed me the prison and said she tries to keep from having to put people there because it is so unpleasant and makes her too sad.  We had a great visit, remembering some of the funny things that happened when we were together.  Then her boyfriend showed up and we went out to a fancy restaurant on the lake for supper. Her friend runs one of the boat companies that take people back and forth across the lake between Goma and Bukavu (a trip I thoroughly enjoy), so I didn't feel badly letting them buy me a delicious meal of fish fresh from the lake.  My clothes and shoes were really dirty from the run so M-j and Pearl cleaned me up, put fancy shoes and a clean shirt on me, and off we went, me wobbling on really dumb, but theoretically pretty, dressy shoes.  One of her five dogs also tried to bite me and ripped a hole in my slacks, but that we had to just ignore.

 

You can read Lisa's account of this day on her blog:  http://athousandsisters.com/blog/  Scroll down to "Barefeet and pink pearls: Our Run in Congo! Part 1"

 

Side note:  if you scroll down further in that blog you will see an entry by Jilma Meneses, who started and runs Our Family Adoptions, the agency David and Kendra worked with to adopt Amari and Desmond.  She writes about how she adopted a child herself here in Congo and then developed the adoption service to help others do the same:  "Asked about adopting Congolese children? A guest blog- Jilma Meneses, Our Family Adoptions"