Back from Tarzan Country

Hi Everybody,

Have you missed me? We had a very good session in the Democratic Republic of Congo. After landing in Kinshasa we took a plane the next day to Mbandakar and then drove to our session site at our convent in Iyonda (about 15 miles drive from Mdandakar.) We were very careful and didn't venture outside the convent premesis too much (not that we had much spare time- because our session was short, it was intensive). The sisters treated us very well and it was a great joy for us to be with so many young and enthusiastic young sisters from Cameroun, Congo, Senegal and Burkina Faso - 18 total. Here are some photos. The country itself is much poorer than South Africa and even Papua New Guinea - many of their houses are in a state of collapse and disrepair and the state of some of the cars and trucks on the road is outrageous. It is a country that is just beginning to get back on its feet after years of war and it will take a long time for it to really build a good economy.

1) This first photo was the view from our session room. It kinda looks like Florida doesn't it?

2)This is a little house where outside cooking is done as well as pounding cooking banannas into a paste with a mallet in a large wooden drum.

3)Our daily diet was bread, rice, fish (or sometimes meat), a cooked green vegitable that looked like spinach, banannas and maniunk (some some of putrid root that I only got a wif of and that was enough). The cooking was good.

4)This is our session room which doubled as our dining room during the session. You can see the kitchen through the porthole at the back.

5)This a the group photo of Joannès, myself, a translator and 18 young sisters, taken in front of our session site.

6)Before beginning our session, 5 of our sister participants made their first vows in the Cathedrale next to the convent. The Mass took 5 hours! Lots of songs and dancing.

7)Me sitting in the sisters garden at Kinshasa, relaxing and waiting to take to plane in the evening back to France.