The tour...

Since the chances of hosting any of our dear loved ones from the States is slim (though we'd love to have you!) we thought we could give you the virtual tour of our home. Jim and I live with two other ladies (the same age as us) - Wendy and Jillian. They live upstairs and we live downstairs but the open spaces are communal.
This is the front of our house...
...and the side yard pretending to be a jungle...
...and the downstairs porch...
...I decorated the living room myself...well, let's say I rearranged the furniture and planted a few plants...which I noticed our guard/gardener already replaced because they died...
...and the dining room with Jim in it. (I forgot to photograph our bedroom. It is just a large room with a bed and a bed-net and lots of closet space... And the occasional mass invasion of a biblical plague of grasshoppers.)
Moving on to the upstairs, we have the best feature of the house -the balcony. We spend many hours on both sunny days and in amazing rainstorms sitting here, reading, praying, typing. It's an incredible view, with Lake Tanganyika on the horizon hedged in by Congo.
And finally, here is a view of our gate and driveway from the upstairs porch.
I'd like to also introduce you to Selius, who works with us full-time as a gardener/landscaper by day and a guard by night. (He goes home each weekend). He is kind enough to put up with my Kirundi as well, since neither he nor I speak French and he doesn't speak English.
This is Emmanuel, who is a great cook and keeps us well fed! We had a great time cooking together for Thanksgiving yesterday. (Though he doubted my measuring skills once or twice since we don't have measuring cups of any sort.) But he stuck with me and it all came out great!

This is our cat Kumusi. He came with the house. He is very little but we do feed him, I promise!


As a final stop on the tour I'd like you to meet our friends. We like to refer to them as the 'creepy Burundi statues.' As you can see, we get a lot of mileage out of them during social events at our house...

(we are 'American Gothic,' the painting - get it?)

Our friends - Meg and Isaac:



There's a spare bedroom upstairs if anyone wants to come for a visit!