It is a pleasure and joy to keep in touch with You. It is already April 2013 and I am traveling to Guatemala to visit my family. The last time that I was there was almost five years ago. That is indeed a very long time.

The hills of Rwanda have been my home for the last almost eight years. I still remember the first day when I arrived here. Everything was so new/strange/exotic to me.

The first baby that we admitted was a tiny one called Rebecca. Now she is a nice young girl age eight. So many of those babies were then so small and weak. Now those boys and girls are running all around discovering their world. What a pleasure and delight is to have a Baby House and to see those small human beings becoming healthy/strong/happy girls and boys.

Not a long time ago I was a little boy as well. I remember dreaming about traveling around the world and living in faraway places. Life has a very interesting humor. For the last twenty six years I have lived abroad in over eight different countries.
The little boy discovering his world…

May I share with You The Baby Report March 2013?  You will find it via this link http://gallery.mailchimp.com/35462dd1ac7308cc2c8253044/files/BABY_REPORT_MARCH_2013.pdf

Who knows what life has prepared for some of those boys and girls? They are invited to have the most fascinating life that they could ever imagine. We will take care of them and give them an excellent start in life. Would You like to support them? Please get in touch with us.

Sending You sunshine and warmth from the hills of Lake Kivu in Rwanda,

Your friend,

Victor Manuel

It was a young, proud man
Many dreams were in his heart
His mind was full of questions
He indeed experienced love and care
For him was reserved only the best
He knew success and admiration
All seemed to be all right
But he left
He left his family, friends, country
He left all and took only himself

Why?
Twenty years ago he wondered
What will happen?
When will he come back?
Will he find what he is longing for?
Will his dreams become true?
Who will answer his questions?

Today twenty years afterwards
He looks back
Many countries, people, situations
Joy and pain
Light and darkness
How to describe all that?

Life is good
Life is very good
An incredible gift
Beautiful
Precious

He is not so proud any more
Even more dreams are in his heart
In his mind are fewer questions

The sunrise invites him to dance
He likes to hug the stars with tenderness
He learned to smell and kiss the flowers
Little children make him laugh
Little children make him cry
He enjoys the simple moments
That man is in love with life
He delights being alive

Today he looks forwards and wonders

What will happen?
When will he come back?
Can life get even better?
Can he fly even higher?
May he dream even more?
Where will he be in twenty years?He does not know
Maybe it is not so important

May this trip called life be
An amazing adventure to you

May
All your dreams become true
The entire universe shines in you
You fly as high as you want
The sun invites you to dance
Simple moments melt your heart
You laugh
You cry
You fall in deep love with life

May you share
As much as you can
As much as you want
May YOU share

Life is a wonderful gift
Precious
Beautiful

A real pleasure to travel together with you
Let us make THE BEST out of this trip

A dreamer lost in the heart of Africa

Written in Rwanda on 22/07/2006.
Victor Monroy left Guatemala on 07/1986, 26 years ago.

In a few days we will have Christmas again.  Families all around the world will come together and enjoy precious moments.  I remember as a kid having so much fun being together with my family.  Those were indeed Golden Moments.

Since July 1986 when I left Guatemala to continue my studies, I have been only twice with my family during Christmas.  That is not much.  Why in the world I am doing that??!!  Good question.

Today, fifty two years after my birth things are getting a bit clearer.

At least to me.  But there is still so much to learn and discover.

Here I am in the middle of nowhere up in the hills of Rwanda.  During the last seven and a half years my task has been to take care of the orphans and their community.  It sounds simple, maybe it is or maybe not.  And in that entire constellation I hope I am growing and becoming a better person.

I am sure that each one of us has dreams and visions.  None of us is here only to suffer and experience pain.  I am convinced that we can have an amazing good life.  That will depend a lot from our own choices and decisions.

And in spite of all what is going on, nothing is taken for granted.  Each time when we breathe we are receiving an incredible gift.  We have many precious babies at our Baby House.  The last one that we admitted this year is named  Vincent.  His story is a golden example of how precious it is to be alive.

May I share that story with You? You will find it in  Vincent’s story.

Sometimes I get a bit sentimental and write poems.  I wish I could be a good poet.  Eventually it could happen.  I wrote a poem at the beginning of my experience up on the hills of Rwanda.  Would You like to read it? You will find it my next post: Reflections from July 2006.

Like little Vincent I am alive as well and there must be a reason why.

May Christmas be a quiet and peaceful time for each one of us.

May the Beauty and Goodness of Life help us to realize how privileged we are.

May those Golden Moments together with family and friends motivate us to share.

Life is an incredible beautiful adventure.

Let us do the best out of our lives and enjoy it as much as we can.

Sending each one of YOU sunshine and warmth from the hills of Lake Kivu in Rwanda,

Your friend,

Victor Manuel

Amakuru? I hope each one of YOU is having a great life experience.

Life is treating me as a king.  Since July 22, 2005, the hills of Lake Kivu in Rwanda are my home.  Our main task here is to make sure that we take proper care of all our kids in a long-term sustainable/efficient way. That includes many different aspects.

Yes, we take care of our kids. We offer them a home, shelter and protection.  We feed them, dress them, take care of their health and we send them to school.  At the Children’s Village Kigarama we have family units.  That means our kids grow up in a family setting–they have brothers, sisters and parents.

But how can we help our kids to prepare them for having real success in life?  That is a huge challenge.  Rwanda experienced just eighteen years ago the most efficient/effective genocide of modern human history.  That caused an incredible damage to the entire country.  Still after all those years many people see themselves as poor victims and they behave like that.

An entire generation learned to scream for help.  Charity and donations came from all over the world causing, without intention, a severe damage.  People became passive and they became long-term victims.  They lost the ability to stand on their own two feet.

That was my experience when I arrived in Rwanda over seven years ago.

None of the kids had ever worked in the fields or wanted to participate in any kind of work activity.  They refused to do it.

It took us many years to help the kids to understand the meaning and value of practical work in life.  They do not need to be victims anymore.  They can become successful/effective citizens by including practical work in their lives.  Success in life is very closely connected with hard work.

Therefore we have established at the Children’s Village Kigarama an Agricultural Work Program.  The kids finally understand that work is not a punishment but indeed a huge blessing.  It is a great experience and satisfaction to see the kids embracing work in their lives.  They are learning to grow their own food and they are regaining their own self-esteem.

We have calculated that with only $3,000 USD per year we could run better and more efficiently our Agricultural Work Program.  That support will help us to provide good and enough working tools for the kids.  It also will enable us to reward them financially for their work.

The Agricultural Work Program is preparing our kids to have real success in Life.

Could YOU please support us achieving that goal?

We appreciate enormously Your contribution.  May I invite You as well to read the Agricultural Work Program Report?  It was completed by one of my last volunteers.  You will find it via this link: Agricultural Work Program

Visit our website at www.lesperancerwanda.org to donate.

Sending You all sunshine and warmth from the hills of Lake Kivu in Rwanda,

Your friend,

Victor Manuel

Amakuru? (How are You in Kinyarwanda)

I hope that the Goodness and Beauty of Life are treating each one of You very well.

This month of November has been very rainy and relative quiet.  You will not believe it but I spent an entire week completely alone in my house.  That happens indeed very seldom.   Last year, I spent only six days alone (without visitors/volunteers) in my small paradise.  This year will be a total of thirteen days.

Yes. We have people from all over the world constantly coming and going.  Without them we would never be able to develop properly the Children’s Village.  But people come and they support us in many different ways.

Everyone comes with the deep desire to have a great life experience. Therefore I open the doors of my house for everyone who would like to come.  Our fundraising strategy is based in offering friendship and hospitality.  People accept it and in most of the cases they are willing to help us according to their own possibilities.

For the last seven years I accepted many young people just finishing High School or starting University studies.  Many of them spent between six to twelve months at the orphanage.  The majority of them had an incredible good life experience.  It was a typical win/win situation.

We are aiming to reach self-sufficiency and economic independence during the next two years.   We have only a very short period of time to reach all our goals.  Because of that we decided to accept from now on only good, qualified volunteers.  They will come to the orphanage with specific tasks/projects.   Volunteers will run/implement those projects during the time that they are here.  Of course there will be always some exceptions that we will need to consider.

There is indeed a lot of beauty in giving.
A lot has been invested in some of us.
But still, it is our own decision to share or not.

Volunteers from all over the world come here to give and to share.  We appreciate each one of them enormously.  It is also very clear to us that without people coming (visitors/volunteers/teams), we would never be able to accomplish our goals.

YES. We want to support as much as we can our Volunteers Program.  Volunteers come in most of the cases covering all their expenses.  We ask them to support us with only (10) ten USD per day, per person for three delicious meals and lodging.  But that does not cover our real expenses.

Rwanda is one of the most expensive countries of the entire African continent.  We have calculated that if we could have only $2000 USD per year, we would be able to run our Volunteers Program in a much better and easier way.  Could You please support us?

Life is indeed an amazing journey.
There is so much that we could do in our lives.
There is so much to learn and experience.

Places like the Children’s Village Kigarama in Rwanda are an open invitation to do good and to get to know ourselves better.  Feel free to come and enjoy with us the magic of hills of Lake Kivu.  Here we can fulfill some of our dreams and in the process become even better people.

May I share with You the experience of one of my last volunteers (Shahar from Israel) that you will find in the link? SHAHAR

Thank YOU so much for Your precious support.

Sending You all sunshine and warmth from the hills of Lake Kivu.

Your friend,

Victor Manuel

It is a pleasure and joy to keep in touch with YOU.

I hope that wherever You may be, You all are having a fascinating life.

Over seven years ago, we started here at the Children’s Village Kigarama an amazing/unique adventure.

We decided to develop a long term sustainable/efficient orphanage up on the hills of Rwanda. We made the decision not to depend long term on charity and donations. In order to finally break that negative cycle, we were encouraged to discover our natural resources and to develop them.

As a Children’s Village our first and main task is to take care properly of all our kids. At the same time we are developing our general infrastructure and creating income generating activities.

Countries like Rwanda for many years got used to depending on outside help. In that process many people became passive and some paralyzed. Without any bad intentions, the system of charity and donations caused huge damage to entire continents.

People, organizations, governments and entire continents need to learn to become self-sufficient and economically independent. From that perspective, when I discovered that one of my own kids (Rukundo Antoinne) wanted to develop his own business, it warmed up my heart and I decided to support him.

People do not need long term charity and donations. People need help to stand on their own feet. People need support discovering and developing their own resources. People, countries and entire continents need help developing their own businesses.

Rukundo Antoinne is a carpenter that got additional training in wooden handcrafts. He is very talented and carves his own designs. We are aiming to export wooden handcrafts and produce income to secure working places for at least ten young persons. Rukundo Antoinne is willing to train ten young people in the art of carving wooden handcrafts.

YES, we need help. Help to develop our own businesses.

With only $1,400 USD we can get all the furniture and tools needed to start the Wooden Handcraft Business.

People in these countries need to regain their self-esteem. They have indeed skills and many talents. Real developing work supports people to stand on their own feet. We appreciate enormously help and support, but we do not want to encourage any kind long term dependency relationship.

We can indeed invest in solutions.

It is a huge privilege to influence positively the lives of people around us.

Life is much better when we share.

May I invite You to read the Life Story of Rukundo Antoinne? You will find it in the attached link below.

If you would like to make a donation to fund the tools for the training, please visit our website www.lesperancerwanda.org to donate at or find the wire transfer instructions in the attachment.

Sending You all sunshine and warmth from the hills of Lake Kivu in Rwanda,

RUKUNDO (click here to read Rukundo’s story)

Your friend,

Victor Manuel

It is a pleasure to keep in touch with YOU. Thanks for allowing me to share with You more news about the kids. There are thousand different things all going on at the same time. We are developing the general infrastructure of the orphanage and we are creating several income generating projects. It is a very intensive experience and it is sometimes easy to forget the heart of our mission. Our main goal is to take properly care of the kids.

It is already January/February and the time to celebrate with family/friends is behind us. It was be the first time for me that I was not here to celebrate Christmas and New Year’s Eve with the kids. Since I came to Rwanda on July 2005 I met my family only once for just a couple of weeks. This past time was indeed very special to me. I traveled with my mother (86 years old) and two of my sisters for three weeks through Egypt, Turkey and Greece. Wow. There is so much history and culture….and I have never seeing so many cars as in Great Cairo (5 million cars)!!! The best present was to enjoy the precious company of My Dear Mother and sisters.

And back to the kids. They have lost their parents, they are orphans. In spite of all that they have the right to be happy. Rwanda is an incredible mixture of joy and pain. Here up on the hills you will hear at the same time laughter and cry.

Not too long time ago we admitted two little babies, Paul and Jean Paul. They both have similar names and they have similar challenges. Little Paul has cerebral palsy and deplegia. Jean Paul has also cerebral palsy and is hemiplegic.

May I share their life stories with YOU? It would be amazing to see them both walking one of these days. They both need intensive, long-term physical therapy. Would You like to support them? Could we help them to get the right treatment?

Download Jean Paul’s Story.

Download Paul’s Story.

Keep breathing deeply the delicious fragrance of Life.

Your Friend,

Victor Montroy

Director, L’Esperance Rwanda

Our Kindergarten kids have been busy creating Christmas cards for Children’s Hospitals in Germany, singing English songs and learning how to communicate in English — everything thanks to our new kindergarten teacher, Jean de Dieu.

On September 2009 we had do say ‘goodbye’ to our kindergarten teacher Alphonse because he received a job at ‘Mugonero Hospital’. One of our older boys, Theophile, took over and educated our kindergarten kids for the next four months. Often the teacher only stays at the orphanage until he finds another job and that is also the reason why Theophile eventually left. The third teacher was Eldad but he also left. We are grateful to know our kids are now in the  good care of our teacher, Jean de Dieu.

Jean de Dieu loves his job as a teacher in the kindergarten. As he says, that is why he doesn’t want to leave the kindergarten in the near future. He acts lovely with the children and we are happy to have him here with us. Every morning at 08.00 o’clock we can listen to the joyful singing of our kindergarten kids. There is no better way to start in the day than singing. Jean de Dieu does great work teaching them new songs or playing little games improving their coordination abilities (e.g. singing and clapping their hands at the same time).

Due to the fact that our kids are very clever, they are learning Math, English and Kinyarwanda. In their first lesson of the day they learn simple English words like names of animals or the colours. Then they have math (e.g. writing numbers) and after play time another English or Math lesson.  Everybody is nonplussed — even the teacher Jean de Dieu — at what they are already able to do: The kindergarten kids can count and write numbers. In English they listen to little dialogs (e.g. “How are you?”  “Where are you going?”), and they are able to greet and say farewell to a person. They can name different materials (e.g. pen, plate, spoon, cup), the days of the week and the alphabet.

Because — as we all know — learning is often exhausting, they enjoy having their break and love to play games or play with the balls.  They used to enjoy the swing but it has broken.  However, a Teachers Without Borders group is planning on fixing it soon.  At noon, the ten kindergarten children who live in the surrounding community, and also the 20 kids of the orphanage, go back to their families so that everybody can look forward to hearing the laughing of the kindergarten kids in the morning again.

Special Events

At the end of November 2009 our kindergarten kids were very busy: One morning our volunteer, Theresa, made together with the children — for the first time in their lives — 30 Christmas cards. They spread colored pens all over the ground, and even though you could not imagine that the children would have had enough space on the ground after this mess, they concentrated hard and did their job very well!

The handicraft work of the Christmas cards was a really wonderful experience. Nevertheless, our volunteer Theresa was confronted with a big problem: Our orphans do not have parents to give their cards to. After contemplating she decided that there could not be a better solution than to send these cards to sick children in Germany in order to show them that they are not alone. The Christmas cards along with the CDs of our orphanage’s choir gave these children, who cannot be together with their family on Christmas, some joy. One school for disabled children, two Children’s hospitals in Kassel, one in Munich and five children cancer departments in Marburg, Leipzig, Göttingen, Hamburg and Berlin received our present. We not only made these ill children smile but also enabled them to listen to the wonderful voices of our choir members. And moreover, the therapists in the hospitals told them our story: How kindergarten children in Kigarama, Rwanda, have colored Christmas cards and have afterwards sent a part of their joy to a country which they have never seen before.

It is amazing to see the kids happy and the kindergarten blooming. Theresa painted beautiful murals on the walls and now the classroom is very nicely decorated. One of our dear visitors, Jeanne Couture, also got involved in improving the decoration of our walls.

We also want to express our thankfulness and gratitude towards Marc and Stephanie Scharfe. Without their kind financial support it would have been impossible to properly run the kindergarten.

In August 2011 we had a group of precious visitors. Hilde Lemey with her team of Teachers Without Borders-Halle/Belgium came for a couple of weeks to improve the quality of our kindergarten and to train our teachers.

In January 2012 a volunteer from Germany, Emanuel Huber, celebrated his 20th birthday with the kids in the kindergarten. It was a great day for every child playing typical German children birthday games and eating marshmallows and biscuits. He also taught English in the kindergarten for the last month of his visit at the Orphanage.

“The kids are very motivated and like to come to our kindergarten. Already half an hour before the kindergarten starts I can see some children from the neighborhood sitting in front of the kindergarten, waiting for the teacher. The program starts with singing songs. It is an amazing experience for me to listen to or to sing with the kids — a perfect start in the day! They sing so loud and joyful that you can hear them in the entire district for sure! What I like to do is to ‘high five’ with them. They love it and it makes them happy. When I begin with that ‘tradition’ all of the kids start to call my name and show me their hands to high five. In the English and Math lessons almost everybody keeps attention – all because of the excellent work of Jean De Dieu.  During the break I join the kids playing outside — that can be very exhausting! — and after that it is time to eat some sweets or biscuits. I really like to be in the kindergarten. It is a great experience for me to work with African children who, we should not forget, lost their parents (at least the kids from the orphanage). To see these kids singing or playing gives me a warm feeling. To spend time with them makes me happy. To be a friend for them is the most I can do… what about you?” —Emanuel Huber

If you also want to be a part of our kindergarten project, please contact us. The team of the Children’s Village Kigarama as well as our 29 kindergarten kids treasure your support and are looking forward to hearing from you.

Your friend,

Victor Monroy, Director
L’Esperance Children’s Aid Rwanda
Children’s Village Kigarama