The Education of Richard

We are on in the midst of assisting Richard with his education. He has settled into Addis and has commenced his studies. Richard is so excited. I receive e-mails from him often. He is eager to share his progress, his situation, and to affirm our trust in him and our willingness to continue our sponsorship of his education. He says things like the following, "Mom, I am very fine and doing well at my studies and today also we are learning Anatomy and microbiology and that is very interesting subject I like it. Yes I have some friends who learn this college like me here in Addis and actually the only one boy is who learn in my college with me but not all because every students are learn their college by different option accordingly their education capacity." And this, "I am giving you my wonderful appreciation to you for being proud of me. Listen! I really found you more kind than I previously expected. All you have doing for me are becoming one of my greatest part of my life. You must proud of yourself because you are in the mood to rebuilt my life once again."

Whew - what a leap this has been for us. I'll keep the blog updated about Richard's progress. We are all well aware that we are on rather unstable ground - we're sponsoring a young man who we met just last month in Ethiopia. We don't know much about him, except that we understood immediately when we met him that he is bright and clever and industrious. And, if our intuition is correct, he's kind and gentle and truly wants to build a fruitful life studying the sciences and medicine. Of course, we know the risks of helping him, of limiting his sense of self help, of creating the impression that foreigners are available for easy financial support. There are a lot of tensions here - but our family continues in our determination to trust and to believe. And, Richard makes us smile. And to think this started in Lalibela!