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	Thursday, August 14, 2008 :: Meeting Martin & Uwamubona This is a video I put together about my trip to Rwanda back in February. It's all a part of a campaign to get more children sponsored in the same villages where my sponsored child are. Watch it. Read more. And then visit www.runningforrwanda.org to start sponsoring a child in Rwanda through World Vision. Wednesday, May 14, 2008 :: New Kids on the Block So for anyone who isn't signed up on the NKOTB.com email list (or didn't found out some less embarrassing way), New Kids on the Block are back in action. They're new single "Summertime" was just released this week, and I could not be happier. You see, I tried to play it cool when I first heard about the New Kids reunion. I tried to act like it wouldn't effect me -- I'm too old for New Kids now, right? Apparently not. As soon as I saw the new photos for their upcoming album, it was like I was 10 all over again... This photo was taken right before I saw New Kids on the Block in concert -- or what my dad always referred to as the night he lost his hearing. Literally. He swore that he never heard the same after a night of tween-age girls squealing for an hour or two. It was a sacrifice I always got the feeling he was happy to have made. Enduring hearing loss wasn't the only thing my dad did for me that night... Our seats were way in the back -- I could barely see. I remember begging him to ask the people sitting beside us to borrow their binoculars. Instead, being the wise and resourceful man that my dad always was, he surveyed the arena for a better spot. We ended up sneaking into one of the side sections where we were right over the stage. He found us the best seats in the house. It's because of memories like this one -- or like my New Kids birthday party complete with NKOTB wrapping paper on my gifts or a countless number of slumber parties in my New Kids sleeping bag -- that I'm finding myself listening to their new single on repeat. And while their music may not have been a model for my own, it's still music that has inspired me. There's something powerful about music that way. How it can transport us like a time machine to our childhood. At least that's what this whole New Kids on the Block reunion has been doing for me the past couple of days. And be warned, I still have the shirt I'm wearing in the photo. Don't think for second I wouldn't put that bad boy on again... Sunday, March 16, 2008 :: I Left My Heart in Rwanda It’s been two weeks now since I returned from Rwanda. I figure it’s about time for a blog... I knew before this trip even began that it would change my life, but I could not have planned for how this place and these people would steal my heart. In a country mainly associated in our world by genocide and AIDS, I witnessed so much love, so much hope and so much beauty. I was literally swept off my feet. Love in Rwanda is overflowing. They are affectionate people. On our first full day in Nyamegabe, the village where we worked on a house and where my sponsored kids live, we visited a woman whose house was built last year by some of the members of our team. She wasn’t home when we got there but arrived shortly after. This was my first time to Rwanda. I had never met this woman before. But when she arrived at her home and recognized the people I was with as the people who put a roof over her head, she hugged me as if we were reunited family. It was amazing. Literally this woman hugged me for a solid minute (try hugging someone you’ve only just met that long...it’s a long time) speaking words I couldn’t translate but understood completely. Another incredible moment was at a hospital we visited. I’ve spent a lot of time over the past five years in hospitals. And even though I was in Africa, I certainly had an idea in my mind of what we would see when we got to the one there in Butare. Much of what we saw was exactly how I’d pictured, men and women with AIDS, children needing nutrition, but what I wasn’t expecting to see were the newborn babies. There in the maternity ward, wrapped in the most beautiful African fabrics, were these tiny little lives only hours old. One family passed their little one around so that I could take each of their photos with the newborn. There was so much hope in that room, in those new lives. This is the image in my mind now when I think about the future of this country. The beauty of Rwanda was the thing that struck me the most but was also the most frustrating because it could not be fullycaptured on film. I’d stick my head out of the window of the car to take a photo of these breathtaking landscapes (each one in steep competition with the last to be named the most beautiful), but when I’d go back and look at them it just wasn’t the same. There was a depth that just could not be captured. But when I went back and looked at every picture of every child that I met along the way I realized that the beauty I was trying to capture in those hills was right there in those big brown eyes, in the smiles, in the laughter. And those pictures are the ones I still can’t get enough of now two weeks later. This is Erica. I met her in an orphanage in Kigali. We bonded over a harmonica. We shouted, "Tugende" ("Let’s Go") together as I ran her around in circles. I would have carried her home that day if I could have. Her face is a constant in mind now, it’s even the wallpaper on my phone. Not because I could ever forget it, but because her face takes me immediately to those hills where I fell in love filled with such hope surrounded by so much beauty. There are so many more stories to share from this experience. I’m sure I’ll be telling them for years to come. And there have already been two new songs written that were inspired by my time there in Rwanda, one about falling in love with this place and these people and the other about the love and hope that exists in a place so many only associate with the genocide. I hope to have recordings of these new songs soon because the story of Rwanda is one I cannot wait to share. I want to say thank you to everyone who made this trip possible for me. Many family members and friends made donations on my behalf for travel expenses and to go toward the building costs of two homes. And many of you in New York came out to Harmony & Love, A Benefit Concert for Rwanda, to raise money for other expenses including two guitars that were donated to a vocational school for street kids. Check out the photos here on MySpace and on Flickr. One thing I know for sure, I’ll be back in Rwanda someday. So more to come... **Click here to read past blog posts.