Leading With Hope: Saying Yes Again and Again!

A hundred kids on a hillside could see a bright green soccer pitch they weren’t allowed to touch. We followed Ryan and Kara Higgins down that hill—first to rent the field for the cost of a sandwich, then to build Imana Kids, a nonprofit that helps Rwandan children move from the margins into school, safety, and a future they can name. What began with a lollipop, a photo, and three questions—What’s your name? What do you like? What do you want to be?—grew into sponsorships, a school, and a community that refuses to say goodbye.

We talk about the moments that changed everything: finding an unregistered orphanage in Kigali, watching children press their faces into turf they had only seen from afar, and the jet-lagged 4 a.m. decision to start a nonprofit with no credentials but a lot of conviction. Kara brings the lens of a women’s health nurse practitioner and midwife who fights for attachment and family preservation; Ryan brings a teacher’s steady heart that widens fatherhood beyond science & engineering. Together, they share how adoption taught them its limits, why fostering can heal fractures before they widen, and how trauma-informed care reshapes volunteers, not just kids.

The road hasn’t been neat. We unpack legal battles, cultural complexity, lost friendships, and the surprising leadership advice that helped them keep going: be a benevolent dictator to the calling that’s yours. Grounding practices matter—Scripture, hot tea, cold water, exercise, telling the old stories until they become fuel. And the best part? The kids themselves now lead. The early “street kids” have graduated, some finished college, and an A-team of young adults is guiding programs on the ground in Rwanda.

If you’re wrestling with where to start, this conversation offers a simple charge: Go. Be. Love. Take the next faithful step, tell the story, protect dignity, and center local voices. If this moved you, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review with the one small yes you plan to make this week.

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Transcript

Meet Ryan And Kara

SPEAKER_00 0:00

We are here today with some of my good friends, Ryan and Kara Higgins. You guys lead the Amana kids. You're the founders and pretty much do everything that needs to be done for Amana Kids over here on the state side, right? And then you also your mom and dad. Yeah. To more than just several times over. To more than just kids that like are biological kids. You're uh you've adopted how many kids? Three officially adopted. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 0:35

And then

Family Of Many Paths

SPEAKER_03 0:36

we have legal guardianship of one, two biological, and then a few here and there scattered in, on and off. I guess it puts us at six per minute.

SPEAKER_00 0:49

We're currently at six.

SPEAKER_03 0:50

Yeah. Plus a son-in-law.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

There you go.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Yeah. Uh Ryan, you're a teacher. Kara, you're a midwife as well as a medical practitioner.

SPEAKER_03 0:59

Yeah, a nurse practitioner, a women's nurse practitioner. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

Yeah. So you guys wear lots of different hats. So let's talk a little bit about Amona Kids. Tell me how that got rolling. How'd that get started?

SPEAKER_01 1:12

Yeah, well, in 2013, we were asked to lead a a mission team to

Why Rwanda And How It Began

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Rwanda. And we had always wanted to go back to Rwanda. It's where two of our sons were born and adopted from. And uh we were in love with the country. We wanted to go back, and we had the opportunity to lead a team back to Rwanda. And Kara would say that she was asking to go someplace that other people weren't going. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:48

We just we we read a book called When Helping Hurts. And we had we had a lot of ideas about like if we were going to go in to a different country that we wanted to do it the right way, not like the colonialism way or the go and do something that a local could do just as well or better. Like, I don't know how to dig a well. Anybody can paint a wall. So we had a little bit of a different mindset going in. So the orphanage that we were asked to go volunteer at was actually, we didn't know it at the time, but it was unregistered and you couldn't drive to it. You could only hike, and it was in the slums of Kigali, which is the capital of Rwanda, and it was about a 15-minute

Finding An Unregistered Orphanage

SPEAKER_03 2:32

climb up like very loose gravel, pretty steep, or in and out and around a bunch of switchbacks. Yeah. Yeah. And so we we stumbled in there, you know, all sparkly-eyed and clueless. And within just moments of being there, I it was this part, always this hard for me to talk about, but I was like, I took my shoes off. I was like, this is something's happening here. I'm in the presence of God. And I didn't really know why. And as we got to know the kids over the course of the week, we found out that there were more than a hundred of them there. And none of them were in school. None of them knew their last names. None of them, like some of them, you didn't even know their gender because they all kept their heads shaved. They all dressed kind of the same. And so we just went back at night and we had a really cool group of people. It was like family members, teachers, social workers, nurses, like our people. And we were like, what would happen if we told Americans about these kids? They would help pay for their school fees. Couldn't we just like get them into school? And in Rwanda, most schools at that time were boarding schools. So if we get a kid in school, then they're not living in this place. And so we went back and we decided my dad, if you know my dad, he uh is he carries Tootsie Roll Pops and bubblish gum everywhere. He has my whole life. And we had this really amazing process. I would ask the kid their name, what they liked to do, and what they wanted to be when they grew up. And

Stories, Dignity, And First Dreams

SPEAKER_03 4:15

then my dad would give them a lollipop, Tootsie Roll Pop through an interpreter, and someone would take their picture. That was our process. Well, that process took a good like eight hours. Most of those kids, it was really an eye-opening experience for me because play is a privilege. Dreaming is a privilege. So most of these kids didn't know what they liked to do. They didn't know what they wanted to be because they'd really only lived surviving, like just in survival mode. And so that was a hard question for them to answer.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

Well, right outside of the orphanage, when you stepped out, you would overlook a valley. And because you were up pretty high. And at the bottom of the valley, there was this brand new, beautiful green soccer

The Soccer Field Moment

SPEAKER_01 5:06

pitch. And the kids would see that and they would see it was in the it was at a at a private school that was kind of off in the distance, and it was you know for the rich kids. And so these kids would see that every time they would step outside the door, they'd see this, and at night it had lights, so at night it was all lit up, so they saw it all the time. And they were never allowed anywhere near it.

SPEAKER_02 5:29

They were the street kids, they had the label.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

And so they just saw this and and and and you know, inside this little, you know, twelve foot by fourteen foot open space that was the double the living room and and play area.

SPEAKER_03 5:42

And they had lights, it was dark. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:45

They had this with a dark with a corner, a hole dug in the corner for a latrine. They that's where they kicked this old flat. I don't know, it wasn't a soccer ball, but they traded it like a soccer ball. Yeah. Just kicked it around, kicked it around. That was their entertainment for hours and hours. And so there was a there was a time that that first week when we were there when I just decided to go down and and ask the the there was a guy that was guarding the field and that there was nobody on it, and just went down there and said, Hey, what would it take to to you know get some kids on on this field here? And and so the the guy was he would he didn't he you could tell he did not want our street kids on their field. And he said, Oh no, no, that's

From Idea To Nonprofit

SPEAKER_01 6:31

it's a thousand francs. A thousand francs. I don't know, actually it was ten thousand francs. Ten thousand francs. And then he got which is equivalent to he started walking away thinking, well, we're not gonna pay that. And I'm like, Well, to Americans, that's about ten bucks. And so we got to rent it.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

I'll take it for the day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:53

We got to rent the field. Uh rented it for two hours, and we brought all we just had this giant parade of kids coming down and long chain of hand holding. Yes, coming down the cliffs.

SPEAKER_02 7:04

A hundred and one kids.

SPEAKER_01 7:05

Perfectly safe. Yeah, and then and then across the one main road. And then and then all just heading out onto this this field, and we opened up the door, and you know, it wasn't a full-size soccer pitch, it was probably probably half half of half of a soccer field. Yeah. But we had about 95 kids that were all just just storming that field.

SPEAKER_03 7:28

And some just wanted to lay down and feel the grass because they'd only ever felt dirt.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There was a it was really touching moments because there were there, yeah, there was a kid that went laid down and like put his face up against the the the it was artificial grass. It was the turf, you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:44

So we were done. We were like, well, we'll go home and we'll sit on it and we'll pray about it, and then maybe we'll see what happens. And you've been to Africa with us, Jetlag. Like we were waking up at 4 a.m. and we're like, we're not sleeping on this. And so I started praying, you know, like if we could get half these kids matched with an American family by Christmas. This was June. By Christmas, then it seems like maybe God is is saying we'll go the right way. So we were Googling at 4 a.m. late June 20 2013, how to start a nonprofit. Like nonprofit for dummies. We still own that book. We still own that book.

SPEAKER_04 8:26

We do.

SPEAKER_03 8:27

And by, and so we just hit the ground running with

Sponsorships And School Access

SPEAKER_03 8:31

getting our nonprofit status. And we were really blessed with a bunch of people that were inspired by those kids and people that just, I don't know why they thought they should trust us, a teacher and a midwife. We don't really have any qualifications, but you know, like if God calls you, he equips you. And so by Christmas of that year, we had all 99 kids matched with a sponsor. And so that meant that those 99 kids were going to boarding school and they weren't living in that place anymore. And from there, it just grew. We've been through it with those kids, a lot of dark, hard stuff. But we're still here. Yeah. We're still winging it. We're still learning as we go.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

So that early trip in 2013 set the stage for now 13 years of continuous trips, continuous, I don't know how many hundreds of kids you guys have helped over the over the years. So that's kind of that that's something that you guys started. And then

Adoption, Fostering, And Mindset Shift

SPEAKER_00 9:36

like over here in Council Bless, Iowa, you're you're doing a lot of stuff as well. And tell us a little bit about the adoption slash fostering slash guardianship. Like you guys are parents to everyone, and I'll I think that's just a beautiful thing. So tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

Well, I I think it actually actually all stems from from that trip for me. Because you know, back in 2009 when we adopted our our two boys from Rwanda, we were heartbroken by the by all the kids that were gonna be left behind. Sure. You know, there are hundreds of kids at this orphanage, and you know, we were we were taking two of them. And it's like, well, this is not a sustainable model, right? We're not gonna be able to find you know adoptive parents for all these kids. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

And it's not the best solution for a culture, for a community, for families, for kids.

SPEAKER_01 10:39

Yeah. So you know, having that having that mentality shift, and especially for me, that was a big eye-opening experience. Big first time, you know, traveling out of the country, first time really leaving comfort and and being forced to see things that really shake you up. That was that was a that was a big shift in my mentality of of how I, you know, how I wanted to be a parent and how you know biology really has nothing to do with being a parent. And and so all the kids that I come across as a teacher and that you know, there I can be, I can try try to be Jesus to those kids, you know. And and it's you know, yeah, it's it's it was a huge shift. And that was that those trips to Rwanda really really shook me up.

SPEAKER_03 11:35

Mine what mine was a lot different because I had traveled and I had worked with vulnerable populations. And for me, being a midwife and delivering babies, I immediately ne I never took a baby from their mom. I immediately put that baby as close to that mom's heart as they could. And so for me, when we when we came back, a lot of times people would say, Why did you adopt from Africa when you could adopt here? Or why would you do that when you could foster here? And I didn't have, I mean, my answer at the time was, well, those are God's

Parenting Through Trauma And 2020

SPEAKER_03 12:10

kids everywhere. And kids everywhere need a home. But once I came home and I saw like the loss that kids experience when they are separated from their families, their biological families and that deep wound and what that looks like for a child that turns into a teenager, that turns into an adult and that generational trauma. For me, like fostering meant maybe we could help preserve that, maybe we could help heal that fracture so that kids don't need adopted or they don't need to go to foster care. Our experience has not often looked that way because the reality is we learn how to parent from our parents.

SPEAKER_04 12:51

Right.

SPEAKER_03 12:52

And so we've had kids that have come in and out, mostly older kids. During 2020, I said, I don't want to do this anymore because being in healthcare in 2020, I can't take that.

SPEAKER_00 13:04

That was a bit stressful.

SPEAKER_03 13:05

It was hard. And I was in a meat packing district. So I was losing a lot of people I cared about. And I told Ryan, like, I don't want any more teenagers. We got enough teenagers around here. We had five at that time. And then it was right, it was the Friday before Mother's Day, and the phone, my phone rang, and it's this lady, and she's like, I'm calling to get your intake for your foster care license. And Ryan looks at me and he goes, Happy Mother's Day. And I was like, Fine, but only little ones, only babies. And, you know, they don't, they don't normally in western Iowa remove babies. In most states, we try not to remove babies from their parents. And then later that year, we got our baby bird. She was placed with us when she was seven months old. And so we went through two years of really trying to work with her biological mom and doing and uh me in this thought of being like an advocate for moms. That was really transformative for me to get to a point of saying, This woman can't be her mom. I'm her mom. And so that that's been a different, we've had different journeys to getting into where we're at now as a couple, as a family. Yeah. And

Influence And The Cost Of Leadership

SPEAKER_03 14:18

it's been really, it's been transformative to all of our other kids too, our and our biological children and our neighbors, our extended family, our our the grandparents, they they've really stepped up our our elderly neighbors, everybody. It's really cool.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

Yeah, the whole network is has been a blessing.

SPEAKER_00 14:38

I've always looked at you guys as kind of the tip of the spear when it comes to either adoption or foster care for the friend group that that we have. Because back in those days, there weren't too many of us that were involved with adoption or foster care or whatever. And now, 13 years later, I can of that friend group that we had, I bet you 75% of us have been involved in some way in either foster care or adopting or guardianship. And so I always look at you guys as kind of the tip of the spear. You kind of led that friend group and you've planted seeds and have I never thought I've never thought of that. I never thought of that either. Yeah. I mean, I was thinking about that this afternoon. But as you guys think about you know having led in that way, what has leadership, what has leading in that way cost you?

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I think leadership cost us a lot of our our older friends. Our our our talk about our friend group that we had, you know, that was when time when we when we met you guys, you know, God brought us to you because we were our our previous life, our previous friends, that kind of all abandoned us, or or or we just it was too messy and we split up because we had way different values than we did before.

SPEAKER_03 16:05

And I mean, I I really look at our life as like before adoption and after adoption because it's so messy, and because if you're not willing to accept some hard lines, like some we've got some hard lines, like if

Benevolent Dictator Advice

SPEAKER_03 16:22

you're gonna be in our our crew and our family, there's some things that are non-negotiable. Yeah, and it goes that way with leadership too. And do you know who Bob Goff is?

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 16:33

Okay. One time I called, I met him at a conference and then I called him, and I was very frustrated.

SPEAKER_00 16:39

Of course you did.

SPEAKER_03 16:39

I was very frustrated because I'm always trying to empower other people to step up. And in our board of directors for monikids, I felt like I was always like, Can you please do this? Can you do this? Can you do this? And Bob Goff told me, you need to be a benevolent dictator. Just ask everybody's opinions once a year, meet them at Disneyland, and then the rest of the year, you just run it. Because he didn't put a calling on their lives, he put a calling on your life. And that at the time I was so disappointed in that advice. But honestly, I've held on to it because it's true. Like, I can't get everybody to care as much as I do because they didn't, that's not on them. That's on that's what God put in my heart.

SPEAKER_04 17:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 17:22

And that that's helped me actually. And so sometimes I just make those decisions.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Like I think they got. I think that's a really good point because I've been passionate about things. And if I'm trying to get people's buy-in and they don't, a little resentment starts to build. Right. And that screws up the entire mission that you're you know trying to accomplish. And so

Staying Grounded Through Faith

SPEAKER_00 17:47

I think that's a really good piece of advice by Bob Goff. As you think about, you know, whether it's Amona Kids or stuff that's going on here at home, uh, how do you stay grounded when like everything around you is demanding or it's going crazy? I know you've walked through some really difficult things at Amona Kids, Hope Village, some of those different things that you guys were you know getting started. There were some hard days. So what keeps you guys grounded during those hard times?

SPEAKER_01 18:23

Well, we would definitely not have continued Amonakids without faith. I mean knowing that God had us where he wanted us was the only reason we kept going. Yeah. And there were so many so many stories that we can go into at another time just through Amona Kids of of things that were that were only possible because God was telling us that's you know that's where you should be. Because of the gospel. Yeah. And it's it's just I mean, I there's no other way. Like if we did not have that faith, we would have shut it down, you know, a few months into it. Doesn't pay enough.

SPEAKER_00 19:11

Right. Right.

SPEAKER_03 19:12

Like you know, I tell younger one thing I like about getting to be this age is I I realize that I am kind of an expert on some things just because I've lived them. And I tell, I will tell younger leaders like, tell the stories, keep telling the stories, just like with the Bible. You tell that story, it reminds you of the truth, it reminds me you of where you've been, where God's delivered you. And that, and that in itself is so comforting.

SPEAKER_04 19:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

One thing that I do, I I have a lot, I train parents and caregivers on how to care for kids with trauma. And I've started recognizing that when things are really hard and I'm feeling a little bit hopeless, that I need to do those things that I've taught those caregivers. So things like having hot tea to put

Miracles Amid Legal Battles

SPEAKER_03 20:03

my hands on to calm, to regulate myself in the mornings, like I'm reading through the whole Bible again, even through the boring stuff, even through like how to build the tapestries. And there's like rereading those things, but then realizing like it's alive, like the word of God is alive. And so, like throughout the day, realize like remembering what I read that morning and then being able to apply it throughout my day, that grounds me a lot. I will switch temperatures, I'll step outside in the cold, or I'll be in the shower and I'll blast cold water, and that really regulates me. That grounds me.

SPEAKER_04 20:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:42

And just the rhythms and keeping those rhythms, like always exercising, always taking time to enjoy my coffee, always reading my Bible.

SPEAKER_00 20:50

Yeah. That's really good. I think the point that you talked about with remembering the stories, remembering there's a kind of the whys behind what you do, because I jokingly said earlier that it doesn't pay well. That's actually true. It's very you never get into this type of leadership because it's gonna pay well. You get into it because you're passionate about it, you see a need and you feel like you can step into that need and make a difference and make an impact. And I think that's something that you guys have definitely done over the years.

SPEAKER_03 21:24

Yeah, but when you say, Wave, that like we're also the ones that get to see like these glorious, amazing things because we say yes, and then we get to witness miracles, we get to witness things that nor normal people don't get to witness. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

It doesn't pay monetarily, we'll put it that way. But yes, the experiences that have that we've been blessed with have been, you know, worth our goal. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:52

About a year ago, I was in Rwanda with

Not Quitting And Wise Counsel

SPEAKER_03 21:55

some of our top children, top students. I call 'em my A team. There's And we're right now in a legal battle with our former headmaster. And it was pretty, it's pretty rough situation. And I'm looking at all those kids, and I'm remembering like I'm feeling really hopeless. And I'm like, maybe we need to walk away. Maybe God's saying, you can't win this. It's a different country. There's no hope here. You need to walk away from it. And I look at all these kids, and these are kids that were those street kids living in that slum, being trafficked. These are kids that we later found out were being trafficked. And now they've all, those A-team kids, they've all graduated from secondary school. Some of them are in college. Two of them have graduated college. One of them is now happily married. And I'm like, those are miracles. And I get to, I get to be in their world. That's that's amazing. And I was really in a dark spot. And one of them just spontaneously started singing How Great Thou Art. And that is not a song I have ever heard sing in Rwanda. And I've been to Rwanda, I don't know, probably 40 times. And he just started singing it. And I was like, okay, yeah, there's my hope. There's my why that's grounding me. That's why I'm still in a legal battle in Rwanda.

SPEAKER_00 23:19

Was there ever a moment where you thought, I'm I'm just ready to

Local Leadership And The A Team

SPEAKER_00 23:24

quit? I'm ready to give it up, give it up.

SPEAKER_03 23:25

That was my moment.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

Oh, that was not the one. That's not the only one.

SPEAKER_03 23:29

That was the dark moment.

SPEAKER_01 23:30

I would imagine there's probably multiple moments, right? But there have been several times when we'll be like, I we don't know what to do. This is not, this is above us.

SPEAKER_03 23:38

And well, not knowing what to do and throwing in the towel are different.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

Yeah. How are they different?

SPEAKER_03 23:45

Because I routinely don't know what to do, but I know that God already has the playbook. And so I just have to be more listen, like just more aware of his presence and his voice. And I we both are always telling our kids, the kids we live with, the kids over there, to like seek wise counsel. I think that's one of the most important things you can do. And if you're a good leader, you're doing that. You're always like, I don't know this. Tell me your expertise. Tell me what you think. Especially running a program in another culture, in another country, more than anything we desire for our Rwandan leadership to run the show. But the reality is there's still post-genocide. There's still we're still growing that program. And so it's a little trickier to seek wise counsel, but we're always trying.

SPEAKER_01 24:35

Yeah. And actually, we have they have started running the show more than you know, because of the A team and the kids that we can count on more now. And and the kids have grown up and become their own leaders.

SPEAKER_03 24:48

And they're so awesome.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

And we can we can count on more than more than just James, our country director. We can count on lots of kids to

Who They Lead And How

SPEAKER_01 24:57

get things done. And that means that means that we don't have to be there every time something happens that they can take care of it.

SPEAKER_00 25:04

So how many people do you guys lead in that organization?

SPEAKER_03 25:10

So well before we were in this this turmoil with our headmaster, we had 17 teachers at Hope Village, and then our headmaster and our director of education. So that would have been 19, and then James, 20. And then he always had at least one kid that was assisting him. So like 21.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

On that side, on that side.

SPEAKER_03 25:35

We have a board of and then we have a board of directors of eight people here.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Yeah, and then a team of volunteers that are and then they're awesome.

SPEAKER_03 25:42

A couple hundred sponsors that sponsor our kids, and we I figure we work for them because it's their donor dollars.

SPEAKER_00 25:49

So this is kind of a two-part question, but whenever you think of with those people that you guys actually lead, have you ever had anybody come up to you and say, you know what? Ryan, I can't do this anymore. Cara, I've tried this for the last five years. I am not just

Protecting Kids And Setting Standards

SPEAKER_00 26:08

capable of doing this anymore. So if you've had that, then what have you said to them? What did you instill in them that cultivated hope?

SPEAKER_03 26:19

We have had we had an accountant, her name was Fiona, and she was lovely. And she she walked away. And and it was hard because we had really wanted to hire a woman because there's still it's still a patriarchal culture. But the things that she was wrestling with were things that were like cultural that I can't change, especially when I can't be by her side every day.

SPEAKER_04 26:43

Right.

SPEAKER_03 26:44

And so letting like supporting her and walking away, that's really important as a leader, too.

SPEAKER_00 26:50

Sure. So over the years, you guys have been just it sounds to me like there hasn't been any like people saying, Hey, I this this weight is so heavy, I can't take it anymore. It just sounds like everybody's bought into the mission. Uh you know, it's we don't really have to lay a whole lot of like vision, right?

SPEAKER_01 27:11

Because it's everybody there understands that that these are God's kids.

SPEAKER_03 27:17

You know, they and I think part of that is because of who we who we call who we invite, and we make we make that invitation really clear from the beginning. And we have expectations like I am really protective of these kids. Part of it's that like mama bear, but part of it goes beyond that because these kids have so

Go Be Love, Not Saviors

SPEAKER_03 27:40

much trauma and I don't want to re-traumatize them. And so we have pretty high expectations. If you're gonna work with our kids, that is such a blessing. And you are the lucky one to be in their presence. And so, so that is always clear. And there's a clear like, we need you to do these things to prepare, we need you to do the these trainings. And if you've bought in your and you go through those six weeks of classes, and now we do say, you can't travel and work with our kids unless you do the full six weeks. So I think that that commitment and being really clear about the mindset of going into another country and being a guest, and that we're not there to change them. I think that that makes a difference too, because we very rarely have somebody that walks away not transformed.

SPEAKER_01 28:32

Yeah. Yeah. The uh the motto of the the company that was or the that was sending us on our first trip was go be love.

SPEAKER_04 28:42

That's it.

SPEAKER_01 28:42

That was just go be love. And that's that's all we ask our our team members to do when they go when we take volunteers with us. So like Kara said, we're not we're not digging a well, we're not building

Family Forever: See You Later

SPEAKER_01 28:54

a church, we're not building it, we're not you know, that's all stuff they can do.

SPEAKER_03 28:57

And we can hire them too.

SPEAKER_01 28:58

And we can hire them to do that if we needed to. And we have for our school.

SPEAKER_03 29:02

Because we want to build that economy. We don't have any business doing that.

SPEAKER_01 29:05

Yeah. And and we're not experts in that, so we let them do it. But going and being and and just and just being the the love, showing the love that that they deserve is is all. That's all it is. And and whatever that entails, whether that's you know, wrestling with uh, you know, four-year-olds in the, you know, in the grass, because it's you know, yeah, fun thing to do and it gives them a great time. And and or if it's just chatting with the older kids and and just being there.

SPEAKER_03 29:39

And yeah, and the we always make it clear too, like when you're in, you're all in. And if you're part of our family, you're you're the family. Yeah. And so we have this idea that was born in 2013 that we don't say goodbye in a monokids, we say aju azaza, which is see you later. And

Rwanda’s Past And Personal Resolve

SPEAKER_03 30:01

so we tell anybody, whether it's a board member, a volunteer, staff, like you're these kids' family now. You might not ever get to go back and hug them physically again, but you represent the family.

unknown 30:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:13

That's good stuff.

SPEAKER_03 30:14

Yeah. And that, so I think that also impacts how people see themselves like in their roles.

SPEAKER_04 30:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:20

And we're just like, we've got room for you. If you can do this and you can follow these, you can understand the hurt and the behaviors and how to do good without harm, like, then we got a spot for you.

SPEAKER_00 30:34

I was talking today with a guy from Sudan, and uh, I told him that I've been over to Africa, I've been to Rwanda, and immediately he's like, Why would you go to Rwanda? And I told him, I said, I said, I have a friend, some friends who lead lead an organization over there, and I told him how in 1993, whenever the genocide happened, how I was it seriously impacted me. And I think I've shared this with you guys before how the bodies were just being bulldozed into into ditches, and there was no response internationally. And I was saddened by that. I could not believe that that was going on. And then here we go, you know, 20 years later, actually 17 years later, when I met you guys in 2010, you have two boys who are from that place that I remembered really distinctly. And then you started an organization

Closing Gratitude

SPEAKER_00 31:38

that is making an impact. So even though there wasn't this international response, there were two people who loved two boys who felt like they couldn't just come back and be the same person. I just think that's a beautiful thing. I think that that doesn't instill hope into others that that their story can change. I don't know what will. So I just want to say thanks for coming on to always hope that you guys are an inspiration to more people than you realize.

SPEAKER_01 32:15

Oh well, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 32:16

I appreciate you having us.