Family matters

Today is my little Great-niece Lola's 6th birthday and shortly I will head to Lisburn to see her. I don't have much by way of immediate family and I don't see them that often. Family life is often complex - people say moreso in this day and age. I'm not sure that's true. I think family life has always been complex - I can remember back from childhood when rumours abounded now and again about who belonged to whom in a family. Maybe then we were just better at keeping the 'secrets'.

Family life in Rwanda can be very complex. We have children brought up by siblings or grandparents, uncles and aunts. It often involves splitting children up, and we have a few cases where the children in a family have been divided among uncles and aunts following the death of parents. One boy in particular comes to mind as I remember him saying how much he would like to be reunited with his twin sister. He gave us a photo of her for his sponsor to see. Sometimes children are sent off to other family or friends because a mother can't afford to feed them all, and in some cases children are sent off to work in another person's home for that same reason.

It is hard for us to get this and understand. We want to label everyone; list brothers and sisters; know who's who in a family. Yet confusion reigns when in one house a child calls a boy there her brother when we later discover he is a cousin or another extended family member. In any home everyone is brother and sister - indeed I was told it was disrespectful to see it otherwise. Your grandmother or aunt, if she reared you, is mama or mother. It's like she has earned that right. For us, going in from our neat little family units, complex is the word!

At the core of it all - though at times, like our own families,  far from perfect - is the desire to look after children and give them home and family and

belonging. This last time in Rwanda we came across one remarkable lady. She is bringing up several grandchildren, including one little boy abandoned by his mother. What sets this woman apart, though there are others like her, is that in addition her home is open to any child she finds on the street. Going into her home with our notebooks and name lists is a total waste of time. All we need to know is that everyone under that roof is family. End of story!

I am honoured and humbled to be 'family' in a place or two in Rwanda; to have my picture there (yikes!) and pointed out to visitors as 'family'. It is a precious thing and reminds me that we are indeed one big family. Maybe in our part of the world we need to push out our walls and let some more 'family' in? it might be a bit mad and chaotic - but that's family for you!