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See all of the updates from our trip here.

Yesterday, following our visit to the Dian Fossey center we settled in the town of Musanze in northwest of Rwanda.

After an early breakfast we made our way to the Bigogwe Sector, Kijote Cell to spend the day with Callixte Rudakenga.

Here are a couple of (not brilliant) photos I took on the drive:

My words feel inadequate in describing this man and his journey, but here is my best shot.

Callixte was wrongfully imprisoned for five years. Eventually he was released, but while he was in jail he found a Peaceful Heart Network flyer from a workshop they had previously offered to inmates. He was inspired to reach out to the PHN via WhatsApp and shortly afterwards started his course of study.

Later that day, as we were driving to see the lake on the border with DRC, we drove past the prison where Callixte had spent five years. He happily shared what it was like to be in the facility, without a sense of anger or bitterness.

The reason we were spending the day with Callixte was because he was running a Trainers of Trainers course where he had been teaching TTT (the version of tapping taught by the PHN) and we were lucky enough to be able to participate in the final day.

The class was filled with healthcare and Red Cross workers.

I wasn’t able to capture it all, but this is how we were greeted by the class:

This welcome has set a high bar for how I hope to be greeted every time I enter a room in future!

We participated in some of the class teaching TTT and did some practice rounds with the students.

We then heard a number of testimonies about tapping from the students, as many of them had participated in prior classes.

Here are just a few of the things the students said:

• After tapping I can feel my body. I can feel my breath. It feels like praising God.
• It puts you in a state of calmness and safety.
• I can focus outward, because the noise in my head has stopped.
• There are lots of things bouncing around my mind…then they all go away.
• When I have a headache and I want to sleep, I start tapping. I never finish because I fall asleep tapping.
• My infant was crying. I tapped on him. First he laughed, then he fell asleep.
• I use tapping as my sleeping pill.
• Just by thinking about tapping, I feel better. I don’t even have to do it. It is the best thing for changing my mood.
• By calming my mind, it allows me to learn new things.
• My kids are more focused in class.
• I tap three times a day. I went from sick to having more energy than I know what to do with.
• When I have a question that I don’t have an answer for, I tap. It helps me to think more clearly and solve problems.
• My friends were suspicious because I was so different.

The rain
One of the women who gave her testimony talked about how before she learned tapping it sounded like it was raining, even when it wasn’t. It was a comment that needed some context for us to understand fully.

I grew up in the high, dry desert and I have always loved the rain.

In the 1990s I remember going to a reading by a poet from Cape Verde, an island nation off the coast of West Africa. Even though it’s in the middle of the ocean, it doesn’t rain much there and in the local language, the word for rain and the word for hope are the same (my memory says the word is chuba, but I could be wrong). Because it rains so infrequently there, when it does, it brings new life and hope at the same time.

For those who lived through the Rwandan genocide, the opposite is true. It rained a lot during the 100 days in 1994 when the genocide took place, so many Tutsi people associate rain with trauma, pain, and death.

The woman sharing the story about hearing the rain, even when it wasn’t raining, was really talking about the terror she associated with the rain that fell constantly during the genocide.

After learning tapping, not only did she stop hearing the rain when it wasn’t raining, but she was no longer terrorized by the rain or her past.

Their stories
For me, the most heartening part of the day was that when the participants talked about their experience with tapping, they first talked about how it had helped them and their families AND also in their work.

I love the fact that tapping isn’t just a tool that is helping them to serve their community and patients better, but something that allows them and their families to heal too.

How it all came together
So there we were. Sitting in a church in the northwest of Rwanda tapping, laughing, singing, and dancing.

The day happened because:

• Callixte, a wrongfully imprisoned man, decided to do good in the world
• The Peaceful Heart Network had done the hard work to get into a prison to make the lives of inmates better
• Callixte decided that every person in his part of the country should have access to tapping
• And YOU!

I didn’t know it until the middle of the day, but this particular training happened as a direct result of the contributions from the 24 Hours of Tapping fundraiser we ran back in July 2022.

If you donated even a few dollars, I want you to go back and reread the (abridged) bullet list above listing just a few of the benefits of knowing how to tap. Because of your contribution, the lives of 33 health care professionals and their families are better, their patients’ lives are better, and the good ripples out even further than that.

One of the participants talked about how he had taught his children to tap, and his children had in turn taught all of their friends.

Another woman told the story of being left for dead in the genocide. Learning to tap has meant that she no longer experiences nightmares every night, and she is also sharing tapping with others.

You are a part of that amazing transformation!

Poems
In addition to testimonies, we have also heard poems. A woman who shared a poem about her healing asked Ulf and Gunilla to stand next to her as she read the poem. When she got to the line about gratitude for each of them, she paused and hugged them.

She didn’t just want them to know how much learning to tap meant to her, but she wanted them to feel it in the form of hugs. (Yes, this did add to my tear tally.)

And then we celebrated
After the sharing of reflections and testimonies, we celebrated.

All the participants received their certificates and PHN t-shirts. We took photos, and the participants also took photos, all wanting a record of themselves holding their certificates next to their friends.

Here is a group photo.

And then we ate!

Odds and ends

Didn’t register, but were welcome
At the training there were also a number of young children who were so much fun to have around. They weren’t quiet, because they are small children, but they weren’t a distraction either. Over the course of the day they were passed from person to person, with everyone being helpful and happy to see them.

Here is my sister making friends with the cutest little pumpkin.

I don’t always tap
In addition to the tapping training, I pulled out a few tricks, which was also fun.

Dinner by phone light
On Wednesday night there was a blackout while we were having dinner. It’s not something that happens all the time, but is also not unexpected. It was absolutely pitch black and still, so we improvised with a water bottle and cell phone light to create candlelight.

Tear Tally
On Day 4, the tear tally is up to six, but all of my tears today were those of huge gratitude.