Getting into a Routine

It has been a while since we have written. Sorry! Things have been going great. We are now getting into a routine and feeling more at home each week. We had some visitors from HOPE this past weekend. Peter Greer, the HOPE President, and Dave Wasik, the VP of Operations, were here Saturday until Tuesday. It was Peter's first visit to Brazzaville and the HOPE Congo office. We were happy to have both of them here. We got to eat several dinners with them. It was nice to share about our time in Brazzaville so far and to receive great insight and encouragement from Peter and Dave.

HOPE Congo hosted a dinner for Peter and Dave to meet the pastors that HOPE Congo partners with. HOPE partners with local churches in order to use their facilities for reimbursement meetings. There we around 20 pastors present and they all got to network, hear more about HOPE's mission, and express their thoughts.  It was a delicious dinner at a nice hotel in town. We have a few pictures from the dinner, but sadly none with Peter or Dave. :( Funny story....Sophie, the HOPE Secretary, asked Nate if he owned a tie! haha She has noticed he never really dresses up and was worried that he would show up to the dinner in a polo. So she asked him to please wear a tie. Allie laughed really hard at this. We had to look really hard to find them! We were a little worried they were lost, but thankfully got him all dressed up for the dinner.

Last night at dinner, Peter brought up the topic of a HOPE Congo basketball team and we all started laughing. A few weeks ago, Nate asked one of the loan officers (Chancy) if some guys in the office might be interested in playing basketball sometime. He mistakenly took this as Nate wanting to form a team. Well Nate couldn't say no so apparently there will be a HOPE Congo basketball team coming soon. Peter loved the idea and even said he would personally pay for all of us to have uniforms with one condition...we had to be name the HOPEfuls. He said that HOPE Int'l had a team one year called that. The team went on to finish 0-10 that year. HOPE is still looking for their first victory. Nate is not sure if it will come with this team, but it will still be fun.

The management team! Xavier (Dir. of Operations), Manny (Managing Director), and Nate

All dressed up!

Peter, Orlane, Manny, and Xavier. Orlane was awarded as the "Loan Officer of the Year"