I have been thinking during the last four days about the definition of a woman of valor, something we talk about in our Jewish tradition. Our time in the Congo has demonstrated to me, once again, the anomalies of life on the African continent. This is my sixth visit to Africa but only my first to the Congo. 

Yesterday we drove east from Kigali to visit the Agahozo Shalom Youth Village, an extraordinary program established by Jewish philanthropist Ann Heyman as a response to helping Rwanda move forward following the horrifying genocide of the early 1990’s.  While visiting the Genocide Memorial in Kigali earlier in the day, we stood in a room filled with snapshots of hundreds of men, women and children who were murdered.  But we cannot forget that thousands of youngsters survived, many without any family or with families that lost mothers or fathers. 

This will be my sixth trip to the continent of Africa over the past thirty five years. I am very excited to make this visit as part of the Jewish World Watch delegation. After spending the last month reading about the tragic situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, I am expecting the visit to be critical to my understanding of the human impact and personal consequences for the residents of this nation.