ET Phone Home? 1/5/13

Town is a couple miles from the Children's home.  When we arrived in Gitega, our driver, Nicolas, headed back to Bujumbura.  (Also called Buja.)  Nicolas is the main driver for the Burundi Office.  The leader of the Children's home, Reggie, took us to town.  Caleb drove.  He is one of the two drivers for the Children's home.  We went to a Smart phone outlet store.  It had three chairs, a counter, and two people behind the counter.  One gentlemen, with an Economics degree, thankfully knew English and helped us out.  Jen and I both got SIM cards to call home.  But, her new phone's charger didn't work, and I forgot my new phone.  My old phone didn't work, which was no surprised.  It uses dual band, and I think most networks have changed to tri band networks.  When I was in Thailand, they dropped the dual band, and I had to get a new phone.  Other staff with my organization had to do the same thing.  My cousin had the same thing happen to him in Russia, so it's not surprising the phone didn't work here.  Jen and I knew we didn't have minutes for the phones, but we weren't able to explain that we needed to stop and buy a phone card to get minutes.  Back at the Children's home, I was able to get my new phone to work, but I still can't call the US, or someone locally.  So...I still can't phone home yet.  Sorry!  Thanks a lot for the new phone!