Last week of PST!

Week 10:
LAST WEEK OF PST!!! I can’t believe it’s almost over. I just got used to and started really liking everyone and having everyone around all the time. It will be sad and difficult to leave everyone, but I am excited to start my new life in my own house and to be able to cook for myself. Monday I got another package of magazines (thanks dad and mary), everyone was jealous. I am trying to figure out how I am going to get all my stuff to site, I have accumulated more things and I am not sure how I am going to pack them all up…
Tuesday was the beginning of the week of mourning and it was not fun. At 9am, we went into town, everything was closed, and we joined the procession moving from the sector office to the memorial site and burial ground in town. It was really slow moving but amazing to see the diversity of people there. The street boys in their tattered, dirty clothes without shoes, the university students in their collared shirts and leather loafers, the moms with babies on their backs and us abazungu. At the memorial site, there was a speech and some singing for about an hour. It was all in Kinyarwanda, so I only got a few words and phrases here and there. Then the whole group of people moved in a pack to the stadium where there were even more speeches. Most of us left after lunchtime had passed, but I felt bad leaving and stayed. It was a bad decision; I was soo bored and wanted to leave so badly that I decided I’d just walk home alone. Well, I went to leave and they had locked the gates to the stadium because the radio broadcast with the president had started and no one was allowed to leave because it was disrespectful to the president. I tried to say I needed to use the toilet, but they just showed me where the one was within the walls. Kagame ended up saying a few words (30 minutes) in English, so I was happy to be able to understand something. It is really difficult to sit and listen to something for two hours when you don’t understand what they’re saying. By the time I got home, everyone pretty much had finished eating except for the small few of us who were stuck in the stadium (I found some others walking home when they let us out). When we got back we didn’t have anything else planned for the evening, so our director asked us if we had any movies to share. One of the volunteers brought Some Times in April and we all watched it at 3:30. Before then, a bunch of girls and I finished watching 27 dresses in my room and ate too much candy that one of the girls was sent in her package (they are way better at sharing than I am). Sometimes in April is a really good movie to describe Rwanda. You get to see how beautiful it is and hear some Kinyarwanda (which was fun for me because I understood a lot of it!), but it was so depressing and started up the water works again. It is just so messed up how we didn’t do anything. There were so many signs that it was going to happen and we all watched it happening and did nothing! Just apologized afterwards and promised we would never do it again, and here we go doing it again with Sudan. Its so messed up!!! Watching that movie made me angry and embarrassed and just so sad. I can’t believe nothing was done. The hardest part for me was watching the UN convoy load up all the white people into trucks to get them to safety and seeing all the Rwandans, knowing they were going to die, trying to get onto the trucks and them being pushed back. No one was after the white people, they could’ve cared less if we were there or not, but those who were truly in danger were just left to die when they could’ve been taken to safety. Not even one child got onto those trucks. They showed what was happening in Rwanda and then showed clips of the news broadcasts during that time in America. There was one clip that talked about when Kurt Cobain shot himself and I remember that clear as day, but I do not remember ever seeing or hearing about what was happening in Rwanda. I didn’t even know Rwanda was a country until Hotel Rwanda came out. This week is going to suck. I came back to my room and lay in bed and cried a while, then decided to watch Mean Girls, just so my mind would be somewhere else.
The rest of the week wasn’t as bad. I watched a documentary called Ghosts of Rwanda, which was really difficult, but really good. I had my final interview and am nominated to be sworn in as a volunteer! I got the highest grade on the cross-cultural exam, which I was really proud of. I feel more proud of that than if I would have gotten the highest score on the technical or language exam. I really should start packing, seeing as how I am leaving on Tuesday, but I don’t even know where to begin. My room is so tiny, it’s difficult to get things out from under the bed and out of the akabati and ameza (bureau and desk, I’ve decided to start adding some Kinyarwanda, so when you all visit you’ll already know some J).
Friday, I went to visit my host family to say goodbye and pick up my gifts. Mama’s cousin was in town and she had her baby with her, so I got to hold a little baby and it was wonderful. He smelled so good. The family gave me some fabric to make a shirt and pants, a pink t-shirt and two candies. I just gave them all chocolate (Queenie, one of the daughters, the first day I visited asked me if I had chocolate and I thought it was really funny and always meant to bring her some, but never got around to it until last week when I gave them gifts as a thank you and goodbye). I’m going to miss them, but I hope to visit and think they may come visit me sometime. Mama keeps telling me that she’s going to send baby home with me when I go back to America.
I got some shopping done this week, mainly for decorating my room. I got two baskets and two wall hangings. I might use the fabric mama gave me instead to make curtains. I don’t really want a matching pants suit…
Side note: The women here are amazing. They carry 30+ lbs children on their backs (I’ve seen 4 & 5 year olds being carried by the smallest women) while carrying another 20 or so pounds on their heads and walking miles! It amazes me every time.
Saturday, I ate breakfast and then took one of my teachers to the pool to teach her how to swim. I am a terrible swim teacher. I really should have had someone else do it. I’ve never taught swimming before, and teaching an adult is a lot harder than teaching a child. It was hilarious, and really flipping cold. We showed up right before the downpour and it was cloudy the whole time we were in the water. I was freezing!! Thank goodness two other people came to the pool and were swimming because I felt like everyone thought we were crazy, so I was glad to divide the craziness among 4 rather than just 2. I picked up my skirt on Wednesday and took it to get taken in on Saturday, but the guy just took it apart and then said he wasn’t able to finish it until Tuesday which is the morning we leave to Kigali, so I asked him if I paid him more would he finish it today, he said no and so I just took my ruined skirt from him and my teacher took me to a different tailor and they fixed it for me within one hour and it only cost me less than $1. So, crisis averted!
Next time I write on here I will be an official volunteer! Ndishimye :)