A friend comes to stay in Mwezi

Planted more peas and green beans on Monday. Monday night, the rain decided to go crazy and since I have this wonderful tin roofing, it made it impossible to sleep. I tried to watch an episode of scrubs, but couldn’t hear a thing even with the volume at max. I find myself singing the scrubs theme song when I get ditched at work. Sometimes they’ll just leave me to fend for myself, and since my language skills are not amazing, I don’t get much accomplished, especially when left to fill out patient charts. Crazy thunder and lightning storm Tuesday while cooking dinner, almost pooped my pants when lightning pretty much struck right outside kitchen door. Loudest scariest sound ever! I was shaking for about an hour afterwards, I think my heart stopped beating. Wednesday the power went out in the morning and we didn’t get it back until late Thursday afternoon. Emily and I were pretty much inconsolable. What is this real peace corps experience?! I want my electricity back!!! And I have to say, I am sooo happy to have it back. Had to go charge my phone at the bank Thursday during work, since it is the only place in my entire village that has a generator. I was getting worried because we don’t have one and the vaccines were in a fridge with no electricity! Oh, and I have a new aspiration to be a sheep farmer and use all natural dyes and sell the yarn to crazy hippies in America for a profit.
Friday my friend who lives in Gisakura came to visit. She waited until after work to start on her way, so she showed up in the dark. It started raining and she still wasn’t here, Emily and I were getting a little worried, so I sent her a text message and got one back saying that shes stuck, that the gate is locked. So, I went running out to get her, in the middle of the thunderstorm with only lightening lighting my way, I lost my shoes, kicked mud up my back, my glasses fogged up and there was the loudest thunder ever, in which both of us screamed bloody murder at the top of our lungs but did not hear the other. The next morning I confessed to my embarrassing scream and she confessed to the same and we realized that neither of us heard the other. Three girls followed her to my house, so we took them inside and had them wait out the rain. They were soaked head to toe and were freezing. I was only outside 5 minutes or so and was completely soaked through. There was another giant thunderclap (or lightning bolt, I really can’t tell which is causing this ear shattering sound) and we reacted worse than the three small girls. It’s indescribable how loud the thunder is here. During the entire storm there are only 2 or 3 of these ear drum breaking thunders, but every time it scares the living daylights out of me and sets my heart running and my hands shaking for an hour afterwards. Emily and I were almost in tears after the one on Wednesday. Anyways, the rain finally stopped and the thunder and lightning passed on to the hill behind me. We had a fun night and Saturday morning decided to go for a walk. Well, we ended up walking with a group of kids and one teacher whom we met on a previous walk and he took us with him until we started going to the bottom of the valley. It was getting really steep and we knew we were going to have to walk back up eventually, so we left before reaching the bottom and took the path he told us would take us home. Well, that path ended up taking us to the bottom of the valley anyways, after traversing over a few rivers we finally started going up again. And we went up and up and up! The last hour or more of our walk was straight up. We all almost keeled over and died. It was about 11am at this point, the sun was beating down on us and the humidity was ridiculous. I don’t know how we made it back, but when we finally did we all just collapsed. I think that hike took a few years of my life with it. After lunch, we packed up and headed to the clinic for the first ever “abana bo muri club”; the club for the kids at my clinic with HIV. It went well, except the Rwandan who was helping us kept it going for 2 hours! I was planning on only an hour. The poor kids were exhausted. Kate, Emily and I went for a drink at the restaurant afterwards to wait for her moto to take her home. Sunday, the kids who helped Kate get here in the rain came by to visit and then Theodore came to visit. We didn’t leave the house.

my week

I have been in the process of making a dress, I have cut out the fabric, but the amount of sewing seemed too daunting and all I could think about was how quick it would be to do on a sewing machine, so I went over to the nuns and asked if they had a machine I could use. They did and said I could bring my stuff over and we’d work on it. Well, sister Dormina is a pretty good tailor and decided to take over. She measured me, recut my fabric and sewed my dress. I helped her to understand what I wanted it to look like and showed her how to put it together, but she did the majority of the work and I finished the dress in one day! I got my inspiration from the show Rome, which I’ve been watching on my computer. I’ll take a picture and post it of my dress soon. One day after work, I heard a knock on the door and three boys were there, they said hi and that they wanted to visit. So I talked to them for a while then Emily came out and she recognized them as the boys who walked with her when she went out the other week. We looked through their class books and I ended up correcting some of the English and then I got out my Kinyarwanda book that I used in training and they had a fun time reading the dialogues. Emily got a small football in one of her packages, so we got that out and played catch. The boys didn’t stay a ridiculous amount of time and they were the ones who said that they were going to leave. It was really nice. I hate being bombarded and then feeling uncomfortable when people stay forever and it gets awkward because you no longer have anything to talk about. I went into town on Friday and picked up packages and bought some groceries and had lunch with two friends. On the way back the moto driver said he couldn’t come get me for another 3 hours, so I decided to go back with my friend and hang out, but just as we were passing my town on the road, I got a call saying the ambulance was coming to the clinic and I could just get a ride in there. So my friend turned around and dropped me off in town. A co-worker was in town, so I talked with her and we both went down to the dirt road to meet the ambulance. Two men carried my boxes for me and we all sat down together on the bridge to wait for the ambulance. Well, two hours later, I was informed that the ambulance actually wasn’t coming, so the moto driver will come get me now. He took longer than usual (about an hour vs. half hour) and the guys who were sitting with me decided we should start walking. They carried my boxes and my helmet for me, so I just had my backpack. We walked for about 25 minutes and the moto showed up, but he had the lab tech on the back and had to take her to town, so he passed us and went into town and we kept walking until he came back to get me. I have had terrible luck with transportation as of late. I think I’ll just stay in my village for a while. Saturday, Emily and I went to our host families house, she had been in the fields so she was all dirty and they had a wedding to attend, so we held and played with the baby while she washed and got dressed. Emily’s mom sent some cloth diapers, so we showed her how to use them and gave her a box full. She was really surprised and happy. I hope she understands how to use them correctly. This is her first baby, so she’ll get a lot of use out of them through the years. There are these square pieces of plastic that most babies wear, moms put a piece of igitenge (the cloth they all wear as skirts) and then tie the plastic around the babies. After that we ate lunch and when I was laying in bed reading, I heard someone yell “mwiriwe!” and they sounded really close. Most kids yell from the fence but this kid sounded like he was at the door, which was wide open. I got up and went to see who it was and if they were in my yard and didn’t see anyone but saw that the gate was open, so I went to close it and a boy came running towards me. He asked if I wanted to play soccer, so I told him I was coming and went to put on my shoes. When I got to the field, he and another boy (they’re about 8) were sitting down so I went and sat with them and we just sat in silence for a while. A mom sent over her 7 children to greet me and the kids weren’t scared of me! This little boy about 3 and his 2 year old sister came up to me and said hello, how are you (in Kinya, not English). It was so cute. After that the boys and I got up and started kicking the ball around. We played for a while and it was really nice, I didn’t get surrounded and stared at. Three girls about the same age as the boys came up and stared at me for a bit, but then they started practicing their dancing. So, the six of us were on the field, kicking the soccer ball and dancing. It was a good time.

Crazy transportation issues and a party with puppies!!

Friday I got a ride in the ambulance to the hospital where another volunteer works. We were both going to a party that weekend, so I thought I would just hang out at her house until we were picked up and then they only had to make one stop. Well, she didn’t pick up her phone before I left, so I didn’t know that she went into town for the day. I got to her hospital and went to her house and sat on her front porch for an hour or so, then I got hungry, so I stashed my bags in her little storage place outside and went to the cantina at the hospital and bought a hard boiled egg and a banana. I went and sat on her back porch and ate my lame lunch, then sat back on the front porch, but the sun was getting too hot, so I went back to the back porch for a while, then decided to move and i saw a little girl staring at me through the bushes. I said hi and she came up to me and gave me a hug and asked me to teach her English. I told her to come back tomorrow and went and laid on the grass on the side of the house. I laid there for about an hour listening to my ipod, then my phone battery was getting low, so I packed up and headed for the hospital. I went into the office building and no one was there, so I just sat outside. The anestesiologist, whom I met during a dance party came and sat with me and I charged my phone while we talked and listened to music. I got a hold of the guy who was picking us up and so I started walking to the main road because he had never been to her house and didn’t know where it was. Half way down the dirt road, a taxi went by and my friend was on it. I was already on my way and he didn’t know how to get to her house, so I decided I would keep going and meet him at the road and we could come pick her up afterwards. When I got to the main road, I got a call from him saying he would be there in a half hour! I left too early. One of the doctors came by with a volleyball and a net and asked if I wanted to play, so I said sure and went with them. There was a soccer game going on with a the entire primary school and some secondary school kids, so I got surrounded and they came in really close. I got a little claustrophobic. Then I got a call from my friend saying that he forgot his license at home and the police pulled him over and wont let him drive, can I drive stick and do I have my license on me? He said he would pay for my moto to the road he was stuck at, but I needed to come now and drive the truck. My manual driving skills leave a LOT to be desired, so I called my friend who was packing at her house and said she needed to come now, we have to take a taxi and drive the truck. About 50 children decided to follow me from the game and surround me while I was trying to talk to my friend on the phone and just stood and stared at me for the 20 or so minutes before my friend met me. By the time she got to me, my friend had called and said he was on his way; the police let him go. We sat around for quite a while until he called and asked where her town was and if we were on the main road. Long story short, he was about 25 minutes from her town thinking he had already passed us, so he kept turning around and around but never going far enough. We finally started walking and told him to just keep driving, that he wasn’t where he thought he was and we found him on the road. There were already three other people in the truck besides the driver, so we had to squish in. Two of our other friends met them on their dirt road and said they would just walk until they picked us up and then we could take them the rest of the way. Well, since getting lost and finding us took so long, the ended up almost walking the whole way (almost an hour driving!). We finally got them and a friend and I sat in the back with all the bags, it was dark by this time. Dinner was amazing, we had pizza and salad with two kinds of lettuce!!! Their dog had seven puppies, and two of them are named after gossip girl characters. I got to hold and cuddle them all weekend, they were only two weeks old. That night we had a sweet dance party and finally crashed around 2am. Saturday, we went to the lake and had a picnic lunch and then watched movies after a delicious dinner of burritos (with homemade tortillas, which took forever to make considering there were 11 of us!). Sunday, we had tortilla chips and guacamole for breakfast, played some bananagrams (themed Michael Jackson and things you miss from home), watched some Gossip Girl on the projection screen and then got into the truck just as it started raining. The car fogged up so badly we had to keep wiping it down every few seconds and it was raining so hard we couldn’t see and had to stop in the middle of the road for a while until we regained a little visibility. And it started hailing at one point! I was so afraid I was going to have to take the moto in that ridiculous rain, but thankfully by the time we got to my town on the road, it had stopped. They dropped me off there and although I called beforehand and asked for the moto to be in the town at 3:30 (I didn’t get there until 4:15) it didn’t show up until almost five. When my moto driver arrived, a drunk policeman who was not on duty, came over and took the key out of the bike and was pushing my backpack off of the moto and saying that he couldn’t drive me (the drivers from my clinic don’t have driving permits). The police guy who was talking to me the half hour I was standing in town helped and we finally got on our way. He sent me a message while we were driving that I didn’t answer which said “sorry, that man was drunk, he can drive you home now and come get his key tomorrow”. The moto driver stopped two or three times to tell his debacle to others on the road (we had to go the back way, so we were on the foot path the first part of the drive and it was super muddy and full of puddles and the rounded log bridges where not fun to driver over), then the police guy called me because I didn’t respond to his text message and I talked to him for a while and he said sorry and then I gave the phone to the driver and they talked and I heard him say “muzungu…abanyarwanda babi….afite ubwoba” meaning something about me thinking Rwandans are bad and that I was scared. Then he passed the phone back to me and the policeman apologized yet again and told me not to have fear and that he would buy me a fanta tomorrow when he came into my village to return the key. I got home in the dark and the policeman never showed up to buy me my fanta.

September, week 1

So, we’re down to two piglets now. The sick one that wasn’t walking died. I went over to the nuns to cook dinner Sunday night again and two of the priests were there, so we ended up in the living room talking with them for about an hour. There was a mom and a little boy outside the house and the boy was afraid of our white skin and would cry if we tried to get too close to him… it happens a lot. Sister Mary came over earlier in the day and we had an English lesson with her.
Monday, I stayed home with the umukobwa and sister mary came over to help me plant some seeds. We planted squash, spinach and sweet basil. The carrots are coming along nicely, a few more weeks and they’ll be ready to pick. I already pulled one up, but I want to wait to pull the others until they are bigger.
Tuesday, I worked in child vaccination. Gave some polio vaccine, weighed babies and measured mid-upper arm circumference.
Wednesday, I measured moms and got them tested for HIV. Didn’t do a condom demonstration this time. I also found a secret room in the maternity ward where the moms who work at the clinic keep their babies so they can come breastfeed throughout the day. I got to hold one of the babies and she wasn’t scared of me! While I was taking blood pressure and measuring bellies, it started to rain. I had done laundry that morning, so I told the nun “oh no, my clothes!” and she said “go quickly”, so I ran home early and got my clothes off the line. Its been raining like crazy!!! What I remember of the rainy season was rains once a day, we’ve been getting it multiples times a day at random times. It rained all night Tuesday, then again around 11:30 Wednesday morning and then again later in the evening. Thursday it didn’t start raining until around 3:30. It rained at 1pm Monday.

guinea pigs and piglets

Monday, I woke in the dark to another earthquake! I’ve only lived here 7 months and have had 3 earthquakes so far. Work was pretty boring again, one of my coworkers from AIDS Relief was here, so I hung out with him and played on the computer. Tuesday I helped with child vaccination and entered some data into the computer, but pretty much just played on my phone. I am getting super excited about starting this club for the kids because then I’ll actually have something to do and look forward to. Wednesday, I weighed and measured moms, took blood pressure and got them and their husbands tested for HIV. We had one girl who was on her second pregnancy at 21 and is not married. The nun was not too happy with her and she got a bit of a lecture. She is the first single mother I have run into the entire time I’ve been here, so that’s not too bad. After lunch on Wednesday, I decided to get some exercise (cold showers are more tolerable if you are hot before hand) and got out my jump rope. The girl who cleans my floors was here helping till the garden and when she saw me jumping she came over and I gave her the rope and she jumped and sang a song and taught me some of the song. We had a fun time playing. Thursday, Emily and I left work early because we were just sitting around doing nothing. We were supposed to have a meeting with out titulaire about getting the club going and other things we have seen at the clinic that we would like to change, but one of her friends had passed and she was going to their funeral, so we left early and went on a walk after lunch and ended up at a primary school where they were playing soccer. It was crazy, but not overwhelmingly. The kids surrounded us and one of the teachers greeted us and then started telling the kids that we were there to look at their hygiene. He told them that we wanted to see if they were wearing clean clothes and wearing shoes, one kid said that he was doing laundry, so that’s why he was in dirty clothes. I asked them where they washed their hands because I didn’t see a hand-washing station outside of the latrines and a boy told me he washed them in the river. I told them they needed to drink clean water, that they need to boil it before hand and I took their picture. So a walk through town ended up being one of the only health lessons I have given! I am planning on making a tippy tap for the school and giving a hand-washing lesson to them when I bring it. The teacher was really helpful and when he was showing us the way home, (he showed us a different way than the way we came, which ended up being an hour hike up the side of a mountain!!!) he would give short hygiene lessons to the people who asked about us.
Friday, I went to work and weighed pregnant women and took their blood pressure and then went into town to go to the bank and buy some more time for the internet. The moto driver took me in a different direction and it was a beautiful drive! We went up a giant hill, possibly the largest in the area, I was looking down on everything! Then we went through a pine forest that looked like Spokane, we passed tea fields and a large house that he said Americans used to live in and arrived on the main road where I took a taxi bus into town. I forgot how much I don’t like public transport here, I got too spoiled with my South African friends who have cars. I didn’t spend too much time in town, the bank went really quickly and then I was back on a bus and back to the dirt path where the moto driver met me. He had to go to the hospital to drop some papers off. On the way back, I saw a little boy holding two guinea pigs! Never seen a guinea pig in Africa before, so I was thoroughly confused! Saturday I slept in, watched a lot of Weeds season 4, read my book, went to the shop and bought eggs, black thread and elastic (I’m making a few dresses and a skirt, really wish I had a sewing machine!) Heard the pig next door screaming and went over to see if they were killing her only to see a little pink piglet! I was standing peeking through the fence slats and saw two men in the stall with her and noticed she had huge nipples and figured they cant be killing a pregnant pig, so I kept watching until one of the guys came out holding a little baby. I went over there and saw three piglets, one of which was too tired and couldn’t walk. He kept getting his ears bitten by one of the other ones and mom was too tired to do anything and lay down so they couldn’t feed. The guy kept whacking her with a stick telling her to get up and she couldn’t. I went over to the nuns to cook dinner because we ran out of gas and was told that the momma pig was sick and needed calcium? I dunno...