On my way home from work on Thursday, a secondary school student stopped me on the road and said she has seen me walking often and that she likes white people and wants to be my friend. Her English was really good and we had a nice, short conversation and exchanged numbers. It’s school break right now, so she was heading to Kigali to stay with her family during break and when she comes back we’ll hang out. Friday, I went and hung out with Richard and Elizabeth at their house for a bit before Adam came. We met up with them again Friday night at the bar and then 3 of Adam’s friends from Kigali were there on their way to Bujumbura for the weekend, so we all hung out together and then went to the club. While Adam and I were dancing, the pants that I finally got around to fixing this week (I got them taken in because they were too big) ripped right up the back! All the way! So, he helped cover me and I took off my over-shirt and tied it around my waist and we just went home. The pants are completely ruined; no way can they be fixed. The rip is a good foot and a half long from the waist to the thigh! It was so embarrassing, but hilarious. Saturday, we watched some football and then Richard and Elizabeth met up with us and a lady whom they gave a ride to earlier in the week called and met up with us at the bar. Turns out she is CRAZY! We all were just in shock at her and couldn’t wait for her to leave and then had a good laugh about it. She said something about Richard and Adam being spies? Haha
Ran into Canisius, a nurse from the clinic in Mwezi who is now at a health center in Simbi, about a half hour from Butare. He called me when he got in, but I didn’t hear my phone and just happened to see him on the road. It was funny. I think his English has gotten even worse than when he lived in the village because we spoke only in Kinyarwanda. It was good to see him. Monday morning, as I was walking to work, I heard “Ali!” and turned and saw Nepo walking, so we said hi and asked how each other were. It’s nice, I feel like now I am starting to be part of the community. Having people to talk to on the street and such. Monday and Tuesday, I went into the field and gave the post-test for the nutrition lesson I gave. I also read over their monthly reports and answered any questions they had and then gave a short refresher on the nutrition information. Monday, someone asked me what to do if the mother is sick and she is breastfeeding. I told her that even if the mother is sick, she should still breastfeed before 6 months of age. There are not good replacement foods here and the ones that are good (the Nestle formula) are way too expensive for the majority of Rwandese to buy it. I also told them that if the mother cannot produce milk while she is sick then they should give the child goat milk instead of cow milk, which is more common practice. Goat milk is much more nutritious, but isn’t as commonly used. The problem I have though is if they will really listen to me and take me seriously. I can just be saying these things and answering their questions, but they may just be like “yeah, okay muzungu” and not change their actions. I try to explain to them why they should do this or that, but when there are deep-seated traditions or ways of thinking, it takes a lot more than just one session with someone to change their ways. Even if they believe that it is better, the community might think they are being strange by doing things the new way and so they won’t do it. It takes a long time for behaviour change and it takes many people changing their beliefs and ways before it becomes a common practice.
Tuesday, I did the same with the other group of youth community health agents and there weren’t as many questions. I don’t know if they were just not asking or if they really didn’t have any. It’s hard to tell. I did get asked what food category urusenda (chili pepper) is in and I said, none really, its just kind of for taste, then one boy said something and everyone giggled. My driver translated for me and I guess it’s said that if you eat urusenda then your sex will be hot. Hahaha. My driver loves to make jokes and always has to explain them to me afterwards. On the way to the meeting with the youth health workers, he told me that one of the mountains was called ibisi by’umucecuru (unfertile land of the old lady, or something like that) and he doesn’t know why. He thinks that an old lady must have lived on that hill. We forgot to tell the CHA’s that they needed to come back tomorrow for a lesson on growing mushrooms (we started a mushroom project to help get more protein into a persons diet) and so we drove up the path they were walking on and he yelled out to two of the guys, “hey, give me that money back!” (we give them money for transportation when they come for a training) and the guys looked so sad and started to reach into their pockets. He then told them he was joking and they all had a good laugh.
After work, Trish and I met up and went shopping for gifts to bring home. I am so poor now! Bought way too much (awesome) stuff, but still have more things to buy! I want to bring home coffee so people can taste it and the tea and I just have so many things I want to share that I just keep buying and buying. One more week and then I’ll be in the US!
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
A wedding, a garden and some friends
I’ve been sick, so I have had to go in and out of Kigali the last week. Its annoying, but was nice seeing Adam on week days. My doctor at the hospital was really cool too. It sucked because I had to wait almost 3 hours to be seen, but it was nice once I got in there. He explained everything and was showing me all kinds of stuff. He was really nice.
Saturday, I went to a wedding of a friend of a friend. One weekend a couple months ago the lady next to me on the bus started talking to me, then stole my iPod for an hour and we exchanged numbers. Well, turns out she works at the church next door to me, so I have run into her on occasion in town or on the road on her way to work, so one time she invited me to the wedding of the girl who was sitting on the bus beside her. They go to the same church. I said sure and she gave me an invitation. I see her all the time and she’s one of my only ‘friends’ in town and I live right next door to the church, so I felt obliged to go. I showed up 40 minutes late, but the pastor was still preaching away. He was up on stage while the two couples (they do simultaneous weddings here) were sitting below him facing the crowd. Both grooms had on white suits with red shirts underneath. But not just any white suit, shiny white suits! One was pin striped with satin or something shiny, the other was just all over shiny and the red shirts beneath were satin as well, so they were shining away! The groom that I was there for had a bright red shiny shirt, with a white and gold brocade tie (it looked kind of like a curtain or some sort of upholstery), the other groom had a more subdued, darker red, but it was still satiny and shiny (I don’t remember what his tie was like). The pastor was talking to the husbands telling them to respect their wives and something about not beating them because they are now one and one cannot beat oneself. Then he came down to the couples and they swore to love each other forever, exchanged rings (while reading vows off of a piece of paper) and then the grooms lifted their brides veils to show the crowd how beautiful their wives were. They did it soooo slowly though. It was funny. The grooms slowly rolled up the veils and then… nothing. No kiss. Nothing. They just stood there. The best man and maid of honor kept wiping the faces of the couples and fixing their clothes and jewelry, all on camera and in front of us all. It was strange. Then the couples got down on their knees and people stood around them and prayed and then a giant dancing party showed up and the collection bowl was set out, not for the couples, but for the church like it was regular Sunday. The pastor had all the married people in the church stand up and wave to the new couples to welcome them into their new life as married people and then had us single people stand up and wave goodbye to them.
After the church ceremony, we all drove over to the museum and took pictures in the gardens and with the kings palace house. I didn’t bring my camera cause I figured I wouldn’t need it, this being the 5th wedding I’ve been to and I don’t really know the couple, but now am I so upset! They were really nice pictures and we took ones in front of the house and in the house. They kept pulling me into the pictures and I wasn’t dressed all that fancy, so I felt a bit self-conscious. We went to the Petit Prince hotel afterwards for the reception and they had a huge cake stand with 8+ cakes and a banana tree in the middle of the cake stand and they had tied bunches of small bananas to the tree. The bride and groom fed each other wine and then went over to the tree and picked a banana and fed it to the other. Everyone got very excited at this point and were all yelling and whistling at the couple. The choir came and sang songs, they cut up the cakes and passed out pieces of it with napkins and we all drank sodas. Then I decided I had enough (it was about 4 hours by this time) and was supposed to meet up with the RPCV who has moved to Butare and was already 20 minutes late, so I told my friend that I had to go and she pointed out to me the way I should walk. It was a nice, quiet walk; not many people around.
Met up with Richard (the RPCV) a while later and we went into town and met up with 3 of his friends from Kigali who spent the day hiking in Nyungwe and were spending the night in Butare. We had dinner and then were going to go get drinks, but they were charging a cover and we refused on principle. So, we went to Richard’s house instead and I got to see it and we had a beer on the balcony overlooking the valley. Then I walked home with a headlamp.
My new friend calls me by my Kinyarwanda name only. All during the wedding she would introduce me as Mukobwajana, or when she needed to get my attention she’d call it out and I had no problem responding immediately. I really respond to that name now and know that if I hear it someone is talking to me. At the PC office, in the official PC database, my name is Kimbrel, Alicia Mukobwajana! Haha Everyone always asks the same questions when they hear my name. "do you know what it means?" and even if I say yes, I know what my name means, i've had it for two years, they still explain it to me. Its annoying. I know what my name means!!!!
On Sunday, my landlady came over and told me that they’d have to construct something at my house to catch the rainwater. She said they would come on Monday and I said that was fine, and they could come at 7. There were a lot of other words exchanged, but I don’t know what she said, and she doesn’t know what I said. She speaks a lot of French to me and honestly, its more confusing than if she’d just speak Kinya. When she was leaving she said that she would call my boss, Jeanne (I’m guess to explain to her, so she could explain to me in English). Later that day, she showed up again with the village leader. He is a lecturer at the University, so he speaks English well and he explained to me that they’re fixing the roads, so my rain water can’t go out onto the road anymore, so they have to build a rainwater catchment thing. Then he told me that I had to turn on my outdoor light every evening to make the street safer for those who walk along it. He said there are thieves on the road, but that they come from Save, a neighboring town, not Butare. He was very insistent on this point. haha. I asked him to ask my landlady to put back the outdoor light on her house because I don’t have one on that side of my house and hers shines on the outdoor sink that I do my dishes in. The last month I haven’t been able to see to do my dishes because her light went out. I also showed her my sink, which is broken and won’t turn off unless you use the knob below the sink. Its annoying, but livable, so I don’t think she is going to fix it for me.
The construction guys came Monday morning along with my maid, who has been gone the last 2 weeks! I was so happy she came back! I was trying to find another one, but to no avail, so I was doing my own laundry and dishes and was getting tired of it and I really didn’t want to mop the house (but I did clean the bathroom). She said she has been sick and then something about breastfeeding… I don’t know what that was about. The guys who came dug a huge hole in my concrete and were pulling out all this rich, dark earth, so I thought, ‘that’s some good, fertile soil. I should use that for my garden!’ So, I told the guys not to take it out and dump it wherever they were dumping it and to instead put it in my garden. Well, they decided to help me build a real garden and we borrowed the hoe from the neighbor and then collected rocks to make a barrier around it and make a nice little garden! The guys were there until the evening and one stayed a LONG time because he got stuck in the rain. It started raining a little after 5pm and then it just kept up and it got dark. I last saw him peeping in my window around 6:30. I don’t know when he left, but he must have walked home in the dark in the pouring rain (this was no light rain!). Poor guy.
The next morning, I got up late after battling with the crows on my roof before 6 and so didn’t leave the house until around 8:30, when I opened my gate, the guy who got stuck in the rain was sitting there outside my gate, so I handed him the lock to the outside gate and went on my way. I then thought about how long he probably had been sitting there. They came at 7 the morning before and most Rwandese start work as soon as the sun is up (6am), so he could have been sitting there for an hour and a half at the least! I don’t know how to say ‘knock’ in Kinyarwanda or else I would have told him its okay to knock and I’ll let him in. At work, I got really into making amazon wishlists of food I want to bring back to Rwanda with me, so didn’t leave the office until 1pm for lunch and when I went out, I found out that I was locked in the office! I only have a key to my office, not to the front door! I tried the backdoor and the side door and all were locked! I called my boss and she laughed and said she would call our receptionist, who lives nearby, to come let me out. I saw the guard/landscaper and asked him to let me out, but he didn’t have a key. He told me the key was 'wapi' and to 'ihangane'. I only had to wait 15 minutes, so it wasn’t too bad, but it was funny and a bit embarrassing. I went into town to buy a few things and ran into Madison, another PCV, while she was walking the other direction but said she was going to the market soon, so I waited for her there after shopping. While I was waiting, I bought an airtime card and the guy scratched it for me and I won a bandana! I haven’t bought airtime in a long time, so I didn’t even know they were having this promotion. The guy selling the card said he didn’t have one and then tried to take the card from me. I took it back and then he said, ‘okay, go to the store and they’ll give it to you’. Madison and I walked over there and picked up my free, bright yellow bandana. We then went to the market and sat in the café and had lunch. After lunch we waited for the VSO volunteer to come in and then sat together for a while talking and then two more VSO walked in and sat with us. We were at the café about 5 hours! But the TV was on and we had a fun time laughing at the ridiculous music videos that were showing and then the stupid MTV shows, Punk’d and Room Raiders and I stole some movies from Madison’s external hard drive. Madison came back to my house for a bit before her bus left.
Saturday, I went to a wedding of a friend of a friend. One weekend a couple months ago the lady next to me on the bus started talking to me, then stole my iPod for an hour and we exchanged numbers. Well, turns out she works at the church next door to me, so I have run into her on occasion in town or on the road on her way to work, so one time she invited me to the wedding of the girl who was sitting on the bus beside her. They go to the same church. I said sure and she gave me an invitation. I see her all the time and she’s one of my only ‘friends’ in town and I live right next door to the church, so I felt obliged to go. I showed up 40 minutes late, but the pastor was still preaching away. He was up on stage while the two couples (they do simultaneous weddings here) were sitting below him facing the crowd. Both grooms had on white suits with red shirts underneath. But not just any white suit, shiny white suits! One was pin striped with satin or something shiny, the other was just all over shiny and the red shirts beneath were satin as well, so they were shining away! The groom that I was there for had a bright red shiny shirt, with a white and gold brocade tie (it looked kind of like a curtain or some sort of upholstery), the other groom had a more subdued, darker red, but it was still satiny and shiny (I don’t remember what his tie was like). The pastor was talking to the husbands telling them to respect their wives and something about not beating them because they are now one and one cannot beat oneself. Then he came down to the couples and they swore to love each other forever, exchanged rings (while reading vows off of a piece of paper) and then the grooms lifted their brides veils to show the crowd how beautiful their wives were. They did it soooo slowly though. It was funny. The grooms slowly rolled up the veils and then… nothing. No kiss. Nothing. They just stood there. The best man and maid of honor kept wiping the faces of the couples and fixing their clothes and jewelry, all on camera and in front of us all. It was strange. Then the couples got down on their knees and people stood around them and prayed and then a giant dancing party showed up and the collection bowl was set out, not for the couples, but for the church like it was regular Sunday. The pastor had all the married people in the church stand up and wave to the new couples to welcome them into their new life as married people and then had us single people stand up and wave goodbye to them.
After the church ceremony, we all drove over to the museum and took pictures in the gardens and with the kings palace house. I didn’t bring my camera cause I figured I wouldn’t need it, this being the 5th wedding I’ve been to and I don’t really know the couple, but now am I so upset! They were really nice pictures and we took ones in front of the house and in the house. They kept pulling me into the pictures and I wasn’t dressed all that fancy, so I felt a bit self-conscious. We went to the Petit Prince hotel afterwards for the reception and they had a huge cake stand with 8+ cakes and a banana tree in the middle of the cake stand and they had tied bunches of small bananas to the tree. The bride and groom fed each other wine and then went over to the tree and picked a banana and fed it to the other. Everyone got very excited at this point and were all yelling and whistling at the couple. The choir came and sang songs, they cut up the cakes and passed out pieces of it with napkins and we all drank sodas. Then I decided I had enough (it was about 4 hours by this time) and was supposed to meet up with the RPCV who has moved to Butare and was already 20 minutes late, so I told my friend that I had to go and she pointed out to me the way I should walk. It was a nice, quiet walk; not many people around.
Met up with Richard (the RPCV) a while later and we went into town and met up with 3 of his friends from Kigali who spent the day hiking in Nyungwe and were spending the night in Butare. We had dinner and then were going to go get drinks, but they were charging a cover and we refused on principle. So, we went to Richard’s house instead and I got to see it and we had a beer on the balcony overlooking the valley. Then I walked home with a headlamp.
My new friend calls me by my Kinyarwanda name only. All during the wedding she would introduce me as Mukobwajana, or when she needed to get my attention she’d call it out and I had no problem responding immediately. I really respond to that name now and know that if I hear it someone is talking to me. At the PC office, in the official PC database, my name is Kimbrel, Alicia Mukobwajana! Haha Everyone always asks the same questions when they hear my name. "do you know what it means?" and even if I say yes, I know what my name means, i've had it for two years, they still explain it to me. Its annoying. I know what my name means!!!!
On Sunday, my landlady came over and told me that they’d have to construct something at my house to catch the rainwater. She said they would come on Monday and I said that was fine, and they could come at 7. There were a lot of other words exchanged, but I don’t know what she said, and she doesn’t know what I said. She speaks a lot of French to me and honestly, its more confusing than if she’d just speak Kinya. When she was leaving she said that she would call my boss, Jeanne (I’m guess to explain to her, so she could explain to me in English). Later that day, she showed up again with the village leader. He is a lecturer at the University, so he speaks English well and he explained to me that they’re fixing the roads, so my rain water can’t go out onto the road anymore, so they have to build a rainwater catchment thing. Then he told me that I had to turn on my outdoor light every evening to make the street safer for those who walk along it. He said there are thieves on the road, but that they come from Save, a neighboring town, not Butare. He was very insistent on this point. haha. I asked him to ask my landlady to put back the outdoor light on her house because I don’t have one on that side of my house and hers shines on the outdoor sink that I do my dishes in. The last month I haven’t been able to see to do my dishes because her light went out. I also showed her my sink, which is broken and won’t turn off unless you use the knob below the sink. Its annoying, but livable, so I don’t think she is going to fix it for me.
The construction guys came Monday morning along with my maid, who has been gone the last 2 weeks! I was so happy she came back! I was trying to find another one, but to no avail, so I was doing my own laundry and dishes and was getting tired of it and I really didn’t want to mop the house (but I did clean the bathroom). She said she has been sick and then something about breastfeeding… I don’t know what that was about. The guys who came dug a huge hole in my concrete and were pulling out all this rich, dark earth, so I thought, ‘that’s some good, fertile soil. I should use that for my garden!’ So, I told the guys not to take it out and dump it wherever they were dumping it and to instead put it in my garden. Well, they decided to help me build a real garden and we borrowed the hoe from the neighbor and then collected rocks to make a barrier around it and make a nice little garden! The guys were there until the evening and one stayed a LONG time because he got stuck in the rain. It started raining a little after 5pm and then it just kept up and it got dark. I last saw him peeping in my window around 6:30. I don’t know when he left, but he must have walked home in the dark in the pouring rain (this was no light rain!). Poor guy.
The next morning, I got up late after battling with the crows on my roof before 6 and so didn’t leave the house until around 8:30, when I opened my gate, the guy who got stuck in the rain was sitting there outside my gate, so I handed him the lock to the outside gate and went on my way. I then thought about how long he probably had been sitting there. They came at 7 the morning before and most Rwandese start work as soon as the sun is up (6am), so he could have been sitting there for an hour and a half at the least! I don’t know how to say ‘knock’ in Kinyarwanda or else I would have told him its okay to knock and I’ll let him in. At work, I got really into making amazon wishlists of food I want to bring back to Rwanda with me, so didn’t leave the office until 1pm for lunch and when I went out, I found out that I was locked in the office! I only have a key to my office, not to the front door! I tried the backdoor and the side door and all were locked! I called my boss and she laughed and said she would call our receptionist, who lives nearby, to come let me out. I saw the guard/landscaper and asked him to let me out, but he didn’t have a key. He told me the key was 'wapi' and to 'ihangane'. I only had to wait 15 minutes, so it wasn’t too bad, but it was funny and a bit embarrassing. I went into town to buy a few things and ran into Madison, another PCV, while she was walking the other direction but said she was going to the market soon, so I waited for her there after shopping. While I was waiting, I bought an airtime card and the guy scratched it for me and I won a bandana! I haven’t bought airtime in a long time, so I didn’t even know they were having this promotion. The guy selling the card said he didn’t have one and then tried to take the card from me. I took it back and then he said, ‘okay, go to the store and they’ll give it to you’. Madison and I walked over there and picked up my free, bright yellow bandana. We then went to the market and sat in the café and had lunch. After lunch we waited for the VSO volunteer to come in and then sat together for a while talking and then two more VSO walked in and sat with us. We were at the café about 5 hours! But the TV was on and we had a fun time laughing at the ridiculous music videos that were showing and then the stupid MTV shows, Punk’d and Room Raiders and I stole some movies from Madison’s external hard drive. Madison came back to my house for a bit before her bus left.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Last week
Tuesday, I called Abdoul to meet up with him for lunch because he called the night before and wanted to get together and I don’t like leaving my house after dark. He ended up being about 20 minutes late, and since I went to a buffet place to eat, I was finished by the time he came. The buffet place I had never been before, and while I was dishing myself food, a lady came to me and said its 600 francs if she serves me, and 900 if I do it myself. I think they do that because here when people serve themselves they take a massive amount of food! But I wasn’t getting meat or half of the carbs they were serving, so I didn’t want her to serve me because she would load my plate with carbs and give me meat, so I said I would do it myself. Then she asked me after I was done if I was having meat and I said no, and I thought she said it was cheaper without meat. So, when I was leaving, she was no where to be found and I just left 700 francs on the table, cause I took a normal amount of food and no meat, and went to the supermarket to buy some things. She tracked me down and demanded the other 200 and I didn’t have any, so I had to break a bill and give it to her. It was stupid. The rules here are ridiculous. I took a small amount of food and no meat, so I don’t think I should have had to pay 900, but I did in the end. Abdoul finally called while I was at the market and we met at the café in the supermarket and ran into two VSO volunteers. We sat with them and Abdoul ordered lunch and then another VSO showed up, so we had a big table of people. We hung out for a while, while they were eating, talking and I found out that one of the VSO, the last one to arrive, lives here in Butare, so we exchanged numbers and now I might have another friend! She was pretty cool. I wandered around town for a bit and saw the other 2 VSO getting onto their motor bike (yeah, they are not only allowed to ride motos, they get to drive them too!) and so I helped them with their bags while they got on and watched them drive away. Ran into a PCV on her way back to site and then went home and did my laundry and dishes (my maid hasn’t showed up in two weeks), talked to mom and read a bit, before getting a text from the RPCV I had dinner with last week asking if I wanted to meet up. I met him and one of his friends at a motel for drinks and they got brochettes and beer and some chips, which I helped out on. We got one plate of chips and they each got a brochette, then we were still hungry (it was about 7pm), so ordered another plate of chips and he got one more brochette and his friend left. They brought two plates of chips and two brochettes! I guess they know the guy and gave them for free and we did end up almost finishing both plates. I got a call from another PCV who was staying in town that night with her parents and met up with her after leaving the motel and they were having fondue! I didn’t know that we had fondue in this town! It was just the hot oil fondue to cook meat, but they offered me some salad (which I took gratefully to try and get some thing other than fried potato into me) and we had a nice night talking and they bought me dessert and then drove me home! It was a nice night meeting up with so many people. I got home at 10:30pm. I usually get home from work, eat lunch, read for hours, cook dinner and watch something on my computer before going to bed, so it was a nice interruption to my ‘routine’.
Spent Halloween weekend in Kigali. We went to a place called One Love and it was filled with people in costume. It was a lot of fun. We danced and met new people and just had a lot of fun. I dressed up as a Chilean miner (which was easy cause I just put on my hiking boots, my headlamp and tied a rope around me with a carabiner), Adam went as Clayton Bigsby from Chappelle Show and there were a lot of other funny costumes, such as a girl who was John Benet Ramsey, a Baobab tree, a shower, a disco ball, etc.
On the way back from Kigali, I got a double seat to myself and was so excited, until we went down the hill and a grandma with TWO kids got into the seat next to me! It was the seat over the wheel, so there is very little legroom. She sat in the seat, put her legs up on the wheel, then put one of the kids on her lap and the other between her and me on the seat. They were small, so didn’t take up a lot of space, but still. Then someone was bringing back a giant number of cushions, so the guy next to me put one on his flippy seat, the guy next to him put one under his bum, one behind him and one on the side of him next to the window. Then the rest were passed around for people to sit on and a group of 5 tied together were placed in the doorway of the bus. Halfway home, the guy in the flippy seat got off the bus, so I put the girl next to me in the flippy seat, only to have to put her back 5 minutes later when we stopped and picked up more people. Then the girl got tired and leaned forward and rested her head between my backpack on my lap and the seat in front of us. It looked so uncomfortable, she was leaned to the side with her head wedged between the seat and the backpack, so I pulled her up and just had her lay on me; but then I got really hot and the villagers on the bus hate wind. There was one guy who was fighting with the others about keeping his window open because it was hot and they don’t like wind, no matter if they’re sweating or not. I liked that guy.
Spent Halloween weekend in Kigali. We went to a place called One Love and it was filled with people in costume. It was a lot of fun. We danced and met new people and just had a lot of fun. I dressed up as a Chilean miner (which was easy cause I just put on my hiking boots, my headlamp and tied a rope around me with a carabiner), Adam went as Clayton Bigsby from Chappelle Show and there were a lot of other funny costumes, such as a girl who was John Benet Ramsey, a Baobab tree, a shower, a disco ball, etc.
On the way back from Kigali, I got a double seat to myself and was so excited, until we went down the hill and a grandma with TWO kids got into the seat next to me! It was the seat over the wheel, so there is very little legroom. She sat in the seat, put her legs up on the wheel, then put one of the kids on her lap and the other between her and me on the seat. They were small, so didn’t take up a lot of space, but still. Then someone was bringing back a giant number of cushions, so the guy next to me put one on his flippy seat, the guy next to him put one under his bum, one behind him and one on the side of him next to the window. Then the rest were passed around for people to sit on and a group of 5 tied together were placed in the doorway of the bus. Halfway home, the guy in the flippy seat got off the bus, so I put the girl next to me in the flippy seat, only to have to put her back 5 minutes later when we stopped and picked up more people. Then the girl got tired and leaned forward and rested her head between my backpack on my lap and the seat in front of us. It looked so uncomfortable, she was leaned to the side with her head wedged between the seat and the backpack, so I pulled her up and just had her lay on me; but then I got really hot and the villagers on the bus hate wind. There was one guy who was fighting with the others about keeping his window open because it was hot and they don’t like wind, no matter if they’re sweating or not. I liked that guy.
Monday, October 25, 2010
War with crows, RPCV, solo field visit, graduation
I've been in a war with the crows that land on my roof. They are so loud!!! They land with a crash, then click along my tin roof with their talons and just make it impossible to sleep! I get woken up anywhere between 5:30-7am, usually right at 6am. I don’t usually get up until 7, so it’s very annoying. I have been getting up, throwing rocks at them and then crawling back into bed. One morning though, they jumped on the roof around 5:50 and came back 4 times! So, I had to get up, put on slippers, unlock the door, grab a rock and throw it, go back in, lock the door and climb back into bed 4 separate times!!!! It was so annoying. I HATE those birds. Adam came one weekend and I ended up getting sick Friday night, so we pretty much just hung out at the house all weekend while I rested. Pretty boring. I felt bad. He left Sunday because he has a work meeting with Tony Blair. yeah, on a sunday! And I got a call from some co-workers after he left asking if I wanted them to drive me to my driver's wedding. I quickly showered and dressed and walked over to my office and found two of the boys there. We waited for a while, walked to the main road and jumped in the car. there were already 5 people in it, with 10 cakes! The boys all got in the back and I ended up with one cake in each hand in the back seat with two other women, one who had a platter of 3 cakes on her lap, the other with two in her hands like me. We hit a bump and the girl next to me with the cakes in her hands smashed the cake into her chest! The other two of us with her in the back started laughing uncontrollably, while trying not to because we felt bad that she was now COVERED in frosting (we ALL had frosting on us, but she was covered now). I had frosting on my neck (?!), on my sweater and my bag when we finally arrived. The wedding was quick and painless and I got a ride home from my boss who lives near me.
I got a call Tuesday from a PCV in the East asking if I wanted a free beer from a RPCV from Benin who just moved to Rwanda and was in Butare for the night. I of course said yes, and told him to give my number to the guy. He called and we met up at one of the hotels where we had beers and dinner. Abdoul ran into us and so sat with us and he bought Abdoul dinner and a soda as well. It was really nice of him and we had a good conversation. He'll be here about 10 months working at the university on a Fulbright scholarship.
I got to go out to the field by myself for the first time last week. Everyone was very busy and they told me to go by myself, so the driver and I went and I had him come in with me in case I needed a translator. I did. I collected their reports, gave them the work plans and had them fill them out for the next month and did all the usual tasks, then asked if anyone had questions. Most of them were confused a bit by the method beads we handed out last month. They’re a family planning method like the rhythm method, but using beads so it’s a bit easier. I explained it to them using a mix of Kinyarwanda and English, which my driver translated for me. They were confused on how to use it and also had some questions about other methods and which are the best to use and where they can get the beads. A lot of what we do is in collaboration with the ministry of health. We take what they want to be taught and give the information to the health agents to spread in the community. So, with the method beads, the villagers who are taught about them want to have the beads and ask where they can buy them, but they are available for free at the health center and when they go to the health center, they are able to hear about the other methods and choose which is right for them as well as get a check up to make sure they are healthy enough for the other methods (this is what I had to explain to the health agents).
I went to Kigali this weekend for Adam’s graduation from the leadership academy thing he did. It was nice, on the top floor of the Rwandan Development Board building. There were speakers and presentations and then drinks and appetizers. I went on a shopping spree the day before trying to find a dress to wear. Found a pretty coral colored strapless dress from Express, but it was a size 12! So, I looked at other dresses and found 2 that were really nice, but he wanted too much for them and so I went back and got the coral one and got it taken in and had the lining shortened (after she took it in, the lining was showing out the bottom) all for 9,000Frw! (about $15), the other dress he was wanting almost $40! It’s used! After the graduation ceremony, Adam had blackjack night with the boys, so I went and met up with Sonia and two of her friends at a restaurant in town. While we were talking, the guy sitting next to me mentioned that he works on an online database for the ministry of health, so I said, “oh, yeah I was just using one of those yesterday” and he asked which one and I told him and turns out he is the guy who I had to talk to on Thursday when my boss got confused. I was just on my computer, having no idea what she is doing and she comes up to me and asks me to help her and hands me the phone. So, the majority of the time I was on the phone, I was talking with my boss trying to figure out what she wanted me to ask the guy! It was a bit embarrassing and I felt bad for him, especially because it turned out that she was on a different webpage and he had no idea of that database and was wondering why we called him to explain someone else’s webpage… It turned out ok once I realized that we shouldn’t be talking to this guy about this and I hung up. So, that night we laughed together about it and when he was leaving he yelled back to me “I’ll talk to you later!”, haha. We then went over to a guy’s house and everyone there was francophone, so I felt a little dumb that I wasn’t fluent in French and was just standing around nodding my head. It was a beautiful house though! His dad had it built in the 60’s and it has a huge outdoor sitting area with a giant fireplace and a full bar, very good for entertaining. I want something similar when I finally buy a house. Then we went to a UN party for a guy moving to Congo. It was pretty nice, but everyone knew each other cause they all work together, so I didn't have many people to talk to. So, I danced. Met up with Adam and the boys at Papyrus afterwards.
Saturday was Adam's roommates mom's birthday, so we all went over to his parent's house for dinner and some drinks. His mom was so funny and kept trying to get all of us to eat more and to drink more. We finished a bottle of Black Label, a box of wine and thought we could make our escape, when she came out with another of each! We showed up early and the power was out except the TV was still on somehow, so we watched some TV, then all the power went out and we sat with candles talking and many more people showed up. Birthdays here are very different. The person having the birthday provided the food and drinks (instead of like in the states when your friends buy you your dinner and drinks), there was no cake or gifts (that I saw), and your children can invite their friends to your party. It was a pretty relaxing, fun time until mama Louis brought out the Tequila! But surprisingly, it was nice and smooth, didn't burn too badly and after 3 shots I was still standing! I guess the saying, 1 tequila, 2 tequila, 3 tequila, floor holds true!
Sunday, it was raining like crazy when I had to leave to catch the bus, so I decided to stay until Monday morning. Adam and I went and met up with the boys to watch the Arsenal game and then went to a fancy dinner at the new asian restaurant. I had phad thai and while it didn’t taste completely like phad thai, it was good. Adam got chicken satay for appetizer and I stole some of the sauce and it was amazing! I wish they had a veggie satay dish. Woke up early and caught the 7am bus to Butare and was at work with ample time to spare before heading out to the field. (I’m sitting at work now writing this waiting to go out.)
I got a call Tuesday from a PCV in the East asking if I wanted a free beer from a RPCV from Benin who just moved to Rwanda and was in Butare for the night. I of course said yes, and told him to give my number to the guy. He called and we met up at one of the hotels where we had beers and dinner. Abdoul ran into us and so sat with us and he bought Abdoul dinner and a soda as well. It was really nice of him and we had a good conversation. He'll be here about 10 months working at the university on a Fulbright scholarship.
I got to go out to the field by myself for the first time last week. Everyone was very busy and they told me to go by myself, so the driver and I went and I had him come in with me in case I needed a translator. I did. I collected their reports, gave them the work plans and had them fill them out for the next month and did all the usual tasks, then asked if anyone had questions. Most of them were confused a bit by the method beads we handed out last month. They’re a family planning method like the rhythm method, but using beads so it’s a bit easier. I explained it to them using a mix of Kinyarwanda and English, which my driver translated for me. They were confused on how to use it and also had some questions about other methods and which are the best to use and where they can get the beads. A lot of what we do is in collaboration with the ministry of health. We take what they want to be taught and give the information to the health agents to spread in the community. So, with the method beads, the villagers who are taught about them want to have the beads and ask where they can buy them, but they are available for free at the health center and when they go to the health center, they are able to hear about the other methods and choose which is right for them as well as get a check up to make sure they are healthy enough for the other methods (this is what I had to explain to the health agents).
I went to Kigali this weekend for Adam’s graduation from the leadership academy thing he did. It was nice, on the top floor of the Rwandan Development Board building. There were speakers and presentations and then drinks and appetizers. I went on a shopping spree the day before trying to find a dress to wear. Found a pretty coral colored strapless dress from Express, but it was a size 12! So, I looked at other dresses and found 2 that were really nice, but he wanted too much for them and so I went back and got the coral one and got it taken in and had the lining shortened (after she took it in, the lining was showing out the bottom) all for 9,000Frw! (about $15), the other dress he was wanting almost $40! It’s used! After the graduation ceremony, Adam had blackjack night with the boys, so I went and met up with Sonia and two of her friends at a restaurant in town. While we were talking, the guy sitting next to me mentioned that he works on an online database for the ministry of health, so I said, “oh, yeah I was just using one of those yesterday” and he asked which one and I told him and turns out he is the guy who I had to talk to on Thursday when my boss got confused. I was just on my computer, having no idea what she is doing and she comes up to me and asks me to help her and hands me the phone. So, the majority of the time I was on the phone, I was talking with my boss trying to figure out what she wanted me to ask the guy! It was a bit embarrassing and I felt bad for him, especially because it turned out that she was on a different webpage and he had no idea of that database and was wondering why we called him to explain someone else’s webpage… It turned out ok once I realized that we shouldn’t be talking to this guy about this and I hung up. So, that night we laughed together about it and when he was leaving he yelled back to me “I’ll talk to you later!”, haha. We then went over to a guy’s house and everyone there was francophone, so I felt a little dumb that I wasn’t fluent in French and was just standing around nodding my head. It was a beautiful house though! His dad had it built in the 60’s and it has a huge outdoor sitting area with a giant fireplace and a full bar, very good for entertaining. I want something similar when I finally buy a house. Then we went to a UN party for a guy moving to Congo. It was pretty nice, but everyone knew each other cause they all work together, so I didn't have many people to talk to. So, I danced. Met up with Adam and the boys at Papyrus afterwards.
Saturday was Adam's roommates mom's birthday, so we all went over to his parent's house for dinner and some drinks. His mom was so funny and kept trying to get all of us to eat more and to drink more. We finished a bottle of Black Label, a box of wine and thought we could make our escape, when she came out with another of each! We showed up early and the power was out except the TV was still on somehow, so we watched some TV, then all the power went out and we sat with candles talking and many more people showed up. Birthdays here are very different. The person having the birthday provided the food and drinks (instead of like in the states when your friends buy you your dinner and drinks), there was no cake or gifts (that I saw), and your children can invite their friends to your party. It was a pretty relaxing, fun time until mama Louis brought out the Tequila! But surprisingly, it was nice and smooth, didn't burn too badly and after 3 shots I was still standing! I guess the saying, 1 tequila, 2 tequila, 3 tequila, floor holds true!
Sunday, it was raining like crazy when I had to leave to catch the bus, so I decided to stay until Monday morning. Adam and I went and met up with the boys to watch the Arsenal game and then went to a fancy dinner at the new asian restaurant. I had phad thai and while it didn’t taste completely like phad thai, it was good. Adam got chicken satay for appetizer and I stole some of the sauce and it was amazing! I wish they had a veggie satay dish. Woke up early and caught the 7am bus to Butare and was at work with ample time to spare before heading out to the field. (I’m sitting at work now writing this waiting to go out.)
Beerfest!!! and other things
Monday it was 110 degrees out in the sun! HOT, but surprisingly didn’t feel excruciating. Went into work and played on the internet after writing up the plan for the nutrition component for 2011. Went out to lunch with Abdoul, then came home and read after a short workout with my jump rope. My bosses want me to teach them English, which I really don’t want to do…at all… but I said I’d do it. So, was waiting for them to come when one of them showed up at my gate saying she was trying to call to tell me she and the other couldn’t come (I was talking to mom and there’s no call waiting). Right after she left, it started raining for the first time in almost 2 weeks.
Tuesday, went into work and played on the internet again. My boss was working on the data in Excel and called me in to help her with creating a new page. It was pretty funny how easy it was, but she caught on quick, so I didn’t have to sit and go over and over it. Went and bought a few things at the shop on the way home for lunch (bread and yogurt). Pretty boring day.
Wednesday morning I was having trouble closing my lock for my gate and a lady walking by yelled up “bonjour!” so I said good morning, then told her my lock was broken and she came up to help me. While she was trying and failing, she recruited two boys walking on the road to come up and help, they couldn’t do it either and told me I needed oil, so I opened the gate and yelled over the fence at the houseboy next door for oil. He brought it, I handed my lock over the fence and he oiled it and opened and closed it a few times (after I passed him my keys). I said thank you and the boys were still waiting at my gate, while the woman had gone. I closed and locked the gate and said thanks to the boys. Surprisingly, I wasn’t that late. Same boring stuff, except that today I had to write up a summary of the nutrition program for the report and my boss asked me to summarize a paper on bereavement for her. She asked me if I was busy that day, and me hoping for some work to do said no, then she asked if I could do something for her that was personal, not work. I reluctantly agreed and ended up reading a paper on bereavement and old age and summarizing each paragraph for her. I tried to use simple language because her English isn’t very good, but it was hard sometimes because it was a technical paper. Anyways, I finished it Thursday. Neither of my bosses came in on Thursday and I don’t know why. They usually tell me when they go somewhere. So, I just was in the office by myself and I left early.
Friday, I didn’t go into work because there was a party for one of the PC staff in Kigali who is leaving back to the states. I met up with Trish in Butare and we took the bus together to Kigali. When we got in, I went up to the Chinese store and bought two pillows and pillowcases and then took the bus to Adam’s where I made jello shots for the party that night. I don’t have a fridge, so I had been holding onto this jello for months waiting for an opportunity to make it, which came when Adam was having his housewarming party. I went to the PC party and it was really fun! I was one of the first ones to arrive (as in, when I got there, there were only 20-25 people!), so I helped cook a few things. We made so much food; I was stuffed to the brim! Mini pizzas, veggie samosas, salad, chapatti quesadillas, chips and salsa, hummus, cheese dip, etc. Almost all the PC staff, from the drivers to the administrators was there along with almost all of the PCVs from the first group and Franchesca’s friends whom she had made in Kigali during her time here. We cooked, ate, talked, jumped on her giant trampoline!, played with the kids and just had a good time. When we all finally filed out, I went back to Adams to get ready for the party. He was still out doing a presentation for the leadership group and my timing was pretty good, because just as I was walking up to the gate, Louis was putting his key in. Just hung out at the house for an hour or two when everyone started showing up. We had a fun night with lots of people, including some PCVs.
Saturday, Adam woke up before me and got up and went to the market to buy stuff to make me guacamole! It was so cute. He had to google how to make it and there were no tortilla chips, so we ate it with regular chips but it was good! Some of the boys came over and sent Adam and I to pick up pizzas so we’d have full bellies for beer fest. We ate our pizzas (I wussed out and had to put mine in the fridge) and then drove over to beerfest! We were some of the first people there and as soon as you got in, there was a table with beers waiting on it, so you walk in, grab a cold beer and then continue on. We had a long night of fun and dancing. I ran into a LOT of PC people and other friends whom I haven’t seen in a while, so that was fun too. And even though everyone swore up and down that we would NOT end the night at Papyrus, we did. Sunday, we slept a lot and I went back to Butare.
Tuesday, went into work and played on the internet again. My boss was working on the data in Excel and called me in to help her with creating a new page. It was pretty funny how easy it was, but she caught on quick, so I didn’t have to sit and go over and over it. Went and bought a few things at the shop on the way home for lunch (bread and yogurt). Pretty boring day.
Wednesday morning I was having trouble closing my lock for my gate and a lady walking by yelled up “bonjour!” so I said good morning, then told her my lock was broken and she came up to help me. While she was trying and failing, she recruited two boys walking on the road to come up and help, they couldn’t do it either and told me I needed oil, so I opened the gate and yelled over the fence at the houseboy next door for oil. He brought it, I handed my lock over the fence and he oiled it and opened and closed it a few times (after I passed him my keys). I said thank you and the boys were still waiting at my gate, while the woman had gone. I closed and locked the gate and said thanks to the boys. Surprisingly, I wasn’t that late. Same boring stuff, except that today I had to write up a summary of the nutrition program for the report and my boss asked me to summarize a paper on bereavement for her. She asked me if I was busy that day, and me hoping for some work to do said no, then she asked if I could do something for her that was personal, not work. I reluctantly agreed and ended up reading a paper on bereavement and old age and summarizing each paragraph for her. I tried to use simple language because her English isn’t very good, but it was hard sometimes because it was a technical paper. Anyways, I finished it Thursday. Neither of my bosses came in on Thursday and I don’t know why. They usually tell me when they go somewhere. So, I just was in the office by myself and I left early.
Friday, I didn’t go into work because there was a party for one of the PC staff in Kigali who is leaving back to the states. I met up with Trish in Butare and we took the bus together to Kigali. When we got in, I went up to the Chinese store and bought two pillows and pillowcases and then took the bus to Adam’s where I made jello shots for the party that night. I don’t have a fridge, so I had been holding onto this jello for months waiting for an opportunity to make it, which came when Adam was having his housewarming party. I went to the PC party and it was really fun! I was one of the first ones to arrive (as in, when I got there, there were only 20-25 people!), so I helped cook a few things. We made so much food; I was stuffed to the brim! Mini pizzas, veggie samosas, salad, chapatti quesadillas, chips and salsa, hummus, cheese dip, etc. Almost all the PC staff, from the drivers to the administrators was there along with almost all of the PCVs from the first group and Franchesca’s friends whom she had made in Kigali during her time here. We cooked, ate, talked, jumped on her giant trampoline!, played with the kids and just had a good time. When we all finally filed out, I went back to Adams to get ready for the party. He was still out doing a presentation for the leadership group and my timing was pretty good, because just as I was walking up to the gate, Louis was putting his key in. Just hung out at the house for an hour or two when everyone started showing up. We had a fun night with lots of people, including some PCVs.
Saturday, Adam woke up before me and got up and went to the market to buy stuff to make me guacamole! It was so cute. He had to google how to make it and there were no tortilla chips, so we ate it with regular chips but it was good! Some of the boys came over and sent Adam and I to pick up pizzas so we’d have full bellies for beer fest. We ate our pizzas (I wussed out and had to put mine in the fridge) and then drove over to beerfest! We were some of the first people there and as soon as you got in, there was a table with beers waiting on it, so you walk in, grab a cold beer and then continue on. We had a long night of fun and dancing. I ran into a LOT of PC people and other friends whom I haven’t seen in a while, so that was fun too. And even though everyone swore up and down that we would NOT end the night at Papyrus, we did. Sunday, we slept a lot and I went back to Butare.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Work meeting in Gisenyi and other activities
Went to Kigali Friday after spending a few hours at the office alone (everyone had gone to Cyangugu for my driver’s dowry ceremony). Adam was still in class when I got there, so I sat on the steps at the gate waiting for Louis to come let me in. He found me there and just laughed at me. When Adam got home, we went over to Gavin’s house to have some drinks and dinner and then went out to the bar. Gavin is leaving on Friday, so it was his last weekend in Rwanda. Saturday, we met up with everyone at a restaurant where they were watching football, then stopped and got some food at a different place and then to a shady bar where a lot of people came. We decided Saturday would be a bar exploration night, so we went to a different one in another part of town after about two hours, had 2 drinks there where Adam and I just sat watching music videos by ourselves the last hour (there was some Michael Jackson marathon on), then went to another bar down the road for another 1-2 drinks before ending up at Papyrus to end the night. Sunday, we stayed in until evening and I made grilled cheese sandwiches on the boy’s new sandwich maker. Adam and I met Gavin for dinner at the ‘Indian’ restaurant next to his house and we were the only people there. The food is expensive and not that good, but I still feel bad for the owners that its doing so crappy. Monday, I took the bus back to Butare in the morning only to find out that we had a staff meeting in Kigali that day and I could have gotten a ride home. Why don’t they inform me about these before?!
Tuesday, I went with the head of SPREAD in the US to visit a coffee farmer whom he is friends with. When he was here (in Rwanda) last time, he took pictures of the farmer’s family and had them framed, so we went to visit him and give him the pictures. He was brewing coffee when we got there (coffee he grew himself and his wife roasted in a clay pot on the fire and then ground in a mortar) and they offered us some. I didn’t try any, but he and another coworker both tried it and the American said that it was the best coffee he has had in the country so far. Both the coffee we brew at the office (the coffee from the bag, brewed in the machine) and at the fancy hotel he is staying at are worse than this guys home grown, roasted, ground and brewed coffee. I think maybe because it’s so fresh and it was made that day from roasting to brewing. The kids were pretty cute, 6, 5 and 2 and the mom was pregnant again! I don’t think my family planning messages are working very well. After visiting them, we went to one of the coffee washing stations to see a new mushroom growing project we started where they use the coffee bean pulp to grow the mushrooms. The spores were in plastic bags on tables in a dark shed. Where they got the plastic bags is unknown, since they are illegal here, but they work really well and I don’t know how it would work using paper bags. The plastic seals in the water so you don’t have to constantly water them. Seems super easy and cheap to do and it’s a good way to get another source of protein. I’m just not sure how well they will be integrated into the Rwandese diet. I talked to the boss-man about it and he thought it would be a good idea to have a short nutrition lesson about the mushrooms along with a cooking demonstration (so they know how to cook the mushrooms) and a taste test (so they can try it and decide if they’ll be able to eat them). He wants to talk to me more about it and maybe I’ll get to design the lesson and demo!
Wednesday, had to wake up at the crack of dawn because we left at 6am to drive up north for a meeting with the other health team. We stopped in Kigali at the main SPREAD office to pick up the M&E manager and all got out and had tea and talked and filled up the back with boxes of condoms and Sur Eau, a water purifier, before getting on the road again. The drive north wasn’t too bad, but the whole day we listened to Kinyarwanda radio, they spoke in Kinyarwanda and I could only understand words and phrases, so I knew what they were talking about in general, but didn’t know the details and couldn’t participate in the conversation. By the end of the 2 days, I was so sick of Kinyarwanda! We stopped in Musanze to drop off the boxes at the office, and then went to Gisenyi to meet the others at the hotel. It was a nice hotel up on the ridge above the water, so the view was nice of the lake and Congo. We ate lunch and then worked a bit on the COP (country operation plan) together with the Musanze team. It was a bit frustrating because no one had read it yet, so I went over what I think we still needed in the plan, but when Jeanne (the head of the health program, my boss) went outside to take a phone call and told me to continue, no one listened to me. One person started playing on their computer, another got up and made a phone call, etc. I had being the underdog. If you don’t have authority in this country people don’t listen to you. So, after working for a while, we decided to go into town. We all packed into the car and drove down into town. Went into a few shops where the women wanted to find clothes and shoes, but didn’t find anything. I called Portia and met up with her and we walked around town together then she packed into the car with us and we drove around town a bit more, before driving down to the border with Congo. We got out of the car and it seemed like they were going to cross, but didn’t and we all packed into the car again and drove along the lake before heading back up into town and dropping Portia off at home. I was hoping that we’d have dinner in town and then get a free meal for Portia, but we ended up eating at the hotel again. The food is surprisingly bad for such a nice hotel. I ate just veggies and French fries for dinner. The next morning, we met again and finished up the COP and then worked on the Work Plan for 2011. They were all speaking Kinyarwanda to each other and then would give me a short summary of what they said, so I just sat on my computer writing up other things and cleaning up my iTunes. We had lunch and then took off to go back to Butare. We stopped in Musanze so they could go to the market, which I guess has cheaper potatoes. We were there for almost an hour as they shopped and I sat in the car with the driver. We stopped again at a roadside market, where they bought pineapples, sugar cane and some meat. Then again at a shop where I and others bought some biscuits. We didn’t stop again after that, thank goodness, until we got to Kigali to drop of the M&E guy. The sun was setting as we got to Kigali and theres one part of the road that goes along the ridge of a hill, so as we were driving along, I looked down and the light was reflecting off of the river below in the valley and it was beautiful! It was just a long slither of sliver across the land. We got into Kigali and dropped off the guy and I was kicking myself for not packing enough for the weekend so I could just stay at Adam’s that night. Didn’t get back into Butare until 9:30pm! I quickly ate some ramen noodles, brushed my teeth and went to bed.
Had to wake up at 5:30 the next morning to go into Kigali for a meeting at 9. We got into Kigali, dropped Beta off at the Sotra bus station so she could pick up a book she sent earlier in the week and then waited for the woman from the Musanze to arrive on her bus to drive with her to the meeting. We were a few minutes late, but were still one of the first ones to arrive. As we sat waiting, we looked over the powerpoint print out they had given us and realized that there wasn’t anything for the health programs on it. After about 15 minutes of the meeting, we realized that we were in the wrong meeting! They sent us an email asking us to come on October first, so it wasn’t our fault, but it was still embarrassing telling the lady. The worst was when she asked us questions about the coffee farming and we just sat there silent and then let out a small ‘I don’t know’ before revealing the error. We still sat through the meeting because there was no one from the agriculture department there, and I thought it might be necessary information for them, so I stayed to take notes. Martin then drove me to Adam’s and dropped me off. He was sick in bed, so I just hung out at the house watching things on his computer, until later in the evening when we went to MTN center for drinks. There we met Adam’s ‘big bro’ and talked with him about his wife and baby. I need to go see the baby again, she’s so frickin cute! One of the guys there who Adam knows bought me a shot of scotch; it was hard to drink! Got home at a reasonable 3:30. Saturday, we hung out at the house for a while but it was sooo hot! Sunny wanted to go swimming, but I didn’t have my suit with me. We went over to Penny’s house for a little bit before heading over to a houseparty for a girl Adam knows that’s leaving to Canada. It was super fancy and the guards at the door had a list of names of people who could get in. Minega and some of the other boys didn’t RSVP, so Adam had to find the host and she had to go to the gate to let them in. It was a fun party. Afterwards, we went to Papyrus and got home around 6am! It was light out. I had to take the bus back to Butare that day, but didn’t make it out of Adam’s house until around 5pm. The bus back was dark and boring because my iPod was dead and it was too dark to read my book. We ended up dropping off a lot of people along the way, which slowed down the bus and then we picked up some villagers and had to drop them at various points along the road. I didn’t get home until 8:30! I made pasta, watched Mad Men and went to bed.
Tuesday, I went with the head of SPREAD in the US to visit a coffee farmer whom he is friends with. When he was here (in Rwanda) last time, he took pictures of the farmer’s family and had them framed, so we went to visit him and give him the pictures. He was brewing coffee when we got there (coffee he grew himself and his wife roasted in a clay pot on the fire and then ground in a mortar) and they offered us some. I didn’t try any, but he and another coworker both tried it and the American said that it was the best coffee he has had in the country so far. Both the coffee we brew at the office (the coffee from the bag, brewed in the machine) and at the fancy hotel he is staying at are worse than this guys home grown, roasted, ground and brewed coffee. I think maybe because it’s so fresh and it was made that day from roasting to brewing. The kids were pretty cute, 6, 5 and 2 and the mom was pregnant again! I don’t think my family planning messages are working very well. After visiting them, we went to one of the coffee washing stations to see a new mushroom growing project we started where they use the coffee bean pulp to grow the mushrooms. The spores were in plastic bags on tables in a dark shed. Where they got the plastic bags is unknown, since they are illegal here, but they work really well and I don’t know how it would work using paper bags. The plastic seals in the water so you don’t have to constantly water them. Seems super easy and cheap to do and it’s a good way to get another source of protein. I’m just not sure how well they will be integrated into the Rwandese diet. I talked to the boss-man about it and he thought it would be a good idea to have a short nutrition lesson about the mushrooms along with a cooking demonstration (so they know how to cook the mushrooms) and a taste test (so they can try it and decide if they’ll be able to eat them). He wants to talk to me more about it and maybe I’ll get to design the lesson and demo!
Wednesday, had to wake up at the crack of dawn because we left at 6am to drive up north for a meeting with the other health team. We stopped in Kigali at the main SPREAD office to pick up the M&E manager and all got out and had tea and talked and filled up the back with boxes of condoms and Sur Eau, a water purifier, before getting on the road again. The drive north wasn’t too bad, but the whole day we listened to Kinyarwanda radio, they spoke in Kinyarwanda and I could only understand words and phrases, so I knew what they were talking about in general, but didn’t know the details and couldn’t participate in the conversation. By the end of the 2 days, I was so sick of Kinyarwanda! We stopped in Musanze to drop off the boxes at the office, and then went to Gisenyi to meet the others at the hotel. It was a nice hotel up on the ridge above the water, so the view was nice of the lake and Congo. We ate lunch and then worked a bit on the COP (country operation plan) together with the Musanze team. It was a bit frustrating because no one had read it yet, so I went over what I think we still needed in the plan, but when Jeanne (the head of the health program, my boss) went outside to take a phone call and told me to continue, no one listened to me. One person started playing on their computer, another got up and made a phone call, etc. I had being the underdog. If you don’t have authority in this country people don’t listen to you. So, after working for a while, we decided to go into town. We all packed into the car and drove down into town. Went into a few shops where the women wanted to find clothes and shoes, but didn’t find anything. I called Portia and met up with her and we walked around town together then she packed into the car with us and we drove around town a bit more, before driving down to the border with Congo. We got out of the car and it seemed like they were going to cross, but didn’t and we all packed into the car again and drove along the lake before heading back up into town and dropping Portia off at home. I was hoping that we’d have dinner in town and then get a free meal for Portia, but we ended up eating at the hotel again. The food is surprisingly bad for such a nice hotel. I ate just veggies and French fries for dinner. The next morning, we met again and finished up the COP and then worked on the Work Plan for 2011. They were all speaking Kinyarwanda to each other and then would give me a short summary of what they said, so I just sat on my computer writing up other things and cleaning up my iTunes. We had lunch and then took off to go back to Butare. We stopped in Musanze so they could go to the market, which I guess has cheaper potatoes. We were there for almost an hour as they shopped and I sat in the car with the driver. We stopped again at a roadside market, where they bought pineapples, sugar cane and some meat. Then again at a shop where I and others bought some biscuits. We didn’t stop again after that, thank goodness, until we got to Kigali to drop of the M&E guy. The sun was setting as we got to Kigali and theres one part of the road that goes along the ridge of a hill, so as we were driving along, I looked down and the light was reflecting off of the river below in the valley and it was beautiful! It was just a long slither of sliver across the land. We got into Kigali and dropped off the guy and I was kicking myself for not packing enough for the weekend so I could just stay at Adam’s that night. Didn’t get back into Butare until 9:30pm! I quickly ate some ramen noodles, brushed my teeth and went to bed.
Had to wake up at 5:30 the next morning to go into Kigali for a meeting at 9. We got into Kigali, dropped Beta off at the Sotra bus station so she could pick up a book she sent earlier in the week and then waited for the woman from the Musanze to arrive on her bus to drive with her to the meeting. We were a few minutes late, but were still one of the first ones to arrive. As we sat waiting, we looked over the powerpoint print out they had given us and realized that there wasn’t anything for the health programs on it. After about 15 minutes of the meeting, we realized that we were in the wrong meeting! They sent us an email asking us to come on October first, so it wasn’t our fault, but it was still embarrassing telling the lady. The worst was when she asked us questions about the coffee farming and we just sat there silent and then let out a small ‘I don’t know’ before revealing the error. We still sat through the meeting because there was no one from the agriculture department there, and I thought it might be necessary information for them, so I stayed to take notes. Martin then drove me to Adam’s and dropped me off. He was sick in bed, so I just hung out at the house watching things on his computer, until later in the evening when we went to MTN center for drinks. There we met Adam’s ‘big bro’ and talked with him about his wife and baby. I need to go see the baby again, she’s so frickin cute! One of the guys there who Adam knows bought me a shot of scotch; it was hard to drink! Got home at a reasonable 3:30. Saturday, we hung out at the house for a while but it was sooo hot! Sunny wanted to go swimming, but I didn’t have my suit with me. We went over to Penny’s house for a little bit before heading over to a houseparty for a girl Adam knows that’s leaving to Canada. It was super fancy and the guards at the door had a list of names of people who could get in. Minega and some of the other boys didn’t RSVP, so Adam had to find the host and she had to go to the gate to let them in. It was a fun party. Afterwards, we went to Papyrus and got home around 6am! It was light out. I had to take the bus back to Butare that day, but didn’t make it out of Adam’s house until around 5pm. The bus back was dark and boring because my iPod was dead and it was too dark to read my book. We ended up dropping off a lot of people along the way, which slowed down the bus and then we picked up some villagers and had to drop them at various points along the road. I didn’t get home until 8:30! I made pasta, watched Mad Men and went to bed.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Last two weeks
Adam came to visit and we went to Abdoul’s for an Eid party. It was pouring rain and we got pretty wet on the way. He invited a LOT of people and didn’t think of where to fit them all if it was raining, so we all tried to squish into the house. It was kind of funny. We ate dinner and drank some fanta and chatted with people around us waiting for the rain to end so we could make a break for it. There was a lull in the rain, so we ran out and tried to get transport back into town. I got about half way there when the rain started again. We got soaked and sat at the bar freezing! Saturday, we didn’t do much. Went and had some food at the hotel and saw Adam’s housemate’s little brother. Sunday, it was just raining and raining all day. Didn’t leave the house and the power went out so I couldn’t cook anything (have an electric kettle and a hot plate only), so we ate a bag of goldfish crackers (thanks g-ma and auntie terri!), then around 3pm, we went and got some real food and adam got on the bus to go back to Kigali.
I taught another group of peer educators the permagardening and nutrition the next week and this time had two students from the university to help me. We started on Tuesday for two days with the Youth PEs and then thursday and Friday with the adults. Thursday after work, I went out to get a drink with the students and they took me to a bar I didn’t know existed, so that was fun. I always like finding new places to go. It was called the forest bar or something to that point, because it was in the middle of nowhere surrounded by trees. It was cold! We had two drinks each and I called Abdoul because I figured he’d be at the University studying, so he came and joined us for the second round. Then Abdoul and I went to dinner. Friday, we left the training early (didn’t eat the free lunch) so that Martin, my driver, and I could catch our buses to Kigali. Mama Adam was in town and I met Adam, Louis and her at the big supermarket where they were buying things for the new house. After shopping, we went and got some dinner then met up with others for drinks at a bar none of us had ever been to. It was a little shady, so we decided to go to the nicer bar that we knew of down the road, but it was closed, so we ended up in some hole in the wall that was actually really fun! By the end of the night (early morning) we were the only ones there and the bar keeps seemed more than ready to go home and sleep (one fell asleep in a chair by the door). Saturday, Adam took me to a BBQ for the new Young Professionals Leadership group thing he just joined. It was pretty fun and at the end of the get together, they had a drawing in which I won the main prize! I got a free pass to go see the gorillas!!! I am really excited because I haven’t done it yet and I have been wanting to since I got here. I almost went in August when Jon visited, but now I get to go for free! After that, we met up with Mama Adam, Minega and Louis for dinner at the fancy Indian restaurant and had a delicious meal; all in all, a really good night. I left Sunday back to Butare.
Monday and the rest of the week, didn’t have much to do. No trainings or anything, so just stayed in the office on the internet and working on the COP (country operational plan) that we need to turn into USAID to get our PEPFAR funding for next year. I also spent copious amounts of time trying to figure out my flight home, working both on the internet and on the phone with mom, but finally got it and I’ll be home November 24th for 2 weeks! Wednesday, a friend from Nyamasheke came and stayed at my house for the night with her friend who was in PC Jamacia. We hung out at the house, got bored and went out for drinks at the motel near me. We saw lightning and heard thunder, but decided to go anyways, since it was close. Well, we got trapped in a little hut thing outside with the rain blowing in and the thunder and lightning interrupting our conversation. We got sick of the rain blowing on us, so we up-ended the table to block the doorway. There was a small lull in the storm, so we ran to pay and to get home, made it just in time! The rain pick back up ferociously right after we got in the door (after I slipped and fell, again!). We made popcorn and just hung out for a few hours talking when the power went out. It came back on not too much later and then we decided to call it a night and go to bed. Oh, and the RPCV from Jamacia did some laundry that night before we went out to the motel…needless to say it was soaked! They stayed for a bit the next day and Katy and I went to the office to use the internet, while her friend went to the museum to check it out. Afterwards, we went to have lunch and then to the ice cream shop. I got hot chocolate instead. There, we met a white guy who Katy had met a few weeks before at the airport and he is with an organization here who works on gardens for nutrition, so we got talking about our work together and he gave me some documents that he thought might be helpful. He was really cool. Went back to my house to get their bags and saw 8 monkeys jumping around outside at the neighbor's.
I taught another group of peer educators the permagardening and nutrition the next week and this time had two students from the university to help me. We started on Tuesday for two days with the Youth PEs and then thursday and Friday with the adults. Thursday after work, I went out to get a drink with the students and they took me to a bar I didn’t know existed, so that was fun. I always like finding new places to go. It was called the forest bar or something to that point, because it was in the middle of nowhere surrounded by trees. It was cold! We had two drinks each and I called Abdoul because I figured he’d be at the University studying, so he came and joined us for the second round. Then Abdoul and I went to dinner. Friday, we left the training early (didn’t eat the free lunch) so that Martin, my driver, and I could catch our buses to Kigali. Mama Adam was in town and I met Adam, Louis and her at the big supermarket where they were buying things for the new house. After shopping, we went and got some dinner then met up with others for drinks at a bar none of us had ever been to. It was a little shady, so we decided to go to the nicer bar that we knew of down the road, but it was closed, so we ended up in some hole in the wall that was actually really fun! By the end of the night (early morning) we were the only ones there and the bar keeps seemed more than ready to go home and sleep (one fell asleep in a chair by the door). Saturday, Adam took me to a BBQ for the new Young Professionals Leadership group thing he just joined. It was pretty fun and at the end of the get together, they had a drawing in which I won the main prize! I got a free pass to go see the gorillas!!! I am really excited because I haven’t done it yet and I have been wanting to since I got here. I almost went in August when Jon visited, but now I get to go for free! After that, we met up with Mama Adam, Minega and Louis for dinner at the fancy Indian restaurant and had a delicious meal; all in all, a really good night. I left Sunday back to Butare.
Monday and the rest of the week, didn’t have much to do. No trainings or anything, so just stayed in the office on the internet and working on the COP (country operational plan) that we need to turn into USAID to get our PEPFAR funding for next year. I also spent copious amounts of time trying to figure out my flight home, working both on the internet and on the phone with mom, but finally got it and I’ll be home November 24th for 2 weeks! Wednesday, a friend from Nyamasheke came and stayed at my house for the night with her friend who was in PC Jamacia. We hung out at the house, got bored and went out for drinks at the motel near me. We saw lightning and heard thunder, but decided to go anyways, since it was close. Well, we got trapped in a little hut thing outside with the rain blowing in and the thunder and lightning interrupting our conversation. We got sick of the rain blowing on us, so we up-ended the table to block the doorway. There was a small lull in the storm, so we ran to pay and to get home, made it just in time! The rain pick back up ferociously right after we got in the door (after I slipped and fell, again!). We made popcorn and just hung out for a few hours talking when the power went out. It came back on not too much later and then we decided to call it a night and go to bed. Oh, and the RPCV from Jamacia did some laundry that night before we went out to the motel…needless to say it was soaked! They stayed for a bit the next day and Katy and I went to the office to use the internet, while her friend went to the museum to check it out. Afterwards, we went to have lunch and then to the ice cream shop. I got hot chocolate instead. There, we met a white guy who Katy had met a few weeks before at the airport and he is with an organization here who works on gardens for nutrition, so we got talking about our work together and he gave me some documents that he thought might be helpful. He was really cool. Went back to my house to get their bags and saw 8 monkeys jumping around outside at the neighbor's.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
My forgetfulness strikes again
The rain has returned. First rain was last Sunday. Felt a few drops while getting my bus ticket back to Butare, thought something pooped on me. There have been ‘teaser’ clouds for a while, but no rain, so when I saw the clouds that morning, I didn’t think it’d actually rain. That night during the blackout, it started raining, not very hard and not for very long, but enough that the dust was a bit diminished the next morning. Also, when I got on the bus, I was sitting in a double seat with my bag next to me, because I was just going to wait for the bus to fill up before moving it to my lap, and I heard this guy say in Kinyarwanda when he got on the bus that he was going to sit next to the white girl and practice his English. There were a million empty seats on the bus, so I was a little annoyed and I was tired from the weekend, so I did not want to be chatting the whole two hours with some random guy. He sat down and asked me a few questions, which I answered, then he said something about us talking and I said “no, I’m very tired” and he asked, “so, we’re going to sit the whole two hours not speaking?” and I just said “yes.” I’m a bit mean, but I just wasn’t in the mood for a conversation with someone I don’t know and who doesn’t speak English well. It’s tiring always trying to figure out what they’re saying and how to phrase your sentences in a way that they’d be able to understand. So, we didn’t speak and I think he was actually pretty mad at me. I thought about at one point turning and talking to him, but didn’t want to start a long convo and by the time I actually wanted to, it was too late to bring up again something he said an hour ago.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Nutrition Training and Permagardens
I spent the weekend after Jon left in Kigali and Sunday, Adam moved into the new house! Its super nice and in a perfect location, right on the bus line (which I have to take due to PC restrictions on taking motos) and within walking distance to the PC Office. Monday, I spent at the PC office finishing my nutrition project and then caught the bus back to Butare. Its still crazy to me that I can spend a whole day working either in Kigali or Butare and get to the other before dark (ok, so not the whole day, but until the 4pm bus). Much different than my previous site, where I’d have to leave early in the morning to make it to Kigali or back before dark.
I did the gender lesson again with a different group of peer educators and they had some that I didn’t agree with (along with men being the only ones with strength). They mostly all agreed that only men have intelligence and make family decisions. The other two times I taught this lesson, those were put into the ‘both’ category. It was Ryan’s last week here and he wanted to go see the chimps, so we tried to figure it out, but were unable to make it. I was really excited and am disappointed it didn’t happen, but after looking into it, I now think it’s fiscally possible for me to do at a later time.
Went into Kigali Friday and met up with Adam at the new house and got to meet the new puppy! She’s super cute, black and brown with a little bit of white here and there. She’s a Rhodesian ridgeback mixed with mutt. After playing with the puppy a while, we went to meet up with a girl who is making a documentary here and needed Adam’s help getting in contact with people. Ryan came and met us there and we went to the pork place, only to find it closed. We went to a different bar instead and then out to another before coming home. Saturday, Adam had a housewarming party, so everyone came over there and we just had fun at the house. Sunday, we got woken up early by the new maid who came to see the house and she decided she wanted to start working Monday, so the mess from the housewarming party was left to fester for a day. I came home Sunday evening and the power went out for 3 ½ hours and when it finally came back on, I read for a few minutes before falling asleep on the couch and waking up in the light an hour and a half later! My computer battery wasn’t full, but still had about 3+ hours to it, so during the blackout I watched a million episodes of The Office. I have a hot plate, so was subjected to eating only things that didn’t need to be cooked, aka an orange, cashews and bread (I know, I know, really healthy!).
Monday, I started my permagarden training. It went really well and we built 3 beds in one day. I have a translator with me who is a student in the agriculture program at the national university and he was a big help! I tried to show them how to dig, and they laughed at me and took the hoe away from me to do it themselves, but there were quite a few times when I had to do it to show them how. It’s a different kind of digging, where they have to do a ‘double dig’ so I had to stop them and take the hoe and do it myself, even though my hoe’ing skills aren’t very refined. There was a lot of laughing at the muzungu trying to dig, but it was fun and productive and I think they’re buying into it. When things start growing, they’ll really be able to see how great of a technique this is and then introduce it in their own homes and in the community. During the digging, one of the women decided that my hair was too unruly and tied it up for me with one of her cloths. SPREAD provided us all with lunch, so they were happy and I am happy that I’ll have a concrete example of a meal that is not very healthy for my nutrition lesson (we ate rice, beans, spaghetti, cabbage and carrots, sauce, fries, meat and green bananas which are like a potato; so 4 carbs, one veggie dish, and two proteins). After lunch, the car was still out and so couldn’t come pick us up, so we went to catch the bus. It was a good 50m away from us when it pulled up, so my translator and I had to run to the bus with our bags and supplies (markers, flip charts, etc.)
Sitting at home after work a monkey jumped on my roof again, SO LOUD! I went out to see and he was just sitting there and then walked along my wall towards me then past me into the neighbors’. The girl next door, while I was taking my clothes off the line, saw me and started yelling nonsense, then yelled “good morning”, so I said back “good afternoon” then she said 4 times “I speak in English” all the while hiding when I’d look up. As the monkey was walking across the wall into the neighbors though, she yelled out “there’s a monkey behind you!” Where that fully developed sentence came from, I have no idea! But I was very proud of her and quite impressed.
The nutrition lesson went well. I gave them all a quiz to do before the lesson, to get their knowledge level, and my goodness it is NOT impressive! Very few got many answers correct. But now I know what needs to be taught, so that’s good. We went over the food groups and I made nutrition cards, where there’s a picture of a food an its name in Kinyarwanda. They sorted these into the food groups and then used them to make complete meals. It was sort of difficult for some of them, but by the end of it, I think it made more sense and they were able to do it on their own. I tried to teach that eating many different types of fruits and vegetables is good and eating massive amounts of carbs is not. Carbohydrates are necessary, but when a meal consists mainly of carbs, that’s not a good thing. After the nutrition lesson, we went back to the garden and added manure, compost and coal dust (for the carbon), and then ate lunch (after washing our hands, of course). We thought we’d have to take the bus again, but we just had to wait 20 minutes for the car to pick us up on the way back. About 3 minutes into the drive back to town, we saw a truck that had fallen into the ditch hood-first. So, we all got out to gawk and talk to people and find out what had happened. The guy’s tire popped and turned him into the ditch. His wife got hurt and had to go to the hospital, but he was ok. They tied the back of the truck onto the back of a bigger truck (one that hauls things) and pulled it out of the ditch. After the excitement was over, we got back into the car and drove to the office.
I repeated the same lessons, permagardening and nutrition the next two days with the youth peer educators. We didn’t make another whole permagarden, just added another bed and looked at the previous beds made by the adults. They were annoying and frustrating to work with because they just kept giggling the whole time and not really paying attention.
I did the gender lesson again with a different group of peer educators and they had some that I didn’t agree with (along with men being the only ones with strength). They mostly all agreed that only men have intelligence and make family decisions. The other two times I taught this lesson, those were put into the ‘both’ category. It was Ryan’s last week here and he wanted to go see the chimps, so we tried to figure it out, but were unable to make it. I was really excited and am disappointed it didn’t happen, but after looking into it, I now think it’s fiscally possible for me to do at a later time.
Went into Kigali Friday and met up with Adam at the new house and got to meet the new puppy! She’s super cute, black and brown with a little bit of white here and there. She’s a Rhodesian ridgeback mixed with mutt. After playing with the puppy a while, we went to meet up with a girl who is making a documentary here and needed Adam’s help getting in contact with people. Ryan came and met us there and we went to the pork place, only to find it closed. We went to a different bar instead and then out to another before coming home. Saturday, Adam had a housewarming party, so everyone came over there and we just had fun at the house. Sunday, we got woken up early by the new maid who came to see the house and she decided she wanted to start working Monday, so the mess from the housewarming party was left to fester for a day. I came home Sunday evening and the power went out for 3 ½ hours and when it finally came back on, I read for a few minutes before falling asleep on the couch and waking up in the light an hour and a half later! My computer battery wasn’t full, but still had about 3+ hours to it, so during the blackout I watched a million episodes of The Office. I have a hot plate, so was subjected to eating only things that didn’t need to be cooked, aka an orange, cashews and bread (I know, I know, really healthy!).
Monday, I started my permagarden training. It went really well and we built 3 beds in one day. I have a translator with me who is a student in the agriculture program at the national university and he was a big help! I tried to show them how to dig, and they laughed at me and took the hoe away from me to do it themselves, but there were quite a few times when I had to do it to show them how. It’s a different kind of digging, where they have to do a ‘double dig’ so I had to stop them and take the hoe and do it myself, even though my hoe’ing skills aren’t very refined. There was a lot of laughing at the muzungu trying to dig, but it was fun and productive and I think they’re buying into it. When things start growing, they’ll really be able to see how great of a technique this is and then introduce it in their own homes and in the community. During the digging, one of the women decided that my hair was too unruly and tied it up for me with one of her cloths. SPREAD provided us all with lunch, so they were happy and I am happy that I’ll have a concrete example of a meal that is not very healthy for my nutrition lesson (we ate rice, beans, spaghetti, cabbage and carrots, sauce, fries, meat and green bananas which are like a potato; so 4 carbs, one veggie dish, and two proteins). After lunch, the car was still out and so couldn’t come pick us up, so we went to catch the bus. It was a good 50m away from us when it pulled up, so my translator and I had to run to the bus with our bags and supplies (markers, flip charts, etc.)
Sitting at home after work a monkey jumped on my roof again, SO LOUD! I went out to see and he was just sitting there and then walked along my wall towards me then past me into the neighbors’. The girl next door, while I was taking my clothes off the line, saw me and started yelling nonsense, then yelled “good morning”, so I said back “good afternoon” then she said 4 times “I speak in English” all the while hiding when I’d look up. As the monkey was walking across the wall into the neighbors though, she yelled out “there’s a monkey behind you!” Where that fully developed sentence came from, I have no idea! But I was very proud of her and quite impressed.
The nutrition lesson went well. I gave them all a quiz to do before the lesson, to get their knowledge level, and my goodness it is NOT impressive! Very few got many answers correct. But now I know what needs to be taught, so that’s good. We went over the food groups and I made nutrition cards, where there’s a picture of a food an its name in Kinyarwanda. They sorted these into the food groups and then used them to make complete meals. It was sort of difficult for some of them, but by the end of it, I think it made more sense and they were able to do it on their own. I tried to teach that eating many different types of fruits and vegetables is good and eating massive amounts of carbs is not. Carbohydrates are necessary, but when a meal consists mainly of carbs, that’s not a good thing. After the nutrition lesson, we went back to the garden and added manure, compost and coal dust (for the carbon), and then ate lunch (after washing our hands, of course). We thought we’d have to take the bus again, but we just had to wait 20 minutes for the car to pick us up on the way back. About 3 minutes into the drive back to town, we saw a truck that had fallen into the ditch hood-first. So, we all got out to gawk and talk to people and find out what had happened. The guy’s tire popped and turned him into the ditch. His wife got hurt and had to go to the hospital, but he was ok. They tied the back of the truck onto the back of a bigger truck (one that hauls things) and pulled it out of the ditch. After the excitement was over, we got back into the car and drove to the office.
I repeated the same lessons, permagardening and nutrition the next two days with the youth peer educators. We didn’t make another whole permagarden, just added another bed and looked at the previous beds made by the adults. They were annoying and frustrating to work with because they just kept giggling the whole time and not really paying attention.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Jon Comes to Visit!
Thursday (12/8), I called Nicole to wish her a happy birthday, and then went into work for a few hours before jumping on a bus to meet Jon at the airport. We got really bored trying to figure out what to do in Kigali and eventually went and ate dinner at the Chinese restaurant before meeting up with Adam and the others.
Friday, we caught a bus up to Gisenyi and met up with Portia who was letting us crash at her house. We walked around town, saw areas of Gisenyi I’ve never been to before and ate some lunch. I tried asking the guy if the croque madame was made with eggs and cheese and he just kind of grunted, so I asked again to no avail and finally just asked if there was meat on it and he said yes. I asked him if I could get a sandwich with egg, cheese and tomato and he said sure (which is amazing b/c most Rwandese make you order EXACTLY what’s on the menu and you cannot change anything up! Example: I tried to get an omelet with onions, tomatoes and cheese and the guy said it was impossible, even though there was an omelet on the menu with onions and tomatoes and one with tomatoes and cheese. After a long debate and me telling him exactly how much more I would pay, he went into the kitchen and came back saying it was possible and that I should pay the amount I had previously stated). When my food came, it was an omelet with cheese, tomatoes and toast imbedded in the eggs! It was hilarious and I took a picture that I’ll try and post soon. I was a little concerned when he wrote down, in this order:
Eggs
Tomatoes
Cheese
Sandwich
I think sandwich is code for slice of bread. It was pretty tasty though. Last time I was in Gisenyi for Nicole’s birthday, I ordered an omelet with tomato, onion and cheese and I pronounce tomato the French way so as not to confuse her, but I got an omelet with onion, cheese and fries (potato). Ariko, the French word for potato sounds NOTHING like tomato (pomme de terre).
Okay, back to Gisenyi this time around. The whole omelet sandwich thing ended up being extremely expensive, so I asked to see the menu and we agreed on a fairer price afterwards (ex. A whole circle of cheese is about 2700 and he was charging me 1000 for putting a few pieces in my omelet). That night we ended up going back to the same restaurant for salads and they were pretty delicious. Saturday morning, we got up, went over to Portia’s school where she helps with the deaf education unit and since Jon is a deaf ed volunteer in Kenya, he wanted to meet some of the kids. They weren’t there that day, but we did get to see Portia’s permagarden she built with the kids. Then we walked over to the Serena (the fancy hotel on the lake) and got beach chairs on the sand and laid in the sun and swam in the lake, read some books, listened to music, ate a yummy lunch and took a nice shower. A very buff Rwandan was walking around the beach and he caught Jon’s eye and we were both staring at him when his friend walked up and asked if we would take a picture with him. Turns out he’s a model and thought we were attractive enough to take a picture with. Jon took a picture with him on his camera, so I’ll have to get the photo from him first before posting it. It was a wonderfully relaxing day. We weren’t really hungry after a day in the sun and our big lunch, so we just went and got tea and a chapatti at the restaurant next to Portia’s house for dinner. Sunday morning, we got up and went to the bus station for the bus back to Kigali. We got in around noon and ate lunch at the cheap Indian restaurant and then hopped back on a bus to Butare. We ended up running into Trish who was on the same bus as us and as we were walking up to Simba (a supermarket with an outdoor café) to get a drink before the bus, my wallet was stolen! Some jerk stole all my money, my PC ID, my ATM card and our bus tickets! I LOVED that wallet too!!!! I was super upset but knew there was nothing I could do. I think the thief was probably pretty upset that he robbed the poor muzungu in town though. My ATM receipt was in there and my PC ID, so he could see how pathetic my bank account balance was and that I was a volunteer, so hopefully he felt bad about robbing me. We were able to get on the bus anyways after explaining to the bus people that we had already paid for tickets but they were stolen, along with everything else. They were all really nice about it. We got into Butare and dropped off our bags at the my house, then went over to Abdoul’s with Ryan for a breaking of the fast with him and his family. There was lots of food and it was pretty delicious.
Monday, I took Jon into my work and introduced him to people at the office. I did a bit of work and let Jon use the internet and then we went to lunch with Ryan. After lunch the boys went to the museum and I just waited for them at the house. We hung out at the house and I cooked dinner. I made ‘biryani’ (pretty much just fried rice with Indian spices, cashew nuts and raisins). It tasted really good though! Then we watched ‘creep show’ some 80’s horror flick someone at PC office put into the case for Ghosts of Rwanda. It was terrible. We made Ryan watch Glee and he liked it! Tuesday, I taught my HIV, sexual decision-making lesson while Ryan and Jon went to Murambi, one of the genocide memorial sites. I didn’t think I could take being there again and I had to teach, so just let them go themselves. The lesson was pretty fun and I think it really got them thinking because afterwards they were all sitting and standing around discussing.
Wednesday, Jon and I stayed in Butare and walked over to the Arboretum for a short hike, had some ice cream and met up with some other PCVs who were there. We sat and chatted with them for a while and walked back into downtown together. We bought some chapatti at a restaurant and cooked fajitas for dinner with guacamole. Ryan came over again and we watched some Glee. Thursday, Jon and I went into Kigali and ate some pizza for lunch before going to the genocide memorial there. The taxi driver who drove us came in with us and went through the whole thing with us and took us back for only 5000! It was a good 2+ hours. After, we took Jon’s bags to Adam’s house and laid there for a bit before heading over to the Ethiopian restaurant for Gavin’s birthday dinner. We were so early, we sat and had a drink and they brought us small bowls of popcorn. There was a little kid there with his parents who kept trying to give Jon his food. He was very entertaining running around and playing with the waiters, so we weren’t bored. My and Jon’s food was good, Adam and Gavin’s food was terrible and they both were so disappointed and swore off Ethiopian food forever. We then went out for a bit to the bar and then home. Jon left early Friday morning back to Nairobi and Mombasa.
Friday, we caught a bus up to Gisenyi and met up with Portia who was letting us crash at her house. We walked around town, saw areas of Gisenyi I’ve never been to before and ate some lunch. I tried asking the guy if the croque madame was made with eggs and cheese and he just kind of grunted, so I asked again to no avail and finally just asked if there was meat on it and he said yes. I asked him if I could get a sandwich with egg, cheese and tomato and he said sure (which is amazing b/c most Rwandese make you order EXACTLY what’s on the menu and you cannot change anything up! Example: I tried to get an omelet with onions, tomatoes and cheese and the guy said it was impossible, even though there was an omelet on the menu with onions and tomatoes and one with tomatoes and cheese. After a long debate and me telling him exactly how much more I would pay, he went into the kitchen and came back saying it was possible and that I should pay the amount I had previously stated). When my food came, it was an omelet with cheese, tomatoes and toast imbedded in the eggs! It was hilarious and I took a picture that I’ll try and post soon. I was a little concerned when he wrote down, in this order:
Eggs
Tomatoes
Cheese
Sandwich
I think sandwich is code for slice of bread. It was pretty tasty though. Last time I was in Gisenyi for Nicole’s birthday, I ordered an omelet with tomato, onion and cheese and I pronounce tomato the French way so as not to confuse her, but I got an omelet with onion, cheese and fries (potato). Ariko, the French word for potato sounds NOTHING like tomato (pomme de terre).
Okay, back to Gisenyi this time around. The whole omelet sandwich thing ended up being extremely expensive, so I asked to see the menu and we agreed on a fairer price afterwards (ex. A whole circle of cheese is about 2700 and he was charging me 1000 for putting a few pieces in my omelet). That night we ended up going back to the same restaurant for salads and they were pretty delicious. Saturday morning, we got up, went over to Portia’s school where she helps with the deaf education unit and since Jon is a deaf ed volunteer in Kenya, he wanted to meet some of the kids. They weren’t there that day, but we did get to see Portia’s permagarden she built with the kids. Then we walked over to the Serena (the fancy hotel on the lake) and got beach chairs on the sand and laid in the sun and swam in the lake, read some books, listened to music, ate a yummy lunch and took a nice shower. A very buff Rwandan was walking around the beach and he caught Jon’s eye and we were both staring at him when his friend walked up and asked if we would take a picture with him. Turns out he’s a model and thought we were attractive enough to take a picture with. Jon took a picture with him on his camera, so I’ll have to get the photo from him first before posting it. It was a wonderfully relaxing day. We weren’t really hungry after a day in the sun and our big lunch, so we just went and got tea and a chapatti at the restaurant next to Portia’s house for dinner. Sunday morning, we got up and went to the bus station for the bus back to Kigali. We got in around noon and ate lunch at the cheap Indian restaurant and then hopped back on a bus to Butare. We ended up running into Trish who was on the same bus as us and as we were walking up to Simba (a supermarket with an outdoor café) to get a drink before the bus, my wallet was stolen! Some jerk stole all my money, my PC ID, my ATM card and our bus tickets! I LOVED that wallet too!!!! I was super upset but knew there was nothing I could do. I think the thief was probably pretty upset that he robbed the poor muzungu in town though. My ATM receipt was in there and my PC ID, so he could see how pathetic my bank account balance was and that I was a volunteer, so hopefully he felt bad about robbing me. We were able to get on the bus anyways after explaining to the bus people that we had already paid for tickets but they were stolen, along with everything else. They were all really nice about it. We got into Butare and dropped off our bags at the my house, then went over to Abdoul’s with Ryan for a breaking of the fast with him and his family. There was lots of food and it was pretty delicious.
Monday, I took Jon into my work and introduced him to people at the office. I did a bit of work and let Jon use the internet and then we went to lunch with Ryan. After lunch the boys went to the museum and I just waited for them at the house. We hung out at the house and I cooked dinner. I made ‘biryani’ (pretty much just fried rice with Indian spices, cashew nuts and raisins). It tasted really good though! Then we watched ‘creep show’ some 80’s horror flick someone at PC office put into the case for Ghosts of Rwanda. It was terrible. We made Ryan watch Glee and he liked it! Tuesday, I taught my HIV, sexual decision-making lesson while Ryan and Jon went to Murambi, one of the genocide memorial sites. I didn’t think I could take being there again and I had to teach, so just let them go themselves. The lesson was pretty fun and I think it really got them thinking because afterwards they were all sitting and standing around discussing.
Wednesday, Jon and I stayed in Butare and walked over to the Arboretum for a short hike, had some ice cream and met up with some other PCVs who were there. We sat and chatted with them for a while and walked back into downtown together. We bought some chapatti at a restaurant and cooked fajitas for dinner with guacamole. Ryan came over again and we watched some Glee. Thursday, Jon and I went into Kigali and ate some pizza for lunch before going to the genocide memorial there. The taxi driver who drove us came in with us and went through the whole thing with us and took us back for only 5000! It was a good 2+ hours. After, we took Jon’s bags to Adam’s house and laid there for a bit before heading over to the Ethiopian restaurant for Gavin’s birthday dinner. We were so early, we sat and had a drink and they brought us small bowls of popcorn. There was a little kid there with his parents who kept trying to give Jon his food. He was very entertaining running around and playing with the waiters, so we weren’t bored. My and Jon’s food was good, Adam and Gavin’s food was terrible and they both were so disappointed and swore off Ethiopian food forever. We then went out for a bit to the bar and then home. Jon left early Friday morning back to Nairobi and Mombasa.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Elections!
SPREAD got an intern, Ryan, from Texas A&M for a month. He’s pretty cool and now I have someone to hang out with again. Had a 4-day weekend this weekend (6/8-10/8) due to the presidential elections. Friday, I had a half-day at work then went home and pretty much stayed there. Saturday, I woke up, did some laundry and then Ryan came over and we went out around town. Went and watched Eclipse in the cinema (which was pretty apparent it was a pirated copy), then walked over to the theater because earlier in the day a Rwandese friend of mine told me she was putting on a play at 7 that evening, so we went and met her outside and she told us it was going to start late. Walked in and sat down and then picked up one of the few programs scattered on seats (1 to every 10 or so) and realized it was in French, so went back to the cinema and watched the new Alice and Wonderland, then went home to bed. Sunday, Ryan and I were going to meet at the market and get food to cook dinner, but it was closed (he’s tired of hotel food). We ended up going over to Abdoul’s house and since it was elections the next day, his houseboy left to go to his hometown to vote, so we ended up making the dinner. Abdoul and I peeled and cut up a million potatoes to make fries and we started the fire and then his sister took over after our batch of frites weren’t too good (they were pretty soggy and not at all crispy, but still tasted fine). We had fries, rice, beans, avocado and tea with an apple for desert with Abdoul and his family and two friends. We watched Hitch and Enemy of the State from a disc of all Will Smith movies (they sell DVD’s here with about 5-6 movies on them).
Monday, while I was lying on the couch reading, Ryan banged on my gate. I wasn't too keen on walking around and disrupting the election process, but he said that not much was going on, he didn't see many people walking around in town, and besides everything was closed until the afternoon. We played checkers at my place and afterwards went out to the video store and rented ‘Thank You For Smoking’ only to take it back and find out that it’s a French copy. We returned to the shop and exchanged it for ‘True Blood’ (after making sure it was in English). It’s a pretty good show so far. Only watched 2 episodes. I stopped in one of the bars to see if there was any news about the elections yet, but it was all in Kinyarwanda and there was no data being shown, so I just moved on. Got a text from Adam though telling me that PK won by a landslide (to be expected).
Tuesday was a holiday because of the elections Monday, so no work. My cleaning lady came and cleaned the floors and did laundry and I went into the office for a bit. Afterwards, I went jean shopping and got a new pair I really like! On my way home, I saw two women standing and staring into a tree. So, as I got closer I stared into the tree too and saw a group of monkeys and a boy throwing rocks at them. Two jumped across the road into the field and one ran up my steps, jumped up onto my wall and then onto my roof. I was kind of scared to go into my house and turned to the ladies when I saw he was headed into my house and told them “crap! That’s my house!” (eh! n’inzu yanjye!!) They just laughed and I got into my gate with no problem, then went and got my camera and took some pictures of the guy. He stayed on the roof for a bit, then came back down onto my wall and finally jumped into my mango tree and off to find the others. My cleaning lady and I were laughing about it together.
Wednesday, went into work, found my boss, she told me another family member died (that’s 3 in the 2 months I’ve been here!) and left. So here I am, yet again, alone in my office with nothing to do.
Monday, while I was lying on the couch reading, Ryan banged on my gate. I wasn't too keen on walking around and disrupting the election process, but he said that not much was going on, he didn't see many people walking around in town, and besides everything was closed until the afternoon. We played checkers at my place and afterwards went out to the video store and rented ‘Thank You For Smoking’ only to take it back and find out that it’s a French copy. We returned to the shop and exchanged it for ‘True Blood’ (after making sure it was in English). It’s a pretty good show so far. Only watched 2 episodes. I stopped in one of the bars to see if there was any news about the elections yet, but it was all in Kinyarwanda and there was no data being shown, so I just moved on. Got a text from Adam though telling me that PK won by a landslide (to be expected).
Tuesday was a holiday because of the elections Monday, so no work. My cleaning lady came and cleaned the floors and did laundry and I went into the office for a bit. Afterwards, I went jean shopping and got a new pair I really like! On my way home, I saw two women standing and staring into a tree. So, as I got closer I stared into the tree too and saw a group of monkeys and a boy throwing rocks at them. Two jumped across the road into the field and one ran up my steps, jumped up onto my wall and then onto my roof. I was kind of scared to go into my house and turned to the ladies when I saw he was headed into my house and told them “crap! That’s my house!” (eh! n’inzu yanjye!!) They just laughed and I got into my gate with no problem, then went and got my camera and took some pictures of the guy. He stayed on the roof for a bit, then came back down onto my wall and finally jumped into my mango tree and off to find the others. My cleaning lady and I were laughing about it together.
Wednesday, went into work, found my boss, she told me another family member died (that’s 3 in the 2 months I’ve been here!) and left. So here I am, yet again, alone in my office with nothing to do.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
End of July to kigali and back
Wednesday (21/7), when I went into work my boss asked me to go to a conference for her in Kigali and take notes. She told me about it, but forgot to send me the email, so when I got into work Thursday and asked her again when the conference was, she goes “um, I think its today and tomorrow. I didn’t send you the email?” So, she sent the email and I saw that it started at 8am Thursday. She asked me to go for Friday’s session anyways, so I stayed at work, went and ate some lunch and bought a ticket to Kigali. Then Peace Corps came to take a look at my new house and gave me a ride to Kigali. I went out to dinner with Marine at a Chinese restaurant and then went to Adam’s. The conference was at 8am and Adam’s cousin was leaving the house at the same time and offered to give me a ride. I got there a few minutes late, but the whole thing didn’t start until after 9 anyways. It was pretty interesting, but there were a lot of arguments. We were working on the country action plan for women, girls, gender equality and HIV. They were making recommendations about how it should be changed to be gender equitable and how to include specific policies that focus on girls and women. There was a lot of arguing and people repeating things over and over and then someone would get the mic and just go on a rant. The host needed to be stricter and tear the mic away from them and get things moving. We were about 2-2 ½ hours behind and I had to catch my bus back to Butare. I went and saw Adam at his new job and we hung out for a bit, then jumped on a bus to Butare. The University students had gotten out of school, so all the buses were full. I had a friend call and reserve me a ticket, but when I showed up they said that I wasn’t on the list. I got lucky though b/c a guy at the ticket desk wanted to change his 4pm ticket to 5:30, so I got his! Got home and met up with Imogen and Trish and we went out to dinner. Marine jumped on a bus after work and met up with us and we all had a fun night. Saturday morning, we tried to get a bus to Cyangugu to go to the kickball tournament in Nyamasheke, but they were all full also. We thought about staying in Butare for the weekend, but the girls weren’t too keen on the idea, so we jumped on a bus again for Kigali, after some shopping at the coop and Kenya market, eating some ice cream and having a beer by the pool. So, my weekend consisted of a bus to Kigali Thursday, bus to Butare Friday, back to Kigali Saturday and again to Butare Sunday. Kind of ridiculous, but it was fun.
A bunch of PCVs returning from the kickball tournament stopped in Butare for the night on Monday because they were unable to make it back to site before dark. So, I met up with them after work at the ice cream parlor and while sitting outside eating our deliciousness, I saw a large line of identical white Hilux trucks going past. I started counting and there were 21! All with almost identical mud markings and only one person in the car, the driver. I thought it was crazy, but Wednesday, I saw one (this time empty and clean) and told my driver about what I saw on Monday, and he said it was probably a shipment of trucks going to Burundi. Two PCV’s stayed the night at my house Monday evening. We went out to dinner and were going to watch a movie at the cinema but instead stayed at the restaurant too late and ended up going home and to bed before 10!
On the way to work on Tuesday I saw a giant bird that I think might have been a parrot at American corner. It was grey with black and a little bit of white on the wings. I don’t think there are any grey, black and white parrots, but it looked like one.
My boss’s father died Tuesday, so Wednesday, for the Family Planning training with USAID, I had to go by myself in her place. The training was at the US Embassy, and when I first got in, I had to surrender my cell phone, computer and ID and then walk through a metal detector. Then I went into the building and was told to sit and wait because I needed to have someone escort me around the premises. I sat and waited and waited, while talking to the guard in Kinyarwanda and reading Ebony magazine the guard gave to me. When I realized that it had to be 2pm already (there was no clock, I wasn’t wearing a watch and didn’t have my cell phone), I went up to him and asked what the heck was up. He finally got me someone to take me there and I was a half hour late. I HATE being late to things, especially when its for some ridiculous reason. The training was pretty interesting and there were big wigs from PSI, FHI, JSI, and other international NGOs and then there was me, a volunteer from the smallest organization present. I think I held my own though and made a good impression. I participated in the conversations, gave some correct answers and interesting insights on a few topics. Hopefully a few of them will remember me when its time for me to get a job. We drove back Wednesday evening and Thursday and Friday, I was in the office by myself working on a few things, but mainly checking email and Facebook. I did manage to finish a course on the USAID center for global health education though.
The whole week (26/7 – 30/7), the entire town was getting ready for President Kagame who was coming to town Friday. Everyone was working hard to decorate (trees all the way from Kigali to Butare were painted white and banana trees were placed alongside the road). There were banners and streamers, and a big sign dug into the hill and then filled with white chalk saying “Tora Kagame” (Vote for Kagame). Prisoners were recruited and spent the whole week working to clean up the area next to the stadium (the stadium was too small to fit all the people) and constructing the stage and site. Friday morning, on my way to work, I saw villagers singing and dancing down the street waving a PK poster, bus loads of people singing and banging the sides on their way to the stadium. I got frisked by some soldiers because my office is right next to the stadium, but didn’t even get to go into work b/c we were closed for the day because of all the activity. I went into Kigali Friday evening with Imogen, ate dinner at the wonderful Indian restaurant, went with the boys to the Sports Club and had a few drinks and watched TV while they exercised, then went to the shady bar and then Papyrus. Saturday, we tried to drive to the lake to go swimming, but the car overheated and we ended up going to Bambino’s. We sat in a village at a bar drinking while they “fixed” the car. Were at the roadside town a good 2+ hours when we finally got going again but the car quickly overheated again. We stopped, added water, but decided to go back towards Kigali, which is where we found Bambino’s fun city (or something like that). It has a pool and fair rides, like the swinging chairs one and a Ferris wheel, but by then it was dark, so we didn’t swim or go on the rides, but got some food. Then we went to a small bar by Adam’s house and went home early. Sunday, Adam and I just stayed home most of the day watching movies, and then I had to catch my bus back to Butare.
Went into work Monday and Tuesday, but no one was there. Tuesday, Imogen came back from Kigali and packed up all her things and I took her to Kigali to do her gift shopping and spent one last night with her in Kigali. Her flight was supposed to be at 4 the next day, so we ran around town getting everything done before 2 and then around 6:30 I get a call from her saying she’s stuck in Rwanda, her flight has been cancelled! They put her up in a hotel room and around 10:30 she said they told her she’s flying out at 1am. So, now my house is empty, just me. Not too bad so far.
From some of my PC friends:
A 2 year old cutting grass with a machete taller than themselves = normal
Carrying a backpack on your head = normal
Men holding hands = normal
Women holding/carrying babies on motorcycles = normal
Things I’ve seen on the back of a bicycle:
People, side saddle or straddle, including women with babies tied to their backs
Goats
Pigs
Big inconspicuous bundles in rice sacks
Tables and chairs stacked upon one another and tied down
Jerry cans
Bag of rabbits (alive and skwirming)
Giant bags of charcoal
Hanging live chickens (though they're usually tied onto the handlebars)
A bunch of PCVs returning from the kickball tournament stopped in Butare for the night on Monday because they were unable to make it back to site before dark. So, I met up with them after work at the ice cream parlor and while sitting outside eating our deliciousness, I saw a large line of identical white Hilux trucks going past. I started counting and there were 21! All with almost identical mud markings and only one person in the car, the driver. I thought it was crazy, but Wednesday, I saw one (this time empty and clean) and told my driver about what I saw on Monday, and he said it was probably a shipment of trucks going to Burundi. Two PCV’s stayed the night at my house Monday evening. We went out to dinner and were going to watch a movie at the cinema but instead stayed at the restaurant too late and ended up going home and to bed before 10!
On the way to work on Tuesday I saw a giant bird that I think might have been a parrot at American corner. It was grey with black and a little bit of white on the wings. I don’t think there are any grey, black and white parrots, but it looked like one.
My boss’s father died Tuesday, so Wednesday, for the Family Planning training with USAID, I had to go by myself in her place. The training was at the US Embassy, and when I first got in, I had to surrender my cell phone, computer and ID and then walk through a metal detector. Then I went into the building and was told to sit and wait because I needed to have someone escort me around the premises. I sat and waited and waited, while talking to the guard in Kinyarwanda and reading Ebony magazine the guard gave to me. When I realized that it had to be 2pm already (there was no clock, I wasn’t wearing a watch and didn’t have my cell phone), I went up to him and asked what the heck was up. He finally got me someone to take me there and I was a half hour late. I HATE being late to things, especially when its for some ridiculous reason. The training was pretty interesting and there were big wigs from PSI, FHI, JSI, and other international NGOs and then there was me, a volunteer from the smallest organization present. I think I held my own though and made a good impression. I participated in the conversations, gave some correct answers and interesting insights on a few topics. Hopefully a few of them will remember me when its time for me to get a job. We drove back Wednesday evening and Thursday and Friday, I was in the office by myself working on a few things, but mainly checking email and Facebook. I did manage to finish a course on the USAID center for global health education though.
The whole week (26/7 – 30/7), the entire town was getting ready for President Kagame who was coming to town Friday. Everyone was working hard to decorate (trees all the way from Kigali to Butare were painted white and banana trees were placed alongside the road). There were banners and streamers, and a big sign dug into the hill and then filled with white chalk saying “Tora Kagame” (Vote for Kagame). Prisoners were recruited and spent the whole week working to clean up the area next to the stadium (the stadium was too small to fit all the people) and constructing the stage and site. Friday morning, on my way to work, I saw villagers singing and dancing down the street waving a PK poster, bus loads of people singing and banging the sides on their way to the stadium. I got frisked by some soldiers because my office is right next to the stadium, but didn’t even get to go into work b/c we were closed for the day because of all the activity. I went into Kigali Friday evening with Imogen, ate dinner at the wonderful Indian restaurant, went with the boys to the Sports Club and had a few drinks and watched TV while they exercised, then went to the shady bar and then Papyrus. Saturday, we tried to drive to the lake to go swimming, but the car overheated and we ended up going to Bambino’s. We sat in a village at a bar drinking while they “fixed” the car. Were at the roadside town a good 2+ hours when we finally got going again but the car quickly overheated again. We stopped, added water, but decided to go back towards Kigali, which is where we found Bambino’s fun city (or something like that). It has a pool and fair rides, like the swinging chairs one and a Ferris wheel, but by then it was dark, so we didn’t swim or go on the rides, but got some food. Then we went to a small bar by Adam’s house and went home early. Sunday, Adam and I just stayed home most of the day watching movies, and then I had to catch my bus back to Butare.
Went into work Monday and Tuesday, but no one was there. Tuesday, Imogen came back from Kigali and packed up all her things and I took her to Kigali to do her gift shopping and spent one last night with her in Kigali. Her flight was supposed to be at 4 the next day, so we ran around town getting everything done before 2 and then around 6:30 I get a call from her saying she’s stuck in Rwanda, her flight has been cancelled! They put her up in a hotel room and around 10:30 she said they told her she’s flying out at 1am. So, now my house is empty, just me. Not too bad so far.
From some of my PC friends:
A 2 year old cutting grass with a machete taller than themselves = normal
Carrying a backpack on your head = normal
Men holding hands = normal
Women holding/carrying babies on motorcycles = normal
Things I’ve seen on the back of a bicycle:
People, side saddle or straddle, including women with babies tied to their backs
Goats
Pigs
Big inconspicuous bundles in rice sacks
Tables and chairs stacked upon one another and tied down
Jerry cans
Bag of rabbits (alive and skwirming)
Giant bags of charcoal
Hanging live chickens (though they're usually tied onto the handlebars)
Thursday, July 22, 2010
World Cup final, wedding and a funeral
Sunday, Imogen and I went to the pool to swim and sit in the sun a bit. We ate lunch and then got an ice cream cone at the new ice cream parlor that opened last month. It was a wonderful day! We watched the World Cup final at the café in town. She had to leave before it finished because she had to get up early, so I stayed and watched it alone, surrounded by Rwandans rooting for Spain. I walked home sad in my orange shirt.
Monday, we had a staff meeting in Kigali, so I got to go with and meet the Kigali staff and the whole meeting was in English! It was so awesome. I was the only white person, and they weren’t doing it for my benefit, they speak English all the time.
Taught my first lesson to the community health workers at KOAKAKA and Buffcafe. I taught on the difference between gender and sex and gender roles. It was pretty interesting to see the way they thought of gender. It was confusing to them at first, the difference, but once they understood, it was easy to explain. I wrote up a bunch of cards with words like, to be pregnant, to go to the market, to drive, beautiful, smart, decision making, authority, etc.and had them place the cards either for female or male and then we discussed and they regarded almost all as for both! I was pretty thrilled about that. The older men didn’t always agree with the younger’s perceptions and a few, such as: to be weak (women), to be strong (men), to build a house (men), to be pregnant and to clean the house (women) they did not say was both. They all agreed though that those activities (besides to be pregnant) could be done by both, but that it just wasn’t done in their culture. They said women were weak because they get pregnant. I thought that was kind of funny, but also sad. I see the women here carrying huge, heavy things on their heads and working so hard in the fields, I can’t imagine them thinking that they are weak!
Finally got up the courage to go to the American Corner that I pass by every day on the way to work and have been wondering what it was for the last month! I had Imogen go with me. It’s a collaboration with the National University of Rwanda and the American Embassy and there is a huge collection of American magazines and books and movies! I took 3 mags home and Imgoen took 3. Got Entertainment, Oprah, Discover, Popular Science and New Scientist. So excited to have somewhere to get info about home. The mags are about 2-3 months old, but its ok. And no real smutty ones like People or OK! L
Saturday, was the gusaba of one of my bosses. She got married in Burundi about 10 years ago, but until now didn’t have a legal Rwandan marriage. The gusaba is where the fathers negotiate the bride price and then they bring the girl to introduce her to the family. It was pretty funny, but I didn’t understand a lot. The husband’s family is Muslim, so they do not drink beer and the wife’s family kept asking them for alcohol to seal the deal, so they would bring bottles of juice or coke saying “here is your alcohol, like we promised”. And then they were joking about religion and saying we cannot give our son to a family who doesn’t believe in Allah and who are a bunch of drunks! It was pretty funny, the parts that I understood. Two young guys and a young woman brought the cows and did a ‘performance’ where they told stories about how good the cows are and sang traditional songs. My other boss kept leaning over and explaining to me that this was a very traditional part of the ceremony. Oh, and she made me wear a traditional dress, called umushanana. I felt a bit uncomfortable at first, because when we showed up, Imogen and I were the only people under 50 who were wearing one! Then others showed up and I got some compliments saying I looked very nice, so I felt a bit better about the situation. We had to go to a shop in Butare to rent it and it cost $6! I’ll post some pictures soon.
Went to my first funeral for the dad of one of my friends. I’ve never been to a burial before. We went to the church service, the burial and after the burial to the washing of the hands (gukaraba). My friend Felli explained the washing to me as washing away the bad spirits encountered at the graveyard, instead of washing your hands of the person whom you just buried. I didn’t think it was the later, but all I could come up with was that back in the day, maybe they had to dig the grave themselves and so everyone goes and washes their hands afterwards and it just stuck. But I guess it’s really something that everyone has to do. You cannot just go home after the burial, but all must go to the place and wash your hands together. The president came to the church service and I saw him walking out. Mourning here is very different from in the US. People all go to the house and stay until late in the night everyday before the funeral and then for a week afterwards. It must get so expensive because at the house, they must provide drinks for over 50 people for about 2 weeks! I came on Saturday after the wedding and went to the house in the evening with the family and friends. Sunday, we did the same. The funeral, burial and gukaraba was on Monday afternoon and evening. Monday night, we went to dinner at Sole Luna and participated in trivia night and won AGAIN! And we were the smallest team! I have such a smart boyfriend. I contributed about nothing. So, we got our dinner and drinks for free! I think I’m going to order the most expensive meal next time and a fancy cocktail!
Monday, we had a staff meeting in Kigali, so I got to go with and meet the Kigali staff and the whole meeting was in English! It was so awesome. I was the only white person, and they weren’t doing it for my benefit, they speak English all the time.
Taught my first lesson to the community health workers at KOAKAKA and Buffcafe. I taught on the difference between gender and sex and gender roles. It was pretty interesting to see the way they thought of gender. It was confusing to them at first, the difference, but once they understood, it was easy to explain. I wrote up a bunch of cards with words like, to be pregnant, to go to the market, to drive, beautiful, smart, decision making, authority, etc.and had them place the cards either for female or male and then we discussed and they regarded almost all as for both! I was pretty thrilled about that. The older men didn’t always agree with the younger’s perceptions and a few, such as: to be weak (women), to be strong (men), to build a house (men), to be pregnant and to clean the house (women) they did not say was both. They all agreed though that those activities (besides to be pregnant) could be done by both, but that it just wasn’t done in their culture. They said women were weak because they get pregnant. I thought that was kind of funny, but also sad. I see the women here carrying huge, heavy things on their heads and working so hard in the fields, I can’t imagine them thinking that they are weak!
Finally got up the courage to go to the American Corner that I pass by every day on the way to work and have been wondering what it was for the last month! I had Imogen go with me. It’s a collaboration with the National University of Rwanda and the American Embassy and there is a huge collection of American magazines and books and movies! I took 3 mags home and Imgoen took 3. Got Entertainment, Oprah, Discover, Popular Science and New Scientist. So excited to have somewhere to get info about home. The mags are about 2-3 months old, but its ok. And no real smutty ones like People or OK! L
Saturday, was the gusaba of one of my bosses. She got married in Burundi about 10 years ago, but until now didn’t have a legal Rwandan marriage. The gusaba is where the fathers negotiate the bride price and then they bring the girl to introduce her to the family. It was pretty funny, but I didn’t understand a lot. The husband’s family is Muslim, so they do not drink beer and the wife’s family kept asking them for alcohol to seal the deal, so they would bring bottles of juice or coke saying “here is your alcohol, like we promised”. And then they were joking about religion and saying we cannot give our son to a family who doesn’t believe in Allah and who are a bunch of drunks! It was pretty funny, the parts that I understood. Two young guys and a young woman brought the cows and did a ‘performance’ where they told stories about how good the cows are and sang traditional songs. My other boss kept leaning over and explaining to me that this was a very traditional part of the ceremony. Oh, and she made me wear a traditional dress, called umushanana. I felt a bit uncomfortable at first, because when we showed up, Imogen and I were the only people under 50 who were wearing one! Then others showed up and I got some compliments saying I looked very nice, so I felt a bit better about the situation. We had to go to a shop in Butare to rent it and it cost $6! I’ll post some pictures soon.
Went to my first funeral for the dad of one of my friends. I’ve never been to a burial before. We went to the church service, the burial and after the burial to the washing of the hands (gukaraba). My friend Felli explained the washing to me as washing away the bad spirits encountered at the graveyard, instead of washing your hands of the person whom you just buried. I didn’t think it was the later, but all I could come up with was that back in the day, maybe they had to dig the grave themselves and so everyone goes and washes their hands afterwards and it just stuck. But I guess it’s really something that everyone has to do. You cannot just go home after the burial, but all must go to the place and wash your hands together. The president came to the church service and I saw him walking out. Mourning here is very different from in the US. People all go to the house and stay until late in the night everyday before the funeral and then for a week afterwards. It must get so expensive because at the house, they must provide drinks for over 50 people for about 2 weeks! I came on Saturday after the wedding and went to the house in the evening with the family and friends. Sunday, we did the same. The funeral, burial and gukaraba was on Monday afternoon and evening. Monday night, we went to dinner at Sole Luna and participated in trivia night and won AGAIN! And we were the smallest team! I have such a smart boyfriend. I contributed about nothing. So, we got our dinner and drinks for free! I think I’m going to order the most expensive meal next time and a fancy cocktail!
Monday, July 12, 2010
I'm forgetful
Tuesday evening, after the first day of the conference, we all went downstairs and were given free drinks and enough hors d'oeuvres to fill us up! AND we got to watch the Rwandese dancers perform. It was awesome, I love watching the dancers. I was happy too because Imogen and Marine got to see the dancers, which without this I don't know if they would've been able to before leaving. The dancers came down and grabbed us and made us dance with them for one of the dances. I tried, but had no idea what i was doing, just tried to copy the girl I was dancing with. But it was fun!
Friday, July 9, 2010
last few weeks
Went to business expo last week with one of my colleagues. There were mattresses, plastic jewelry, traditional medicines, Kenyan products (jewelry, clothes and sandals), foods, biofuels, orange-fleshed sweet potatoes (aka yams, which I just designed a new program for that we’re going to implement with the community health workers), beer and wine, etc.
Visited my boss, Jeanne, at home, watched Cartoon Network with her kids, ate, drink wine, husband is impressed with my vegetarianism, says it takes a lot of restraint.
Petrol truck turned over on the main road, so sad, everyone running with buckets to clean up water in fields. Turned over into the river and the community had diverted water from the river for their fields, so it spread like wildfire into all their crops! Felt so sad to see everyone terrified that their crop was going to be destroyed.
Watched the Holland game alone, American girls sitting at another table didn’t talk to me. We got back late from the field and the game started at 4:30, so had to immediately run to the restaurant to watch the game and I was starving because I forgot my breakfast that morning and it was the first time I ate that day.
Went off-roading in Nyamagabe (Gikongoro), needed a sports bra, but there were beautiful views, could see everything we were so high up! World Vision went down one of the roads about ¾ of the way we traveled and built a primary school and health center. Didn’t end up finding anyone that we were looking for (went out into the field to watch the community health workers in action). Bought amakara (coals) because we saw smoke and its cheaper to buy it from the source and we stopped to get tomatoes because they’re cheaper in the village.
Almost got ran over by cows. Walking by two and Imogen grabs my arm and tells me one is running at us. I just started running and she stood there almost frozen, thinking if she ran it would chase after her.
Saw VCT (voluntary counselling and testing) at a washing station and the theatre group perform. Had the lady from the radio come and she recorded them doing the skit and then interviewed them afterwards. Wanted to interview me, but I refused. Helped out a bit with the VCT, writing on tubes, etc. all the “skills” I learned working at the HC in Mwezi. My boss was taking out her twists and saving the hair and took a piece of mine and twisted it with her used hair. Haha, wasn’t gross though, kinda funny. I wish more women would wear their hair natural. When she took the fake hair out, hers was still in the same shape as the twists and down to her shoulders and looked really cute! I don’t know if she’d be able to do it like that though without having the fake hair to twist it around.
Went to Kigali, met mama Adam, she's very nice but I was so nervous. Watched the football matches, happy Holland won! Adam went to a Dutch embassy party to watch the game with other Dutch people and then met up with us later. Went out dancing, took Imogen around town to see Kigali. Monday, we went to run errands, change Imogen’s flight, register for the conference, etc. Ethiopian Airlines’ system went down, so we didn’t get to do that, then we went to the hotel to check in and signed in under our friend’s name and got a card to her room and just hung out in the lap of luxury! It was so nice. I was in heaven! Just laid on the bed watching TV, enjoying the air conditioning and using the fast internet. We didn’t want to leave. Tuesday and Wednesday, had a conference on child and maternal health. While walking to the hotel Tuesday morning, I ran into a piece of steel rebar sticking up from the sidewalk and cut my toe open, so we went into the hotel and got a bandaid and then up to our friend’s room to clean it in the tub. The conference was good, lots of interesting information, but a few annoyingly bad presentations. After the conference every day, we would go up to Marine’s room and wait for her to get back from work and then go out to dinner or what not. Monday evening, we went out to trivia night at one of the restaurants. The girls and I decided we wanted to eat there first, so we went early (trivia didn’t start until 8) and had pizza and drinks. Then the boys showed up and we WON! I totally didn’t expect us to win because we didn’t get many answers correct, but we got a few obscure ones (Adam answered something about an economist author). I kind of contributed, but I think that every question I answered someone else had the answer also. If you win, then your food and drinks for the night are free! So, we stayed until everyone left ordering drinks and the boys got pizzas also. Wednesday evening, after the conference finished, we went out to watch the Spain Germany game and then ended up at karaoke at the bar across from the one we watched the game at. It was pretty fun, and since it was a Wednesday, we ended up closing the bar. They finished cleaning and were just sitting waiting for us to leave. Came back to Butare Thursday and met up with a guy from Mwezi who was in town for the preparation of the health clinic’s imihigo. Nyamasheke won the award for best district in Rwanda this past year! I’d like to pretend that I had something to do with that, haha.
Visited my boss, Jeanne, at home, watched Cartoon Network with her kids, ate, drink wine, husband is impressed with my vegetarianism, says it takes a lot of restraint.
Petrol truck turned over on the main road, so sad, everyone running with buckets to clean up water in fields. Turned over into the river and the community had diverted water from the river for their fields, so it spread like wildfire into all their crops! Felt so sad to see everyone terrified that their crop was going to be destroyed.
Watched the Holland game alone, American girls sitting at another table didn’t talk to me. We got back late from the field and the game started at 4:30, so had to immediately run to the restaurant to watch the game and I was starving because I forgot my breakfast that morning and it was the first time I ate that day.
Went off-roading in Nyamagabe (Gikongoro), needed a sports bra, but there were beautiful views, could see everything we were so high up! World Vision went down one of the roads about ¾ of the way we traveled and built a primary school and health center. Didn’t end up finding anyone that we were looking for (went out into the field to watch the community health workers in action). Bought amakara (coals) because we saw smoke and its cheaper to buy it from the source and we stopped to get tomatoes because they’re cheaper in the village.
Almost got ran over by cows. Walking by two and Imogen grabs my arm and tells me one is running at us. I just started running and she stood there almost frozen, thinking if she ran it would chase after her.
Saw VCT (voluntary counselling and testing) at a washing station and the theatre group perform. Had the lady from the radio come and she recorded them doing the skit and then interviewed them afterwards. Wanted to interview me, but I refused. Helped out a bit with the VCT, writing on tubes, etc. all the “skills” I learned working at the HC in Mwezi. My boss was taking out her twists and saving the hair and took a piece of mine and twisted it with her used hair. Haha, wasn’t gross though, kinda funny. I wish more women would wear their hair natural. When she took the fake hair out, hers was still in the same shape as the twists and down to her shoulders and looked really cute! I don’t know if she’d be able to do it like that though without having the fake hair to twist it around.
Went to Kigali, met mama Adam, she's very nice but I was so nervous. Watched the football matches, happy Holland won! Adam went to a Dutch embassy party to watch the game with other Dutch people and then met up with us later. Went out dancing, took Imogen around town to see Kigali. Monday, we went to run errands, change Imogen’s flight, register for the conference, etc. Ethiopian Airlines’ system went down, so we didn’t get to do that, then we went to the hotel to check in and signed in under our friend’s name and got a card to her room and just hung out in the lap of luxury! It was so nice. I was in heaven! Just laid on the bed watching TV, enjoying the air conditioning and using the fast internet. We didn’t want to leave. Tuesday and Wednesday, had a conference on child and maternal health. While walking to the hotel Tuesday morning, I ran into a piece of steel rebar sticking up from the sidewalk and cut my toe open, so we went into the hotel and got a bandaid and then up to our friend’s room to clean it in the tub. The conference was good, lots of interesting information, but a few annoyingly bad presentations. After the conference every day, we would go up to Marine’s room and wait for her to get back from work and then go out to dinner or what not. Monday evening, we went out to trivia night at one of the restaurants. The girls and I decided we wanted to eat there first, so we went early (trivia didn’t start until 8) and had pizza and drinks. Then the boys showed up and we WON! I totally didn’t expect us to win because we didn’t get many answers correct, but we got a few obscure ones (Adam answered something about an economist author). I kind of contributed, but I think that every question I answered someone else had the answer also. If you win, then your food and drinks for the night are free! So, we stayed until everyone left ordering drinks and the boys got pizzas also. Wednesday evening, after the conference finished, we went out to watch the Spain Germany game and then ended up at karaoke at the bar across from the one we watched the game at. It was pretty fun, and since it was a Wednesday, we ended up closing the bar. They finished cleaning and were just sitting waiting for us to leave. Came back to Butare Thursday and met up with a guy from Mwezi who was in town for the preparation of the health clinic’s imihigo. Nyamasheke won the award for best district in Rwanda this past year! I’d like to pretend that I had something to do with that, haha.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Monkeys!
So forgot to mention last week a few things:
First, on the way to work, we ran into 5 monkeys running across the road from the neighbor's house to the field across the way and then today (28/6) I heard a really strange noise when I got out of my gate. It was a cross between a crow and a frog and then I saw a blue butt and long tail jump down from a tree! It was a huge monkey, not like the small brown ones I saw last week, about the size of a toddler. Don't know what it was, but it was loud and running around the neighborhood. Saw two white guys walking down my road as I was going up, so I said good morning and warned them about the monkey. They seemed a little flabbergasted.
Secondly, my British roommate and I went to watch the England and USA matches which played at the same time, so she stayed at one place and held down the fort for me while I ran back and forth between two places to watch each game! I was running with my beer in hand around the building from the cafe to the cinema. Had to pass 3 shops and the small market and got many strange looks, but it was worth it! America beat Algeria, only to lose to Ghana in the next match. I feel like its a consolation prize though. We watched the US Ghana game in the Cinema with a bunch of Rwandese and one of Imogen's friends from the hospital called to laugh at me after the first Ghanaian goal. The guy sitting in the row in front of me kept turning around to heckle me and I finally just waved my hand at him and yelled "I can't hear you!". The Rwandese are so excited for an African team to be in the finals, that it makes it fun for me to watch the games, so even though we lost, I'm glad that it was to an African team and it'll be fun to watch them play again.
First, on the way to work, we ran into 5 monkeys running across the road from the neighbor's house to the field across the way and then today (28/6) I heard a really strange noise when I got out of my gate. It was a cross between a crow and a frog and then I saw a blue butt and long tail jump down from a tree! It was a huge monkey, not like the small brown ones I saw last week, about the size of a toddler. Don't know what it was, but it was loud and running around the neighborhood. Saw two white guys walking down my road as I was going up, so I said good morning and warned them about the monkey. They seemed a little flabbergasted.
Secondly, my British roommate and I went to watch the England and USA matches which played at the same time, so she stayed at one place and held down the fort for me while I ran back and forth between two places to watch each game! I was running with my beer in hand around the building from the cafe to the cinema. Had to pass 3 shops and the small market and got many strange looks, but it was worth it! America beat Algeria, only to lose to Ghana in the next match. I feel like its a consolation prize though. We watched the US Ghana game in the Cinema with a bunch of Rwandese and one of Imogen's friends from the hospital called to laugh at me after the first Ghanaian goal. The guy sitting in the row in front of me kept turning around to heckle me and I finally just waved my hand at him and yelled "I can't hear you!". The Rwandese are so excited for an African team to be in the finals, that it makes it fun for me to watch the games, so even though we lost, I'm glad that it was to an African team and it'll be fun to watch them play again.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Alyssa! World Cup! Move to Butare!
I had my mid-service training in Kigali for a week and the Saturday after Alyssa came to visit! We stayed at Adam’s and I introduced her to everyone and took her out then we went to Mwezi and I showed her off there and got to show off my village to her. Took her all around town and to the clinic where she got to watch me in action and got an earful from the titulaire. Wednesday evening, the clinic gave me a goodbye “party”. They gave speeches and we drank fantas and beer and they ate brochettes. One of my favorite speeches came from one of the janitors. He said when I first came that he didn’t expect me to talk to him because I was white and he was dirty. He was very surprised and happy that I would greet him in the mornings and talk to him and help him out sometimes and he encouraged me to continue this at my new house and job.
Then Thursday, Peace Corps came to move me to my new site and my new job! Thursdays are when I meet with my cooperative, so we ran up there early to meet them and so I could tell them I was leaving and why, etc. They were upset, but I promised I would come back to visit. The nun who has been the most helpful to me during my time in Mwezi, sister Mary Immaculee, came to say goodbye Wednesday evening and said “it feels like die” while clutching her heart. I was so sad. Miraculously, I fit all my stuff into the car, along with Alyssa and her bags and two people from PC. When I got to Butare, we first stopped at my new office and picked up Beta who took us to the house. They weren’t quite finished with everything, so we ran into a LOT of people hammering, sawing, painting and cleaning the house. My landlady is pretty nice and her son came to say hello and welcome me. He has visited the states quite a few times and was interested where I was from in America and how long I’d been in Rwanda. He speaks English perfectly and seems like he’ll be a nice person to visit every once in a while. We moved all my stuff in and then went into town to eat lunch while they finished up in the house. I couldn’t cook yet cause I didn’t have my stove set up, so we ate dinner out also. After dinner it was the first world cup game and we watched it at the ‘cinema’ with one of my friends who lives in Butare. It was so exciting watching it with the Rwandan guys. They were so excited about South Africa playing and were so loud! It was fun. The next day, we went into my office for a bit and she told me to just settle into my house and come in on Monday, so we went to Nyanza to see the King’s Palace and ended up going to the art museum also. It was interesting and we got a ride back to Butare with an American tourist. When back in town we met up with some other PCV’s who had come into town for some things. I showed them my new house and we went to the ice cream shop that just opened up and then watched more World Cup. Saturday, we went to Nyamasheke to stay the night at a friend’s house and go swimming in the lake. The president was in town and so when we got off the bus, it was like a ghost town! I had never seen it so deserted and it was impossible to get a taxi because they weren’t letting cars down the road, so we set off on foot. We were walking about half an hour when a moto went by. I flagged him down and put Alyssa on it and then continued on foot. Turns out, he hit a road block and couldn’t go any further, so I ended up meeting up with her sitting on the side of the road surrounded by a bunch of Rwandans. Luckily, there was a bus waiting at the roadblock so we were able to jump into that and it took us to town. The president was literally in my friend’s backyard! She lives near the school and behind her house is a huge sports field and that is where they set up the stage and all the chairs. I think there were around 5,000+ people there. It was a sea of people that was never ending. It was for the entire district of Nyamasheke, so there were a LOT of people!!! A few of us went down to watch the speech, but I wanted to take Alyssa swimming, so we just went past the field and down to the lake. When we got back to her house, everyone was ecstatic because one of the girls just asked if she could meet the president and she went on the stage, shook his hand, thanked him for letting us into the country, complimented the people and the country and then got her picture taken! I got a call the next day from another PCV whose entire village was talking about the PCV who was on the radio talking to the president! It was crazy and I was so jealous that I didn’t get to shake his hand. But we had fun swimming. That night was the USA vs. England game and there are two British VSO volunteers in that town, so we all went and watched the game after making an American flag out of a rice sack and crayons (the VSO girl had an England flag and we felt left out). It was fun watching with them and heckling. It was a tie and the British guy was horrified and I was relieved. The next morning, we took a walk around town and ended up getting a ride in a boat by some guys who sang songs and did tricks with their paddles. Then we ate some lunch at a place on a cliff that overlooks the lake then caught the bus back to Butare. On the bus ride, I got placed in the very back squished with 4 other people and a little boy. The boy ended up puking and some got on me, so I gave them the wetwipes I had in my bag (thanks grandma!) and then the boy leaned over and fell asleep on my lap. I just left him there and told the dad it was fine (he was trying to move the kid off of me) because I was terrified of him puking again. We went into my office again on Monday and went out with them to the field for a refresher course with the community health workers at one of the coffee washing stations. It was pretty cool, but we were very hungry by the end of it and so they dropped us in town and we ate a late lunch and watched the end of the Holland game. Tuesday, went into the office again and played on the internet but not much was happening, so I asked if I could leave and take her to the museum. There was a dance troop at the museum that some tourists had paid for, for a special dance, so we weren’t allowed to watch, but we stood from afar and watched a bit of it. Then I took her to the coop and she bought a bunch of gifts and I got a woven side table and trivets. We watched more World Cup games that day and tried to stay awake. Wednesday, we came into the office and then went into Kigali afterwards. We went out dancing that night after watching world cup. The next day, we had some Chinese food for lunch and then got her all packed up and to the airport. Sucks having friends leave!! L I still didn’t have all the things I needed for my house (cutting board, dish drainer, knives, mosquito net, etc.) so I took the rest of the day and Friday to purchase things before heading home. I also got to meet Adam’s new boss and we had a nice dinner together.
Have a new roommate for a month and a half. She’s a British medical student and is interning with SPREAD and shadowing at the hospital. She’s pretty cool and it’s nice to have someone to talk to when I get home and to go with me to watch the games. I hope I make some friends here before she leaves. We’ve been going out with SPREAD to the community health worker trainings and have been showing them the videos on the disc ‘Sinigurisha’ which means, ‘I am not for sale’. They are videos about sugar daddies and sugar mommies created by different high schools in Rwanda to warn mainly young girls about accepting gifts from men. Afterwards, we have a discussion with the people about what they saw and how they can help to reduce the occurrence of intergenerational sex. Thursday, we went to a meeting with representatives from the 5 health centers we work with when we do mobile testing and asked them how they felt things were going and any problems they were having. Most said that it is difficult to go out and do this because of time restraints and expenses. When SPREAD finishes, its going to be difficult to get these clinics to continue working on this program because there will be no money given to reimburse them for the travel to the coffee washing stations to do the mobile testing. Got hit by a giant dust cloud on the way to work Friday. Saw it coming, so I closed my eyes and turned my back, but it still got up my nose and in my eyes and covered me with a fine layer. I went and picked up a package from the post office for a fellow PCV and they kept asking me what my name was, and I kept telling them her name, then finally they asked me “You are Patricia?” and I said “no, she’s my colleague” but by then I had already gotten the package and paid for it so they couldn’t give me crap. A girl in secondary school said to me this morning “hello girl. What is your tongue?” I told her English and then she asked me if she could talk with me, but I was late so I told her no that I had to get to work. I just thought it was funny that a 16 or so year old girl called me girl.
Then Thursday, Peace Corps came to move me to my new site and my new job! Thursdays are when I meet with my cooperative, so we ran up there early to meet them and so I could tell them I was leaving and why, etc. They were upset, but I promised I would come back to visit. The nun who has been the most helpful to me during my time in Mwezi, sister Mary Immaculee, came to say goodbye Wednesday evening and said “it feels like die” while clutching her heart. I was so sad. Miraculously, I fit all my stuff into the car, along with Alyssa and her bags and two people from PC. When I got to Butare, we first stopped at my new office and picked up Beta who took us to the house. They weren’t quite finished with everything, so we ran into a LOT of people hammering, sawing, painting and cleaning the house. My landlady is pretty nice and her son came to say hello and welcome me. He has visited the states quite a few times and was interested where I was from in America and how long I’d been in Rwanda. He speaks English perfectly and seems like he’ll be a nice person to visit every once in a while. We moved all my stuff in and then went into town to eat lunch while they finished up in the house. I couldn’t cook yet cause I didn’t have my stove set up, so we ate dinner out also. After dinner it was the first world cup game and we watched it at the ‘cinema’ with one of my friends who lives in Butare. It was so exciting watching it with the Rwandan guys. They were so excited about South Africa playing and were so loud! It was fun. The next day, we went into my office for a bit and she told me to just settle into my house and come in on Monday, so we went to Nyanza to see the King’s Palace and ended up going to the art museum also. It was interesting and we got a ride back to Butare with an American tourist. When back in town we met up with some other PCV’s who had come into town for some things. I showed them my new house and we went to the ice cream shop that just opened up and then watched more World Cup. Saturday, we went to Nyamasheke to stay the night at a friend’s house and go swimming in the lake. The president was in town and so when we got off the bus, it was like a ghost town! I had never seen it so deserted and it was impossible to get a taxi because they weren’t letting cars down the road, so we set off on foot. We were walking about half an hour when a moto went by. I flagged him down and put Alyssa on it and then continued on foot. Turns out, he hit a road block and couldn’t go any further, so I ended up meeting up with her sitting on the side of the road surrounded by a bunch of Rwandans. Luckily, there was a bus waiting at the roadblock so we were able to jump into that and it took us to town. The president was literally in my friend’s backyard! She lives near the school and behind her house is a huge sports field and that is where they set up the stage and all the chairs. I think there were around 5,000+ people there. It was a sea of people that was never ending. It was for the entire district of Nyamasheke, so there were a LOT of people!!! A few of us went down to watch the speech, but I wanted to take Alyssa swimming, so we just went past the field and down to the lake. When we got back to her house, everyone was ecstatic because one of the girls just asked if she could meet the president and she went on the stage, shook his hand, thanked him for letting us into the country, complimented the people and the country and then got her picture taken! I got a call the next day from another PCV whose entire village was talking about the PCV who was on the radio talking to the president! It was crazy and I was so jealous that I didn’t get to shake his hand. But we had fun swimming. That night was the USA vs. England game and there are two British VSO volunteers in that town, so we all went and watched the game after making an American flag out of a rice sack and crayons (the VSO girl had an England flag and we felt left out). It was fun watching with them and heckling. It was a tie and the British guy was horrified and I was relieved. The next morning, we took a walk around town and ended up getting a ride in a boat by some guys who sang songs and did tricks with their paddles. Then we ate some lunch at a place on a cliff that overlooks the lake then caught the bus back to Butare. On the bus ride, I got placed in the very back squished with 4 other people and a little boy. The boy ended up puking and some got on me, so I gave them the wetwipes I had in my bag (thanks grandma!) and then the boy leaned over and fell asleep on my lap. I just left him there and told the dad it was fine (he was trying to move the kid off of me) because I was terrified of him puking again. We went into my office again on Monday and went out with them to the field for a refresher course with the community health workers at one of the coffee washing stations. It was pretty cool, but we were very hungry by the end of it and so they dropped us in town and we ate a late lunch and watched the end of the Holland game. Tuesday, went into the office again and played on the internet but not much was happening, so I asked if I could leave and take her to the museum. There was a dance troop at the museum that some tourists had paid for, for a special dance, so we weren’t allowed to watch, but we stood from afar and watched a bit of it. Then I took her to the coop and she bought a bunch of gifts and I got a woven side table and trivets. We watched more World Cup games that day and tried to stay awake. Wednesday, we came into the office and then went into Kigali afterwards. We went out dancing that night after watching world cup. The next day, we had some Chinese food for lunch and then got her all packed up and to the airport. Sucks having friends leave!! L I still didn’t have all the things I needed for my house (cutting board, dish drainer, knives, mosquito net, etc.) so I took the rest of the day and Friday to purchase things before heading home. I also got to meet Adam’s new boss and we had a nice dinner together.
Have a new roommate for a month and a half. She’s a British medical student and is interning with SPREAD and shadowing at the hospital. She’s pretty cool and it’s nice to have someone to talk to when I get home and to go with me to watch the games. I hope I make some friends here before she leaves. We’ve been going out with SPREAD to the community health worker trainings and have been showing them the videos on the disc ‘Sinigurisha’ which means, ‘I am not for sale’. They are videos about sugar daddies and sugar mommies created by different high schools in Rwanda to warn mainly young girls about accepting gifts from men. Afterwards, we have a discussion with the people about what they saw and how they can help to reduce the occurrence of intergenerational sex. Thursday, we went to a meeting with representatives from the 5 health centers we work with when we do mobile testing and asked them how they felt things were going and any problems they were having. Most said that it is difficult to go out and do this because of time restraints and expenses. When SPREAD finishes, its going to be difficult to get these clinics to continue working on this program because there will be no money given to reimburse them for the travel to the coffee washing stations to do the mobile testing. Got hit by a giant dust cloud on the way to work Friday. Saw it coming, so I closed my eyes and turned my back, but it still got up my nose and in my eyes and covered me with a fine layer. I went and picked up a package from the post office for a fellow PCV and they kept asking me what my name was, and I kept telling them her name, then finally they asked me “You are Patricia?” and I said “no, she’s my colleague” but by then I had already gotten the package and paid for it so they couldn’t give me crap. A girl in secondary school said to me this morning “hello girl. What is your tongue?” I told her English and then she asked me if she could talk with me, but I was late so I told her no that I had to get to work. I just thought it was funny that a 16 or so year old girl called me girl.
End of May
Sunday (May 23), I took the bus home to Mwezi and when I arrived, my host family was visiting, so I came in and said hello and scared the baby into a fit of crying and screaming, but he soon calmed down with some sweet, milky tea, which he slurped from his mom or dad’s spoon, it was really funny to watch! He kept looking at me and smiling and then the next minute would make a whine and look terrified. By the end of the visit, he was all smiles, but still wouldn’t let me hold him. He did give me a high five a few times though. And they brought us 6 eggs, 2 cabbages and a bunch of bananas! The eggs were bad though, which I found out while cracking them into the pan.
Monday, I went to the sector office to meet the co-op women, but they weren’t there! So, I went into the clinic and saw I had a box and took it home and opened it. It was from grandma and full of goodies!!! Walking in Mwezi is full of interesting smells, you get the good ones, like the smell of the eucalyptus trees on the road to the clinic or the smell of squashed guava that someone dropped and then there are the bad: the smell of grinding cassava root (it smells like puke), manure after the rain, people who just finished a hard day working in the field… Its always surprising what smell is going to hit your nose, sometimes you are nicely surprised and it makes your day.
Tuesday, I was the designated photographer again and tried to get people to let me take their photo for their work card and then Desire’s (the accountant who got married in January) wife came with their baby for vaccination and he asked me to take family photos.
Got kidnapped by the titulaire Wednesday morning into sitting in the hygiene meeting, taking pictures for him of the clinic, and walking with him to a meeting at the primary school, then I escaped and worked in PMTCT. The hygiene meeting was just a yelling match between the workers and the titulaire about how the clinic needs to look better and be cleaner and then one of them mentioned human waste that they found that morning. We went and looked at it and it literally was right behind the toilets, still on the concrete of the building! Someone walked past all the toilets and then squatted down next to the wall and relieved him or herself there. After seeing this, the titulaire went to the hospitalization and asked the people from last night who did it, no one came forward, and so he fined every one of them 200 francs for being dirty. I thought it a bit harsh, but also a little funny. The social affairs guy from the sector office came and took Emily and I out for a fanta at the restaurant and we had a hilarious conversation! I asked him about his baby and how he was and then realized I didn’t know his name, so I asked and Emily piqued ‘Homie’, so we both laughed and he asked us what homie meant, so I told him it meant friend and he said “yes, you will be his homie” and Emily told him that other children will be his homie and he disagreed by saying “No, children can be your homie”. I died laughing!
Went to the coop on Thursday and Friday Adam came to visit! We pretty much just hung out at the house, but I tried to take him over to the nun’s one evening, but only one was there. On Sunday, the nuns had visitors who were leaving in their car and they offered us a ride to Kigali, so we accepted. Didn’t realize that they were going to pack 9 people into the car and poor Adam had to squish up his legs the entire time and was in quite a bit of pain by the end of it. The driver also was ridiculously slow and we got passed by the buses!!!
Monday (May 31)I had my Mid-service training. Got there early and went swimming with people.
Monday, I went to the sector office to meet the co-op women, but they weren’t there! So, I went into the clinic and saw I had a box and took it home and opened it. It was from grandma and full of goodies!!! Walking in Mwezi is full of interesting smells, you get the good ones, like the smell of the eucalyptus trees on the road to the clinic or the smell of squashed guava that someone dropped and then there are the bad: the smell of grinding cassava root (it smells like puke), manure after the rain, people who just finished a hard day working in the field… Its always surprising what smell is going to hit your nose, sometimes you are nicely surprised and it makes your day.
Tuesday, I was the designated photographer again and tried to get people to let me take their photo for their work card and then Desire’s (the accountant who got married in January) wife came with their baby for vaccination and he asked me to take family photos.
Got kidnapped by the titulaire Wednesday morning into sitting in the hygiene meeting, taking pictures for him of the clinic, and walking with him to a meeting at the primary school, then I escaped and worked in PMTCT. The hygiene meeting was just a yelling match between the workers and the titulaire about how the clinic needs to look better and be cleaner and then one of them mentioned human waste that they found that morning. We went and looked at it and it literally was right behind the toilets, still on the concrete of the building! Someone walked past all the toilets and then squatted down next to the wall and relieved him or herself there. After seeing this, the titulaire went to the hospitalization and asked the people from last night who did it, no one came forward, and so he fined every one of them 200 francs for being dirty. I thought it a bit harsh, but also a little funny. The social affairs guy from the sector office came and took Emily and I out for a fanta at the restaurant and we had a hilarious conversation! I asked him about his baby and how he was and then realized I didn’t know his name, so I asked and Emily piqued ‘Homie’, so we both laughed and he asked us what homie meant, so I told him it meant friend and he said “yes, you will be his homie” and Emily told him that other children will be his homie and he disagreed by saying “No, children can be your homie”. I died laughing!
Went to the coop on Thursday and Friday Adam came to visit! We pretty much just hung out at the house, but I tried to take him over to the nun’s one evening, but only one was there. On Sunday, the nuns had visitors who were leaving in their car and they offered us a ride to Kigali, so we accepted. Didn’t realize that they were going to pack 9 people into the car and poor Adam had to squish up his legs the entire time and was in quite a bit of pain by the end of it. The driver also was ridiculously slow and we got passed by the buses!!!
Monday (May 31)I had my Mid-service training. Got there early and went swimming with people.
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