Motobikes are motorcycles that have been converted into awesome modes of transportation all over the city of Kigali. Besides the general rules like, do not lean too hard in any one direction as you may tip over the bike, there are some general ‘rules of engagement’ for those who decide to take the cheap compromise between buses and taxis.
1) The drivers have a vested interest in your safety as it is totally tied to their own. A driver wants to crash as much as you, dear rider, want to. Unlike the bus drivers who are comfortable with the safe bubble a bus gives them between their riders and the pavement, moto drivers have no such bubble and therefore always make sure to do things like make you put your helmet on even if you just did your hair for the first time in a month and are on your way to a club.
2) Like so much in life, the first time is the scariest. You won’t know where to put your hands, you’ll appear to driving directly in to oncoming traffic and your driver may or may not pick up their cell phone and take a call. Refer to rule 1 for the later situation and for the others, just open your eyes and enjoy it. It’s more enjoyable than walking, faster, and a great way to see the city. The RAs personally enjoy because we often get crap (or no) directions to places so we just ask the motos to take us there.
3) Negotiate, Negotiate, Negotiate. There will never be a time a moto or a taxi driver will start off at a fair price. If you want that luxury – ride the bus friends. I prefer to ask a local what they would pay and work with that number. Later at night is more expensive, but the buses aren’t running so they have a bit of a monopoly during those hours. Don’t fret though – you’ll learn what the price SHOULD be pretty quickly and if they know you know, then they won’t mess with you.
Let your hair down, jump on a moto and enjoy it! It’s the one epic convenience that Africa has over the US. And I’ve been in more accidents with taxis (1) than I have in motos (0) – so that ratio should give you full confidence to hop on the back and ride on.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Saturday, January 30, 2010
"The List"
Hello loved ones,
Even before we arrived, people were asking us what they could send. We
wanted to make sure we got a clear idea of what both the people and
the programs would need to thrive. FVA runs the GBV program (our
program) which includes a school and income-generating activities for
women. FVA also works and places volunteers with EDD (street boys'
school/orphanage) and Gisimba (orphanage). We, personally, wanted to
do something more direct than sending money - but bear in mind, money
is always appreciated here, and it always goes to extremely good use.
FVA, for example, "sponsors" many students - pays all their school
fees, without which support they would have had to drop out. Three
kids here are still waiting for sponsors and will rely on the two of
us for the entirety of their education over the next 2 months - think
of the children!! FVA has been our home away from home and our family away from family since the moment we landed in Kigali - in all our dirt and sleep-deprived glory. They continuously amaze us with their grace and generosity.
We also completely understand if, like us, you want to see the
tangible results of your contribution. IF YOU DONATE, WE WILL
PERSONALLY MAKE SURE YOU GET A PICTURE AND A LETTER OR EMAIL DETAILING
EXACTLY WHERE YOUR CONTRIBUTION WENT.
And with that, we give you The List:
- Clothes for boys and girls from infancy to 18 yrs
- Clothes for men and women
- Shoes in all sizes, from children to adults (did your kids grow out
of crocs? those are VERY
useful here!!)
- English language workbooks (Rwanda changed its national language to
English recently and there is a big learning curve)
- Math workbooks, all levels (we'll copy the pages so they'll last forever!)
- General school supplies (paper, colored paper, pens, STICKERS,
markers, chalk etc)
- General office supplies (paper, pens, folders etc)
- Books in English - particularly simple picture books for teaching and learning
- Toys for infants, babies, toddlers and children
- DVDs for children - particularly DVDs they can learn from such as
Dora the Explorer or Bob
the Builder, but also fun ones like Disney movies. Gisimba has a TV
but the kids spend a lot of
time watching German dance competitions!
They can be mailed here:
Kaitlyn and Nicole
c/o Faith Victory Association
P.O Box 2800
Kigali, Rwanda
In terms of personal stories:
- Claudine has a 3 yr old daughter and is expecting a baby. She lives
in severe poverty and has trouble feeding her family from day to day.
She hasn't had time or money to prepare for the baby, and she needs
baby clothes, cloth diapers, spit up wipes, and clothes and shoes for
Sylvie, her 3 yr old.
- There are 3 children at FVA without sponsors relying on us for all
their schooling. They need picture books, English language workbooks,
and math workbooks.
- EDD has only one computer for over 100 kids - and they LOVE their
computer classes with Ian. They would love the old computer you've
been thinking of replacing!!!!!
- Gisimba runs three kindergarten classes now that the older kids are
headed back to school, and they need colored paper, crayons, glue,
stickers for rewards, books, computer paper, pens, pencils...
There's plenty of need, and anything you send will be appreciated. The
women love beautiful things and take very good care of what little
they have. Luxuries like soap and body lotion are very expensive here
and they absolutely cherish them. The kids here have literally no toys
and we have seen them occupy themselves by playing with things like
electrical outlets and wire hangars - true story. Anything you send
will light up someone's world - and not in the way that a wire in an
electrical outlet will!
All our love,
Kaitlyn and Nicole
Stipps and Soli
The Manolos
Even before we arrived, people were asking us what they could send. We
wanted to make sure we got a clear idea of what both the people and
the programs would need to thrive. FVA runs the GBV program (our
program) which includes a school and income-generating activities for
women. FVA also works and places volunteers with EDD (street boys'
school/orphanage) and Gisimba (orphanage). We, personally, wanted to
do something more direct than sending money - but bear in mind, money
is always appreciated here, and it always goes to extremely good use.
FVA, for example, "sponsors" many students - pays all their school
fees, without which support they would have had to drop out. Three
kids here are still waiting for sponsors and will rely on the two of
us for the entirety of their education over the next 2 months - think
of the children!! FVA has been our home away from home and our family away from family since the moment we landed in Kigali - in all our dirt and sleep-deprived glory. They continuously amaze us with their grace and generosity.
We also completely understand if, like us, you want to see the
tangible results of your contribution. IF YOU DONATE, WE WILL
PERSONALLY MAKE SURE YOU GET A PICTURE AND A LETTER OR EMAIL DETAILING
EXACTLY WHERE YOUR CONTRIBUTION WENT.
And with that, we give you The List:
- Clothes for boys and girls from infancy to 18 yrs
- Clothes for men and women
- Shoes in all sizes, from children to adults (did your kids grow out
of crocs? those are VERY
useful here!!)
- English language workbooks (Rwanda changed its national language to
English recently and there is a big learning curve)
- Math workbooks, all levels (we'll copy the pages so they'll last forever!)
- General school supplies (paper, colored paper, pens, STICKERS,
markers, chalk etc)
- General office supplies (paper, pens, folders etc)
- Books in English - particularly simple picture books for teaching and learning
- Toys for infants, babies, toddlers and children
- DVDs for children - particularly DVDs they can learn from such as
Dora the Explorer or Bob
the Builder, but also fun ones like Disney movies. Gisimba has a TV
but the kids spend a lot of
time watching German dance competitions!
They can be mailed here:
Kaitlyn and Nicole
c/o Faith Victory Association
P.O Box 2800
Kigali, Rwanda
In terms of personal stories:
- Claudine has a 3 yr old daughter and is expecting a baby. She lives
in severe poverty and has trouble feeding her family from day to day.
She hasn't had time or money to prepare for the baby, and she needs
baby clothes, cloth diapers, spit up wipes, and clothes and shoes for
Sylvie, her 3 yr old.
- There are 3 children at FVA without sponsors relying on us for all
their schooling. They need picture books, English language workbooks,
and math workbooks.
- EDD has only one computer for over 100 kids - and they LOVE their
computer classes with Ian. They would love the old computer you've
been thinking of replacing!!!!!
- Gisimba runs three kindergarten classes now that the older kids are
headed back to school, and they need colored paper, crayons, glue,
stickers for rewards, books, computer paper, pens, pencils...
There's plenty of need, and anything you send will be appreciated. The
women love beautiful things and take very good care of what little
they have. Luxuries like soap and body lotion are very expensive here
and they absolutely cherish them. The kids here have literally no toys
and we have seen them occupy themselves by playing with things like
electrical outlets and wire hangars - true story. Anything you send
will light up someone's world - and not in the way that a wire in an
electrical outlet will!
All our love,
Kaitlyn and Nicole
Stipps and Soli
The Manolos
Thursday, January 28, 2010
PICTURES!!!!!!!!!!!!
Houston, we have lift-off. After a mere 14 hours of uploading, one of us has an album on Snapfish you can peruse! More to come, as obviously free 14 hr windows of time are readily available here :p No, really, enjoy the nearly 200 pictures!! And we'll get more up soon.
All our Snapfish albums as we upload them:
http://www2.snapfish.com/photolibrary/
And RA2's album (uploaded!) specifically here:
http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=1755948024/a=1844700024_1844700024/
All our Snapfish albums as we upload them:
http://www2.snapfish.com/
And RA2's album (uploaded!) specifically here:
http://www2.snapfish.com/
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Bringing Up Baby/Out of the Mouths of
Yesterday RA2 got to do her first home visit to see Claudine, who is expecting a new baby in March (we'll be here!). Claudine has a BEAUTIFUL daughter named Sylvie, who has the suspicious look of RA2's cousin Kate and the independent nature and big smile of her fairy goddaughter Nadia. Claudine also lost a child to SIDS about a year ago, and she is so excited for her new baby.
After two weeks here, we had a few big breakthroughs yesterday. At times we have felt that while things like home visits were awesome and very informative for US, they might not be as helpful to the women we're working with as we would like them to be. But out of the information that came from several hours of chatting yesterday, we made some huge steps forward. First, women here always carry their babies on their backs. It's beautiful to see and really cute, but they get TIRED. They have to have their baby strapped to them even while making dinner, because cribs are expensive, and if they put the baby down on the bed, it might roll off if they aren't paying perfect attention. Also, obviously, their child sleeps in bed with them, exacerbating the exhaustion and complete lack of privacy. After a brief discussion of "baby baskets", Claire had an amazing idea; since these women are weaving baskets anyway, why not find a design for baby baskets? They could use them themselves, AND they would be very marketable.
During that conversation RA2 also realized there's very little infrastructure in terms of organizing the volunteers; Claire heads up all of us as well as running the entire GBV program, two truly daunting tasks. Since rebuilding it (bigger better faster stronger) is EXACTLY what the RAs do, we've been thinking of creative ways to apply our unique skill set (there's a resume sentence for you - "Applied unique skill sets to new and challenging situations IN AFRICA") to make Claire's life easier and introduce some continuity to the volunteer program. Yesterday, for example, we drafted Claire an email she could edit and then send out like clockwork to every volunteer two weeks before they arrived.
A recent counseling session with an amazing, very bright young woman named Jen who is having a lot of problems at home had your fearless RAs stumped for a little while. She had mentioned perhaps wanting to grow up to be a journalist, so RA1 was working her DC connections, thinking of something special to do for her. Then, last night, RA2 just so HAPPENED to meet a journalist named Gloria who writes for The New Times, the only English language daily paper in Rwanda. Not only did she say Jen could come visit her at her office and get a feel for journalism, she said the paper has a children's page and they always need writers! We're connecting Jen and Gloria this week and setting up a time for them to meet soon - how cool would it be for Jen to see her own byline at 16!
Finally, in an out of the mouths of babes moment which can only be regarded with a shrug and a T.I.A., RA2 was privy to a conversation between the womenfolk at the house this morning tye-dying. Willy, Claire's supervisor and head of FVA, had told us that hanging out with the women would give us an opportunity for them to open up and be comfortable, and even with the language barrier, after two weeks they seem to be getting used to us. Sitting in Louise's house today with her two boys, Edison (about 6) and Addison (about 4) who are students of ours and who are ADORABLE, Peace translated the "funny" conversation they were having. Apparently, praying last night with the whole family, Addison asked God to "forgive my father for stabbing my mother and for using bad words and for hitting her and drinking." Oh, and also, "please help my lazy uncle find a job so he can support my auntie." They were all cracking up laughing. Man, we thought we had perfected the art of "laugh or lose it," but these women PUT US TO SHAME.
T.I.A.
After two weeks here, we had a few big breakthroughs yesterday. At times we have felt that while things like home visits were awesome and very informative for US, they might not be as helpful to the women we're working with as we would like them to be. But out of the information that came from several hours of chatting yesterday, we made some huge steps forward. First, women here always carry their babies on their backs. It's beautiful to see and really cute, but they get TIRED. They have to have their baby strapped to them even while making dinner, because cribs are expensive, and if they put the baby down on the bed, it might roll off if they aren't paying perfect attention. Also, obviously, their child sleeps in bed with them, exacerbating the exhaustion and complete lack of privacy. After a brief discussion of "baby baskets", Claire had an amazing idea; since these women are weaving baskets anyway, why not find a design for baby baskets? They could use them themselves, AND they would be very marketable.
During that conversation RA2 also realized there's very little infrastructure in terms of organizing the volunteers; Claire heads up all of us as well as running the entire GBV program, two truly daunting tasks. Since rebuilding it (bigger better faster stronger) is EXACTLY what the RAs do, we've been thinking of creative ways to apply our unique skill set (there's a resume sentence for you - "Applied unique skill sets to new and challenging situations IN AFRICA") to make Claire's life easier and introduce some continuity to the volunteer program. Yesterday, for example, we drafted Claire an email she could edit and then send out like clockwork to every volunteer two weeks before they arrived.
A recent counseling session with an amazing, very bright young woman named Jen who is having a lot of problems at home had your fearless RAs stumped for a little while. She had mentioned perhaps wanting to grow up to be a journalist, so RA1 was working her DC connections, thinking of something special to do for her. Then, last night, RA2 just so HAPPENED to meet a journalist named Gloria who writes for The New Times, the only English language daily paper in Rwanda. Not only did she say Jen could come visit her at her office and get a feel for journalism, she said the paper has a children's page and they always need writers! We're connecting Jen and Gloria this week and setting up a time for them to meet soon - how cool would it be for Jen to see her own byline at 16!
Finally, in an out of the mouths of babes moment which can only be regarded with a shrug and a T.I.A., RA2 was privy to a conversation between the womenfolk at the house this morning tye-dying. Willy, Claire's supervisor and head of FVA, had told us that hanging out with the women would give us an opportunity for them to open up and be comfortable, and even with the language barrier, after two weeks they seem to be getting used to us. Sitting in Louise's house today with her two boys, Edison (about 6) and Addison (about 4) who are students of ours and who are ADORABLE, Peace translated the "funny" conversation they were having. Apparently, praying last night with the whole family, Addison asked God to "forgive my father for stabbing my mother and for using bad words and for hitting her and drinking." Oh, and also, "please help my lazy uncle find a job so he can support my auntie." They were all cracking up laughing. Man, we thought we had perfected the art of "laugh or lose it," but these women PUT US TO SHAME.
T.I.A.
Photographic Proof!!!!
Scroll down - our first photo update is below!
We are slowly, but surely working on getting more photo updates posted - but as previously mentioned - internet is a bit like in the 90s here.
Your patience always makes us very happy!
We are slowly, but surely working on getting more photo updates posted - but as previously mentioned - internet is a bit like in the 90s here.
Your patience always makes us very happy!
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
The Occasional Odd Moment of Grace
We apologize for the unusally long time between posts but we went on adventure this weekend (we have an adventure in the works for next week too, and we'll let you know if it works out - as a nice young traveler we met this weekend told us, "This is Africa. It's better not to make any plans.") and we're trying to do a really special update about it. IT WOULD INVOLVE PICTURES, if it works, which many people have been asking about. We appreciate all your patience on that front, as every update of any kind from here must be forcibly wrenched from the unwilling, rusty jaws of Rwanda's excuse for a technological infrastructure. Perhaps some of you remember dial-up. Think back to the 90's. Now imagine that instead of owning the incredibly slow computer you were working on, you paid by the minute for the privilege of using it, and answering 6 emails or doing the simplest of updates took, at minimum, 2 hours.
Still, there's something friendly and comfortable about internet cafes, and I will be a little sad when the rest of the world goes the way of the US and gets rid of them in favor of home computers. Internet cafes are a lot like payphones, actually.
We've each had an opportunity to teach for a few days at this point, and I have never felt more empathy for those who take on this task as a career. I can't imagine anything more difficult and consuming on a daily basis, except, perhaps, being a nurse. At the same time, I've never felt less sympathy for the complaints I've heard about teaching in the states. Oh, so you had a classroom of 24 students? Why, do did I, and they ranged in age from 4 to 16. Your students had all different skill levels, you say? How funny! My 16 yr olds could speak conversational English while one of my 9 yr olds was nearly fluent. I had a 5 yr old doing long division and a 12 yr old doing subtraction. In addition to this, my students and I do not speak the same language, making it difficult for me to ask the proper questions in order to determine WHY my 7 yr old girl has wandered away from the classroom and is staring at her reflection in a car, WHILE DANCING. I also need to learn how to say, "Please stop touching one another inappropriately" in Kinyarwandan. Also "Please stop hitting." Also "Please line up," "Stop", "Please speak louder", "Please be quieter", and "Please stop smearing one another with the glue stick I have already confiscated twice."
RA1: Get over it, they're just kids.
RA2: I will NOT, and you can't make me.
In all seriousness, the kids are mostly adorable, and we are frequently able to split up the classes into more experienced and less experienced students. We can run for a translator if we need one, and sometimes we can actually get one for the entire class. Bless RA1, she has them doing worksheets and projects, and they adore her. Starting next week, we should actually have an idea of what students will be showing up every day, which will both be phenomenal and allow for some continuity in our lesson plans. Right now everyone sort of shows up hodge-podge, and yesterday Claire had to remove to children who it turns out don't even ATTEND our little one-room classroom and try to determine who they belonged to and how they'd gotten there.
Working with the women is, as ever, amazing beyond words. English lessons are the best part. The women really want to learn and they get excited to improve our Kinyarwandan. We worked very specifically on buying and selling today, appropriately (RA1's brilliant idea). We did basket-weaving afterwards and one of the women brought her 2 yr old daughter, Carina, who was beautiful, bright and reminded me very much of my friend's daughter who is the same age. But that poor Mama looked tired beyond words, so RA1 took Carina for a little walk and made funny faces at her, which was just enough to keep her distracted for a little while. She's at the age where all she wants to do is cling to her mother, and I don't think the woman is getting any sleep.
I also had to have a somewhat uncomfortable talk with a woman today who does manicures and pedicures and wants to have people staying at our guest house book appointments with her. There are some very small changes she's going to have to make in order to meet western sanitary standards, and we can't advocate for her comfortable unless she does. She was very kind and receptive, but it's still incredibly awkward to tell a grown woman how to make changes to her business, a business I have never personally been involved in.
Some aspects of the project are going incredibly well, others are going to need to be worked through slowly. But that's exactly why we gave ourselves 3 months here; when I think of how much we've done in only 2 weeks I'm astonished.
Still, there's something friendly and comfortable about internet cafes, and I will be a little sad when the rest of the world goes the way of the US and gets rid of them in favor of home computers. Internet cafes are a lot like payphones, actually.
We've each had an opportunity to teach for a few days at this point, and I have never felt more empathy for those who take on this task as a career. I can't imagine anything more difficult and consuming on a daily basis, except, perhaps, being a nurse. At the same time, I've never felt less sympathy for the complaints I've heard about teaching in the states. Oh, so you had a classroom of 24 students? Why, do did I, and they ranged in age from 4 to 16. Your students had all different skill levels, you say? How funny! My 16 yr olds could speak conversational English while one of my 9 yr olds was nearly fluent. I had a 5 yr old doing long division and a 12 yr old doing subtraction. In addition to this, my students and I do not speak the same language, making it difficult for me to ask the proper questions in order to determine WHY my 7 yr old girl has wandered away from the classroom and is staring at her reflection in a car, WHILE DANCING. I also need to learn how to say, "Please stop touching one another inappropriately" in Kinyarwandan. Also "Please stop hitting." Also "Please line up," "Stop", "Please speak louder", "Please be quieter", and "Please stop smearing one another with the glue stick I have already confiscated twice."
RA1: Get over it, they're just kids.
RA2: I will NOT, and you can't make me.
In all seriousness, the kids are mostly adorable, and we are frequently able to split up the classes into more experienced and less experienced students. We can run for a translator if we need one, and sometimes we can actually get one for the entire class. Bless RA1, she has them doing worksheets and projects, and they adore her. Starting next week, we should actually have an idea of what students will be showing up every day, which will both be phenomenal and allow for some continuity in our lesson plans. Right now everyone sort of shows up hodge-podge, and yesterday Claire had to remove to children who it turns out don't even ATTEND our little one-room classroom and try to determine who they belonged to and how they'd gotten there.
Working with the women is, as ever, amazing beyond words. English lessons are the best part. The women really want to learn and they get excited to improve our Kinyarwandan. We worked very specifically on buying and selling today, appropriately (RA1's brilliant idea). We did basket-weaving afterwards and one of the women brought her 2 yr old daughter, Carina, who was beautiful, bright and reminded me very much of my friend's daughter who is the same age. But that poor Mama looked tired beyond words, so RA1 took Carina for a little walk and made funny faces at her, which was just enough to keep her distracted for a little while. She's at the age where all she wants to do is cling to her mother, and I don't think the woman is getting any sleep.
I also had to have a somewhat uncomfortable talk with a woman today who does manicures and pedicures and wants to have people staying at our guest house book appointments with her. There are some very small changes she's going to have to make in order to meet western sanitary standards, and we can't advocate for her comfortable unless she does. She was very kind and receptive, but it's still incredibly awkward to tell a grown woman how to make changes to her business, a business I have never personally been involved in.
Some aspects of the project are going incredibly well, others are going to need to be worked through slowly. But that's exactly why we gave ourselves 3 months here; when I think of how much we've done in only 2 weeks I'm astonished.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Weekend Getaway
So, as much and as hard as the RAs work, sometimes, you need a little break. One may ask oneself, what do two fabulous single ladies DO in the country of Rwanda with a weekend off? We have discovered, friends, that they go to Gisenyi, Rwanda: the local equivalent of the Hamptons (or the Vineyard for our DC family).
Gisenyi sits on the coast of a ginormous lake, Lake Kivu. Lake Kivu shares borders with Rwanda (to the south'ish), Congo (to the north'ish) and Uganda (to the east'ish). We booked two nights in the guest house of the local Presbyterian church (roughly 2000Rwf a night - or about $4 a night) and took the "Virguna Express" bus for a little over a 4 hour ride to town which cost us 2800RwF one-way (Yes, in total it cost us little more than $30 for a full weekend trip, including transportation and lodging). Luckily, since we are fabulous assistants and sometimes have assistant ESP, our hotel was literally 54 seconds from the bus stop and thus the center of town - such as it was.
After an adventurous jaunt that actually took us past the infamous Stipp Hotel (aptly named of course) to the border of Congo (oops, we missed the street signs) we ducked into a little backyard bar, sat under a African version of a cabanna and had dinner. As we walked back, RA2 failed to pay enough attention on the unlit road and walked into a hole. Oh yah. INTO a hole, which came up to about her ribcage. While she's extremely luky she didn't break anything, she did take most of the skin off her left leg below the knee. Rather than reacting to the shock and pain of the fall like a normal person (tears, perhaps) she instead freaked out and yelled at everyone who tried to comfort her, ask her anything, or even speak. Public apology: SORRY ABOUT THE YELLING AND THE SWEARING. It was bad. Luckily the volunteers here are of a kindly and forgiving nature, and Ian patched her up with what was available and then took her for Rwandan medication (beer).
After the exhausting day of working all day, traveling on a bus and walking all over Gisenyi we turned in for the night, excited for a day of sunbathing. Saturday brought with it a fantastically sunny day. RA2 discovered a great little pastry shop and ran into 2 traveling Austrians, Manuel and Helmut. Manuel took her to the pharmacy for supplies and fixed her leg up properly. Austrians are required to take a first aid class when getting their license, and according to their good samaritan laws, anyone who doesn't stop at the scene of an accident can be prosecuted. At this point, RA2's leg definitely looked like an accident scene.
RA2: Well, you saw my leg before, Ian fixed me up.
Manuel: Yes, I saw. I meant to ask you about that - was he drunk at the time?
No, but, thank you Ian, you are an Irish angel.
RA1 slept in a bit later and found a fun little cafe that brought you the most amazing chai tea (100RwF - $.20) that has ever graced her mouth and chapati bread (100RwF - $.20) kind of like naan bread, but more fried and a bit sweeter. So - yes - less than $.50 for breakfast; it was clearly a sign of an amazing day to come. Ian had discovered a nice hotel a few minutes from our guest house that had a great private beach, so we wandered over to the Lake Kivu Serena Hotel.
The garden and beach area provided some of the most beautiful views of Goma, DRC. We felt like we had accidently found a tropical paradise in the middle of sub-saharan Africa.
We totally considered sending that picture home as a postcard: "Many needy orphans here. Please send cash."
It's hard to explain what a change this hotel and beach were from even our hostel. The streets of Gisenyi, like Kigali, are lined with kids asking for money, tiny EXTREMELY inexpensive places to eat or purchase necessities, lots of dust and little commerce. This was like - America, basically.
We ordered some scrumptious Rwandan coffee blendy/icey drinks and headed out to the garden.
RA1 got restless and ordered a beach chair (3000 RwF) and sunbathed for a few hours and RA2 did the same in the garden.
Funny enough, since someone promptly stole RA1's chair as soon as she stood up to get out of the sun for a bit - they didn't charge her (told you: amazing day). The sky started to look foreboding, so we headed in to the hotel's posh lounge/lobby and waited out a wee rainstorm.
For dinner, we had discovered this amazing restaurant that was quite literally an alley way that had been sectioned off, filled with chairs and turned into a restaurant. They were serving three menu items: a buffet (in Rwanda, a buffet is when there are several food options, like at home, only you don't go back for seconds - you pile ONE plate with AS MUCH FOOD AS POSSIBLE. it's an art we haven't yet perfected, but give us time), roasted corn on the cob and omelettes w/ fries. We opted out of the buffet and all ordered a cob of roasted corn, omelettes w/fries and some sort of 'tea.' Our tea came quickly and was some sort of concoction that tasted a bit like cider, a bit like fermentation and a bit like vinegar. We are still unclear if it was alcoholic or not. Our food came within 15 minutes (a RECORD in Rwandan service times) and the food was filling and so tasty. We went back to the guesthouse full and ready for an awesome sleep. Most of us were planning to wake up at 6am the next day to take a day trip to Goma in the Congo (RA2 had to opt out due to gimp leg - everything about the Congo is RA1s story! RA2 is going to go sometime in the next few months with the new volunteers). Then - we came home to a surprise.
Our room, that had been full of just us, was now full of women we didn't know. Which in most cases would be totally fine, but in this case we were ready for a good long sleep and it appeared these women didn't sleep at all. Ever. We weaved our way through the women to brush the teeth, change into pjs, pack for the Congo trip, etc. Finally, when we were all tucked into our beds, happily under our mosquito nets, we realized: the other women are not going to stop talking. Dutifully, RA2 flipped off the lights. The talking continued. An hour or so later, we were blissfully asleep in a sun-filled-day-induced coma. Then, 4am happened. A phone rang, a conversation started. It ended about 25 minutes later and we breathed a collective sigh of relief for our almost two more hours of sleep. Then, 5am happened. The door to the shower room, which redefined loud and creak, was opened and closed approximately 74 times. RA1 was, awesomely, sleeping right next to the shower room door. Around 5am it was apparently time to wake up because the radio came on - from someone's cell phone - the conversations started and there was no escaping. The apocalypse of loud talking had just bombed our room and we were not getting a full night's sleep. We grumbled out of bed and two of us set off in search in breakfast and perhaps a quiet place in the road to sleep and the rest set off to the border.
The border of Rwanda and Congo is surprisngly small and quiet. We arrived around 7am, quickly got exit stamps from Rwanda and headed to the Congolese side. They speak French only (ONLY) in Congo, so one of our tripmates was translating everything with the border guards. They checked our Yellowfever cards and filled out our entry visas for us. After 5 of us had finished and paid $35 to cross, the office realized they had ran out of copies of visas for the last two of our travelers. We waited while someone took a donkey to the nearest Kinkos, waited 47 minutes for copies then slowly walked back (I'm only guessing at the reason for the delay of course) and we finally set off into Goma around 8:30am. I must say - for the Congo, which I pass judgement and expectation on purely from the news, photos, Heart of Darkness and Poisonwood Bible - it was rather unsurprisingly normal. Normal for African city standards. We wandered in to the middle of town, found a little restaurant and ordered breakfast. Breakfast in Congo is: tea, bread, and cheese. Simple. Filling. Awesome. Our friend, Stefan, talked to one of the restaurant goers (who was drinking a Primus at 9am - he rocked) about getting up to one of the villages that was still covered in the volcanic rock that had covered a majority of the city about 10 years ago when one of the volcanoes erupted and sent lava flowing in to Goma. He did the following things to make our trip awesome and as painless as possible: found someone to exchange our RwFs for Congolese Dollars; Found 7 motobike drivers to drive us to the village; Negotiated a fair price to take us to the village, wait for us to look around and then drive some of us to the border the some of us back to the restaurant. Again, he was a rockstar.
We hopped on motos and took one of the most beautiful rides through Goma and up into one of the villages. The roads are littered with volcanic rock and the dust/dirt is pitch black. We arrived to the middle of the village which was about a 1/2 a square mile of just huge volcanic rocks. A local (and about 60 local kids) circled the curious group of muzungus - yes, it transcends borders - to tell us the story of the volcano's eruption. The lava in the area we had been standing in was over 10 feet deep. The area we were in is the last are to be rebuilt and the rocks from that area were continously being used in rebuilding efforts for walls and fences around houses.
It started to sprinkle a bit and as we rode away from the lava rocks, I had a realization: I was riding on a motobike, down a hill covered in volcanic rock and it was starting to rain - the old me would have been angry at the rain and worried about falling off the moto; the new me that is slowly emerging here in Rwanda thought that it was perhaps the single most awesome moment of her life.
Half of our group headed back to the border to catch a 1pm bus while the other half headed back to the restaurant to say thanks to our friend who hooked up the entire trip for us. He invited us in for a Primus (at 11am - I love Congo) and stayed to chat with us for a bit. He suggested ending our day in Goma with a walk down to the harbor. Reaching the harbor we saw that Gisenyi looked just as epically grand and beautiful as Goma did from the beach. There were lots of boat taxis offering rides to Bukavu (another Congolese volcano town on the lake) and some little lakeside restaurants. We also saw about 60 Congo families participating in the worldwide phenomenon of "Sunday Laundry" on the beachside. They were using a beached boat as a clothes line and shouting "French? Bonjour! English? Hello!" at us as we walked by. We ducked in to a nice hotel near the border for a quick restroom stop and some tea. It was clearly catering to the muzungo crowd that we could see that most guests were aid workers and humanitarian organization volunteers. We made it back to the Congo border around 3:30pm, came back into Rwanda, exchanged some of our Congo money back to RWFs, discovered we had totally been had by the money exchange man and hopped on motobikes back to the guesthouse. Grabbing one last delicious chai tea for the road, we happily slumped in to our bus seats and set off on the 4 hour ride back to Kigali.
We had never been so happy to fall into the Favor Guest House beds and call it a weekend.
Gisenyi sits on the coast of a ginormous lake, Lake Kivu. Lake Kivu shares borders with Rwanda (to the south'ish), Congo (to the north'ish) and Uganda (to the east'ish). We booked two nights in the guest house of the local Presbyterian church (roughly 2000Rwf a night - or about $4 a night) and took the "Virguna Express" bus for a little over a 4 hour ride to town which cost us 2800RwF one-way (Yes, in total it cost us little more than $30 for a full weekend trip, including transportation and lodging). Luckily, since we are fabulous assistants and sometimes have assistant ESP, our hotel was literally 54 seconds from the bus stop and thus the center of town - such as it was.
After an adventurous jaunt that actually took us past the infamous Stipp Hotel (aptly named of course) to the border of Congo (oops, we missed the street signs) we ducked into a little backyard bar, sat under a African version of a cabanna and had dinner. As we walked back, RA2 failed to pay enough attention on the unlit road and walked into a hole. Oh yah. INTO a hole, which came up to about her ribcage. While she's extremely luky she didn't break anything, she did take most of the skin off her left leg below the knee. Rather than reacting to the shock and pain of the fall like a normal person (tears, perhaps) she instead freaked out and yelled at everyone who tried to comfort her, ask her anything, or even speak. Public apology: SORRY ABOUT THE YELLING AND THE SWEARING. It was bad. Luckily the volunteers here are of a kindly and forgiving nature, and Ian patched her up with what was available and then took her for Rwandan medication (beer).
After the exhausting day of working all day, traveling on a bus and walking all over Gisenyi we turned in for the night, excited for a day of sunbathing. Saturday brought with it a fantastically sunny day. RA2 discovered a great little pastry shop and ran into 2 traveling Austrians, Manuel and Helmut. Manuel took her to the pharmacy for supplies and fixed her leg up properly. Austrians are required to take a first aid class when getting their license, and according to their good samaritan laws, anyone who doesn't stop at the scene of an accident can be prosecuted. At this point, RA2's leg definitely looked like an accident scene.
RA2: Well, you saw my leg before, Ian fixed me up.
Manuel: Yes, I saw. I meant to ask you about that - was he drunk at the time?
No, but, thank you Ian, you are an Irish angel.
RA1 slept in a bit later and found a fun little cafe that brought you the most amazing chai tea (100RwF - $.20) that has ever graced her mouth and chapati bread (100RwF - $.20) kind of like naan bread, but more fried and a bit sweeter. So - yes - less than $.50 for breakfast; it was clearly a sign of an amazing day to come. Ian had discovered a nice hotel a few minutes from our guest house that had a great private beach, so we wandered over to the Lake Kivu Serena Hotel.
The garden and beach area provided some of the most beautiful views of Goma, DRC. We felt like we had accidently found a tropical paradise in the middle of sub-saharan Africa.
We totally considered sending that picture home as a postcard: "Many needy orphans here. Please send cash." It's hard to explain what a change this hotel and beach were from even our hostel. The streets of Gisenyi, like Kigali, are lined with kids asking for money, tiny EXTREMELY inexpensive places to eat or purchase necessities, lots of dust and little commerce. This was like - America, basically.We ordered some scrumptious Rwandan coffee blendy/icey drinks and headed out to the garden.
RA1 got restless and ordered a beach chair (3000 RwF) and sunbathed for a few hours and RA2 did the same in the garden.
Funny enough, since someone promptly stole RA1's chair as soon as she stood up to get out of the sun for a bit - they didn't charge her (told you: amazing day). The sky started to look foreboding, so we headed in to the hotel's posh lounge/lobby and waited out a wee rainstorm.For dinner, we had discovered this amazing restaurant that was quite literally an alley way that had been sectioned off, filled with chairs and turned into a restaurant. They were serving three menu items: a buffet (in Rwanda, a buffet is when there are several food options, like at home, only you don't go back for seconds - you pile ONE plate with AS MUCH FOOD AS POSSIBLE. it's an art we haven't yet perfected, but give us time), roasted corn on the cob and omelettes w/ fries. We opted out of the buffet and all ordered a cob of roasted corn, omelettes w/fries and some sort of 'tea.' Our tea came quickly and was some sort of concoction that tasted a bit like cider, a bit like fermentation and a bit like vinegar. We are still unclear if it was alcoholic or not. Our food came within 15 minutes (a RECORD in Rwandan service times) and the food was filling and so tasty. We went back to the guesthouse full and ready for an awesome sleep. Most of us were planning to wake up at 6am the next day to take a day trip to Goma in the Congo (RA2 had to opt out due to gimp leg - everything about the Congo is RA1s story! RA2 is going to go sometime in the next few months with the new volunteers). Then - we came home to a surprise.
Our room, that had been full of just us, was now full of women we didn't know. Which in most cases would be totally fine, but in this case we were ready for a good long sleep and it appeared these women didn't sleep at all. Ever. We weaved our way through the women to brush the teeth, change into pjs, pack for the Congo trip, etc. Finally, when we were all tucked into our beds, happily under our mosquito nets, we realized: the other women are not going to stop talking. Dutifully, RA2 flipped off the lights. The talking continued. An hour or so later, we were blissfully asleep in a sun-filled-day-induced coma. Then, 4am happened. A phone rang, a conversation started. It ended about 25 minutes later and we breathed a collective sigh of relief for our almost two more hours of sleep. Then, 5am happened. The door to the shower room, which redefined loud and creak, was opened and closed approximately 74 times. RA1 was, awesomely, sleeping right next to the shower room door. Around 5am it was apparently time to wake up because the radio came on - from someone's cell phone - the conversations started and there was no escaping. The apocalypse of loud talking had just bombed our room and we were not getting a full night's sleep. We grumbled out of bed and two of us set off in search in breakfast and perhaps a quiet place in the road to sleep and the rest set off to the border.
The border of Rwanda and Congo is surprisngly small and quiet. We arrived around 7am, quickly got exit stamps from Rwanda and headed to the Congolese side. They speak French only (ONLY) in Congo, so one of our tripmates was translating everything with the border guards. They checked our Yellowfever cards and filled out our entry visas for us. After 5 of us had finished and paid $35 to cross, the office realized they had ran out of copies of visas for the last two of our travelers. We waited while someone took a donkey to the nearest Kinkos, waited 47 minutes for copies then slowly walked back (I'm only guessing at the reason for the delay of course) and we finally set off into Goma around 8:30am. I must say - for the Congo, which I pass judgement and expectation on purely from the news, photos, Heart of Darkness and Poisonwood Bible - it was rather unsurprisingly normal. Normal for African city standards. We wandered in to the middle of town, found a little restaurant and ordered breakfast. Breakfast in Congo is: tea, bread, and cheese. Simple. Filling. Awesome. Our friend, Stefan, talked to one of the restaurant goers (who was drinking a Primus at 9am - he rocked) about getting up to one of the villages that was still covered in the volcanic rock that had covered a majority of the city about 10 years ago when one of the volcanoes erupted and sent lava flowing in to Goma. He did the following things to make our trip awesome and as painless as possible: found someone to exchange our RwFs for Congolese Dollars; Found 7 motobike drivers to drive us to the village; Negotiated a fair price to take us to the village, wait for us to look around and then drive some of us to the border the some of us back to the restaurant. Again, he was a rockstar.
We hopped on motos and took one of the most beautiful rides through Goma and up into one of the villages. The roads are littered with volcanic rock and the dust/dirt is pitch black. We arrived to the middle of the village which was about a 1/2 a square mile of just huge volcanic rocks. A local (and about 60 local kids) circled the curious group of muzungus - yes, it transcends borders - to tell us the story of the volcano's eruption. The lava in the area we had been standing in was over 10 feet deep. The area we were in is the last are to be rebuilt and the rocks from that area were continously being used in rebuilding efforts for walls and fences around houses.
It started to sprinkle a bit and as we rode away from the lava rocks, I had a realization: I was riding on a motobike, down a hill covered in volcanic rock and it was starting to rain - the old me would have been angry at the rain and worried about falling off the moto; the new me that is slowly emerging here in Rwanda thought that it was perhaps the single most awesome moment of her life.
Half of our group headed back to the border to catch a 1pm bus while the other half headed back to the restaurant to say thanks to our friend who hooked up the entire trip for us. He invited us in for a Primus (at 11am - I love Congo) and stayed to chat with us for a bit. He suggested ending our day in Goma with a walk down to the harbor. Reaching the harbor we saw that Gisenyi looked just as epically grand and beautiful as Goma did from the beach. There were lots of boat taxis offering rides to Bukavu (another Congolese volcano town on the lake) and some little lakeside restaurants. We also saw about 60 Congo families participating in the worldwide phenomenon of "Sunday Laundry" on the beachside. They were using a beached boat as a clothes line and shouting "French? Bonjour! English? Hello!" at us as we walked by. We ducked in to a nice hotel near the border for a quick restroom stop and some tea. It was clearly catering to the muzungo crowd that we could see that most guests were aid workers and humanitarian organization volunteers. We made it back to the Congo border around 3:30pm, came back into Rwanda, exchanged some of our Congo money back to RWFs, discovered we had totally been had by the money exchange man and hopped on motobikes back to the guesthouse. Grabbing one last delicious chai tea for the road, we happily slumped in to our bus seats and set off on the 4 hour ride back to Kigali.
We had never been so happy to fall into the Favor Guest House beds and call it a weekend.
Friday, January 22, 2010
The Power of (More Than) One
Since starting our program 4 days ago I’ve realized that the most powerful thing we provide these women is the fellowship they have once or twice a week. The RAs are not the most stringent in their religious beliefs, but the one thing organized religion provides for its members is a sense of community and fellowship. The women we work with all have different stories, different homelives and different family structures; but the common strand is that they all have come seeking something from the GBV group. On the surface of course, they are seeking training for IGAs (Income Generating Activities), but under that is a sense of belonging.
The stories of these women range from husbands who do not work and are illiterate, to abusive husbands that threaten to kill them. We had one woman tell our supervisor that her husband often threatens her life and that she has had to move into her children’s room to feel safe. She is HIV positive. Other women are coming to learn so that they can provide for their young children in hopes of a better future for them.
So as we end the week on a positive note of epic basket-weaving, a finished load of handwashed clothes, hemmed dresses and awesome school days, we continue to be excited about what we provide these women: a room that contains a sense of belonging for women who often feel so alone in their world. We’re excited to be a part of their community and to have been accepted so quickly and fully. These women are the backbone of Rwandan society even if they are often invisible. They are working, literally, their hands to the bone to provide a better future for their children and that, friends, is one thing that we couldn’t be happier to participate in.
The stories of these women range from husbands who do not work and are illiterate, to abusive husbands that threaten to kill them. We had one woman tell our supervisor that her husband often threatens her life and that she has had to move into her children’s room to feel safe. She is HIV positive. Other women are coming to learn so that they can provide for their young children in hopes of a better future for them.
So as we end the week on a positive note of epic basket-weaving, a finished load of handwashed clothes, hemmed dresses and awesome school days, we continue to be excited about what we provide these women: a room that contains a sense of belonging for women who often feel so alone in their world. We’re excited to be a part of their community and to have been accepted so quickly and fully. These women are the backbone of Rwandan society even if they are often invisible. They are working, literally, their hands to the bone to provide a better future for their children and that, friends, is one thing that we couldn’t be happier to participate in.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Workin' 9 - 5
Gender Based Violence Placement (Days 2-4)
So far, we’ve been able to expand our skills in the following: basket weaving, tye-dye and teaching children. RA1 & 2 have never been rumored to be amazing with children, but we must say – not to toot our own horn or anything – but that we’re doing a good job. Lindsey was the first to work with the children and told them all about Canada and her family. RA1 & 2 followed up on the family lesson with teaching the children how to do introductions of their family and of boys (his name is...) and girls (her name is...). It sounds very rudimentary, but the children have been mandated by the government to learn English so we’re using various methods with them including, but not limited to: “Body Man ('these are my hands,' 'this is my nose'),” “duck, duck, goose,” “head, shoulders, knees and toes,” “tracing time,” “coloring time” and “red rover.”
The women, of course, are the main reason for this program and BOY do those women put us to shame! We learned to do basket weaving with the teacher, Habiba - we affectionately refer to her as HABIBATEACHER and we think it makes her laugh. She was great, but I think she thought RA1’s baskets were crap and she gave RA2 a brand new basket to work on due to her lack of confidence. Cordina is a cute young woman who is having her second baby and makes great baskets. She sat beside RA1 the first day of basket weaving and provided lessons on top of endless laughs. ESPECIALLY, when she grabbed RA1’s hand and put it on her tummy since she couldn’t communicate in English that she was preggers. RA1 – clearly, the one with the aversion to newborns – was equally horrified and crying she was laughing so hard. We finished this day on a high note, coming up with publicity and marketing ideas for the womens’ various products and agreeing to come in an hour early on basket weaving days to teach the women English. In exchange, they are going to teach us Kinyarwandan.
After basketweaving, we walked with Elise to her manicure and pedicure lessons. Elise has roughly the education of a third grader, so she is learning to do manis and pedis to make a living. We walked for what seemed like hours, to arrive to a shop – roughly the size of half of a cubicle in America. We sat down and were promptly serviced for manicures and pedicures. In total, a full mani/pedi cost 2,000 RwF or - $4. We’re working on setting up some times for the women to come to our guest house and do mani/pedis. First however, we must work on communicating some health and safety standards for our women beauticians because there was a huge lack of rubbing alcohol in the place we had our nails done and although we’re brave and doing this for their practice – we want to make sure they are able to give a high standard of service to the next women so they can charge more and make more money and be independent – YAY WOMEN!
Our last group of IGA (Income Generating Activity) is tye-dye. The first time we went we were taken to Kristen’s house where she was teaching Louise and Mary how to tye-dye. The next day a woman named Melissa came to join. The women sit together, gossip and tye up white bolts of fabric to prepare for dying. Then they boil water and put dye, some sort of acid and some sort of powder into a bucket (we weren’t allowed to participate in this part because we haven’t gotten our hot little hands on a set of Dexter-approved work gloves) and mix it together. They quickly put the white fabric in the buckets of dye and basically handwash the fabric in the dye. After about 5 minutes of that they take the dyed fabric out, remove the strings and dip it into a mix of water and some special powder which keeps the color from fading, then rinse. After they’ve finished they hang the fabric up on the clothes line to let it dry. They’ve learned to fold the fabric in a way that if you split it in half, you have two matching pieces. You can buy a full piece of fabric for 5000RwF (roughly $10) or one half of fabric for 3500RwF (about $6.50). A lot of the fabric is purchased with the intent to sew it into something fabulous like a skirt, dress or scarf.
Basically we’ve learned how the women in Rwanda, who can’t afford school, make a living. It’s been a fascinating experience filled with laughter and us waiting for the translation of a gossip session from Claire. As we’ve mentioned before, we’re pretty much writing the GBV program from scratch, so there’s tons of opportunities for us to put our assistant hats on and help the women sell the fabulous products their making. It is extremely cost prohibitive for women to purchase a stall at the local markets (300,000Rwf or roughly $600), so we have to come up with creative ways to get their products out in the world. Unfortunately, we’re still learning the functions of publicity in a country we’ve been in for barely a week – so it’s a work in progress, much like you’re beloved RAs.
So far, we’ve been able to expand our skills in the following: basket weaving, tye-dye and teaching children. RA1 & 2 have never been rumored to be amazing with children, but we must say – not to toot our own horn or anything – but that we’re doing a good job. Lindsey was the first to work with the children and told them all about Canada and her family. RA1 & 2 followed up on the family lesson with teaching the children how to do introductions of their family and of boys (his name is...) and girls (her name is...). It sounds very rudimentary, but the children have been mandated by the government to learn English so we’re using various methods with them including, but not limited to: “Body Man ('these are my hands,' 'this is my nose'),” “duck, duck, goose,” “head, shoulders, knees and toes,” “tracing time,” “coloring time” and “red rover.”
The women, of course, are the main reason for this program and BOY do those women put us to shame! We learned to do basket weaving with the teacher, Habiba - we affectionately refer to her as HABIBATEACHER and we think it makes her laugh. She was great, but I think she thought RA1’s baskets were crap and she gave RA2 a brand new basket to work on due to her lack of confidence. Cordina is a cute young woman who is having her second baby and makes great baskets. She sat beside RA1 the first day of basket weaving and provided lessons on top of endless laughs. ESPECIALLY, when she grabbed RA1’s hand and put it on her tummy since she couldn’t communicate in English that she was preggers. RA1 – clearly, the one with the aversion to newborns – was equally horrified and crying she was laughing so hard. We finished this day on a high note, coming up with publicity and marketing ideas for the womens’ various products and agreeing to come in an hour early on basket weaving days to teach the women English. In exchange, they are going to teach us Kinyarwandan.
After basketweaving, we walked with Elise to her manicure and pedicure lessons. Elise has roughly the education of a third grader, so she is learning to do manis and pedis to make a living. We walked for what seemed like hours, to arrive to a shop – roughly the size of half of a cubicle in America. We sat down and were promptly serviced for manicures and pedicures. In total, a full mani/pedi cost 2,000 RwF or - $4. We’re working on setting up some times for the women to come to our guest house and do mani/pedis. First however, we must work on communicating some health and safety standards for our women beauticians because there was a huge lack of rubbing alcohol in the place we had our nails done and although we’re brave and doing this for their practice – we want to make sure they are able to give a high standard of service to the next women so they can charge more and make more money and be independent – YAY WOMEN!
Our last group of IGA (Income Generating Activity) is tye-dye. The first time we went we were taken to Kristen’s house where she was teaching Louise and Mary how to tye-dye. The next day a woman named Melissa came to join. The women sit together, gossip and tye up white bolts of fabric to prepare for dying. Then they boil water and put dye, some sort of acid and some sort of powder into a bucket (we weren’t allowed to participate in this part because we haven’t gotten our hot little hands on a set of Dexter-approved work gloves) and mix it together. They quickly put the white fabric in the buckets of dye and basically handwash the fabric in the dye. After about 5 minutes of that they take the dyed fabric out, remove the strings and dip it into a mix of water and some special powder which keeps the color from fading, then rinse. After they’ve finished they hang the fabric up on the clothes line to let it dry. They’ve learned to fold the fabric in a way that if you split it in half, you have two matching pieces. You can buy a full piece of fabric for 5000RwF (roughly $10) or one half of fabric for 3500RwF (about $6.50). A lot of the fabric is purchased with the intent to sew it into something fabulous like a skirt, dress or scarf.
Basically we’ve learned how the women in Rwanda, who can’t afford school, make a living. It’s been a fascinating experience filled with laughter and us waiting for the translation of a gossip session from Claire. As we’ve mentioned before, we’re pretty much writing the GBV program from scratch, so there’s tons of opportunities for us to put our assistant hats on and help the women sell the fabulous products their making. It is extremely cost prohibitive for women to purchase a stall at the local markets (300,000Rwf or roughly $600), so we have to come up with creative ways to get their products out in the world. Unfortunately, we’re still learning the functions of publicity in a country we’ve been in for barely a week – so it’s a work in progress, much like you’re beloved RAs.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
T.I.A. Part 1
Welcome to Africa, where random occurrences that don't quite fit the overarching narrative are both common and entertaining. We'll try to fill you in occasionally on the adventures of the muzungas in Kigali.
1) Our first full day here, orientation day, Willy (Claire's boss/FVA director) drove the RAs, Maggie May, and Ian to the Genocide Memorial. When we came out, we divided up and piled back into our car. 3 or 4 minutes later, we realized we were in the wrong car, with a man none of us had ever seen before. We climbed over each other to get out, apologizing profusely. Turned out he hadn't noticed either - he had brought 3 muzunga girls and 1 muzunga boy to the memorial, and 3 muzunga girls and 1 muzunga boy had gotten back in the car! Perfect. Apparently we all look alike.
2) It is well known amongst our friends that RA1 maintains a base level of ZERO interest in children. Occasionally she tolerates them as a curiousity, and she has even come to enjoy RA2's young cousins and fairy goddaughter. But in general, children are something she maintains a safe distance from. It turns out that in Rwanda, when a bus gets full and a mother has her hands full, it is customary to dump her child on the nearest person's lap. Our 1st bus ride, a mother climbed on and looked around, hesitantly gesturing at RA1 - who handed her bag to RA2 and sat happily with the child on her lap. It helped that the little girl looked EXACTLY like one of RA2's cousins, for whom she has a fondness: big smile, big dimples, and a fuzzy little ponytail. Still, no one would believe it who hasn't seen it. I SAID I WOULD TELL EVERYONE AND I DID.
3) The "guest house", where we are staying with the other volunteers, is a hostel - an old-fashioned inn. That's why there is a cook (Damian), as well as three young women who clean, do laundry, and generally run the place (Assumpta, Console and one other who's name I haven't caught - I'll get it). The guest house has visitors who aren't with our program; currently there are 6 or 7 Lithuanians, who appear to all know each other, who have been there since before we got there. There's also a handyman named Innocent. We can always tell when it's Innocent's turn to put his music in the cd player because it switches from the Christian Gospel favored by the ladies to rap and R&B. Since Innocent was cleaning the front yard and washing his car one morning, RA2 decided to hand over her iPod while she took a shower. And that's how we found out that Innocent GETS DOWN. Whenever he thinks no one is looking, he busts some seriously awesome moves. If he realizes someone can see him, he stops immediately and pretends it never happened. The iPod exchange is totally worth it.
1) Our first full day here, orientation day, Willy (Claire's boss/FVA director) drove the RAs, Maggie May, and Ian to the Genocide Memorial. When we came out, we divided up and piled back into our car. 3 or 4 minutes later, we realized we were in the wrong car, with a man none of us had ever seen before. We climbed over each other to get out, apologizing profusely. Turned out he hadn't noticed either - he had brought 3 muzunga girls and 1 muzunga boy to the memorial, and 3 muzunga girls and 1 muzunga boy had gotten back in the car! Perfect. Apparently we all look alike.
2) It is well known amongst our friends that RA1 maintains a base level of ZERO interest in children. Occasionally she tolerates them as a curiousity, and she has even come to enjoy RA2's young cousins and fairy goddaughter. But in general, children are something she maintains a safe distance from. It turns out that in Rwanda, when a bus gets full and a mother has her hands full, it is customary to dump her child on the nearest person's lap. Our 1st bus ride, a mother climbed on and looked around, hesitantly gesturing at RA1 - who handed her bag to RA2 and sat happily with the child on her lap. It helped that the little girl looked EXACTLY like one of RA2's cousins, for whom she has a fondness: big smile, big dimples, and a fuzzy little ponytail. Still, no one would believe it who hasn't seen it. I SAID I WOULD TELL EVERYONE AND I DID.
3) The "guest house", where we are staying with the other volunteers, is a hostel - an old-fashioned inn. That's why there is a cook (Damian), as well as three young women who clean, do laundry, and generally run the place (Assumpta, Console and one other who's name I haven't caught - I'll get it). The guest house has visitors who aren't with our program; currently there are 6 or 7 Lithuanians, who appear to all know each other, who have been there since before we got there. There's also a handyman named Innocent. We can always tell when it's Innocent's turn to put his music in the cd player because it switches from the Christian Gospel favored by the ladies to rap and R&B. Since Innocent was cleaning the front yard and washing his car one morning, RA2 decided to hand over her iPod while she took a shower. And that's how we found out that Innocent GETS DOWN. Whenever he thinks no one is looking, he busts some seriously awesome moves. If he realizes someone can see him, he stops immediately and pretends it never happened. The iPod exchange is totally worth it.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Working Girls (and Boy)
Note on previous post: the rest of that nursery rhyme is "home again home again jiggety jig." Thanks mom!
Yesterday all six of us got our assignments. We (who are now "recovering assistants" or "RAs", thanks) were lucky enough to get to go and see where everyone would be working, because we stuck close to Claire, our fantastic coordinator who also runs the GBV (gender-based violence program) with which we are working directly.
We started off by traveling to the site of FVAs new orphanage, which they hope to have building permits for in March. Currently its farmland, and they will continue to grow crops there and use the money they get from selling them to support the orphanage and other FVA programs. Sustainable! We love it. They're growing peanuts, lots of corn, bananas, PUMPKINS (I know go figure) and they have papaya trees. Ian "picked" a few papayas (you knock them out of the tree with a stick and try to avoid them as they fall directly towards your head) and RA2 managed to knock one down as well.
We dropped Ian off at Les Enfants de Dieu (Children of God), an all boys orphanage that takes in street kids. They get a full education and have a really interesting internal system of government. The boys elect ministers - a minister of education, a minister of technology - from among their peers. These ministers have control of the orphanages entire budget and administration. The adults and directors must go to them for permission to purchase or change anything. It gives the boys a great learning experience, agency and empowerment.
Maggie May is teaching English to teachers at a private school.
A NOTE ON THE ENGLISH THING: In hopes of opening trade and tourism with neighboring countries who were colonized by Britain (such as Uganda) as well as North America, about a year ago, Rwanda made a decision to switch to English. Having been colonized by Belgium (it's all about colonization here), they spoke French for many years, and many people still do. Kinyarwandan was introduced as a common, unifying Rwandan language, and everyone speaks it (Muraho!). And then a year ago - English. Learn it. It's like the government of America declared, "Everyone must speak Swahili." Teachers don't know it, and they have to pass on this knowledge they don't have to their students. On the plus side, for us, teaching English here is NOT a vanity project. If we pass on one word of English while we're here, it's huge. The people Maggie May is teaching will, we hope, be passing on that knowledge to children who have a real chance of bring Rwanda into a better future.
Many people here are TRILINGUAL, putting us and our 4 words of Kinyarwandan to shame.
Tsufit is teaching Gisimba Orphanage. It was founded by (and is named for) a man who saved 400 people during the genocide by hiding them in the orphanage and buying off the genocidaires one at a time when they came around. He's a hero in Rwanda and is mentioned at the genocide memorial. We plan to spend some time at Gisimba and we're considering productive ways to do that - story time, dance hour. The older kids there go off to boarding school, and one of the women who is working at FVA and going to university (getting her degree in Sociology!) lived at Gisimba for 9 years. They do their best to give the kids there every opportunity, they get an education, and many go on to be very successful. That said, there are so many young kids there in need, it is incredibly overwhelming. As you walk through they grab you, grin at you, or hide behind a bigger kid and stare. They love digital cameras and the smile on their face is amazing but it breaks your heart when you have to take the camera back and they look miserable - or worse, cry. One kid was particularly awesome. He had a big smile no matter what and took very, VERY good pictures, whether by design or accident we may never know. He had a little kid who clung to him, who is deaf-mute and almost never happy, but clearly loves this older boy. We found out later he's HIV+.
C-Note, RA1 and RA2 (like Little Thing 1 and Little Thing 2, but not as long to type) spent yesterday afternoon realizing that GBV is starting from scratch, which is both overwhelming and exciting. It leaves us a lot of room to expand and hopefully tailor classes to the women's exact needs.
Today was our first full day of work. GBV consists of women who come to participate in "Income-Generating Activities" and talk and spend time together, a small school of roughly 8 with WIDELY varying skills and ages (Peace is our translator/TA for this, and we adore her), and women who come in for counseling. Our working schedule currently has us switching days for the school (tomorrow is my first day teaching!) and participating in IGAs, as well as offering classes on whatever the women feel they'd like to learn about, and doing home visits and counseling as needed.
If you're thinking we're not qualified to be doing these things, join the club! But our friend Zak gave us an excellent reminder: We're not qualified, but we're the most qualified people in the room. Fake it til you make it. And now we know a little but about what it's like to be an army medic who walks into a hospital and is treated like the Surgeon General - and expected to perform surgery. We now have two mottos: "Go slow, you'll reach", which we saw on the back of a truck, and "But I only know first aid!"
Yesterday all six of us got our assignments. We (who are now "recovering assistants" or "RAs", thanks) were lucky enough to get to go and see where everyone would be working, because we stuck close to Claire, our fantastic coordinator who also runs the GBV (gender-based violence program) with which we are working directly.
We started off by traveling to the site of FVAs new orphanage, which they hope to have building permits for in March. Currently its farmland, and they will continue to grow crops there and use the money they get from selling them to support the orphanage and other FVA programs. Sustainable! We love it. They're growing peanuts, lots of corn, bananas, PUMPKINS (I know go figure) and they have papaya trees. Ian "picked" a few papayas (you knock them out of the tree with a stick and try to avoid them as they fall directly towards your head) and RA2 managed to knock one down as well.
We dropped Ian off at Les Enfants de Dieu (Children of God), an all boys orphanage that takes in street kids. They get a full education and have a really interesting internal system of government. The boys elect ministers - a minister of education, a minister of technology - from among their peers. These ministers have control of the orphanages entire budget and administration. The adults and directors must go to them for permission to purchase or change anything. It gives the boys a great learning experience, agency and empowerment.
Maggie May is teaching English to teachers at a private school.
A NOTE ON THE ENGLISH THING: In hopes of opening trade and tourism with neighboring countries who were colonized by Britain (such as Uganda) as well as North America, about a year ago, Rwanda made a decision to switch to English. Having been colonized by Belgium (it's all about colonization here), they spoke French for many years, and many people still do. Kinyarwandan was introduced as a common, unifying Rwandan language, and everyone speaks it (Muraho!). And then a year ago - English. Learn it. It's like the government of America declared, "Everyone must speak Swahili." Teachers don't know it, and they have to pass on this knowledge they don't have to their students. On the plus side, for us, teaching English here is NOT a vanity project. If we pass on one word of English while we're here, it's huge. The people Maggie May is teaching will, we hope, be passing on that knowledge to children who have a real chance of bring Rwanda into a better future.
Many people here are TRILINGUAL, putting us and our 4 words of Kinyarwandan to shame.
Tsufit is teaching Gisimba Orphanage. It was founded by (and is named for) a man who saved 400 people during the genocide by hiding them in the orphanage and buying off the genocidaires one at a time when they came around. He's a hero in Rwanda and is mentioned at the genocide memorial. We plan to spend some time at Gisimba and we're considering productive ways to do that - story time, dance hour. The older kids there go off to boarding school, and one of the women who is working at FVA and going to university (getting her degree in Sociology!) lived at Gisimba for 9 years. They do their best to give the kids there every opportunity, they get an education, and many go on to be very successful. That said, there are so many young kids there in need, it is incredibly overwhelming. As you walk through they grab you, grin at you, or hide behind a bigger kid and stare. They love digital cameras and the smile on their face is amazing but it breaks your heart when you have to take the camera back and they look miserable - or worse, cry. One kid was particularly awesome. He had a big smile no matter what and took very, VERY good pictures, whether by design or accident we may never know. He had a little kid who clung to him, who is deaf-mute and almost never happy, but clearly loves this older boy. We found out later he's HIV+.
C-Note, RA1 and RA2 (like Little Thing 1 and Little Thing 2, but not as long to type) spent yesterday afternoon realizing that GBV is starting from scratch, which is both overwhelming and exciting. It leaves us a lot of room to expand and hopefully tailor classes to the women's exact needs.
Today was our first full day of work. GBV consists of women who come to participate in "Income-Generating Activities" and talk and spend time together, a small school of roughly 8 with WIDELY varying skills and ages (Peace is our translator/TA for this, and we adore her), and women who come in for counseling. Our working schedule currently has us switching days for the school (tomorrow is my first day teaching!) and participating in IGAs, as well as offering classes on whatever the women feel they'd like to learn about, and doing home visits and counseling as needed.
If you're thinking we're not qualified to be doing these things, join the club! But our friend Zak gave us an excellent reminder: We're not qualified, but we're the most qualified people in the room. Fake it til you make it. And now we know a little but about what it's like to be an army medic who walks into a hospital and is treated like the Surgeon General - and expected to perform surgery. We now have two mottos: "Go slow, you'll reach", which we saw on the back of a truck, and "But I only know first aid!"
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Spice Girls go to Market
"To market to market to buy a fat pig..." it was the only line of that nursery rhyme I could think of yesterday and it is STILL bothering me.
So, off to market we went - an "open air" market, by which they mean a "very crowded series of stalls and tables under a roof with no doors or walls which is not designed for those with claustrophobia." Our group, and thus the dynamic, will change about every two weeks as new volunteers arrive and some of us leave, but we got off to an awesome start. The five girls (three plus us), known collectively as the Spice Girls, are:
Margaret (Maggie May), originally from a town very near mine in Massachusetts, spent a few years in DC and had the good sense to flee - we have a lot in common. She is interested in coffee and microfinance, and for that and many other reasons is AWESOME.
Tsufit, also a DC refugee, just quit her job in NYC as an assistant at a non-profit! and seemed to have a similar experience in that role to mine. We came all the way to Africa to meet a former DC girl turned recovering assistant, and a former DC girl from Boston. Also came all the way to Africa to: listen to Dolly Parton and Celine Dion (played with alarming regularity) and meet a girl getting her degree from UMass, which we will get to. We have a lot of "we came to Africa to" moments.
Lindsey (C-Note), from Canada, and this is not her first rodeo; she worked in a refugee camp in Ghana, got herself sent home in a wheelchair from Thailand, and seems to have been everywhere in between.
Ian, currently our lone male ranger (he doesn't appreciate his nickname so I'll keep it out of the blog - for now) is 20 years old and left a job working with the homeless to travel the world for a year. He reminds me of Fred, looks like Will, and therefor calls up an irrational and unearned affection. Also plays the guitar (EARNED affection!) and speaks British fluently.
Told you guys you'd see your names in print!
We got lost on our way to the market (ahemian'sfaultAHEM) but it allowed for really ridiculous exercise we all felt deep in our muscles this morning, and also allowed us to accidentally pick up what can only be described as two street urchins. We turned around and there was one, clearly the ringleader with an impish little face, hanging on to C-Note and babbling excitedly to his friend, who was trudging along unwillingly. When next I looked the instigator was holding Maggie May's hand and had one arm wrapped around his friend's shoulder to prevent escape. They were still talking, and I assume the conversation went something like this:
Instigator: No, this is awesome! Crazy white people, who knows what they'll do? Maybe they'll cast a spell or eat someone!
Friend: I want to go home.
They didn't ask us for money or food and eventually ran off.
We met a nice young man on the way, Frances, who's father (I believe I got this right) is the minister of Rwandan coffee - just about the best job ever. He had a tattoo of a basketball player on his arm ("It's not Jordan! It's ME! I'm learning his moves from the internet."), has a brother in college in the United States, and spoke perfect English.
When we got to the market we went on a rampage for fruit, haggling over prices and collecting anything we couldn't identify with almost unholy glee. A woman told me not to take pictures in the marketplace, and we realized later she may have been trying to help me out - a woman tried to charge me $1 (500RWF) for taking a picture of the biggest pile of garlic I had ever seen (and I have seen BIG piles of garlic). There were bunches of green bananas taller than my knees all over the aisles, huge piles of beans, live chickens in the back, and men trying to sell us grocery bags even though we had clearly brought one. We got papayas, mangoes, passion fruit, tree tomatoes!, a giant pineapple, two avocados, tomatoes, and an onion for less than $3. Trip to future travelers: the women start you at a more honest price than the men, and if they see you effectively haggle with someone, they get pretty honest, and you can just go down the row. I made the mistake of trying to haggle a woman who was actually giving me a fair price, not realizing that we were being treated like people who knew what they were doing! We haven't gotten to the crafts yet but we'll be back - some of the other volunteers have picked up beautiful jewelry.
We got one of the best compliments we could ever receive in the market. A woman told us we "dress Rwandan". Rwandan women dress conservatively but very nicely, and saying that was like telling us we fit in and were dressed respectfully - which is all we want!
We went on a coffee rampage on the way home but couldn't find any. Tea is abundant here, and delicious, but only a few westernized places will sell you a cup of coffee. But I noticed that everyone was drinking giant, frothy mugs of something white. We stopped into one last place and asked for coffee. They didn't have it, but an older woman pointed to the benches and motioned for us to sit down. An invitation from an elder is an honor - we sat. We tried a few words of English - nothing. We tossed out some French - no response. We tried the four words of Kinyarwandan we knew - oya, nothing. Well, we're out of ideas. I pulled out my Kinyarwandan translation sheet in desperation, and the older woman pointed at it, nodded to the women in the shop and said "Kinyarwandan." As in, that's the nonsense the Muzunga is spouting. Somewhere in this, I accidentally ordered a glass of the white frothy stuff in the midst of trying to ascertain what it was. I was informed it was milk and they set one in front of me. I knew I might regret it later but there's enough things to be careful about so I took a sip. Oh, milk alright - fermented milk, tasting a lot like yogurt. Cold, and actually really weirdly good. Most of the girls tried it and my partner in crime split it with me with enthusiasm.
A girl in the corner (the entire cafe was the size of a bathroom in the US) spoke up shyly in perfect English, and we all got to talking. Her name is Cossy and - go figure - she's getting her online degree at UMass! She asked what we thought of Rwanda and we fell over ourselves describing how beautiful the country is and how much fun we were having. She did what so many Rwandans have done when we answered that way: humbly thanked us for appreciating her country, and told us that it was "not as good as yours." She kept suggesting "nicer", western places for us to see in the country than that particular neighborhood, which is poor, and we kept explaining to her that this was incredibly fun and beautiful. We traded numbers and she wants to have us over for tea, which will be awesome.
She then informed us the women spoke Swahili.
Three languages to grab-bag from is going to have to be enough - until we learn enough Kinyarwandan to haggle effectively, we can't tackle a fourth!
So, off to market we went - an "open air" market, by which they mean a "very crowded series of stalls and tables under a roof with no doors or walls which is not designed for those with claustrophobia." Our group, and thus the dynamic, will change about every two weeks as new volunteers arrive and some of us leave, but we got off to an awesome start. The five girls (three plus us), known collectively as the Spice Girls, are:
Margaret (Maggie May), originally from a town very near mine in Massachusetts, spent a few years in DC and had the good sense to flee - we have a lot in common. She is interested in coffee and microfinance, and for that and many other reasons is AWESOME.
Tsufit, also a DC refugee, just quit her job in NYC as an assistant at a non-profit! and seemed to have a similar experience in that role to mine. We came all the way to Africa to meet a former DC girl turned recovering assistant, and a former DC girl from Boston. Also came all the way to Africa to: listen to Dolly Parton and Celine Dion (played with alarming regularity) and meet a girl getting her degree from UMass, which we will get to. We have a lot of "we came to Africa to" moments.
Lindsey (C-Note), from Canada, and this is not her first rodeo; she worked in a refugee camp in Ghana, got herself sent home in a wheelchair from Thailand, and seems to have been everywhere in between.
Ian, currently our lone male ranger (he doesn't appreciate his nickname so I'll keep it out of the blog - for now) is 20 years old and left a job working with the homeless to travel the world for a year. He reminds me of Fred, looks like Will, and therefor calls up an irrational and unearned affection. Also plays the guitar (EARNED affection!) and speaks British fluently.
Told you guys you'd see your names in print!
We got lost on our way to the market (ahemian'sfaultAHEM) but it allowed for really ridiculous exercise we all felt deep in our muscles this morning, and also allowed us to accidentally pick up what can only be described as two street urchins. We turned around and there was one, clearly the ringleader with an impish little face, hanging on to C-Note and babbling excitedly to his friend, who was trudging along unwillingly. When next I looked the instigator was holding Maggie May's hand and had one arm wrapped around his friend's shoulder to prevent escape. They were still talking, and I assume the conversation went something like this:
Instigator: No, this is awesome! Crazy white people, who knows what they'll do? Maybe they'll cast a spell or eat someone!
Friend: I want to go home.
They didn't ask us for money or food and eventually ran off.
We met a nice young man on the way, Frances, who's father (I believe I got this right) is the minister of Rwandan coffee - just about the best job ever. He had a tattoo of a basketball player on his arm ("It's not Jordan! It's ME! I'm learning his moves from the internet."), has a brother in college in the United States, and spoke perfect English.
When we got to the market we went on a rampage for fruit, haggling over prices and collecting anything we couldn't identify with almost unholy glee. A woman told me not to take pictures in the marketplace, and we realized later she may have been trying to help me out - a woman tried to charge me $1 (500RWF) for taking a picture of the biggest pile of garlic I had ever seen (and I have seen BIG piles of garlic). There were bunches of green bananas taller than my knees all over the aisles, huge piles of beans, live chickens in the back, and men trying to sell us grocery bags even though we had clearly brought one. We got papayas, mangoes, passion fruit, tree tomatoes!, a giant pineapple, two avocados, tomatoes, and an onion for less than $3. Trip to future travelers: the women start you at a more honest price than the men, and if they see you effectively haggle with someone, they get pretty honest, and you can just go down the row. I made the mistake of trying to haggle a woman who was actually giving me a fair price, not realizing that we were being treated like people who knew what they were doing! We haven't gotten to the crafts yet but we'll be back - some of the other volunteers have picked up beautiful jewelry.
We got one of the best compliments we could ever receive in the market. A woman told us we "dress Rwandan". Rwandan women dress conservatively but very nicely, and saying that was like telling us we fit in and were dressed respectfully - which is all we want!
We went on a coffee rampage on the way home but couldn't find any. Tea is abundant here, and delicious, but only a few westernized places will sell you a cup of coffee. But I noticed that everyone was drinking giant, frothy mugs of something white. We stopped into one last place and asked for coffee. They didn't have it, but an older woman pointed to the benches and motioned for us to sit down. An invitation from an elder is an honor - we sat. We tried a few words of English - nothing. We tossed out some French - no response. We tried the four words of Kinyarwandan we knew - oya, nothing. Well, we're out of ideas. I pulled out my Kinyarwandan translation sheet in desperation, and the older woman pointed at it, nodded to the women in the shop and said "Kinyarwandan." As in, that's the nonsense the Muzunga is spouting. Somewhere in this, I accidentally ordered a glass of the white frothy stuff in the midst of trying to ascertain what it was. I was informed it was milk and they set one in front of me. I knew I might regret it later but there's enough things to be careful about so I took a sip. Oh, milk alright - fermented milk, tasting a lot like yogurt. Cold, and actually really weirdly good. Most of the girls tried it and my partner in crime split it with me with enthusiasm.
A girl in the corner (the entire cafe was the size of a bathroom in the US) spoke up shyly in perfect English, and we all got to talking. Her name is Cossy and - go figure - she's getting her online degree at UMass! She asked what we thought of Rwanda and we fell over ourselves describing how beautiful the country is and how much fun we were having. She did what so many Rwandans have done when we answered that way: humbly thanked us for appreciating her country, and told us that it was "not as good as yours." She kept suggesting "nicer", western places for us to see in the country than that particular neighborhood, which is poor, and we kept explaining to her that this was incredibly fun and beautiful. We traded numbers and she wants to have us over for tea, which will be awesome.
She then informed us the women spoke Swahili.
Three languages to grab-bag from is going to have to be enough - until we learn enough Kinyarwandan to haggle effectively, we can't tackle a fourth!
Kinyarwanda Lesson!
Here in Rwanda the native language is Kinyarwanda. Here’s a quick tutorial for you all at home!
Muraho (Mer-a-ho) – Hello | to a stranger or on first meeting
Mwiriwe (Meeri-way) – Hello/Hi | to an acquaintance or someone you’ve met before
Those are the first words we learned and the ones we’re the best at. However we’re picking up some new ones pretty quickly.
Amakuru ki? (A-mah-coo-rue-kay) – How are you?
Ni Meza (nee-may-za) – Am well
Mwaramutse (Mar-a-moot-say) – Good Morning!
Murakoze (moor-a-co-za) – Thank you
Hehe? (hay hay) – Where?
Nangahe? (nan-ga-hay) – How Much?
Yego (yay-go) - Yes
Oya (o-ya) - No
Muraho (Mer-a-ho) – Hello | to a stranger or on first meeting
Mwiriwe (Meeri-way) – Hello/Hi | to an acquaintance or someone you’ve met before
Those are the first words we learned and the ones we’re the best at. However we’re picking up some new ones pretty quickly.
Amakuru ki? (A-mah-coo-rue-kay) – How are you?
Ni Meza (nee-may-za) – Am well
Mwaramutse (Mar-a-moot-say) – Good Morning!
Murakoze (moor-a-co-za) – Thank you
Hehe? (hay hay) – Where?
Nangahe? (nan-ga-hay) – How Much?
Yego (yay-go) - Yes
Oya (o-ya) - No
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Orientation
It was so fantastic to get such a thorough introduction into the country, the culture, the language and the people we’d be working with. Our two supervisors, Claire and Willy are by far two of the most kind people we've ever had the privilege of meeting. Claire repeatedly told us that she ‘wants us to feel no stress’ while we’re here and that our hearts were so valuable to them. She gave us all sorts of tips on spending money, how to spend it, how much to expect to spend, etc, as well as instructions on what to do when we're not feeling well, how to get around and what to visit.
Claire gave us a one hundred year history of Rwanda leading up to the genocide and forward. We later learned that she had lost some of her family and she had been on the run on her own for a very long time before coming back to the country. I cannot explain in words how inspiring it is to hear her story and then realize that a she has come back and her job is to make this country a better place and manage the volunteers that come here to help.
We went to lunch at this wonderful hotel restaurant, Chez Lando. It’s our main geographical marker here in our neighborhood - the taxis can find it! The food. The food was amazing. We both got mango juice with some weird delicious cinnamon aftertaste. I had chips (fries), and a chicken kabob which came with so much meat I could only finish one of them! One of the girls had a fruit salad that I can only describe as being touched by God. We learned about an amazing little fruit called the ‘tree tomato.’ It looks a bit like a plum with a shiny red peel.
The next part of our visit was the Kigali Genocide Memorial. Since we chose to come here and learn what there was to learn, we don't feel it's fair to subject everyone to what are definitely disturbing descriptions of violence. If you'd like to read about our visit to the museum, you can read on, but if not, skip the next few paragraphs. The experience was incredibly moving for us, but this is a country that was ripped to pieces not long ago. Everyone here over the age of 2 can remember what happened - it's going to be an unavoidable part of our time here. What we saw in the museum was sometimes very graphic, sometimes very disturbing and always, incredibly sad. If you feel touched to do so, the museum takes donations online (http://www.
The museum is staffed by survivors of the genocide and contains about 300,000 bodies of genocide victims who were given a proper burial at the memorial. For many families, this was the only peace they were able to get after the tragic deaths of their family members – a proper, Christian burial. One of the most touching parts of the museum was the children’s section. Full disclosure – I thought it was of child survivors of the genocide so I walked in with a big smile on my face, looking at the beautiful pictures of children; the first plaque I read said this:
Name: David
Age: 10
Favorite Food: Milk & Cookies
Last Words: “Mama, UNAMIR will come for us”
Cause of Death: Tortured to death.
Then this:
Two Sisters
Ages: 6 & 7
Cause of Death: Killed by a grenade thrown in their shower.
Then:
Name: Thierry
Age: 9 months
Cause of Death: Hacked apart by a machete in his mother’s arms.
I cannot explain how impacted I was by this. There were almost 30 children’s profiles in this section of the museum. To us, the death and mayhem that occurred in the city we’re living in now seems incomprehensible. The thriving city we live in with smiling people, shouts of “Muzungu, Muzungu!” (that means white person-more on that in a moment) and the kindness we’ve experienced – just didn’t seem to reconcile with what happened here so long ago. In Kigali, the genocidaires were given thousands of names of Tutsis and at a predetermined time, they were to begin killing all Tutsis on the lists with the goal of killing 1,000 every 20 minutes. Much like the Nazis, the brains behind the Rwandan genocide had plans and strategies and ravaged a population. I was – I cannot come up with another word, so I apologize if this is too strong – appalled at the stories of some of the church leaders who invited Tutsis into the churches saying they would be safe, and then surrendering all of them to the genocidaires to be killed. But then, as I turned the corner, I saw the stories of many who hid Tutsis in their home to protect them. My favorite story was of a woman who was known as the ‘town crazy lady’ came to the door as the mob approached and acted like the crazy lady they all thought her to be and scared them all away! I thought about how heroic all these people were and how such small actions made the difference in the lives of millions.
We took a walk in the beautiful gardens outside where the bodies of the genocide victims were finally laid to rest and chilled a little. It was a lot to take in.
After that we went downtown to the UTC (United Trade Center) to exchange money and buy Rwandan cell phones. Muzunga, as we mentioned, means white person. People here aren't saying it to be rude or mean - it's like they're excited to have correctly identified you. They say it the same way you would say "Giraffe! Giraffe!" if one were to walk down the street. The guy who sold us our phones was great - he accidentally called the cheap phone the Muzunga phone, because its white, and we each bought one. We're going back to practice English with him, and he's going to help us work on our Kinyarwandan (universal Rwandan language, of which we can now say 4 words).
We rolled in to the house around 7pm for dinner, which was some awesome baked fish (Tilapia we think- but not like Tilapia in the states. Tilapia that is thick and sweet and comes from Lake Victoria!), pasta, chips and grilled veggies. They truly feed us so well here, its crazy!
Then we and two other volunteers decided to go to the bar behind our house (no literally, there is a bar in our backyard) for one of the famed Primus beers. These costs 800RwF (roughly $1.50) and are the size of a 40oz – AND they are really good! The bar didn’t have tables, instead there were small bungalows dotting the courtyard and you sat in one at a table with chairs. The bungalow next to us got all excited about the Muzungas and one reall brave guy came and politely introduced himself. Another, Isaac, originally from DRC, came and asked to take a picture with us (yes, we are also like giraffes in the sense that we are exotic zoo creatures) after asking if we were allowed to take pictures with black people. We assured him we were. THEN – the lights in the entire bar, block and district went out. The guy from the next bungalow leaned over, smiled and said, "This is Africa!" T.I.A. friend. We finished our beers by candlelight and went back to the guesthouse.
It’s been crazy, but so incredible! We’re genuinely having the time of our lives here. Get excited for the market update – you won’t believe the bounty we found at the market and then what we got to do afterwards with one of the coolest Rwandans we’ve met to date!
All our love,
The Manolos
Planes, Buses and Automobiles
Before leaving, we took advantage of last minute American amenities like cupcakes, grilled cheese (thanks Rei) and free continental breakfast (thanks Mama Stipps!). We got on a shuttle to the airport and went to KLM to check in. Ten minutes later we realized we were technically flying Delta and we (and our combined 150 lbs of luggage) were very far away from the proper terminal. Undaunted, we navigated O’Hare, settled in and waited for our first flight to JFK. We might have played “Empire State of Mind” when we flew in; we’ll never tell.
JFK International was a new kind of mess involving shuttles. We shall never speak of it.
Our international flight from JFK to Amsterdam was AWESOME. KLM offers seriously good food, your own screen, and a choice of movies. We recommend this to future flyers. Unfortunately, by the end of the trip we were on about hour 20 of tiny, tight little seats. It’s good that we like each other, and that people moved to let us sit together. Also by this point we possibly did not smell very good.
When we got to Amsterdam everything was closed, including our terminal; some kind of crack-of-dawn hour there. They have a very cute airport and they sell tulips. Go figure. We got into line under economy class (we had to go through security there a second time to get to our gate) and our bodies, grateful to be horizontal, promptly passed out. We were rudely awakened a few minutes later and informed we were 2nd and 3rd in The Wrong Line, so we dragged ass over to another line in which we were 75th and 76th, respectively. Half an hour later we realized we HAD been in the right line, went scurrying back, and landed at about 30th and 31st, respectively. Watched more movies for 10 hrs on more tiny tight little seats.
36 hrs and counting, we can finally see Africa. AWESOME. We were beyond maybe not smelling good and exhausted, but thrilled. We looked at our options and decided to take a bus instead of a puddle jumper, saving a lot of money and waiting around, and giving us a chance to see both the Ugandan and Rwandan country side. We asked a few natives what a taxi to the bus station should cost - $20 each for an hour ride! Sweet. And that’s how we met Sard.
Sard, our driver, turned out to be a native of Kigali Rwanda (our home for the next 3 months) who had been living in Uganda for 7 years. As he’s old enough to remember the genocide, we could understand why he wasn’t in a hurry to return to Rwanda, but his animosity was downright funny.
“What should we absolutely see in Rwanda?”
“Nothing, there is nothing to see in Rwanda.”
“What should we eat in Rwanda?”
“Nothing, the food is terrible in Rwanda.”
And so on and so forth.
But he loves Uganda, so he gave us a tour, including Lake Victoria. Even at night everything was beautiful. We got his email so he can pick us up at the bus station when we get back.
When we got to the station he suddenly became concerned – "don’t make friends", "don’t talk to anyone about money", "you have too much luggage!", "your skin color matters here." And then he waited there until we had our tickets to leave. Sard is awesome.
It was 11:30p and we waited for a 1am bus bolt upright. When we finally loaded we were way in the back on a bench meant for 2 now holding both of us AND our carry-ons AND a large woman AND her bags. As if that wasn’t restful enough, Uganda’s southern roads are… fascinating. They appear to be paved with motorcycles, the speed bumps are as tall as children, and we had a new sympathy for tenderized meat. We did not sleep - but we did giggle, a lot.
But at 6am the sun came up, and we could see the mountains through the mist. The landscape redefined green. The richest, most gorgeous colors we’ve ever seen. Everything was so beautiful, but the further you get from Entebbe and Kigali, the more you have to adjust your concept of poverty.
When we got to the border we experienced the African past-time of “fluking” (FLEW-KING: like cheating, a word we learned from Sard) which in this case meant pushing, shoving and elbowing to get to the head of the line for the exit stamp at Uganda's customs office. A man casually twirling a baton casually admonished them they should not do that. They ignored him. We waited three times as long in line as necessary, and then turned around to find our bus was gone. Hoping it had merely “moved” and not “driven off with all our worldly possessions for the next 3 months”, we crossed the border into Rwanda on foot and were never so happy to see the Jaguar sign. We got our passports stamped and our plastic bags confiscated at the border, and at 9:30am, 3 hrs late (standard Africa time) we landed in Kigali, exhausted and unspeakably filthy. An amazing man named Jean of God was waiting for us to take us to the FVA office and then to the guesthouse. He drove very well on very paved roads but spoke only French - so, generally, we were very pleased with this part of the trip.
We’re so glad we got to experience something more than the airport, as our travels were much more interesting than the other volunteers’, and we were even more excited to SHOWER.
all our love,
the manolos
JFK International was a new kind of mess involving shuttles. We shall never speak of it.
Our international flight from JFK to Amsterdam was AWESOME. KLM offers seriously good food, your own screen, and a choice of movies. We recommend this to future flyers. Unfortunately, by the end of the trip we were on about hour 20 of tiny, tight little seats. It’s good that we like each other, and that people moved to let us sit together. Also by this point we possibly did not smell very good.
When we got to Amsterdam everything was closed, including our terminal; some kind of crack-of-dawn hour there. They have a very cute airport and they sell tulips. Go figure. We got into line under economy class (we had to go through security there a second time to get to our gate) and our bodies, grateful to be horizontal, promptly passed out. We were rudely awakened a few minutes later and informed we were 2nd and 3rd in The Wrong Line, so we dragged ass over to another line in which we were 75th and 76th, respectively. Half an hour later we realized we HAD been in the right line, went scurrying back, and landed at about 30th and 31st, respectively. Watched more movies for 10 hrs on more tiny tight little seats.
36 hrs and counting, we can finally see Africa. AWESOME. We were beyond maybe not smelling good and exhausted, but thrilled. We looked at our options and decided to take a bus instead of a puddle jumper, saving a lot of money and waiting around, and giving us a chance to see both the Ugandan and Rwandan country side. We asked a few natives what a taxi to the bus station should cost - $20 each for an hour ride! Sweet. And that’s how we met Sard.
Sard, our driver, turned out to be a native of Kigali Rwanda (our home for the next 3 months) who had been living in Uganda for 7 years. As he’s old enough to remember the genocide, we could understand why he wasn’t in a hurry to return to Rwanda, but his animosity was downright funny.
“What should we absolutely see in Rwanda?”
“Nothing, there is nothing to see in Rwanda.”
“What should we eat in Rwanda?”
“Nothing, the food is terrible in Rwanda.”
And so on and so forth.
But he loves Uganda, so he gave us a tour, including Lake Victoria. Even at night everything was beautiful. We got his email so he can pick us up at the bus station when we get back.
When we got to the station he suddenly became concerned – "don’t make friends", "don’t talk to anyone about money", "you have too much luggage!", "your skin color matters here." And then he waited there until we had our tickets to leave. Sard is awesome.
It was 11:30p and we waited for a 1am bus bolt upright. When we finally loaded we were way in the back on a bench meant for 2 now holding both of us AND our carry-ons AND a large woman AND her bags. As if that wasn’t restful enough, Uganda’s southern roads are… fascinating. They appear to be paved with motorcycles, the speed bumps are as tall as children, and we had a new sympathy for tenderized meat. We did not sleep - but we did giggle, a lot.
But at 6am the sun came up, and we could see the mountains through the mist. The landscape redefined green. The richest, most gorgeous colors we’ve ever seen. Everything was so beautiful, but the further you get from Entebbe and Kigali, the more you have to adjust your concept of poverty.
When we got to the border we experienced the African past-time of “fluking” (FLEW-KING: like cheating, a word we learned from Sard) which in this case meant pushing, shoving and elbowing to get to the head of the line for the exit stamp at Uganda's customs office. A man casually twirling a baton casually admonished them they should not do that. They ignored him. We waited three times as long in line as necessary, and then turned around to find our bus was gone. Hoping it had merely “moved” and not “driven off with all our worldly possessions for the next 3 months”, we crossed the border into Rwanda on foot and were never so happy to see the Jaguar sign. We got our passports stamped and our plastic bags confiscated at the border, and at 9:30am, 3 hrs late (standard Africa time) we landed in Kigali, exhausted and unspeakably filthy. An amazing man named Jean of God was waiting for us to take us to the FVA office and then to the guesthouse. He drove very well on very paved roads but spoke only French - so, generally, we were very pleased with this part of the trip.
We’re so glad we got to experience something more than the airport, as our travels were much more interesting than the other volunteers’, and we were even more excited to SHOWER.
all our love,
the manolos
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Here, Safe and Sleepy
But let us just quickly redefine both "safe" and "sleepy" for you. For anyone who had a passing concern about our safety, rest easy at night, please, knowing that we live in a fortified compound. We're not kidding. The "guest house" is essentially its own gated community, it is amazing. Everything locks. So yeah - safe! In other news, WE GET OUR OWN BATHROOM. Is that not ridiculous? We are so spoiled. There's even warmish water. The place reminds one of the assistants exactly of a convent (her aunt is a nun, she would know). Very plain and clean, comfortable, two beds and nightstands per room, and many references to God's blessings.
As for sleepy, we arrived this mornign at 10am after 3 straight days of traveling - 72 hours absolutely without pause. What little sleep we did manage to catch was always had sitting up, what with there being no beds, and always at inconvenient times, as we tried to push ourselves 6 hrs ahead to minimize jetlag. Add to that MANY FREE MOVIE OPTIONS on the plane, and our general excitement, and naturally it was a total disaster. We're both so tired we're cross-eyed, but we're not allowed to go to bed until 8pm, so we can sleep through a proper night and be bright-eyed and bushy tailed for orientation tomorrow. If we nap we won't sleep, and then it will go on like this for eternity. But at this point, if we glance sideways at a bed, it's over.
The extent of our French is being pushed quickly, not only by the many lovely people we have already met who can speak only a little English, and our wish to communicate with them, but also by things like this website, which here in Uganda appears in French, making navigating it much more difficult on aforementioned non-sleep.
We're excited to spend tomorrow getting in-depth details about our work here!!! which will definitely be the most exciting part. Once we're settled in this weekend we can change some money into bizarre denominations (500 RWF for a bottle of water!!! (means 1USD)), and sit in an internet cafe and regale you all with our tales of planes, buses and automobiles.
As for sleepy, we arrived this mornign at 10am after 3 straight days of traveling - 72 hours absolutely without pause. What little sleep we did manage to catch was always had sitting up, what with there being no beds, and always at inconvenient times, as we tried to push ourselves 6 hrs ahead to minimize jetlag. Add to that MANY FREE MOVIE OPTIONS on the plane, and our general excitement, and naturally it was a total disaster. We're both so tired we're cross-eyed, but we're not allowed to go to bed until 8pm, so we can sleep through a proper night and be bright-eyed and bushy tailed for orientation tomorrow. If we nap we won't sleep, and then it will go on like this for eternity. But at this point, if we glance sideways at a bed, it's over.
The extent of our French is being pushed quickly, not only by the many lovely people we have already met who can speak only a little English, and our wish to communicate with them, but also by things like this website, which here in Uganda appears in French, making navigating it much more difficult on aforementioned non-sleep.
We're excited to spend tomorrow getting in-depth details about our work here!!! which will definitely be the most exciting part. Once we're settled in this weekend we can change some money into bizarre denominations (500 RWF for a bottle of water!!! (means 1USD)), and sit in an internet cafe and regale you all with our tales of planes, buses and automobiles.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
IT'S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN
If your mind didn't go to a very hair-metal 80s band place reading the title of this post, we're not friends.
Tuesday we get on a plane to JFK, make a connection in Amsterdam, land in Uganda and head to Kigali. In about 16 hrs I'll be headed to Chicago. I am not so much exactly totally packed, but I have a fairly impressive pile of crap in the living room. In order to fall off the grid for 3 months, both of us had to suspend our cell coverage and car insurance, inform our banks we would be leaving the country, leave enough in our accounts to cover miscellaneous bills while gone, cancel our medical insurance, obtain travel insurance, pass criminal background checks - and this is all AFTER we both eliminated rent and utilities. They don't make it easy but we're making a break for it anyway.
If you would like to send us a care package or donate to one of the many orphanages and women's organizations the program works with, you can reach us here:
Our Names
c/o Faith Victory Association
P.O Box 2800
Kigali, Rwanda
Letters and envelopes take about 10 days, and packages take about 4 weeks.
I always said I wouldn't believe we were really going until we were actually there, and two days before we get on a plane, it's still true. I am, however, getting increasingly excited, 9 months (!!!!) after we started planning this little escapade, to actually post about Rwanda FROM RWANDA. Almost there!
Tuesday we get on a plane to JFK, make a connection in Amsterdam, land in Uganda and head to Kigali. In about 16 hrs I'll be headed to Chicago. I am not so much exactly totally packed, but I have a fairly impressive pile of crap in the living room. In order to fall off the grid for 3 months, both of us had to suspend our cell coverage and car insurance, inform our banks we would be leaving the country, leave enough in our accounts to cover miscellaneous bills while gone, cancel our medical insurance, obtain travel insurance, pass criminal background checks - and this is all AFTER we both eliminated rent and utilities. They don't make it easy but we're making a break for it anyway.
If you would like to send us a care package or donate to one of the many orphanages and women's organizations the program works with, you can reach us here:
Our Names
c/o Faith Victory Association
P.O Box 2800
Kigali, Rwanda
Letters and envelopes take about 10 days, and packages take about 4 weeks.
I always said I wouldn't believe we were really going until we were actually there, and two days before we get on a plane, it's still true. I am, however, getting increasingly excited, 9 months (!!!!) after we started planning this little escapade, to actually post about Rwanda FROM RWANDA. Almost there!
Friday, January 8, 2010
Secondhand Lions
I've decided, that when people talk about me I want them to come down to the final thought of: She went out with her boots on.
Now, when I come back from Africa and am back on the payroll of some company somewhere I can only hope and pray they're Spring '11 Manolo Blahnik black booties; but the thought none the less remains. I want people to think of me as the person who never went down without a fight - who grabbed life by the balls and shook it within an inch of its life. I want people to say that when adventure presented itself, I followed and when a risk came up I jumped and landed safely on the other side.
As I set off on a weekend that will be full of endless checklists, packing - unpacking - final packing, letting my mom go through my packing, and finally zipping up the bag, I wanted to leave a final (pre ocean crossing) word, nay, a challenge to myself.
When we're on that plane, flying to another continent and people happen to think about the Manolos on their way to Rwanda I want them to say - they didn't let a moment pass them by; they went out with their boots on.
When we post our first pictures of the first few days in Kigali, our house, our antics, our miniadventures I hope people open them up, look at them, laugh at us and then think - these two girls are living out loud and savoring the moment; they went out with their boots on.
When we overcome the first bout of homesickness, a moment when things seem to be falling apart or when we face our first problem millions of miles from home I hope our friends will say - they pushed through the mud, came up on the other side and made mud pies; they went out with their boots on.
After almost two months in Indiana, with countless episodes of 'country living 101' I can think of no better motto to put in my last post before crossing the ocean. My boots may have been Ugg boots this winter, but they were steadfast and strong when I was unloading truck fulls of wood, being a midwife for a dog in labor and loading a wood burning stove. I know that I won't have boots on per say in Africa (because it's warm enough for FLIP FLOPS!!!) but I know that spirit of determination and resilience will be radiating through my fingertips - ready to pitch the first log of challenge into the burning stove.
Friends, the first hill in the rollercoaster is almost over and the next week will be the headrush, eardrum pounding, speed thrill downhill thrust we've been waiting almost a year for - I can't wait to see you on the other side.
We're Going Out With Our Boots On!!
Now, when I come back from Africa and am back on the payroll of some company somewhere I can only hope and pray they're Spring '11 Manolo Blahnik black booties; but the thought none the less remains. I want people to think of me as the person who never went down without a fight - who grabbed life by the balls and shook it within an inch of its life. I want people to say that when adventure presented itself, I followed and when a risk came up I jumped and landed safely on the other side.
As I set off on a weekend that will be full of endless checklists, packing - unpacking - final packing, letting my mom go through my packing, and finally zipping up the bag, I wanted to leave a final (pre ocean crossing) word, nay, a challenge to myself.
When we're on that plane, flying to another continent and people happen to think about the Manolos on their way to Rwanda I want them to say - they didn't let a moment pass them by; they went out with their boots on.
When we post our first pictures of the first few days in Kigali, our house, our antics, our miniadventures I hope people open them up, look at them, laugh at us and then think - these two girls are living out loud and savoring the moment; they went out with their boots on.
When we overcome the first bout of homesickness, a moment when things seem to be falling apart or when we face our first problem millions of miles from home I hope our friends will say - they pushed through the mud, came up on the other side and made mud pies; they went out with their boots on.
After almost two months in Indiana, with countless episodes of 'country living 101' I can think of no better motto to put in my last post before crossing the ocean. My boots may have been Ugg boots this winter, but they were steadfast and strong when I was unloading truck fulls of wood, being a midwife for a dog in labor and loading a wood burning stove. I know that I won't have boots on per say in Africa (because it's warm enough for FLIP FLOPS!!!) but I know that spirit of determination and resilience will be radiating through my fingertips - ready to pitch the first log of challenge into the burning stove.
Friends, the first hill in the rollercoaster is almost over and the next week will be the headrush, eardrum pounding, speed thrill downhill thrust we've been waiting almost a year for - I can't wait to see you on the other side.
We're Going Out With Our Boots On!!
We Have the Greatest Friends.
As our departure quickly approaches and we make piles of clothes and flipflops and things - some of our amazing friends have taken a few moments and sent us email words of encouragement and love. I couldn't help but repost them here because they were such pieces of sunshine in this snow covered tundra I'm writing from. Thank you for being amazing friends!
____________________________________________________
"and though it's not much, it moved me to put together a small, 7-track EP for you. I know that I will listen to it often in the coming months, and think of you both.
Since I'm sure you have enough people telling you to be careful and safe and eat plenty of penicillin and wipe your hands from the dirty continent, I can focus on a different and obviously more important message, which is to do the opposite of all of those things. It's an adventure, dammit, so treat it like one. I hope they have gin there (whiskey might be asking too much). I, for one, am envious of the opportunity you two have carved out for yourselves and am sure that, one way or another, it will make you into better people than you are now (which for me is a little like trying to figure out the square root of a negative integer). Even if you DO actually wipe your hands.
105 is my favorite. I love you. Have a wonderful journey.
P.S. I have the strangest feeling I just quoted Donna Lewis."
---------
"finally, you better have booty called a ex in Indiana because you are not allowed to have sex in africa. end of story.
oh man, are you missed around here? seriously, the office is not the same without you. but don't think about that! there is a world of adventure they awaits you. live it up while you are there, and don't say no! see everything you can see, do everything you can do and be everywhere you can be.
"The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time." ~ Abe Lincoln"
--------
I know you are getting more and more excited about Africa... Your life is seriously about to change forever! This will be an experience you will never forget.
____________________________________________________
"and though it's not much, it moved me to put together a small, 7-track EP for you. I know that I will listen to it often in the coming months, and think of you both.
Since I'm sure you have enough people telling you to be careful and safe and eat plenty of penicillin and wipe your hands from the dirty continent, I can focus on a different and obviously more important message, which is to do the opposite of all of those things. It's an adventure, dammit, so treat it like one. I hope they have gin there (whiskey might be asking too much). I, for one, am envious of the opportunity you two have carved out for yourselves and am sure that, one way or another, it will make you into better people than you are now (which for me is a little like trying to figure out the square root of a negative integer). Even if you DO actually wipe your hands.
105 is my favorite. I love you. Have a wonderful journey.
P.S. I have the strangest feeling I just quoted Donna Lewis."
---------
"finally, you better have booty called a ex in Indiana because you are not allowed to have sex in africa. end of story.
oh man, are you missed around here? seriously, the office is not the same without you. but don't think about that! there is a world of adventure they awaits you. live it up while you are there, and don't say no! see everything you can see, do everything you can do and be everywhere you can be.
"The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time." ~ Abe Lincoln"
--------
I know you are getting more and more excited about Africa... Your life is seriously about to change forever! This will be an experience you will never forget.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Packing
The title of the post says it all: we've hit the home stretch. We really can't believe we're at the packing stage of the game, but here we are with piles strewn around the house and lists out the wazoo (lovely mental picture, I'm sure). Currently, each assist is planning on bringing in her carry-on:
doxy pills
1 change of clothes
sunglasses
sunblock
small facewash
1 pair of contacts
pertinent paperwork
books
earplugs
eye covers
and will be concealing passport, tickets and money about her person. Packing list for the big bag includes:
several long dresses
pajamas
flip-flops for the shower
flip-flops for walking
rainboots
sneakers
exercise clothes
3 months worth of sunblock
" of contacts
" of contact solution
first aid kit
LOTS of ibuprufen
personal sanitary products
camera and ipod - we were informed we would be glad we brought them and would be able to charge them.
1 asst is bringing multiple memory cards and both are bringing usb cords.
Here I would like to insert a plug for Walmart, as a service to future travelers. Though their labor practices are REALLY UNACCEPTABLE, credit where credit is due. Asst 1 went there for her prescriptions and paid less than 30USD for her doxy, as it should be. Asst 2 went to CVS, where they attempted to charge her 115USD. No kidding. Asst 2 then went to Walmart, where she was able to fill the doxy and a prescription for a broad-spectrum antibiotic for less than 80USD. That is a significant difference, and both assts are now relying on Walmart for many of their travel needs. We hear Costco and Walgreens are also good, if there's one near you.
Shopping list at present includes:
immodium (good idea from oft-travelling cousins)
bacitracin
triple antibiotic ointment
calamine lotion
more sunscreen
poncho (the last month or so of our time there, it will rain all day, every day. fun!)
diflucan
probiotics
daily multi-vitamin
Both assts are now also in possession of REI quality hiking backpacks. Aren't we prepared? One of us might not necessarily FEEL prepared, but as a recovering asst, I know that lists help establish a false sense of control - essential to surviving on foreign terrain. I know helpful blogs have been to us - I hope to put up a list of key sites before we leave - and I hope this list will help others with the daunting task of deciding what 40 lbs of their life to take on a mission to the bush.
doxy pills
1 change of clothes
sunglasses
sunblock
small facewash
1 pair of contacts
pertinent paperwork
books
earplugs
eye covers
and will be concealing passport, tickets and money about her person. Packing list for the big bag includes:
several long dresses
pajamas
flip-flops for the shower
flip-flops for walking
rainboots
sneakers
exercise clothes
3 months worth of sunblock
" of contacts
" of contact solution
first aid kit
LOTS of ibuprufen
personal sanitary products
camera and ipod - we were informed we would be glad we brought them and would be able to charge them.
1 asst is bringing multiple memory cards and both are bringing usb cords.
Here I would like to insert a plug for Walmart, as a service to future travelers. Though their labor practices are REALLY UNACCEPTABLE, credit where credit is due. Asst 1 went there for her prescriptions and paid less than 30USD for her doxy, as it should be. Asst 2 went to CVS, where they attempted to charge her 115USD. No kidding. Asst 2 then went to Walmart, where she was able to fill the doxy and a prescription for a broad-spectrum antibiotic for less than 80USD. That is a significant difference, and both assts are now relying on Walmart for many of their travel needs. We hear Costco and Walgreens are also good, if there's one near you.
Shopping list at present includes:
immodium (good idea from oft-travelling cousins)
bacitracin
triple antibiotic ointment
calamine lotion
more sunscreen
poncho (the last month or so of our time there, it will rain all day, every day. fun!)
diflucan
probiotics
daily multi-vitamin
Both assts are now also in possession of REI quality hiking backpacks. Aren't we prepared? One of us might not necessarily FEEL prepared, but as a recovering asst, I know that lists help establish a false sense of control - essential to surviving on foreign terrain. I know helpful blogs have been to us - I hope to put up a list of key sites before we leave - and I hope this list will help others with the daunting task of deciding what 40 lbs of their life to take on a mission to the bush.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
If Wishes Were Horses
I love traditions. I come from a big family that's full of them, and I find them comforting. I got two new traditions for New Year's day this year that I'm excited to carry into the future. The first is southern: black-eyed peas on NYD for luck. This is so ingrained in my southern side of the family, who are in the military, that whenever they lived abroad my aunt packed a can of black-eyed peas, knowing you can't just run down to the grocery store in Hong Kong to pick one up. Considering she sometimes had to think of this almost a year ahead of time, while packing up two children and an entire household, that's a pretty serious commitment. The second is, apparently, Polish: you live the year as you began it. If so, I will spend it sleeping, vaguely hungover and being fed and loved by family and friends. There are worse ways, I'm telling you. Next year I'll make a point of having a more productive day, ALSO full of food and love.
I was unable to even think about Rwanda in the past few weeks, between travel, the holidays and The Wedding. But now that the last big event before the trip has passed, I'm nervous, excited and a little overwhelmed (I'm also exhausted - I would go to Africa at this point just for a full night of uninterrupted sleep). I explained my trip to and answered questions for 150 different people over the last five days, one at a time, and it's finally dawning on me we may actually be going. There's nothing between now and the 11th except packing, working, reviewing my french and, god willing, napping.
Good-bye 2009, you will not be missed. Hi 2010 - BRING IT.
I was unable to even think about Rwanda in the past few weeks, between travel, the holidays and The Wedding. But now that the last big event before the trip has passed, I'm nervous, excited and a little overwhelmed (I'm also exhausted - I would go to Africa at this point just for a full night of uninterrupted sleep). I explained my trip to and answered questions for 150 different people over the last five days, one at a time, and it's finally dawning on me we may actually be going. There's nothing between now and the 11th except packing, working, reviewing my french and, god willing, napping.
Good-bye 2009, you will not be missed. Hi 2010 - BRING IT.
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