Mini Safari Adventure!!!

Forget those sanitized, group, paved road Safari adventures you've heard about. We're bringing you the story of 4:30am wake up calls, getting hit by branches while driving down muddy roads on the top of an SUV and seeing no less than 25 giraffes at once. You've been warned.

Scene of the crime : Akagera National Park
Date : Crack of dawn, February 21, 2010
Seekers of Adventure : The Manolos (RA's, 105, etcetera), Tsufit, Drew, MARGE, Kimironko House Kids (Cat, Annie, Vanessa, Alex) & justin (Irish's co-worker)

Our cell rings at 4:57am to let us know our ride is at our backdoor. We go outside to see - perhaps - the BIGGEST, MOST COMFORTABLE cars we have yet seen in Kigali. They are giant, 4-wheel drive trucks which have more room in them than any bus we've ever ridden in here (not saying much, but still). Our driver has told us to pack breakfast, lunch and lots of water, but provided a full case of bottled water! We knew this was a good sign.

After picking up the Kimironko House Kids we set off in the dark to Akagera. As we watched the sun rise over the mountains of Rwanda, we got closer to Akagera and our driver was apologizing for driving a bit fast. In our haze of vehicular comfort we assured him that we would clearly be driving faster so no worries.

When we pulled off the main paved road onto a dirt road our excitement began to build and when we pulled in to Akagera we were pretty much balls of energy (It was roughly 7:30am so you can imagine that this was particularly unnatural for us).

We paid our $30 park fee, and got a guide. SURPRISE! Our driver had popped the top of our truck and turned it into a 'Best-Safari-Panoramic-View-Vehicle' ever. Of course the RA's claimed a sweet piece of location right on the back (amongst MANY SAFETY BARS MOMS) and we set off on our way.


Our car was second in line as the guide was in the first car. Suddenly, we see a roadblock ahead. Downed tree you ask? No. Perhaps a stalled SUV? Wrong. BABOONS. Many, many Baboons. Big ones, small ones, babies hanging from mamas. They were so close to us and so awesome. Did you know that some baboons look like they have orange eyes? True story. They also travel in huge groups so they are all over the place.


First Stop : Lake Ihema
Mission : Hippo Spotting

This lake redefines huge and gives even our favorite Lake Kivu a run for its money. On one side of the lake is Tanzania and inside the lake are hippos!!! We saw tons of birds near the water - but as we pulled up closer to the lake we saw those telltale bubbles and ripples in the water and knew hippos were there! Then - joy of joys - one of them raised his GIANT head up out of the water to say hello. We drive to another part of the lake (past many baboons) to see another group of hippos. YAY - there is a baby in this group! The baby was awesome, but the fella in front of the baby was not playing around - he didn't take his eyes off us the entire time.


Second Stop : North End of the Park (70 minute drive) [FYI: the animals migrate through the park over the seasons.]
Mission : Zebra, Giraffe, Warthog Spotting

RA2 has not been subtle about her desire to see a giraffe. However, we knew not to get our hopes up as 1) TIA and 2) disappointment sucks. After pulling in to the park part 2, we hop up onto the top of the truck but as we set off into the (LEGIT) bush, we realize this is not going to work as branches seem to be happily reaching out to grab us. We drive through about 20 minutes of bush and suddenly it breaks into a huge savanna. Surrounded by some of Rwandas' finest mountains the view is breathtaking. Even from thousands of feet away we can see the fields are spotted with hundreds of animals.


We have a driving tour of many different antelopes and huge families of zebras. Then, in the distance, we hear the tracker say 'do you see the giraffes?' RA1 restrains RA2 from jumping off the truck and running breakneck towards said land of giraffes. We full steam ahead and the closer we get, the more we can make out the shape of a giraffe. NO - many giraffes. WAIT - there are like 4 of them. NO NO, MORE!! We apparently stumbled upon a group of no less than 25 giraffes. On the way however, we did stop to pay homage to a few water buffalo as they are big and pretty awesome.

We were exhausted and UNSPEAKABLY FILTHY by the time we returned to Kigali, and roundly agreed that not only was it the highlight of our trip to Africa so far (and won't likely fall in the rankings), but it was actually possibly the best day of our lives. We got to ride around, ON a car, staring at baboons a few feet from us, making faces at hilarious looking baby giraffes, and taking in the most gorgeous panoramic vistas either of us could never have imagined. We don't know how we got this lucky, or as we frequently as one another in various tones, "how is this our life?", but we'll take it.


Full Safari Pics Here : http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=1828080024/a=1844700024_1844700024/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

What are YOU doing this weekend?

We'll be heading out for a mini-Safari on Sunday through the Akagera National Park. Our driver picks us up bright and early at 5am and we spend the whole day at the park.

We're keeping our fingers crossed for hippos, holding our breath for elephants and praying for a giraffe!!

More about the park here and here.

Have a good weekend!

Life or Something Like It

Your faithful RAs settled on the length of time we would be in Rwanda - 3 months - as accidentally as we settled on Rwanda itself; we just let fate and visa rules guide us. As in the case of Rwanda itself, fate's guiding hand intervened perfectly in terms of timing. While one of our fellow volunteers has already left and others leave in a few weeks, we have just settled into a life here, and while there are plenty of exciting things left to do, there's a routine and a sense of calm at times that is really comforting. We generally get up at around 6:30am, not because we're such go-getters or early risers (those of you have met us at 6:30am will VEHEMENTLY AGREE, I'm sure), but because breakfast goes out around 6:30 and when the fruit is gone, it's gone. For Rwandan pineapple and tree tomatoes, we'll commit physical violence if we have to. Getting up on time is just our way of insuring minimal bloodshed.

We leave for the office around 9:00, and it is a 3 1/2 minute walk, or, more aptly, exactly one Beyonce or Better Than Ezra song long. When we arrive, T.I.A. Since the kids have started school there is actually LESS order to our time with them; they show up as occasion, their mother's mental health, or their own need to pass math demands. We can no longer bank on having child-free afternoons, and have told the FVA office to plan to always have someone on standby, as we cannot abandon our work with the women here in favor of chasing children around all day every day. Four days a week, yes, BUT NOT FIVE. You see our steely resolve. We keep ourselves and the kids entertained on off days by teaching them the difference between "tiger" and "turtle" the best way we know how - WITH RIDICULOUS HAND GESTURES. RA2's father recently asked her what qualified her as a teacher, and we hope this picture will demonstrate visually what we already affirmed verbally: absolutely nothing qualifies us to be teachers. But these kids now know the difference between a tiger and a turtle, and are reasonably certain it involves claws and the word, "GRRR!", and that is something. The tall, gangly, adorable muzungu on the left is Drew, who has graciously started helping us out on afternoons. It's turned out to be great in terms of giving the kids, and the women, a positive male role model.

The length of our stay has allowed us to work some of our personal causes into the program, and hopefully establish a continuity to maintain them after we leave. As of today, we will be teaching a theater class every Friday afternoon at Gisimba orphanage designed to engage the kids in discussions around HIV/AIDS, gender-based violence, poverty, and whatever else they come up with. RA2 is glad years of community theater will finally be put to good use; RA1 will be in charge of all things related to crayons, paper, markers, scissors, and "big dish", as RA2 has an aptitude for none of these.

We've also been working closely with Claudine, a beautiful, very pregnant young mother whose daughter Sylvie made off with RA2's heart and has thus far refused to return it. Claudine has recently asked us to be, if possible, present at the birth of her next child. She should give birth in early March. We're incredibly honored that she would want us t be part of such a momentous event in her life, even if all RA2 will be able to do is sit in a corner rocking back and forth insisting she "don't know nothin' bout birthin' babies." Claudine is hoping for a hospital birth, but she lives on a series of poorly designed and labor-inducing dirt roads, so if the baby decides it's coming at home, it's coming at home. We're feeling lucky we happen to know a strapping young gentleman who has helped women through labor before, and hoping he can at least give us some breathing exercises to keep us busy and out of the way if we're actually there when the time comes.

We spend our evenings reading before dinner, which has been served a lot earlier since Ian learned to say, "I am very hungry" in Kinyarwandan and wandered into the kitchen rubbing his stomach and repeating it plaintively. We're all but devouring books here; RA1 is midway through, in the span of a week, a book that took RA2 about 4 months. There's time in the evenings to talk about what work we've done that day and what ideas have been kicking around in our minds. We occasionally break up the evenings by going out. Last night was Tsufit's 25th birthday (happy birthday sweetie!!) and we have many ridiculous pictures of Ian in a hat, and probably some of Drew and RA2's unwise decision to hop on a child's merry-go-round after at least 2 Primus'.

This weekend we're scheduled (fingers crossed) to go see Akagera national park, which is something RA2 has been looking forward to since we arrived. Fingers crossed for amazing animals, particularly a gangly-legged, awkward looking you-know-what. We have been advised not to get between hippos and the water, and our American education says to never smile at a crocodile, so we should be all set.

The Long-Awaited Ivuka Update!

Since we arrived, we've been spending a lot of our free time at Ivuka, an art studio/art co-operative in Kigali. It was founded by an amazing man named Collin (that's him on the left).

There aren't a lot of people making art in Rwanda, and RA2 has been known to describe Ivuka as "water in the desert". It's a gorgeous, open space where people create art, share art, and spend time together around art. In keeping with that spirit, Collin also founded a children's dance troupe dedicated to traditional Rwandan dance, essentially to give the neighborhood kids something to do. They're in the studio every Saturday and Sunday, and whenever they have free time, dancing and banging (LOUDLY) on drums. The troupe has been to Holland to perform and Collin is constantly promoting them, trying to figure out where else they can perform. They're really incredible.



Our friend Richard recently represented Rwanda in the equivalent of the Art Olympics. Every country sends a painter and a sculptor. This was the first year Rwanda participated, and this gorgeous piece of art was Richard's contribution.


Auggie is another one of our favorite people (on the entire planet, possibly), mostly because his smile is so amazing it can light up a universe, but he also makes beautiful things that we love to look at.


The guys (and lady - hi Chance!) at Ivuka have been amazingly good to us, letting us just hang out and paint. Art therapy is a really nice way to unwind after a week of cranky children. Richard has begun to refer to our paintings as "abstract", which is both generous and kind. Chance has been trying to teach us to dance, bless her hopeful heart.

If you want to learn more about Ivuka, or would like to invest in the future of Rwandan art AND have something beautiful for your living room or bedroom wall, you can check them out at www.ivukaarts.com, or email Charles, Collin's brother Chief Officer in Charge of Everything at Ivuka at ivukaarts.kigali@gmail.com

A Shout Out To Our Homies

Many of the volunteers here are keeping blogs about their time in Kigali. They are also posting pictures there where you may or may not spy a pic of your favorite Recovering Assistants. There's so much that happens here everyday its quite impossible for us to capture it all in one place - plus all the volunteers are doing something different in their programs which often provide highly entertaining stories.

We hadn't realized how lucky we were to have such an amazing group to spend our first month with, until we heard some stories about other groups in the past. We've fallen in love with all of our fellow 'vols' and hope you enjoy their stories as much as we do =)

Lyndsey's Blog (Her last day with us is today, but she's the only volunteer in our group to have gone and seen the gorillas!) : http://www.getjealous.com/getjealous.php?go=lovesafrica

Tsufit's Blog (Our resident Kosher-Orthodox-Surviving-on-Ricecakes-in-Rwanda vol, has an equally awesome blog. I would read it just for the food adventures that she goes through- and she's one of the top quoted people on our guest house quote board.) : http://getjealous.com/kosherinrwanda

Wrapping your head around it…

As we live in a house full of internationally minded individuals (mostly women, woot!) we often find ourselves in the midst of all-night discussions about being somewhere with such a vibrant but tragic past. We often find ourselves discussing with our Jewish roommates the differences and similarities between the ’94 genocide and the Holocaust. And sometimes we find ourselves stumbling over our very expensive, very elite educations on the question of : How do Rwandans do it? How do they forgive?

It’s interesting living somewhere that is post-conflict, but that so badly wants to move forward from their past. I struggle with their motives, but understand their intentions of not wanting to be referred to as 'post-conflict.' If you call your country post-conflict for so long does that impede your ability to move forward in the international arena and does it make you look vulnerable? To be honest, I think Paul Kagame wants his country to no longer be the charity case of Africa and wants to do things like ban the omnipresent primitive wall security barriers (Broken glass bottles cemented to the top of houses' security walls to keep intruders out) because his country is safe now. Again, I understand his intentions, but I still struggle with the motives behind trying to move forward in a rapid pace. This country is peaceful and this country has made leaps and bounds in progress. But I still find it too soon to declare that they’ve officially moved on from the effects of the genocide. RA2 has suggested that for them to be post-conflict they will have to peaceably make it into a time where all the children/young people that survived the Genocide are adults or when there are no longer any survivors.

When we think on the progress being made, RA2 and I often find ourselves comparing it to the Civil Rights movement. The United States continues to be plagued by the remnants of the Civil Rights movement, as well as extremely racist events, commentary and associations. I’m not sure we can even say our country is “post-civil rights movement” as we still fight daily to protect the things our elders fought for in the Civil Rights movement. Let’s not even start on the way we’ve moved backwards (and yes, sometimes, forwards) in rights for women. But somehow, Rwanda has managed to skip a lot of the strife and growing pains that come along with progress after a tragedy. Genocide victims are living next to genocidaires in every village, slum and neighborhood in this country and you don’t hear everyday about violence between the two groups. Some of the Rwandan Genocidaires were responsible for some of the most brutal and senseless killings (more to come on that in our entry about Nyamata), and although many of them have been brought to justice through local gacaca courts – a lot of the ‘lower ranking’ individuals live daily with victims and victims’ family members on a day to day basis. How does that work? Are Rwandans just hardwired differently? Are Rwandans just more able to let go of their grudges and forgive? I know they don’t forget, but are they able to simply forgive and move forward in the name of a peaceful Rwanda?

There are so many things we think about since we’ve gotten to this country; but this is one that we often come back to : How do they do it? Where did they find this capacity to forgive? On this teeny-dot-on-the-map country in the middle of East Africa, how have these people figured out how to move forward? Is it because in a country where some people had the capacity to commit brutal acts of violence against their countrymen, other people have the capacity to forgive on some of the most grand scales imaginable?

We don’t know, but we’re working on figuring it out.

Pictures Part Deux!

http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=1797904024/a=1844700024_1844700024/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Hope you enjoy!!!!

xoxo
stipps & soli
the manolos

Gisneyi 2.0 (Friday – Monday)

So once we had finished the hard labor of farming on a mountainside, sweating more than we do in our spinning class at the WSC – we had a pretty downhill last two days of work in Gisenyi. Friday morning we headed in to what can only be described as an 1800s style sewing circle. The women had HUGE bedsheets which they sketched some designs on. They used these big, cloth sewing circles to cross-stitch yarn into the designs they had put on the sheets. The designs were beautiful and since they were using yarn, the patterns showed up bright and thick against the thin bedsheets. RA1 came up with ideas for pillowcases, which she will be expanding on upon her return to America.

After about 3 hours of sewing, we ran out for a quick samosa and came back to a bead making factory that had been concocted while we were gone. Beadmaking kind of goes like this:

1) Cut measured strips of glossy paper (posters, calendars, etc). They are fat at the top (inside of the bead) and taper down into a point.
2) Take tiny strips and start rolling. If your fingers start to burn or cramp up you know you are doing it correctly.
3) After about 15 minutes of rolling, you get to the end. If your bead doesn’t look lopsided you have successfully made a bead. If lopsidedness does occur – start at #2 and try again.

After 4 tries, 45 minutes and a few sweaty fingers, RA1 finished a bead. Perhaps the woman was humoring RA1 and just let her use the gluestick to finish the bead, or perhaps she was actually successful. We will never know.

Next, we went around the corner to teach a class in a nearby building. Of course (per TIA standards) no one had come to unlock the door so the neighborhood hauled out a chalkboard – where they found it and hauled it from, we will surely never know – and we began our English lesson with about 15 adults. We did very basic greetings, counting to ten and family describers. We know – from our years of teaching experience and our short weeks of teaching Rwandan children – that attention spans basically crap out around 45 – 60 minutes. As we ended the lesson, we noticed that a large contingent of boys had gathered outside the building walls and were listening to our lesson. As the adults left we heard cheers – yes cheers – of “Teach us English!” “We know English, teach us!” RA1 heaved a sigh of acquiecense while RA2 stepped up and taught a full-on English Grammar lesson. She rocked these kids’ worlds with things like “Who, What, When, Where” and introductory phrases. Then she pulled out the smoking gun of English teaching in Africa (again, per our years of teaching experience) and started a game of Simon Says. We were barely winded after an hour with these kids and if we didn’t already know about the time/retention ratio previously referenced, we would have kept teaching them until the sun set. They were such an antithesis to our Kigali kids who are so privileged to be able to hear a lot of English in their daily lives just by shear fact of living in the capital city. These kids were quite literally dying and crying and shouting to learn as much English as we would teach them. It was an amazing way to end the week.

We had an amazingly relaxing weekend to prepare us for the last day of work (and a full day of travel) so we were excited to go to the activity marked “marshrooms” on our schedule. However (per TIA standards) we arrived to a tye-dye making plant being operated out of one of the womens’ front yard. (Sidenote: In Kigali, there are no yards. There are shanties upon shanties upon hole-in-the-wall restos and cafes. In Gisenyi, people have yards, bigger houses and generally more space.) There were about 10 buckets full of dye, at least 40 different tyed sheets and many, many helpers; not including the 20 children that followed us from the road shouting muzungu and being generally excited to see exactly where these crazy white girls were going up the side of a mountain on a Monday morning.

As the sheets were immersed in the dye buckets, the final products became some of the most beautiful patterns and sheets we had ever seen. In Africa, you can use these bolts of cloth for tons of things: dresses, shirts, sarongs, etc. Although RA1 has a staunch rule against tye-dye in any part of her clothing regimen, a few of the sheets were starting to look like pretty amazing sarong options. Then, as we were standing up to leave the women stopped us and said they were making us lunch. We literally feasted on some of the best burnt corn and rice/sauce/meat combo we had had since we’d been in Gisenyi. It was so good and the meat was super tender and the corn was amazing. Then one of the ladies that we’ve been working with almost everyday brought in fresh squeezed pineapple juice, which had clearly been touched by God. It was so sweet and fresh that I started to loathe Dole and their weak attempts to create this taste anywhere but where pineapples grow naturally.

So, besides the general lack of most of our quasi-modern conveniences afforded to us at our guesthouse in Kigali, Gisenyi was a wonderful place to spend a week. We were able to meet new women, interact and share with them in a brand new way and feel that we had given these women a new found connection to the Kigali office that they hadn’t felt before. We may have boggled their minds when we jumped out into the fields with them to hoe right along beside them, but we had never felt more welcomed than when they invited us into their homes and hearts to listen to them.

Telling Tall Tales in Rwanda

We're back to our "real lives" in Kigali, and hope to update you soon on our last few days in Gisinye, which were productive and beautiful, because time in Gisinye generally is. But here in the present, there are small children with eager faces and short attention spans to be attended to (and we don't just mean Ian and Drew), and today was absolutely my favorite day of teaching so far.

Since the older kids have gone back to school for half days and now only require tutoring, I had a class of just 4 - a 9 yr old boy who was way ahead in both English and math, a 7 yr old boy and a 7 yr old girl on roughly the same levels, and a 3 yr old girl who I thankfully had the time to do special lessons with, since there were so few students. We started with numbers; they can count 1-10 in English, but they can't identify the numbers individually or out of order. Then we switched to English for the end of the class.

Coming up with creative ways to teach the alphabet has been a challenge for all of us. Last time, my class got through the letter H, and I had pictures with words underneath to help them remember ("ant", "bat", "hands" etc). This time, the printer was broken, so I decided to try something I'd been thinking of for awhile: fairy tales. I'm hoping if the kids catch on, eventually they'll tell me Rwandan fairy tales. I took a class on the origins and sociology of folk tales in college, and I found it fascinating. If you look at early fairy tales - Grimms, for example - they're simply re-told popular folk tales absolutely soaked in Christian moralizing. Also, they're brutally violent. For the most part these stories were told to children to illustrate what was good and what was bad behavior, and to imply that if you behaved badly you might, just MIGHT, be thrown into an oven and eaten for dinner. And the bad guy would only bother to cook you first if you were really, really lucky.

So we skipped the moralizing and the scary, for the most part, and I told them a simplified version of Little Red Riding Hood. Afterwards we talked about "big" and "bad" and "little", and then, my kids acted out scenes. I told them they could do it in Kinyarwandan if they would use the English words they'd learned as well, and it was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. The little boy playing the big bad wolf gave himself a deep raspy growl and chased the girls with maybe a bit too much enthusiasm, and the shy little 3 yr old got right up and told him what big eyes, ears and teeth he had. But the best part was the basket.

I had told them that Little Red Riding Hood carried a basket to grandmother's house, and without my suggesting it, they reached for props, using the chalk box as a basket. And the little girl stuck it right on her head. It hadn't occurred to me they would think of a basket going anywhere but over their arms (and I should have known better!!); it hadn't occurred to them that a basket of goodies would go anywhere but on top of their heads. It made me want to re-write and re-illustrate a series of American/European fairy tales specifically for them. Think of Conderella here!! Jealous stepmothers and stepsisters, girls being forced to work and miss school - that happens here every day. But at the end of THIS Cinderella story, Cinderella isn't going to be saved by a Prince. She's going to be saved by a local woman with HIV whom she always cooks for when she has time, who decides to sponsor her for school. HA! How's that for moralizing? I'm going to spend the rest of the day re-writing Sleeping Beauty. This will be the best new game EVER.

I also need to learn how to say "Be your own hero" in Kinyarwandan.

What If She's An Angel?

The RAs are indeed coming to you, LIVE, if definitely not in real time, from the beautiful mountainous Gisinye. Monday night we made it to the concert at the stadium, which featured many MANY Ugandan artists, each of which got to sing only 2 or 3 songs, most of which were lip-synching. We spent a good part of the evening playing "Name That Pop Act." "Ugandan TLC!" "Ugandan Ne-yo!" "Ugandan Usher!" "Ugandan Lady Gaga?" etc. Some of the acts were actually terrific, including a bizarre, definitely live rap group who know our friends at the art co-op and featured, bizarrely enough, a member dressed as a Sheikh. We did NOT get to see Medi, but we're here for many more weeks, and we are sure we'll track him down.

I have a Rwandan reading over my shoulder, with absolutely zero shame. He speaks excellent English and apparently reads it as well. He wanted to know who I was sending this to, and seemed to understand when I said it was a blog.

Tsufit's camera was stolen at the concert, which means 3 out of the original 6 we had amongst us are gone (Stipps' needs some repairs but will be fine). Africa is re-absorbing our cameras at an alarming rate. The lack of cameras, tragically, is the reason there is no photographic evidence of any of the following:

Tuesday we arrived in Gisinye and went to see a volcanic-rock mine owned by one of the women here whom FVA's GBV program helped, Vestine. It was AWESOME. That is some seriously physical labour. They hack away at the rocks with giant hammers. Goats were running around looking for scraps - there are goats everywhere here. We met the Vestine's husband, a pastor, who is missing all of his left arm and half of his right arm, below the elbow, and has some deep scars in his face. We asked one of the other women, Christine, what had happened, thinking he had probably been attacked during the genocide. But no: she said they had been wealthy, and in 2000, a decade ago, his friends tried to rob him, and they were the ones who had done this to him.

Wednesday we got to make dolls, which was extremely awesome. We're crazy about these dolls they make here, with baskets on their heads and babies on their backs, because that's just how the women here walk. We got to actually stitch their faces on: eyes, eyebrows, nose and mouth. That afternoon, we went up the mountain to teach a class for kids, and waited about 45 minutes for our guide to take us what turned out to be only a 3 minute walk. We kept the locals entertained simply by existing. We drew a crowd, and finally a man shouted at them all to go away, we weren't going to do tricks or anything. They yelled back that they'd never seen a muzongo and wanted to keep looking; if we wanted them to go away, they said, we would tell them. Our translator Clemence interjected in horror, "No they would not!" Meanwhile, the local children kept RA1 entertained by teaching her a game in which you sit on the ground and throw rocks at a ledge and try to get them to stay up there and not roll or bounce off, which kept her mercifully occupied for the better part of 30 mins. In a genuine T.I.A. experience, When our guide arrived to take us on our 3 minute walk, we discovered know one had actually told the kidswe would be teaching this class, FOR THEM. We agreed to move the class to Friday (we'll see how that goes) and went back to the bus stop. At this point, the dark clouds that had been threatening all day opened up in a torrential downpour, and we took shelter in a one-room tin roof salon, watching as the (soaking wet) owner tried to keep all the electricity from blowing, by touching electrical wires with his wet hands. Meanwhile, the man behind Clemence was obviously drunk and, we were afraid, about to fall over on her at any moment. The storm was so bad it took down branches and part of the roof of the restaurant at the hostel we're staying at caved in. But Gisinye really needed the rain.

Today we walked up the hill to farm, which we were super excited about. On the way, we saw a pig on a bicycle, which RA2 considered the highlight of the experience. The pig was, as it were, hog-tied, and flung over the back of the bike with its head very close to the ground, which must have been one of the stranger experiences of its soon to be discontinued life. We also gathered an entire PARADE of children yelling "Muzongo!" in teeny-tiny excited voices. This actually happens so often we hardly ever mention it, but this was quite a crowd, they were adorable, and they had props, including tires they were spinning beside us as they ran to keep up.

We had been told we would be picking maize (tough, big corn that is delicious when you grill it) but when we got there they were tilling the soil by hand with big hoes, and they wanted us to sit in the shade and watch, which would have been no fun. So we took off our shoes and grabbed us some hoes. It was awesome, and the rich soil feels amazing when you bury your feet in it. After tilling, the women picked fresh maize and threw it on a small charcoal grill, and we ate it outside. Christine asked us if we knew the story of the angel the lord sent to Abraham. We did not. She said, "The Lord sent an angel to Abraham to see how he would be received, because God only gives us things we can handle*. Abraham and his wife received the angel, and the angel told God it was good, and even though they were old, God sent them a child, because he knew it would be received well**. So, I am telling the other ladies that we never know what God's plans are, and we should always receive everyone well, and you might be angels***! But you will go back to your homes and tell people how you were cared for here." To which RA1 had the good sense to reply, "You are OUR angels." And they are.

We had a really productive meeting (we hope) with the women after, and it raised some of their real concerns and questions. Apparently they were in a good place as an organization, and then several of the people working with them robbed them, and they're having a lot of trouble getting back up and running. During the meeting, Vestine passed around some pictures of herself. They love cameras here because they so rarely get pictures of themselves or their children, and we were sorry we couldn't take any this time. One of the pictures was of Vestine and her husband, before they were robbed, and there he was, holding his daughter in two strong hands, looking worlds different in the eyes than the man we had met. They are a very beautiful couple.

*All RA2 could think of was the line from a Lori McKenna song that goes "Oh but God only gives us as much as we can take... I guess."
**All RA2 could think was, "God used to really micromanage. What is he doing now? Is it because there are too many of us? Did he just give up? I mean, he doesn't have to get into everyone's details all the time, but he could stop by and say Hi..."
*** All RA2 could think of was a line from a country song about a little girl with cancer who needs help: what if she's an angel?/sent here from heaven/and she's making sure that you're doing your best to help one another/brother are you gonna pass that test?

Hero's Day

Rwanda has two major holidays to commemorate the Genocide: Hero's Day and Genocide Memorial Day. One is for celebrating those who fell, and the other is a national day of mourning. We are lucky enough to be in the country for both, and today was the happier of the two occasions. Clemence, who has replaced Peace as our Girl Friday translator and is absolutely fabulous, took us to the equivalent of the local town hall to be part of the... let's call them festivities. This "town hall" is one room with long benches and, we got the impression, a kitchen or prep room in the back. The 60 or 70 people in the small room ranged from about 12 yrs old to what looked like 70.When we got there (late - just like Rwandans but it is beyond awkward to interrupt such a solemn occasion) they led us right to the front row. After the first speaker finished, a man got up and explained in English that the man has been discussing Rwanda's three kinds of heroes, heroes he had known, and how the youth could step up to be heroes. Then they began to dance.

They were doing traditional Rwandan dancing, which we've been lucky enough to watch a lot of and even take a few lessons in from our friends at Ivuka, the art co-op. The men have stronger motions and more rhythmic stomping, while the women move more gently and weave together intricate arm positions. Halfway through the second song, they began pulling all of us, the volunteers, up to dance with them, and if we embarrassed ourselves they were very kind about it.

After the dancing they pulled out bottles of Fanta (they love this here), Coke, and beer, and passed it around, and followed it up with what looked and tasted like tiny delicious pizzas. These are people who celebrate their fallen heroes with beer, food and dancing - who doesn't love that?! If I were ever a hero, that's how I'D want to be honored.

While we were eating and drinking, they kept the music on and the accompanying videos as well. We couldn't understand why all the videos were of men in uniforms dancing until "Rwandan Military Band" flashed across the screen. This is the best military band EVER. It's like a cross between a giant boy band, traditional Rwandan dancing, and the army. It's phenomenal.

By this point, we had made some friends. The RAs were talking to an incredibly kind man named John, who looked tired and sad but was eager to make conversation. Everyone asks us what we think of Rwanda and we always say the same thing - we love it, it's beautiful. When we told him he said, "Good. Please spread the word to others." I feel they do a truly amazing job here of balancing the twin duties of acknowledging the past and trying to move forwards, and on the day of honoring the old, this man was thinking about the new. Ian had made a new friend as well, who wanted him to drink a banana beer. It's just what it sounds like - beer from fermented bananas - and it's drinkable but awful. The label say 15% alcohol but the locals know it's always more than that and random tests generally show it to be about 25%. By the end of the light lunch Ian had finished one - did we mention it was not yet 1pm? - and they were looking for one of us to say a few words about why we had come and what we thought. Ian, as usual, is in many ways our best representative, and he got up, threw out the few words of Kinyarwandan he knows, thoroughly charmed the crowd, and made a ridiculous speech that included phrases like "The food was really good, and the drink as well." We hope the woman who translated caught the spirit of the message and maybe not it's exact, word-for-word meaning.

There a few new volunteers but only a few of them are staying for longer than two weeks. There's a concert tonight at the stadium, which is right behind our guest house, and we're all going to try to go. Rwanda has one major popstar, Medi (sp?), and he has apparently been the special guest at EVERY concert since Ian arrived, so we're all hoping to see him tonight. We know every word of his songs, since there isn't much else to play around here except gospel hymns (we know all the words to those too). As of tomorrow, the RAs will be coming to you LIVE from Gisinye for one week. Gisinye is the town we went to our first weekend here (beautiful beach, giant holes to fall into etc). FVA has programs out there so they're sending us to work with them. We are so excited for a week of meeting new and amazing people, sitting on the beach, and drinking the touched-by-Jesus 100RWF chai tea we found in a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant down an alley.