Boiled Potatoes and Pineapple

I wrote this about a week ago, but every day I have come to post it, the internet either doesn't work or there isn't any electricity. But I guess it's better late then never. The internet is SO slow, so don't expect pictures anytime soon. For your reading pleasure, enjoy the essay on my first 2 weeks in Rwanda:

Muraho! Hello! Sorry it has taken me over a week to post a blog; Peace Corps has been keeping us incredibly busy and any free time I have is spent studying or sleeping. You all probably want to know how Rwanda is and to put it simply, it’s beautiful. I walk out my door every morning and look out over the mist-covered mountains and cannot believe I’m actually here. And then I begin my walk to the training center (1.5 miles up hill, both ways, in the rain) every day and curse the altitude and the hills J No, but seriously, this country is gorgeous; we have amazing mountain views during the day and at night the stars, Jupiter and the Milky Way guide us home (we often trip or walk into someone because we are looking up too much).This post will hopefully not be too long, but I can’t make any promises; a lot has happened in the last week and a half and I really want to fill you all in.

            We arrived in Kigali on October 22 (I think) and went straight to the conference center, where we spent 3 days getting basic overviews of topics such as Safety and Security, Health, Administrative (banking, valuable storage, etc.), Language and Cross Culture, and Rwandan History. We went non-stop from 7 AM to 7 PM every day while in Kigali; Peace Corps had a lot of administrative stuff to take care of and we needed to have a basic understanding of exactly what is expected of us and what the next three months of training will require of us. We got shots, deposited valuables in a safe, and were given a “Walking Around Allowance” of 28,000 RWF for nineteen days (about $2.50 a day), which has been more than enough for me. Peace Corps gave us an intense medical kit that has everything you could ever need in it: malaria prophylaxis, malaria slide kit (yes, we have to stab our fingers and make blood slides for testing and yes, we had to practice) and meds in case we get malaria, bandaids, antibiotics, rehydration salts, ace bandage, sunscreen, dental floss, chap stick…literally, everything.

One afternoon we were able to go visit the Genocide Memorial Center, which is a museum as well as a cemetery for all the victims from Kigali City (they continue to add remains as more bodies are found, which continues 16 years later). There are currently 250,000 bodies buried at the center in large cement tombs. We each placed individual roses on one tomb and Peace Corps placed one large arrangement that read “Never Forget”. We then went into the museum, which documented the evolution of ethnic tensions in Rwanda, the execution of the genocide, the reaction (or lack there of) of the international community, and the gacaca courts (local trials that allowed victims and survivors of the genocide to seek justice over the perpetrators). After the history and seeing the graphic images of the atrocities, we walked through rooms of pictures of the victims; many of our LCFs (Language and Cross Cultural Facilitators) recognized some people in the photos and were extremely emotional, which certainly made the history even more real, but still incomprehensible for someone who did not experience it. Finally, on the top floor there was a room of children’s pictures and a brief bio. This is the room that I almost lost it in. Seeing pictures of little babies whose best friends were their sisters and mothers really touched close to home; I can’t imagine losing my whole family overnight. Children were targeted by the Hutus because they wanted to wipe out the next generation of Tutsis. They were so innocent and had yet to experience life and were killed because of ethnic hatred propagated by “mature” adults. I could write a whole blog post about the Center and the Genocide, so please ask questions if you want to know more.

Sunday morning we had a few sessions in the morning and then loaded the buses for Nyanza, which is a large town about 2 hours south of Kigali, where we will be spending the next three months. I am living in Laundry House with twelve other girls and three LCFs. We have charcoal stoves to cook on, no running water (YAY bucket baths!), squat toilets (a hole in the ground), bunk beds, water filters that make the water taste horrible, but luckily we have electricity. The house is actually really nice and we have all pretty much adjusted to our new daily routines, though bug bites are proving to be an ever-present challenge. Since arriving in Nyanza about a week ago we have had training every day. Breakfast is at 7, so we leave the house around 6:45 to get there close to on time and then usually we come home after dinner, which is a solid 12 hours later. Everyday we have language class (about 3.5 hrs) and tech training for teaching, while about once a week we have sessions on health, safety and security, and cross culture.

The cross cultural component has been filled by time with our resource families (basically host families that we eat with twice a week, but don’t live with). I have a mother named Dina and six siblings. I am pretty sure only one of the children goes to school (despite school being free for the first 9 years, schools still require students to contribute money each trimester, so many families cannot send all the children to school) and he is also the only one in the house who speaks a little English, while the others only speak Kinyarwanda. I will be having dinner with them every Wednesday and Friday and hopefully spending a couple more afternoons a week with them. They have a small cement house with no electricity, three cows, a bunch of rabbits, chickens, and a lot of fruit and vegetable plots. We spend a lot of time practicing Kinyarwanda and English, but I’m hoping that soon we will be comfortable enough to go on adventures in the community so I can practice the language more. To demonstrate the challenge of communication here, I will share a funny story: On Saturday I showed up for dinner and sadly they were not expecting me (the schedule changed this week and they thought I was coming Friday, so had prepared a meal for me then), so I was lucky enough to have cold boiled potatoes, pineapple, and a Fanta for dinner. Meanwhile my friends were all eating meat, cassava bread, pineapple, beans, rice, and beer. For the most part I am completely dependent on the Resource Family Coordinator to tell them when I’m coming and sadly he hasn’t managed that successfully yet, so I am working on learning the days of the week and time, so I can inform them myself. Hopefully they will be expecting me this week!

In other news, we got bikes! After doing road/drainage maintenance in Nyanza Saturday morning for umuganda (required community service once a month for everyone over 18), we played a couple hours of soccer and then in the afternoon the Peace Corps distributed brand new Avalanche mountain bikes to all of us with helmets, pumps, lights, repair kits, and locks. If the bike is stolen, we have to pay for the loss, but they are really nice and once we are all used to the hills, they will hopefully prove to be useful means of transport. Sunday was Halloween, so we of course had to celebrate. Everyone in Laundry House dressed up as ninjas and we made numchucks out of cardboard and duct tape and met up with a majority of trainees at a bar in town that has one of the sketchiest “clubs” I’ve been in, but hey it was fun to be super American for a few hours. Six AM came a little too early Monday morning though; Rwandan coffee is not strong enough to help fuel a trainee for the day, but I survived.

I know this post has been all over the place, but so much has happened and I’m sure I’ve forgotten to mention all of the high points, but once I get into more of a routine (right now we are all gasping for air and free time), I will keep this updated on a much more regular basis and target my posts to discuss certain issues/events. I want to share everything I learn about this dynamic country and hopefully encourage a dialogue between you all and myself over the next 27 months. We haven’t really had the opportunity to leave the Peace Corps bubble yet, but from the little time I have spent out in the community I know that the next two years will be incredibly challenging, but also incredibly rewarding. I look forward to sharing it all with you and hope that you will keep me posted on happenings in the United States. I miss you all and cannot wait to hear from you!

Love,

Sarah