Wednesday 17th: Day Eleven in Rwanda

Please note that VSO is in no way connected with or responsible for the content, comments and observations in this blog: these are solely my own in a personal capacity.


Kind of a nothing day but with some really interesting bits. Some volunteers had their discussions with their programme managers today (I had mine last week) so the rest of us started on a session with Soraya on ‘practicalities’ – how to set up and run a water filter, kerosene stove and lamp, charcoal stove and setting up a mosquito net. It all went quite well: you definitely want to be cooking on a charcoal fire for doing a stirfry, no question – a kerosene stove just doesn’t produce that much heat but charcoal is banned in parts of Rwanda because it adds to deforestation (given the price of kerosene I don’t know how people in those parts of the country cope). It is available and allowed in the south but we’ll see how we go (kerosene is paraffin, by the way, for us in Ireland!). The session went quite well and was extremely informative and useful.

Then Tina and I got a lift with some of the programme staff to the VSO office and just mooched around the resource room for a while. The internet connection was pretty slow but I did get on and sent a few messages, especially to all you wonderful people who are contributing to my sponsorship drive!! It’s great to get messages from people so keep them coming, or else make comments here on the blog page (that’s actually better in some ways, though bear in mind that blog comments won’t appear on the actual blog page until I have okayed them; that’s how the Blogger site operates). They have a library there so I took out a PD James and The Name of the Rose which I haven’t read in ages. Then we tootled back to the guesthouse, missing lunch (which is no loss for me given how much I have been eating recently) and had sessions on mentoring (our allowance for paying someone to help us with our French and/or Kinyarwandan during our stay – maximum of three hours per week at RWF2000 per hour) and our last Kinyarwandan class which was a bit heavy going for some because we are getting VERY tired but Emmanuelle is so enthusiastic we buckled down and did all the vocabulary on clothes and household items that he had prepared. We were also delighted to hear that we should have him again in November when we are all back in Kigali for ICT2 (our second bout of In-Country Training – VSO do love their acronyms).

It is interesting to look at how many foreign loanwords there are in Kinyarwandan and in what categories: for fruit and vegetables there are obviously very few and presumably apply to non-native plants: ikaroti, avokat, inanasi, itomati, ipera, and maracuja are all I could find so far. But for clothing virtually all items betray their foreign origin: how many of these can you decipher: karavati, ipantalo, ijinkisi, isogisi, ijaketi, umupira and ijipo. Guesses can be posted as comments on this blog! Also interesting is that in Burundi, which has a very similar language, almost all these words are translated into something that is recognisably Burundian whereas Rwandans use the French or English word and just stick a vowel on the front and make a few other minor changes. It’s a bit like the difference between saying mo rothar and mo bhicycle.

We then finished with a session with Mike Silvey who is the country director who was looking for a frank and open discussion of how the entire ICT had gone. So we did!! Overall, the group was extremely positive about almost everything, though – inevitably – you tend then to list the things that were could be improved the next time around. However, without going into those, overall we have been very impressed with the Programme Office here and the staff and especially those volunteers already incountry who worked so hard over the last week to greet us and make us feel at home: Bruce, Els, Chris, Paula, Cathy, Dani (?spelling) and I may have missed out a few others – sorry guys! Soraya and Jane in particular spent an enormous amount of time with us, answering stupid questions, guiding us around and showing incredible amounts of patience!

So I am now off to supper (it is 1856 my time, one hour ahead of Ireland and the UK). My employer is staying here tonight so he may well be at supper, so I am already trying to think in French!! I’ll update after supper!

OK – no employer but I got a nasty turn when I thought a guy at another table that I hadn’t even spoken to was him! Everyone’s thoughts are beginning to turn to breaking up tomorrow and what the reality of our placements is going to be. It’ll be good to get started but it has been very safe and protected here, so I’m pretty sure everyone is feeling some kind of degree of apprehension. However, we will see each other in eight weeks’ time which is good to know!

Just a quick word about my fundraising. You will have noticed that I have a little tag at the end of every entry about my fundraising for VSO. One or two people have asked me if I will be fundraising for any projects here in Rwanda itself at any stage. The answer is yes and you will hear all about it when it happens but I am strongly committed to fundraising for VSO as well. The degree of support they give their volunteers is enormous and it all costs. To give the figures of what VSO is paying for for me being here:
· three weeks of training in Birmingham including accommodation and flights
· all inoculations
· flights to and from Rwanda
· all accommodation costs in Rwanda
· the bulk of my RWF150,000 per month
· an equipment grant of RWF100,000
· a language grant of up to RWF6,000 per week for my entire time in country
· all medical costs incurred while in-country
· a holiday grant of (I think) about £400 if your placement is over one year
· a resettlement grant for when you return from your placement
I don’t think there is any other organisation that provides this level of support – both financial and organisational – to its volunteers. It means that countries that could not possibly afford to support volunteers themselves are able to tap into the skills, experience and enthusiasm of people like ... well, I suppose like me! The work VSO does and its vision of a world without poverty where everyone is equal is an inspiring and worthy one and I want to do everything I can to support them in this. So, that’s why I continue to look for your sponsorship in my fundraising drive!

Having said that, I do have a few ideas already about other projects that could do with support, combining the ideas of children’s health and education and you will be hearing more about that anon. In the meantime, thank you all again for your support, whether through sponsorship, emails, messages, blog comments or whatever. If anyone prefers to write in the old-fashioned way my new address is: Ruairi O hEithir, BP 129, Butare, Rwanda. Murabeho!

Thank you very much to all those who have supported my ongoing fundraising effort. I will be continuing my fundraising for VSO for a few more months so, if you would like to contribute, please go to www.mycharity.ie/event/ruairi.