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.
NEW POSTING POLICY: I was entering each day separately up to now but it is a real pain so from now on each entry will cover all the days since my last posting. Hope that is clear!! Also, I am still having trouble getting photos and labels to align, don’t know why yet!
Thursday
Flashback to yesterday – Tina met Mike and Charlotte and basically they agreed to her plan to relocate to Shogywe. She is going to go and live in Gitarama with Hayley and Soraya until the end of November when the house in Shogywe will be free (Alfred: ha, ha! – not only does Tina now have a Man Utd umbrella, she is going to be living with a puppy!!! You gotta love the way the universe messes us around!). This means I will be on my own in my placement until at least September – which is fine (I suppose) as I had originally figured I would be placed on my own anyway and I doubt a combination of a working me and an increasingly frustrated non-working Tina would be very good for either of us (Alfred: on second thoughts, she is better off weth the puppy!). Charlotte rang me to update me and also to check that I was OK with being on my own in Gisagara – I said fine but they should think of a placement there for September 2009 or even earlier if someone were to become available.
She also asked me had I sent her any details on what needed to be done about the house – I had promised to do this and forgot! So I quickly drafted up a list of points, wishing I had been a little more observant when I was there and maybe even taken some pictures. It was quite a list and I hope to hear back soon whether or not VSO are happy with what I have put in it.
Today morning (Thursday), Joe Walk arrived down from his session with Mans and brought me the missing files. It was really great to see him again – we shared a room in Kigali for 17 days but hadn’t seen each other since. He is extremely isolated over in Nyamasheke on the shores of Lake Kivu and is in an incredibly small 2-roomed house – he can’t cook or do laundry so the nearby nuns are feeding him and doing the laundry (at an outrageous price, I might add). He is looking into alternative accommodation arrangements or else they will have to move him. Again, interesting parallels between our two situations: accommodation that was obviously not checked out beforehand and is inadequate, enormous delays between informing the Program Office and hearing back from the Program Manager (10 days in both our cases). However, he has made great progress with his work, including organising a twinning between his school in England and a local secondary school in Nyamasheke.
We had a great day in Butare – explored all the shops so Joe knows what is available here (Namasheke has nothing and Cyangugu, the nearest town about 90 minutes away, has very little). We also had a few beers and a meal in the Chinese restaurant where the manageress refused to allow us to order as much food as we wanted to as she said it would be far too much – and she was right! Good for her – wish all restaurants were as obliging!
Friday
Friday was a busy day! Christine – a friend of Paula Rolston’s in Gahini – is leaving Rwanda after some years working here and Paula is throwing a big party for her so I said I would go. Gahini is in the east, about two hours away from Kigali and I haven’t been to that side of the country yet. Also, T. – the German volunteer I am particularly friendly with and who has not been feeling too well recently – is now in hospital in Kigali and awaiting the results of tests on her kidneys, so I figured I would go up Friday, see her and head on to the party Saturday. I packed my laptop because I figured I would get a wireless modem in Kigali and, because I have Windows Vista, they need to actually install it for you because of compatibility issues! Also, all my Irish music is on the laptop and Paula had suggested I start teaching people the Irish dances we are hoping to have on St Patrick’s Day next year (figure on starting with Ballaí Luimní, The Siege of Ennis and Baint an Fhéir for those of you who remember them!).
Anyway, ran into Nidhe, Heloise and others in Kigali Centre, went out to the Program Office to check for mail etc (none) and to lodge expenses; had a brief chat with Mike but said I would meet him on the bus to Gahini at 1630 Friday, and then headed back to the city centre to meet the others. I had missed T. at the program office and she texted me to say she had arrived in the hotel VSO were putting her in following her discharge from the Clinic and wasn’t feeling up to visitors so I said I would visit her the following day. A big gang of us then met up for a drink, including Thom, Chris, Els, sunburned Andy, Nidhe and Tiga (not spelled with an ‘a’ in it, sorry about that). Tiga wasn’t in good form as she had just heard her application to stay on in her placement had been turned down as the place had already been offered to a new volunteer, so I floated the suggestion that she might consider the now-vacant Gisagara placement. They headed off and I met Ivana for a drink, food and then back to her house where I was staying over. She has a really nice place in an area whose name I now forget and we chatted late about our various experiences to date!
OBSERVATION
Had a really nice email from one of my students in Rathdown, Wilmé Verwoerd who is doing her Leaving Certificate (A-level/section) exams this year. She and another student, Seoin, were selected as two of the four Irish delegates to the Global Forum on AIDS in Dublin recently and seem to have had an amazing experience. Well done girls! In about a week the next batch of Model United Nations delegates will be heading off to London with Catherine and Noëlle so best of luck to all of them – I look forward to hearing the stories!!
Saturday
After a very long and chatty breakfast with Ivana, I headed off to find the Hotel Bloom where T. is staying. It is quite a long way out – bus all the way to the Kimironko market and then headed off on foot. I have got over my disinclination to ask for directions and stopped every five minutes to make sure I was going in the right direction. Everyone said it was ‘thataway’ and only about another 200m. I was praying they were right because I had a heavy backpack (because of the laptop) and was carrying 3 litres of water, chocolate, crisps and cookies for T. and it was VERY HOT! Thankfully, the directions were right and the hotel is only about a 10-15 minute walk from the bus terminus. {NOTE: it is a really nice, modern hotel, only RWF25.000 per night – which is good for Kigali I’m told; potential visitors take note).
T. was sitting out on the balcony and looked fairly well but is still far from being 100%. I gave her a good talking-to about not even thinking of going back to work too soon (no idea if it had any effect but she reads this blog so I’m sure I’ll be hearing from her!). I also gave her stuff that Thom had brought up from Kibungo (clothes and drugs).
Back to town (it’s amazing how much shorter the same walk can be when you know where you are going!), and then looked for a moto to bring me to the Polyclinique to drop off some medical stuff for T. (it’s only a short walk but time was short and I didn’t know where the Polyclinique was). Well, the moto driver said he did know – and I believed him. Unfortunately, there are a lot of clinics and polycliniques in Kigali and we visited quite a few of them. Eventually I just got off at one, paid the driver and then went in to ask directions! Directions secured I found another moto and, as I was getting on, the clinic director came running out and gave the driver very specific directions to the place I wanted – nice guy!
Dropped docs, back to UTC building to get modem (I had three hours before the bus) and – guess what? It either doesn’t open on Saturday or only opens in the morning!! So I killed a few hours in the Blues Cafe with water and a minced beef baguette sandwich (not really recommended) before heading off for the 1630 bus to Kayonza/Gahini.
This is where the day got really fun! Mike Silvey (VSO Rwanda Country Director – remember this because he comes up a lot and I am not typing that out every time) was supposed to be getting the same bus but when he turned up they said there was a 1600 bus and stuck him on it. I had bought an advance ticket for the 1630 so I had to stick around. By 1630 no sign of a Kayonza bus and I figured (as the painted timetable on the gate said) that buses were actually at 1600 and 1700.
Anyway I kind of hung around not sure what to do and at 1640 this guy appeared from nowhere, asked if I was going to Kayonza and had me escorted to where the 1630 bus was waiting with all its passengers (no sign on the window, that’s what had fooled me). As far as I could figure out, the bus had been about to leave when someone on board remembered a muzungu had bought a ticket and someone was sent off to find me! Of course everyone spent the entire journey cracking jokes about me (at least I think that is what they were doing) but at least they didn’t just leave me there!
It was a long trip – I don’t ever remember anyone here ever complaining about a driver going too slowly but this guy was really slow so it was pitch dark by the time we got to Kayonza and the bus stopped there instead of going on to Gahini. Eventually I found a moto - Paula had told me it was RWF1000 and I found one guy who said that was fine but the other moto drivers said that a) I wasn’t allowed to go with him b) it was RWF1500 at that time of night and c) - not sure what c) was but there was definitely a third reason in there somewhere. Anyway, at this stage I was far too tired to care so I said fine and jumped on. Then I found out I couldn’t get the moto helmet on (I do have an unusually large head) (Alfred: don’t laugh, it’s actually true): the answer was for me to take off my glasses, another guy rammed the helmet on from behind and then they threaded the glasses back onto my head from the front of the helmet!! This was hard because the tips of my ears had folded downwards with the helmet but eventually they got the ends stuck in somehow and the driver insisted I put the visor down to make sure the glasses stayed in!!
Once we set off I realised that reason a) was justified – that first driver’s little moto would never have brought me that distance and certainly not up the final extremely steep hill. So finally I arrived at Paula’s and it was party-time! And it was fantastic! Met loads of people I either hadn’t met before or had only met briefly: George Pinto, Tiga, Els, Paula, and so many others. Sonya was also there (Sonya Fay from Cavan was on SKWID when I was on Teacher Development and we travelled over from Ireland together). She has been having a difficult time down in the extreme south-east, especially with her accommodation and a few other things but she seems to have coped with it all extremely well indeed!! I also met Eric O’Flynn from Limerick again and we have decided to only speak in Irish from now on when it is feasible (Eric maintains his Irish is not great which is crap, he is remarkably fluent, especially for someone who hasn’t used it in ages: it was SOOOOOO nice to be able to speak Irish again even for a short while).
Eventually we headed off down the hill to the restaurant (me with my backpack and laptop in case we needed the Irish dance music later and a half-bottle of Waragi gin I bought in Kigali in case of emergencies!) for fish and salad and brochettes (very tasty and only RWF 3600 a head – see pictures) and then it was more drinking and dancing (also see pictures though – as usual – my batteries gave out because of having to use the flash all the time). By 1 a.m. some began to bow out and by around 0300 there were only five muzungus left (Alfred: the proper plural is abazungu but I presume Ruairí thought you guys couldn’t cope with that level of grammatical sophistication) – all Irish! In fact – in a real stereotypical way – all the Irish were still drinking and dancing as were pretty much all the Rwandans and everyone else had bowed out (Alfred: strictly speaking Christine is not Irish but she is part Australian which as everyone knows is pretty much the same thing). We had pretty much stopped drinking at this stage –we couldn’t get the top off my bottle of gin no matter how hard we tried – just as well I suppose.
So off we headed home around 0330 but when I put my backpack on, I noticed a funny smell: the bag had tipped over on the floor and the bottle of gin, after all our attempts to open it, had completely drained into my bag! Panic! Through some miracle neither the laptop nor the Palm Pilot had been soaked, only my clothes, a book and my passport (the latter not too badly). We headed off home then, up a really steep hill, in various stages of semi-inebriation. Eric was adamant that you can’t walk home from a pub without singing songs so the eight of us walked home to a combination of Spancel Hill, the Dubliners greatest hits and Rwandan gospel music. Every time we had a go at Whiskey in the Jar or The Girl from the County Down or whatever, our Rwandan companions would sing a kind of harmony, really well – who said Rwanda doesn’t have a musical tradition!
By now it was about 0400 so I said there was no way I would be able to get into the guesthouse at this hour and decided to look for a corner in Christine’s house (which is actually the Bishop’s house). there was a sofa which I collapsed onto (Chris gave me his blanket in return for the use of my mosquito repellent!) and off I went to sleep, pausing only to go into the bathroom and wash the gin out of my precious Chelsea shirt! Great night!
Sunday
Unbelievably, I woke up at seven and, since I was in the sitting-room, figured I might as well get up before others began wandering in – as if!! The first callers were two women going to church around eight who needed a giant pestle and mortar for use in mass (don’t even ask). Eventually a few other people struggled to life and we had a really nice long-drawn-out breakfast. It’s a real pity I am only getting to meet Christine just as she is about to leave but at least I did get the opportunity!
Soraya, Mike, Tiga, Andy and I then headed off to get the bus (Els and the others had to stay for a meeting Eric had called – on a Sunday! What kind of a workaholic is he? And what is the Irish for ‘workaholic’? Answers by email or use the comment thing at the bottom of the blog entry). The first bus was packed full but the next one was going all the way to Kigali so we decided to stay on it rather than get off at Kayonza and look for a bigger bus. It wasn’t a bad trip at all considering it was a one of the small little buses and I got a chance to have a long chat with Mike about how each of us had ended up in this particular situation (.i. Rwanda, as opposed to the bus).
So, Kigali, lunch at Simba’s where Tiga and Andy and I met quite a few others (Heloise – still wearing her cool boots, Thom, Amy, Nidhe, Catherine Devine) to grab something to eat before heading to Butare. The food was OK but – unlike the last time – the service was really terrible so we ended up having to leave money for what we thought we would be charged for (lots of stuff we ordered never turned up so we presumed we would not be charged for it) and Tiga and Amy and I headed for the bus (Alfred: ‘presumed’ is not a word you should ever use in Rwanda). We had a great trip, actually, especially once Tiga went up and ordered the driver to either turn the music off or lower the volume! Both Amy and Tiga were talking about the various degrees and postgraduate courses available in Development Studies and it really got me thinking of doing something along the lines of an OU degree or diploma course while I am out here! Really interesting conversation, definitely going to have consequences. Also, Tiga is wondering about the Butare Diocese placement I mentioned in a previous blog so she may well be staying around for a while, at least until September anyway, and there may be another volunteer interested in the Gisagara placement, so lots happening all of a sudden!
Then back ‘home’ (it’s a bit pathetic really but getting back to the little hotel room really did feel like coming home – that is not a good sign!), dinner and bed – lots of sleeping to catch up on.
OBSERVATION: FRIENDS
Maybe it is because the same kinds of people tend to apply for jobs like this but it is amazing how really nice everyone is that I am meeting out here (volunteers I mean). Not that everyone is perfect (Alfred: someone get this guy a mirror, quick!) but people do seem to get on really well together! I remember Noëlle telling me back in Ireland how her friends who did VSO (or similar things) said they made really long-lasting and strong friendships and I can see that already beginning to happen (Alfred: cue alarm and panic among all Rwanda VSO volunteers who are reading this!).
OBSERVATION: POETRY AND SONG
One of my plans was to try and writing some poetry while I was here but I haven’t really been in the mood. However, in an attempt to get the logjam broken, here is a tribute partly inspired by Paula and Christine’s party. It should be sung to the air of that well-known Dublin ballad ‘Whiskey on a Sunday’. If you don’t know the ballad, tough! Some of the words in the third line of each chorus are a bit of a stretch – please do not hesitate to suggest alternatives (use the comment feature below so everyone can see!). And yes, I do have too much time on my hands..........
Mützig on a Sunday
We sit in the gloom of a kerosene lamp
Eating our rice and our beans.
We count our allowance and hope it will stretch
Until the next pay day is seen.
Chorus
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah – come day, go day
Wishing my heart it was Sunday
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah, filtered wa-ater all the week,
Mützig on a Sunday.
We queue in the bank for three hours and a half
But find we filled out the wrong form.
We stood in the wrong line but nobody thought
The dumb muzungu to inform!
Chorus
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah – come day, go day
Wishing my heart it was Sunday
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah, eating melange all the week,
Pizza on a Sunday.
We pack into buses with five to a seat
And pray that the babies don’t pee.
And sometimes we sit there and close our eyes
‘Cos sometimes it’s best not to see!
Chorus
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah – come day, go day
Wishing my heart it was Sunday
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah, Atraco death-traps all the week,
Sotra on a Sunday.
“I’m just being friendly, don’t take it up wrong,
With me you would have a great life!
Can I have your number? Can I just call round?
I think you would make a fine wife.”
Chorus
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah – come day, go day
Wishing my heart it was Sunday
Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah, unwanted visitors all the week
Lie-in on a Sunday.
PS: If you liked this one, VSO volunteers can check out my ‘Are You Going to Harbourne Hall?’ on my website, http://www.ruairioheithir.ie/ but apologies for how out-of-date my section on the US Elections is – I can’t update from Rwanda.
And, of course, no party is complete without photos!!!
1 Christine, in honour of whose leaving this party was held!
2.Chris, Scary Soraya, Els, Tiga and an obscured Andy.
3. A very untypical moment for Tiga!
4. Awwww – a group photo in which EVERYONE looks cute: Julie, Els, Tiga, Eric, Mike and Andy.
5. Never did catch his name but that is one stunning hat!
6 Sonya, sweetly smiling, unaware that behind her Paula is about to finish off the gin!
7 WHO'S GOT RHYTHM? Julie's got rhythm!
8 Mike, out of the goodness of his heart, decides to offer Chris the most tempting morsel of all.
9 Eric shares with Sonya his researches into the ancient art of Rwandan seated dancing.
10 Paula is shocked when Els informs her she is wearing a Remembrance Day poppy as an earring and it is still only October!
Monday
Meant to get up early but ..., what for? Eventually did get up around 7:30 (which is really late here), had breakfast – the usual coffee and omelette and as a bonus half a huge ripe avocado (Alfred: notice the word ‘coffee’ there – that’s the third day in a row now; bet the nails won’t last long either). I then did a huge cleanup of my room, more to try and figure where everything had gone to rather than its being especially messy. It’s amazing how hard it is to find stuff even in a very small room like this. Then Eli came to the door of my room saying a friend of his was selling Barack Obama shirts and baseball caps and did I want to buy one? At RWF20.000 (€25) they are bloody expensive but, as I had tried and failed to buy one before over the Internet at a higher price I figured what the hell. At least I am properly dressed for the election night special on Tuesday fortnight, now that Colin Powell seems to have hammered the final nail .......... (Alfred: Shut up! Don’t tempt fate!! Remember Neil Kinnock!) .... hmmm, maybe Alfred has a point. OK – off to the Cybercafe! Remember to keep those emails and messages coming – it’s always nice to hear from people. Murabeho! Umukiza wacu ni Yesu (that’s a really useful phrase here but not one that I ever expected to learn!).
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.
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