Wednesday 11th February 2009

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.

FOOD
Well, it was market day today and I decided to see exactly how much food I could buy there. It was a bit of a shock just how little variety there is: I bought tomatoes, green peppers and onions, could have bought a cabbage but I am off to Kigali for the weekend. I passed on intoryi which are little green aubergines and easily the most revolting food I have tasted here (Alfred: MOST revolting? Remember the cassava bread – smells of sick and tastes like wallpaper paste? Or the goats’ intestines brochettes?) – OK point taken. But they are horrible. There was also garlic (have some), sweet potatoes (see comments on intoryi) and cassava roots (not even going to go there – insanely laborious to prepare and taste horrible). There was some maize – I’ll get that next time – and the smallest potatoes I have ever seen. And that was it – no fruit that I could see, no avocadoes (they’ll be back in season here soon), no bananas for some reason. But, basically, all you get here is whatever is grown within walking distance of the village. The north and east have a much bigger variety of foodstuffs, here it is much more limited. (Alfred: he forgot the dried beans, huge piles of multicoloured beans – definitely have to try cooking them, make a chilli or something and use up some of those herbs and spices so many of you kindly sent him). The prices were very reasonable (I think) – big bunch of large onions for RWF100, three peppers for RWF100, twenty tomatoes for RWF300 (someone out there tell me if I was being ripped off). I was also looking for eggs but couldn’t find them (luckily as it turned out).

Of course I can’t cook any of this yet because I am still eating my way through the huge stir-fry I cooked for Enock (apparently he spells it with a ‘k’, not a ‘h’). Had it for lunch and finished it for dinner – and it was really good!! No way of storing food so if I cook a load of something that’s what I eat until it is finished. Going to do a pasta sauce tomorrow though eating pasta without parmesan is going to be a slightly disappointing experience (Alfred: Awwww! And no red wine either – why bother, eh?).

I went to work (more on that later), taught my English class (photocopier broken and almost everyone forgot to bring their notes so it was uphill going) and then walked back home with Enock. As we got near home, he said he had been to the market earlier and, remembering my mentioning I wanted eggs, had bought me eleven eggs as a present! Very nice of him, given that I hadn’t even fed him the other night.

Spent the morning updating various statistics – mostly staff returns from primary schools. They are grim reading – huge numbers of vacancies everywhere, leaving students sitting in their classes with no-one to teach them. In some schools teachers have been timetabled for over 40 hours of class contact per week (these being classes averaging 49 students). Normally they have a 40 hour week of which a maximum of 26-30 hours is supposed to be class contact. No wonder they are dropping out in droves. Added to that they have been told to start work earlier (0715), finish later (1645) and have had their lunch break cut to just 30 minutes which means there isn’t enough time for them to go home to eat (Alfred: you said most of this in yesterday’s post! It’s boring enough without repeating yourself all the time!)

NIGHTTIME INTRUDERS
(Alfred: teddybears don’t sleep, did you realise that? While whathisface is snoring softly away and dreaming of whatever it is he dreams of I sit there in the corner of the room on the chair I have been occupying for the last few months and I listen. I can’t really see anything because a) it’s dark (duh!) and b) he usually dumps his clothes all over me at night (just what you need, a pair of boxer shorts that have been worn all day in the African sun draped across your muzzle). And what do I listen to? Well, we have the mice and/or bats in the attic that we spoke about the other day. Then last night there was something new – definitely bigger, tramping around up there, huge bloody (Get a grip, Alfred) – OK, maybe not big but DEFINITELY a lot noisier than anything we had before. And moving faster too. Large rat? Snake? Goodness knows. His nibs actually woke up (he wasn’t sleeping with his MP3 earplugs in last night) but he just kind of grunted and rolled over and went back to sleep. Meanwhile I am left sitting there listening to a re-enactment of what sounds like The Texas Chain Saw massacre crossed with Animal Farm going on above me. And what if ‘it’ comes down? I’m not the most athletic of bears and my fur is very nibbly. I’ve seen the mice running across his bed at night and he never even budges, so I know he’ll be damn all help if anything else comes visiting.

And, by the way, any chance of getting moved around occasionally? All I know of Rwanda is what I read in this blog!! So far I have seen a hotel room in Kigali (three weeks), the inside of a suitcase (don’t even ask how long) and the bedroom in Gisagara. And I face the door which is usually closed. Occasionally Alexandre comes in and washes the floor – high point of my bloody week!! (No offence, Alexandre)

DOG! I PETTED A DOG!
If there is one thing I really miss here it’s dogs. There are actually more dogs here in Gisagara than anywhere else I have seen in Rwanda but they are still pitifully few. And they are not pets and are not used to being petted. I suspect they wouldn’t object but I also worry they might not have a clue what I am at! Plus all the warnings about rabies etc (though if they have been here for months and living in someone’s house you figure they are probably OK).

Anyway, we were in the pub the other night (Enock and I) and this dog wandered over. His name is Box and he became very friendly with Enock’s friend Kenneth while he was here. Now Kenneth has gone back to Kigali and Box misses him. So I decided that maybe Box would like to be friends with me and guess what – it seems to be working!! He hangs around the pub because his owners moved to Uganda and left him behind. Somebody must feed him as he isn’t particularly thin.

Dogs have a bad press here – they were eating the bodies in the aftermath of the genocide and virtually all of them were shot or otherwise killed and people are still very wary of them. But there must be at least a dozen of them around the village here. Looks like I ended up in the right place.

PROJECTS
Thanks for all the feedback on my project ideas. Have had lots of offers from family and students to help with the moto for Deo so that looks like it is up and running. Am also quite keen to see if I can do something on both the other ideas so I’ll keep you all posted. (Alfred: actually there were three – TABARA (single parents), Kivu Writers Workshop and Liliane Fonds!).

GUUS HIDDINK
If he gets appointed (or anyone) I think that makes our thirteenth manager in the time Alex Ferguson has been manager of Manchester United ...... (Alfred: it’s really funny, actually: apart from the last-minute equaliser against Stoke, every time he gets dressed up in his Joe Cole shirt and goes to a match, they either lose or draw to an embarrassingly weak team. Maybe he should start wearing a Man Utd shirt ...... )

PLAYTIME
The students in Enock’s school were teasing him that I don’t really exist because I he was telling them about me. So I gave Enock a big pile of Economists and Guardian Weeklys for his class. Now they have written a play for me which they are rehearsing at the moment and want to perform it for me on Sunday 22nd February! It is called ‘The Wages of Sin is Death’ (sounds exciting). I’ve never had a play written for me before so I am really looking forward to it! Enock had been thinking of getting them to write a play on HIV/AIDs but now he is talking to the District about organising a playwriting competition for all the secondary schools on the HIV/AIDS theme and having the winners tour around the different schools to perform it! He’s quite an inspirational teacher – no wonder his school has the best English results in the District. And all this on the equivalent of an ordinary level Leaving Certificate (which is all he has, which means he gets paid peanuts because your salary is mainly determined by your qualifications).


MOCKS
Meanwhile back at home my 6th Years are enduring the mocks! I’m sure they aren’t as awful as some of them have been saying (Alfred: wouldn’t bet on that ...) and at least they will be over soon. Hang in there guys!! All that hard work in 5th Year will pay off!!