Thoughts about Rwanda

Its exactly 2 weeks now since we left Rwanda and already it seems like a world away,although a piece of my heart will always remain in Cyanika. If you have been reading the blog regularly you will know about the terrible poverty that is everywhere in rural Rwanda and especially in the area where we lived. Progress is being made in Rwanda but it seems to be concentrated on Kigali, places like Cyanika remain forgotten and yet the villagers work so hard - they have to to survive!

You will also know about the plight of students who must pay for ther education - the equivalent of £40 a term and yet most families could never raise that amount of money and so many many children never go on to secondary education and for those that do, the students i was teaching, its touch and go whether their parents will find the money for next term and often they never finish their education. My lovely headmaster, calixte tries his best to keep the students at school for as long as possible but if it comes to exam time and they havent paid, they cant sit the exam. They are bright intelligent young people, desperate to get on in life and they know that it all depends on them finding enough money (a large amount for them, nothing for us)to get through.
At the end of this term, my school ran out of money and the students had to go home a week early because there was no money to feed them.

I just want to tell you about one or two of the students who became particularly dear to me:

JOHN DAMASCENE 21 is an orphan who spent his early years in a refugee camp in the Congo. He has been in orphanages and boarding schools all over Rwanda. He wants to become a musician.

JOHN MARIE VIANNEY17 - his mother left him and his 2 younger siblings when they were babies, now his father is in prison (denounced for genocide crimes)and he is bringing up his younger sister; He receives just enough money from the red cross to pay his fees but not enough to buy school materials. Unless he finds a sponsor he wont be able to go to university and he is very intelligent and a talented musician.

VALENS M 24 supporting himself and younger sister, very proud that he has his provisional driving licence and wants to become a moto driver but needs £45 to join the moto drivers' union before he can do anything

VALENS N 23, another brilliant student who wants to become a journalist.

JOHN BOSCO 16 a lovely boy and one of the youngest in year 10 but very bright, has so many plans but no money

and then of course there are the absolutely destitute families living near us and their starving children!

I have worked out that if i could raise £5,000 a year I could make a significant difference to these peoples lives. I am looking into starting a charity but you need a minimum of £5,000 to do that.

If any schools who read this blog would like to sponsor a student - one of the above or a younger child, or if any individual would like to make a donation, I can assure you that the money will go immediately to where it should. Callixte is my contact in Cyanika and he is one the nicest and most honest people I have ever met.

Akagera and the gorillas

AKAGERA

At 5.30 in the morning,just as a beautiful dawn was breaking over Kigali, we set off for Akagera national park;its very small by african park standards and until 1994 was almost twice as big but it is still an amazing experience. It took us just over an hour and a half to get there in the massive land cruiser (with 2 petrol tanks) that picked us up;( the sort of vehicle that we had always sneered at because they cost a fortune and were always full of muzungus) but once in the park it really came inti its own as we went completely off road, only such a vehicle could have managed the terrain and we really felt we were on safari as we stood with our heads out of the roof looking at giraffe, buffalo,; many different types of antelope, baboons, wart hogs - you name it.Unfortunately the zebras were on holiday in Tanzania that day! There were so many different kinds of birds and a real highlight were the hippos basking in lake Muhazi; we actually got out of the vehicle to look at these creatures - how amazing and to think that that they live on grass, cant really swim but spend all day in the water only coming out at night to feed. Who thought that one up!! There are elephants too in the park and lions and many other animals but they are very elusive. Poaching is still a big problem in the park as traditionally rwandans have always hunted some of thes animas for food and skins; We saw a picture of a hippo trap in the national museum.

On the return to Kigali our pwerful vehicle broke down. A million people tried to get it going again but to no avail so we were eventually rescued by two lovely men with a lot of bananas. They gave all four of us a lift back to our hotel in Kigali, they told us that it is a rwandan belief that if you see someone in trouble and you dont help them, your daughters will never find husbands.

GORILLAS!

The climax of our stay in Rwanda was definitely our visit to the mountain gorillas last week. Although it is hideously expensive it really is a once in a lifetime experience.It involved another early start; we were picked up from the "hotel" by a 4 by 4 and driven to the volcanoes national park HQ where guides were waiting to put us into one of seven groups of eight people. We were given a short briefing by Ignace, our guide as to how we should behave in the presence of the gorillas; no pointing, no touching, no showing you are afraid as this can make them aggressive. After a 40 minute drive to the lower slopes of the Virungas we then had a 3 hour climb, very steep and slippery in places, through very difficult, thick jungle. Ignace was in constant touch with the trackers who were tracking the movements of our group of gorillas, the Amohoro ( peace) group, a family of 16. At last we reached the trackers and had to leave all bags and sticks behind and minutes later we were in the midst of the gorilla family, all of whom were enjoying their mid morning nap. They soon woke up and we were able to observe them eating, playing, climbing and occasionally insisting upon their right of way on the narrow jungle trails and ever so gently pushing us aside if we were in their way. We saw mothers with small babies, juveniles, and young adults and the highlight was right at the end of the visit when Ubumwe, the massive silver back and leader of the group moved off and the rest of the group had to follow him. It was a breathtaking experience and we felt we were greatly priviliged to be allowed to spend an hour in the company of these noble creatures.Back down the mountain in the pouring rain, slipping and sliding all the way but totally elated and then just time for a bite to eat and a well earned primus before getting the bus (filthy as we were) back to Kigali.

leaving school

The last week at school was a very emotional one for me, I had to say goodbye to my beloved pupils, some of whom I had become very attached to. Seb and Kate being there made the week extra special; as they are the same age as most of the students, they were absolutely adored and made to feel very special (which they are) One evening, the students arranged a special demonstration of wonderful intore dancing and drumming just for us. We were all dragged up to dance with them - the rest of the school went wild! Seb was taken on stage to show his talents and all I will say is that he di'dnt disappoint them! Many speeches were made and I was made to feel that my presence in the school over the year had been greatly appreciated. I had to make a return speech and John gave a speech entirely in Kinyarwanda; the school loved it. what a night!!

Eventually,in the last few days it was time to take leave of my special students; the 5 or 6 I have taken under my wing and who have been coming to the house a couple of times a week to play guitar, sing or just chat. We intend to carry on helping these students in the future (more of this project later) We were so sad to say goodbye to them and they to us. Impromtu concerts were given, the house had never been so full of music and light!

Finally it was the turn of John Damascene who has been coming to visit for longer and more often than anyone. He is an orphan who spent the first 7 years of his life in a refugee camp in the Congo. Now he lives in an orphanage on lake Kivu and is sponsored to go to school in Cyanika. he plays the guitar so well, writes his own songs and knows congolese music. we decided to give him the guitar and when we said goodbye he hugged and hugged me and didnt want to let go. I felt all the love that he has never been able to give to anyone else and I wished i had done more for him: but we will carry on helping him.

Nyungwe

Last weekend we went to Nyungwe forest; it is the largest rain forest left in Africa which is amazing when you consider that Rwanda is so small. We had been through it a couple of times on the bus but this time we did it in style -our wonderful friends th Medical Missionaries of Mary lent us their four wheel drive jeep for the weekend plus Bosco their driver! We could stop wherever we wanted to admire views or look at animals. We stayed on lake Kivu where we ate lots of SAMBAZA - a wonderful tiny lake fish that you eat whole - hot and crispy mmm!

The first day we did a 10.5 kilometer walk with a guide, to an incredible waterfall. It is expensive to do the walk but so worth it. We started off walking through tea plantations and even before we entered the forest we saw blue monkeys; The forest is marvellous, magical, magestic, magnificent! you feel you have stepped back thousands of years. You are surrounded by strange and sometimes ancient trees and plants; The guide,David had told us not to touch any green plants in case they were hiding green vipers and then suddenly there was a green viper in all its green glory slithering across our path! its bite is poisonous but not fatal!

the waterfall was worth the very difficult trek down to and up from - so incredibly powerful and so alone, it was wonderful! There are many animals in the forest but they remain so well hidden or only come out at night that we were very lucky to see the large group of rare blue monkeys and colobus monkeys and also a blue turaco and many other birds. You can go on a special chimp treck but that is even more expensive.

The second day we went on a shorter walk, it had been raining very hard so going was treacherous. The guide told us to tuck our trousers into our socks because of the driver ants which attack anything that disturbs their activities, but because of the rain he didnt think they would be about - he was so wrong!! We spent at least 5 minutes pulling them all off. Again we were struck by the majesty and timelessness of the forest. The last elephant was killed in Nyungwe in 1999 and the plants that only they eat have become rampant and are choking other plants; there is a plan to reintroduce elephants into the forest, I hope they do it soon

football parts 1 and 2

Seb and Kate are with us now and life has suddenly become much more interesting in Cyanika; one of the first things seb wanted to do was play football with students from my school. They went down to the sports' field to see if Seb could get a game and we followed a little later to find them absolutely mobbed by primary school children ( they had chosen to go down to the field just as school finished!) Some of my students soon arrived and took Seb off to play. Practically the whole village was soon spectating with us and as it was also market day which takes place on a corner of the field, there was added spice to the proceedings.

Many people couldnt believe that Seb was real, someone asked if his hair was artificial, but as play proceeded everyone cheered each time Seb got the ball. Kate had problems watching the match because everyone was surrounding her and questioning her and wanting to marry her, or failing that she should bring them her first girl child when it was old enough to marry! A very exciting time was had by all and we walked back with a cast of thousands and a promise to play again soon.

Seb said it was the first time he had prayed with a team before a kick off!

Playing a second game proved to be more difficult because Rwandans will say that something is going to happen whether it is or not, but finally, with the help of Callixte our wonderful headmaster, another match was played; Seb has now become a local hero.

incident

We had a rather disturbing experience on friday when leaving cyanika to come to kigali to pick up seb and kate; we pushed it to the back of our minds in the euphoria of meeting them, but i dont think it should be forgotten.
We had arranged for the wonderful Aragis plus friend to come and pick us up on their bikes; Unfortunately john had told them to come at 7 instead of 10 (kinyarwandan time-telling is impossibly difficult!) anyway they came at 7 and I apologised profusely but they said they didnt mind and would return at 10; Valerie said they didnt want to wait where they usually waited because there was an UMUGANDA -community work where everyone has to take part; its always on the last saturday of every month and sometimes randomly on another day, the work can involve anything but it usually involves clearing a road or digging a ditch - its always back breaking work;
Aragis and friend returned at 10 and made us understand that they had hidden their bikes in the bush somewhere and went off to retrieve them. we jumped on the back and set off, but when we reached the kiosk where all the bikes and everyone else always hangs out it was deserted and we wre suddenly set upon by guards who proceeded to attack us with huge wooden truncheons to try and knock us off the bikes. We put our hands up to defend ourselves and they didnt actually hit us but only because the boys were determined to carry on whatever and eventually we got away and sped off leaving the guards shouting after us; They obviously werent making any concessions for muzungus that day and we felt very threatened and quite shaken up although we made a joke of it with the gallant cyclists.
We dont know whether to inform VSO of the incident or complain to the village chief, but i think we should tell someone ; generally we feel very safe here although i believe ther are some aid workers who get up to 100 pounds a day danger money for being in Rwanda!!

wonderful weekend in cyanika!

had problems writing this blog because there has been a distinct lack of any sort of electricity in cyanika this week! the school generator broke down so we had no way of charging the computer. no one has ever stayed with us in cyanika before but the young vso girls have always been planning to walk up the mountain and spend the night with us so they could experience life without electricity. so finally, last saturday 5 muzungus plus one kenyan boyfriend arrived with sleeping bags. as soon as they arrived, john damascene, our resident guitarist arrived to give them a recital - they were most impressed! then we went out for a walk - say no more! we had an entourage of thousands, even an elf!! (see photo) i had prepared a beef curry (john went down to gikongoro for the beef) and a chick pea curry which seemed to be very much appreciated. then reality set in ie darkness fell. its great when you are sitting around chatting but not so good when you are preparing yourself for bed! anyway, i think they all said they couldnt live like this for more than 2 weeks. It was so lovely to have the company though, especially from such a lovely vibrant group of girls (and fred)-(who read)!!!

is it fresh?

Some days in Cyanika just seem to evolve, in an unexpected kind of way. (well most days actually
Friday was suddenly a day off as all teachers in Rwanda were sitting an english exam -it only lasted half an hour but it took the whole day and i can just imagine the chaos! Although we had known for about 3 weeks about the exam, We only officially found out what was happening the night before and that was by ringing the headmaster after school.
At about 8am on friday, a woman rattled the gate, we thought she was selling mushrooms but it turned out to be chicken. John asked if it was fresh and as the chicken was clucking loudly, i assured him that it was. We never get chicken normally, they are too precious for their eggs and we have only ever had cock which is tasty but tough. We bought the chicken very cheaply thinking that goldfish man would dispatch it for us but he was on his way to Butare - yikes what to do! Then we decided to try Johns' lovely bicycle boy,Aragis who came and did the deed for a very small fee, surrounded by local children who have probably never had chicken and who looked on longingly. I remember from my childhood that killing and plucking a chicken involves a great deal of boiling water !It turned out that this was a very matronly bird and even tougher than a cock, so john ate the meat and i ate the soup it was cooked in and very tasty it was too!

ELEGY WRITTEN IN A RWANDAN (COUNTRY) VILLAGE with apologies to Thomas Grey

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day

The bleating goats wind slowly o'er the lea

The villagers noisily homeward plod their way

And leave the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight

And all the air a solemn stillness holds

Save where a crying child pierces the blackening night

And muffled shouting from the hillside rolls.

wet weekend in Nyamasheke

On Saturday, we went to visit our friend Joe, who lives on the other side of the Nyungwe forest, on lake Kivu.

We set off down our mountain on foot as there were no motos around but half way down we managed to find bicycle boys who took us down on the back of their push bikes - exhilarating!

leg 2 of the journey- too exhilarating! A death defying bus journey round hairpin bends and up and down all the way and this time the road had deteriorated so much because of the rains, the driver had to swerve constantly from one side of the road to another to find a bit of road he could drive on. People are always sick on this journey, so i made sure i was at the back where i couldnt be hit by flying vomit! A man further up the bus spent nearly the whole journey with his head out of the window copiously vomiting;the first time he stuck his head out,the people behind him didnt have time to shut their windows in time to avoid being splattered. 2 and a half hours later we arrived at the crossroads where we then had to complete leg 3 - a 30 minute journey on the back of a moto.
Nyamasheke is in a stunning setting overlooking the lake and feels much more african many more banana plantations and much more space than where we are. There was a serious earthquake here last year and the church was completely destroyed. It has just been rebuilt.

The rain welcomed us soon after our arrival and the road was a sea of mud

on Sunday we had a nice long walk down to the lake - i was tempted to swim, but it is the 3rd deepest lake in the world and I like to see the bottom when I am swimming.

We had loads more rain later - the short rainy season has arrived.

Same journey in reverse on monday and i mustnt forget to mention that the forest is stunning, 100's of square kilometres of primeval rain forest and most of the time we are looking down onto the forest canopy. The first time we did this journey we saw loads of monkeys, but not this time; However, we will be returning there in a couple of weeks to stay overnight and do a couple of trails.

OU EST LA VACHE?

Saturday was going to be a quiet day in Cyanika. We had just finished a lazy breakfast of ryvita biscuits and tomatoes, when Phocas arrived with the news that la vache de l'ecole est tombée dans la toilette. This we had to see. A small crowd had already gathered and were looking sadly into what looked like a big hole but was actually a disused pit latrine, where the errant cow lay dead. These were toilets which belonged to an annex of the school which was abandoned some time ago and were totally overgrown and hidden from the poor unsuspecting animal, so in she went, 6 foot drop and lights out cow.

NOW the problem is how to extract 100 kilos of dead, prime Rwandan beef from a 6 foot hole with no technical help?(remember no electricity here!)

Eventually, after at least 100 people were consulted, it was decided to dig a tunnel into the pit and drag the carcass out. WOW it worked.

There were several weddings going on in the village that day and these go on for several hours. By the time the cow had been extracted, many of the wedding guests had escaped from the church and were finding the cow more interesting;

next problem what to do with the meat - no way of preserving it, it had to be chopped up and cooked straight away - boiled! The last laugh was on us - on sunday we were presented with a bucket of boiled beef! John tried a few strands and then we gave it along with an onion and a cabbage to our very poor neighbour and her very large family.

The pupils told me that the meat was disgusting because it was so badly cooked.

John has found a new and very pleasant way of going down the mountain - on the back of a bicycle! of course you have to walk up the odd hill but generally very relaxing.

some of my colleagues:1 Theonase the nasty

2 me in my white coat between concessa the curious and Guerison thegentle

3 Salvator the smooth and Aimable the likeable with Theonase

4 Pheneas the fun-loving, Guerison, Jerome the joker and Aimable.

note the wonderful staff room!

I dont know how bathroom lizard got here again but my little sink lizard has been murdered by creatures unknown!

THE REALITY

We are worried that we have been making life in Rwanda ( especially our part of Rwanda ), sound too romantic and idealised. Its not that we havent told the truth but we may have glossed over some of the more difficult aspects.
for example the reality of being without any source of power is the biggest problem for us. During the day its fine obviously but as soon as 6pm chimes on the church bell things just go down hill. We light the kerosene lamps - they stink and make your eyes sting and they give out hardly any light; We invested in lamps with batteries but they are so badly made (like everything in Rwanda) that they are falling to pieces all the time. You have to remember to take a light with you wherever you go and you do drop things and you do bump into things and the nights are so long! You go to bed at 9 and often wake up half way through the night praying for it to get light. and if anything happened to you on the mountain in the night in the dark what would you do ? you are trapped you just have to hope.
Then there is the reality of being a muzungu in Cyanika - you are from another world, you may as well be a monkey or a martian. People may be slightly more used to us now but they still come out of their houses to see us go by; Every morning half way to school, I have to run the gauntlet of all the men idling outside the kiosk waiting for something to turn up; they usually shout something which I ignore but i hate it. If people address me which they often do, I will reply but if they shout muzungu I ignore them but i still hate it.
We are now known as " muzungu kuruhu" which means the muzungu that doesnt give money!
It is embedded in the rwandan psyche that muzungu means money. Rwanda has always been a jewel in the aid- agencies' crown although not much of that aid money gets to Cyanika. so to rwandans all muzungus are dripping with money which should be given to them and no matter what we do here to help with our services they would still prefer our money.
Finally there is the reality of the limited food supply; we have eaten nearly all the ryvita bicuits and laughing cow cheese and tins of pate (for John) that we bought back with us so its back to avocadoes and beans. sometimes we just dont know what to cook, the other night all we had was a baked potato with a fried egg and tinned sardines (it was ok)
we are in Kigali this weekend, we came for VSO team building and family dinner, so we have been eating and drinking at their expense.
Muzungus who live in Kigali have no idea what life is really like for most rwandans.

Rwandans dont have a typical national-dress as many other african countries do. Until they were colonised they wore garments made from tree bark and animal skins. On special occasions women dress up in what is probably the only real "national costume": a long flowing robe with a matching piece of flowing material that goes over one shoulder and often a band in the hair - it looks lovely. The men wear suits or african shirts for such an occasion.

For day to day wear however, women wear either various pieces of coloured cloth wrapped around themselves and their babies(this all comes from Tanzania) or they wear second hand garments which you and i may have donated to charity in the past. This is where something quite scandalous happens! -we have all given things to charities, which promised to be sent to poor African countries, which indeed they have been , but here is the scandal - they end up on markets where the poorest people in the world then have to buy them!!! We cant understand how this is allowed to happen! and wish we could get to the bottom of it. Someone is obviously making a great deal of money from the second hand clothes market.

As you can see from the photos, some people cant even afford second hand clothes and are literally dressed in rags, usually the children. Their clothes might have been recognisable once but not any more.

A more amusing aspect of the second hand clothes industry is that people buy items of clothing when they have no idea who or what they were actually originally worn as: men quite happily wear pink flowery tops or very obviously female attire or you will see people in dressing gowns or salopettes, but it doesnt matter they have customised them and look good in them -the item of clothing takes on a whole new life. The funniest thing i have seen to date was the other day when I passed an old man standing at his door wearing a lady's high-necked,long, frilly night dress over his trousers - he looked very dignified!

I used to be careful about taking photos, but in Cyanika now if they see us with a camera they come and ask us to take a photo so they can see themselves, which they may never have done. Occasionally, I will have photos developed and present them to the person - they are always delighted!

return to rwanda

We knew it was never going to e easy aftr a wonderful month of seeing family and friends and having electricity and eating and drinking wonderful things whenever we wanted to! The supermarkets were a shock.

We returned to a very dry and dusty cyanika and the news that we had had no water in the house for 4 weeks. The garden was a wreck - goldfish man had done nothing and it was all rather depressing. However, the next day we were greeted with great warmth by everyone we met; gone was the more formal hand shake, we had moved up to the much nicer head - touching greeting and we really felt they were pleased to see us.

It has been really hard getting used to being in the pitch dark again from 6pm and we have had some very early nights this week!

my week culminated with a funeral! The mother of a colleague had died and it was debated long and hard as to how the staff could show their respect. it was finally decided that a delegation should go to the funeral and I was chosen along with 5 other members of staff. I was forced to go down the mountain on the back of a motor bike which i had refused to do up till now, but i actually enjoyed it! The funeral cortege was somewhat different to what we are used to: 5 or 6 flat bed trucks with the coffin and main mourners in one, together with the big wooden cross that was to be placed on the grave, and the other mourners standing crowded together in the other trucks. The main mourners were dressed in typical rwandan national dress - in white. We had a very long steep walk to the grave side, where after many speeches and songs, Clothildes mum was finally laid to rest and then we went back to her very humble house (about 50 or 60 people) and were given a soda and invited back to continue the funeral in a week. It was good to share the experience of a rwandan funeral and i think people felt that i had shown respect by attending.

back in august

we are off to uk and France tomorrow for a taste of civilisation - bring on the cheese, red wine and prawns!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

KIGALI

We have been in Kigali for 2 days attending an education workshop with VSO. It is a two and a half bus ride plus an hours walk (or 15 minute taxi ride if we have a lot to carry) from Cyanika.

Every time we come to Kigali there is something new, so many new ultra modern buildings are shooting up, more and more things can be bought in the shops and the traffic is horrendous! Thousands of brightly painted mini buses - mostly advertising british football teams (especially Arsenal) vying with huge four wheel drive jeeps, many driven by 'muzungus' working for aid organisations and earning fat salaries! pollution is becoming worse and worse. You just wouldnt believe that only a few miles away there is nothing - no electricity, no water, no traffic and abject poverty! It seems that all aid is concentrated in kigali. There are still many many poor people trying to survive here and a very large concentration of people who survived the genocide but were terribly maimed - had legs and arms hacked off and there is nothing they can do but beg - its so terribly sad to see and you wonder if it was such a good thing that they survived.

The mini buses compete with one another for customers, there is a boy whose job it is to fill the bus and collect the money, so the buses dont leave until they are absolutely full to bursting - every ride is an adventure!

We do like Kigali though, its an exciting vibrant place and so wonderful to have some civilization, Bourbon coffee sells the most wonderful cappucino! and last night we went for a wonderful pizza. Also, because ther are so many 'muzungus' here we are not the centre of attention all the time which is also wonderful . Most of the volunteers and other muzungus who live here have absolutely no idea what its like to live in the rest of Rwanda.