Adventures

It didn't take me long to find something more meaningful to do. We were exhausted, napped, and went out to eat and shop, and then Caitlin and I left to go join the group at the secondary school to teach English to the teachers. The government switched the official second language from French to English because they hate the French, and now the teachers have no way to learn it. We showed up and talked to the headmaster, and he desperately wants me to come back and teach economics, which is happening next Thursday!! I thought that was unique at first, but then talked to our other volunteers. Each one introduced themselves as chemistry, history, etc. majors and all were taken by the headmaster to their class to teach by themselves. The headmaster apparently walked in and announced "Please stop, we have Americans to teach". Pretty sad how little faith they have in their teachers, but also illustrates the constant misconceptions about America being a paradise, where money grows on trees, everyone loves each other, and finding jobs is no problem for anyone.

Teaching the teachers was really fun and challenging. Some of them actually spoke really good English, so we didn't really know where to start. We eventually settled on a discussion of geography and politics, and sports before that. They were really interested in the differences between colleges and universities, as well as the U.S. education system in general. They also wanted to know about the differences between state and federal government in the U.S., and other specific questions like that.

The hardest part was when we broke into groups and three of them peppered me with questions. The first ones were on the current political climate, and I felt kind of silly telling them about our financial problems. But they continued to ask me about why it was that way and how to fix it, so I continued giving my opinion. The line of questioning then changed to me, and how I was able to afford coming to Africa, how I was able to afford school and housing and food at the same time, really difficult stuff like that where the only answer I could give was that I was really lucky for my family to have a significant income. They were doing it because they saw the need in the community, and the pay was obviously very poor. They ended though by asking how they can improve their school, looking for access to any English books, computers, or even paper that would make their jobs so much more effective.

We got back and headed to dinner, at our favorite restaurant down the street. There's no name we can find (it just has a Primus, the local beer, sign outside), no menu and only three options. However, the goat kabobs and fried potatoes are amazing and keep us coming back. Our group had a great meal and talked for hours afterwards about politics, genocide, and religion. You all know I love serious and powerful conversations, and this trip has been full of them.

We woke up Friday morning and went to two incredible memorials. We drove through the beautiful countryside to Ntarama, where 5,000 people were slaughtered or burned alive while taking refuge in a church. Their bones are still there, as the remaining clothes and personal artifacts they had before they were killed. The scale of the tragedy is unimaginable, even with the skulls staring back at you, but the emotion I felt most there was anger, that people could do that to one another, be excited about it, and continue to spread and orchestrate more terror and murder. I don't know that many people walk away from such a site angry and can't really explain why I did, but that's what kept building up as we walked around.

Next we went to Nyamata where 10,000 people were killed in a church. This site was equally powerful but somewhat obscured by a crew filming a documentary there, basically trampling over the serentity and meaning of it while they yelled at each other and called out commands. Despite that, it was incredibly powerful to see a building very similar to my sanctuary at home where so many people's trust and lives were taken. As we walked through the many skulls there, I wondered why these people weren't given proper burials, but also thought about everyone I knew, and how that would only be a drop in the bucket of even this one massacre. I thought about my hopes and dreams and how those of the victims were cut down, right then and there for no reason. Walking out of both structures made me pause, as it was an opportunity that every single one of them never had, to come through the door and see the vibrant daily life and activity that now surrounds the memorial.

On the way back we stopped at the Nyaborongo River crossing where many bodies were thrown. The custom is to drop a message on a piece of paper into the river, so we followed suit and I wrote about the pain and resilience that I could never imagine, but that we can work together to prosper in the future. When we got back to the guesthouse, we had lunch and relaxed, and with that backdrop on my mind, I went to my golf date.

Playing golf was a wierd feeling, especially after our morning and surrounded by poverty, but I rationalized it by playing with Rwandans who were left with nothing after the genocide and still desperately needed a friend. I was a little early for our "tee time" (the clubhouse was a hut), so everyone wanted to talk to me, even though they speak really good English and see Americans all the time. Patrick was there right on time, he brought me clubs, and I thought we were sharing, but he put on his caddy outfit and said he was excited to teach me, but couldn't afford to play today. I of course wanted him to play (we picked up the other guy, the head pro who shot even par, on the second hole), so I paid another $20 for his round.

I parred the first hole (Patrick doubled) but triple bogeyed the second. I ended up parring four holes, bogeying one, and shooting a 50 on the nine we played (although sometimes the caddy would move my ball to a better lie... apparently that's normal here) The course, the only one in Rwanda, was the quality of Candler, but I took a lot of pictures to remember everything. The pro we played with was really cool, champion of the Rwanda Open, finally someone who knew American football, and was hoping to play golf in Europe soon.

I had taken a taxi there, but was really glad I walked back by myself. People glare at you until you greet them in Kinyarwandan, and then smile uncontrollably. So I greeted everyone I met, and multiple people stopped me to tell me their stories or to practice English. I met four Rwandans I knew along the way- we passed the soccer field, and the guys we played with were making their way there, excited to see me and welcomed me back! I think that will be next Monday or Tuesday we head over there again. I knew one other local student, and he wanted to know when we could play basketball next. Even here, sports are what I'm known for, which is a great way to meet so many people!!

I got back, hung out a little while with everyone else who just slept and journaled all day, and went to exchange money. On the way back, we heard some singing coming from our guesthouse and stumbled onto a Christian choir practice of the local workers. It was amazing, as they sang two songs I knew (All in All and another tune I recognized) in Kinyarwandan and some new ones, and then they invited us to listen to their first album that had just been recorded. We had no idea where this recording studio would be, but it turned out to be right next to our guesthouse in an open building with a church and English class that I borrow the socer balls from. It was really odd seeing such a nice recording studio here, but the music sounded fantastic and was well worth the adventure.

We left for dinner at a Chinese place and ran into our friends from Minnesota. We had talked about going out, but everyone else was tired and wanted to go back, so the Minnesota girls were headed to a local hotel I hadn't checked out yet. So I switched course and went with them, and we went up to the top floor and looked at Kigali from each side. The coolest part were sides of the hills, where the only being able to see the lights made it look like it was rising up to the sky. I'm definitely getting the UNC group to go there sometime, it's really cool but Westernized. We stopped at our hangout the Novotel for a local art exhibit which I actually enjoyed, and came back to our guesthouse. Other people from our group ran into Patrick that night, and approached him because he was wearing the UNC shirt I had just given him as a thank-you. He told them I played so well, and could make their national team with a little more practice, which is pretty sad. He called me that night and told me again how happy our day made him, and that he really appreciated me being his friend.

We woke up this morning to do the Umugando, the national day of service on the last Saturday of every month. No cars are allowed on the streets, and apparently there's a $20 fine if a citizen doesn't participate. We walked right outside our guesthouse to work on the road, which was overgrown with weeds. We hoed and tilled for awhile, and the fifty of us working for three hours accomplished the same thing as a brushmower in about fifteen minutes. Oh well, it was a fun community building activity and afterwards we went to their townhall meeting. One man translated the government representative's message for us, and they talked about how it was your patriotic duty to keep Kigali beautiful and serve others. Then they went into specifics about a new doctor in town, a potential bridge being constructed, how to print your name and then sign it on any official document, that chickens were no longer allowed except in a pen, and finally that each home was going to be given an address soon so the police could find them in case of emergency.

It was a really cool exercise in democracy, and the whole last three days have been incredible. We're off now to go explore another area of town, and possibly hike Mount Kigali before going clubbing again tonight!!

A Global Event

Wednesday of course we had class from 9 until 3. Interesting, but probably not worth blogging about. After that, we visited a home for widows, supported by the Belgium government to empower women to heal from the genocide, generate income, and take care of medical expenses. Everyone was really nice, and we gave their craft market some good business. We came back to meet up with two girls from Minnesota who teach English next door, and they gave us a crash course in English instruction. They're also bored, so we invited them to watch the UEFA championship with us downtown.

We heard you had to get there two hours early, so we rushed down there and were some of the first people in the stadium. The stadium was the local volleyball stadium, indoors with a really nice videoboard, and it was so fun. As they crammed about 3,000 people (about 98% male) into the stadium, I struck up a conversation with the man sitting next to me who's a software engineer for Partners in Health, one of the most renowned NGOs in the world, started by Paul Farmer. He was really nice and we exchanged information, and there's a couple of us who want to see PIH's work while we're here.

Once the game finally started, the stadium was packed and going crazy. Definitely more vocal Man U. fans but Barcelona scored within the first 10 minutes to quiet them and send us into a frenzy. Ronaldo and Rooney suck so I was pulling for Barcelona, and we joined in the cheers and celebration. Man U outplayed Barca the first 20 minutes but couldn't score, and Barca took over from there. At halftime we talked about how this is probably the biggest annual sporting event in the world, as people we knew studying abroad all over the world were all tuned in to this championship. It started raining during the second half, which killed our satellite feed. It was obviously a common occurrence because no one was really fazed, and during the interruption Barca scored! That may have been even more memorable because we could tell something was going on, and word finally made it to us from someone with a radio and we again went crazy.

This morning we woke up early for our day of volunteering. The primary school we were supposed to go to cancelled on us at the last minute, so we were lumped into the group going to the orphanage. We got there and the headmaster would not allow visitors on Thursdays, and the whole setup had been a miscommunication. Luckily, our taxi drivers stayed to see how we were doing because they overheard and directed us to a new place to volunteer. Our cab struggled up the wet, steep dirt road, stalled out multiple times, and spun the tires so much our driver asked us to get out and walk up the hill. 

We got back in the cab and went to the orphanage they suggested, which was great. We toured the orphanage and eventually made it to the primary school, where the English teacher was excited to meet us and have us teach her class of about forty 5 year olds. The students were tentative at first, but eventually got really comfortable with us. We helped them learn numbers, letters, colors, and taught them the parts of the body through the "head, shoulders, knees and toes" song I hadn't practiced in awhile. When I heard it was an English class, I tried to ask basic questions like "how are you" and "how old are you" and I was surprised when they didn't understand. Eventually we found out they were just learning basic things to memorize, but it was really fun. 

Then we had recess and that was predictably crazy. I brought a Frisbee, which they couldn't get the hang of and turned it into tug of war whenever it hit the ground. Eventually I was left with the bullies, but we also did things like lifting them up in the air, jumping jacks, and tag, and now I'm exhausted. Overall I'm not sure how much of an impact we made, but I know they had a good time and I hope to do some other service work before we leave.

School Starts

I haven't talked much about everyday stuff like eating and living yet, so I'll start with that. I feel like our guesthouse is too nice. It is very comfortable, and of course I'm not complaining about that, but it's definitely an isolated (not phsyically, but economically from the local Rwandan) island of amenities. We do have to shower with basically a hose, with hot water that's unreliable at best (and no shower curtain), plus sleep under bednets and avoiding drinking the water (dirty water also makes things like putting contacts in difficult- I got hand sanitizer in my eye for the first time today...), but overall it's very very nice.

That being said, they feed us breakfast and lunch and it's amazing. We have croissants, bread, nutella, and fruit (usually not me) every morning. Lunch is Western food, pork chops or casserole, but it's really really good. The kitchen is downstairs, so it's like we're living in better dorms than on campus UNC with better food than the dining hall!

For dinner we've had pizza or burgers a couple of times (and french fries everywhere) and when we didn't know where to go it was expensive, because we're close to the U.S. and other embassies and the small district for tourists. We've started to dig deeper and have found the local places, where for instance tonight I got goat brochettes and the best fried potato, plus two beers for less than $4!! We've also had a buffet of local food twice, and it was really interesting that it was the exact same meal. We had some intersting beans, french fries, all kinds of meat, spinach-type vegetables, and bananas that are cooked to taste like potatoes so even I eat them!

Banana beer was supposed to be the thing to try from Rwanda, but so far it's been tought to find. While it was in one bar, they sold out of it after the first of our group arrived, and most people tell us it's like moonshine, locals brewing a really strong version for themselves. I'm undeterred though, we'll definitely go back to the place we ate tonight which, rumor has it, will have it in stock.

Classes started this morning, and while reading is a pain to make time for, I'm really glad that I have a solid context to better understand Rwanda. We've been looking at everything like geography and history, especially current events, and I think the readings make it easier to engage with this place and have a better overall experience.

The rest of my day today was incredibly interesting and memorable. I walked to the closest hotel to try and find a soccer field for us to play tomorrow by talking with the cabbies. I've ended up with five Rwandans of various vocations who want to play with us tomorrow, as well as the English school across the street that will loan us a soccer or basketball! I talked to them awhile about the sports like the Champions League and asked about baseball and American football. They asked if soccer and baseball were the same thing, and so I went through the rules of baseball, comparing it to cricket, and the rules of American football, comparing it to rugby. I think they really enjoyed it!

I got back just in time to head to dinner with my fantastic group of friends here! We went to a close restaurant and finally found some great, cheap food. We hung out awhile (playing the sports/cities game was my idea and really fun), and invited a guy sitting by himself at the table over to join us. It was a great decision, as he immediately introduced himself as a member of the Rwandan national golf team! The rest of our group turned and looked at me, and of course we now have a tee time for Thursday!!!! Needless to say, I'm really excited about golfing in Rwanda.

With a handicap of 2 (that's incredibly good for those of you unfamiliar with such a great game), I figured he was upper middle class and living the good life. It took about two minutes before I realized how wrong I was, as his heartbreaking story flowed freely in very good English. He was the first Rwandan we've met to bring up the genocide in conversation, and he explained that his entire family was killed when he was 10. He lived on the streets for seven years, and told us how it was when no one cared whether he was sick or what he made of himself. He talked openly about hating Rwanda, the gacaca courts that are supposed to bring justice, and even black people everywhere (he was himself black). He said he can't love anymore, but that he wants to marry a foreigner so that he can get out of here. We didn't fully understand how he got into golf or his Muslim faith, but he said that when he's not engaged like that his mind wanders to 1994. Whenever there was a pause in the conversation, Amber and I obviosuly had no idea what to say, and he would simply continue after a few moments, obviously longing for someone to listen to him. He talked about his love for Akon (like everyone here), Manchester United (he's a card-carrying member of the fan club), the best place to watch the game for "youth like us who want to go crazy", even his hatred for Christiano Ronaldo. Like everyone here, he talked about his love for Obama but added that he disagreed with his belief in gay marriage. But it would always come back to a story of loneliness, where for example he was traveling in South Africa and someone asked where he was from. When told Rwanda, they asked why (not how) he was still alive and walked away. I kept expecting him to ask for money or help with a visa, like we hear all the time, but all he wanted was to play pool and give me golf lessons.

It was a different kind of poverty (although he was also financially poor, just supported by the state to play golf) than we witnessed in the slums, psychological rather than economic. He was clearly depressed and held a deep-seated resentment from the genocide we had read about a little but definitely not witnessed. For all the talk of reconciliation and development, he may have represented the most common view that is totally understandable and the underbelly of this country after such a life-changing and devastating experience.

Even surrounded by so many people who have nothing, I still don't say enough how lucky and thankful I am to have been given so much. This is all part of a huge, exciting, challenging adventure to me, while to so many there are no options but the daily (all day, everyday) grind of work for practically nothing. I'm so thankful to have the money to enjoy myself like this, and a loving family and friends who constantly support me. I know it's easy to find so many similar challenging circumstances in the U.S., but the question of "why me, why was I born so lucky?" is constantly on my mind, especially after conversations like this one, and an important aspect of my trip I wanted to include.

I woke up this morning to Gilbert's phone call, more than four hours before our 11:00 meeting. Ughh. I had gotten directions there on my own, so we never ended up meeting. Anyways, in class we played the role of military powers who didn't want to intervene here in Rwanda, or want to in the next one (Darfur). Class in the afternoon followed the same idea, taught by the Rwandan professor. He apologized for throwing the U.S. under the bus, but described how we totally ignored the mass murders because there was no political will, a characteristic of our society (not politicians, especially for something like this they do what the people want) that is pathetic and still rampant. We should have been apologizing to him.

We returned to the guesthouse and the fun began. I went to the school teaching english across the street and talked my way into borrowing a soccer ball and basketball, plus met some girls from Minnesota who are looking for a group like us to hang out with. The headmaster also told me yesterday she would invite her students to play, and about 12 of them came! I had brought a pump for my host family, and the school's balls were quite flat, but I had forgotten a needle. Miraculously one of the students had a needle but no pump, so we formed a great team.

The last part of my event planning was to call five Rwandans who had wanted to play. I talked to all of them, but only a taxi driver from down the street showed up to play. The area was great although poor- soccer in an overgrown and uneven field, basketball on dirt with destroyed rims, volleyball, and of course the frisbee I brought along. I jumped in to the serious "football" game for 20 to 30ish year olds, and got my tail whipped but had a great time. I ran a lot, got it occasionally, and I also believe we were winning when we had to go. It was a great experience to compete in their national pastime, and I can now add it to my list of ping pong in China and soccer in Germany!

I then took a large group to meet up with a friend from CARE. It was an adventure for sure, as one cab ran out of gas and the power went out while we ate, but I really enjoyed catching up with Linnea! She was really interesting to talk to, as she said that this country is not even close to being heeled. She said it took her two months to be able to sense the elephant always in the room that no one talks about. She also said she's found how close our consumption of things like copper can fuel poverty, but aren't going to change, just like intervening in genocides.

Hope you all are doing great!!! Keep me updated!!

Weekend!

I wasn't too sure what to do Saturday morning, but it turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Gilbert and David are unemployed 25 year olds that hang around our guesthouse looking for work. They were excited to meet us and invited us to their house. We trekked about 10 minutes down the dirt road, and started down the side of one of the huge hills that define Rwanda. The houses toward the top were modest but comfortable. We kept going towards Gilbert's house, and as we went further the terrain got almost unpassable. It started getting really narrow, about 2 feet in some places, and then the path merged with the sewer so there was less than six inches on both sides to straddle and keep going. Gilbert said residents fall and hurt themselves constantly.

We got to Gilbert's house and he was quite proud of his 8 by 8 ft room, with a single lightbulb and grungy bed that took up the majority of the room and had never been changed. It smelled terrible and the heat was stifling. Orphans came up in the conversation and in the midst of his obvious poverty, he encouraged us to come see "the real poor area".

The worst stretch of the path was a two foot walkway with barbed wire on one side and rusted tin roof on top. Everyone came out of their houses and enjoyed exchanging the only greeting we know, over and over. We stopped one place to say hello to some kids, and I looked back to see people from every direction coming to see who we were. Some kids were shy, but they all just wanted to touch us. We all have pencils and crayons to give out, so on our next trip I can't wait to hand them out!!

A lot of places we've seen jerseys from the U.S. and European teams (Brett Favre is the most popular from my informal poll), but not here. Their clothes were so grungy, and they wore mismatched flip flops if they had anything. Hardly anyone spoke English, which is noticeably different from the developed area of Kigali, and they were by far the most welcoming.

We made it to the bottom of the hill, where the Red Cross had built a structure for clean water. The little kids come get water out of the four spickets and carry gallons of water back in both hands or their head. We helped them carry the jugs, but they just kept coming and we couldn't help everyone. We met a student who spoke English walking around in a coat and tie. He had grown up in this slum, and was coming back to do research on the psycho-social response to HIV/AIDs. He had worked with CARE, and we tried to think of a mutual contact from Atlanta but unfortunately couldn't. We exchanged information though, and I really hope to get back in touch with him.

The last part of the morning was the craziest. Gilbert is in a dance group, and he got them all together to perform for us. It started with the elders on wooden "flutes" and the younger men followed with dance moves. They went for a long time, and by this time a crowd of more than a hundred had stopped to watch. At the end, as I knew was coming, they pulled us in individually to try their dances. I did my best, took note as they laughed hysterically, promised that all Americans weren't such bad dancers, and thoroughly enjoyed it! We ended by taking pictures with the huge group, and most memorable was the kids' mad dash to see the screen after the picture had been taken!

Saturday afternoon we finally tried the public transportation system. It consists of hundreds of old passenger vans that they cram as many people as possible into. With 12 seats on our last one, we had 20 people and I was in the back corner!! As long as we don't wreck, it's an incredibly efficient and cheap way of transport! It's a good example of the lack of structure I really like. There's ditches on the side of every sidewalk for drainage that you jump over. Little kids run freely without their parents. Rules of the road are different each time and communicated by hand signals! Without the constant threat of lawsuits, it's much more of an adventure everyday and I love it!

Half of us made it downtown, where we met a group from Baylor studying microfinance, and the other half ended up at the bus terminal for international trips. We just walked around and had a great time in the city! We met up with a local who took us to a restaurant, where instead of karaoke they lip-synched and danced. It was cool and cheap, I think we're going to go back. The best part was the way back, where I rode in the front seat of the cab on the left side while we drove on the right. Some cars here have the drivers on the left, others on the right depending on where its imported from. I kept wanting to adjust the mirror and absolutely flipped about not being in control at every turn or pedestrian encounter.

Sunday morning I woke up at 6 to participate in the International Peace Marathon, although I just did the 5K fun run. I saw lots of other foreigners around, so I thought a lot of people would be doing the 5K. They made an announcement and all the kids starting running. We thought the race had started, so we took off too. Turns out, they just said to make your way to the starting line, and all the kids were really excited to get there first. Whoops! UNC students were three of the 5 white people running the race. The other two were NGO workers chaperoning their kids. It was a really funny sight as I towered over everyone, but we ran with the kids and had a great time!

We walked around the stadium for awhile, saw cultural dances and a judo group, and watched as a Kenyan won the marathon (of course), made it about 3 steps and threw up everywhere, and was carted straight into the ambulance. Overall though, it was really fun and the thing to do in the city that day. We walked around the rest of the day, and the best part was finally stumbling onto someone in a Carolina jersey. We had seen LSU, Ohio State, Wisconsin, etc. and lots of people know Michael Jordan, so I figured we'd find UNC eventually. We were all in Carolina shirts that day, so it was easy to communicate our excitement as we got our picture with him! We went to eat and then walked past him later, where his friend was equally excited to show us his Carolina blue basketball shirt. We ended the evening heading back downtown to hear stories from a guy I met on the plane to Kigali. He was traveling from NYC around the world in 6 months, and he had done everything from gorilla tracking to crossing the border into the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He made it to Goma, which has been home to some of the worst fighting (although not right now) in a war that is the deadliest conflict since World War II, and somehow back to Kigali alive. Pretty cool stamp to have on your passport though...

Today we've had class all day. We talk about systems and rule of law, which is really interesting, and then listened to a lecture in the afternoon about the specific stages and schools of thought on the genocide from a local Rwandan professor. It was a little tough to follow, but very interesting.
Right now I'm off to find the local soccer field so our group can play a game tomorrow after class!

Discovering Kigali!

Kigali has been fantastic. We got settled in, although didn't think it through all the way. Putting up bednets without the staff's help proved to be quite difficult, but a really fun exercise in engineering and teamwork. Mine failed miserably the first day (there's apparently a picture of me wrapped up in it like a cocoon...) but now I've got it figured out.

Anyways, meals at the guesthouse are fantastic and got us started to head downtown. We wanted to see the city, so we decided to walk. We ended up going through what was formerly the most dangerous slum in Kigali (its ok now, but was still an interesting experience- we stopped right in the middle to ask about the bus system), but were glad we did it. The city is amazing. The Land of a Thousand Hills lives up to its names, really big hills that at the top you can see across the whole city. We finally made it town to buy cell phones (they had never seen my American one and didn't speak English, but we got it to work, $14 for the card and 55 minutes!) We ate at a restaurant with Sportscenter on (not because of that, I swear, but it was nice!) and later hung out at Hotel Rwanda, the subject of a popular American movie and famous story of bravey. We actually learned today that the manager of the hotel was not as humanitarian as he appeared, charging people outside of his family to come in, and that Rwandans don't consider him a hero. It was still an interesting landmark, although not quite as erie to me as my visit to the apartments in Munich where the Israelis were killed during the Olympics. Hotel Rwanda was a place of hope and safety, it's the rest of the landscape that meant terror and brutality for so many.

Thursday was very intense. We listened to the owner of the guesthoues tell his story of survival during the genocide. He was found twice, and was incredibly lucky both times, through personal connections and the interahamwe's miscommunication. It was an incredible backdrop for the genocide memorial that afternoon. The memorial is supported by lots of foreign governments, which is great but incredibly frustrating.  We've talked a lot about this here, but it's just another example of where we would rather build a memorial than take the risk to stop the atrocities. The number of troops needed to stop the genocide was less than the number Western countries sent to evacuate their embassies. Unbelievable.

There were two sections of the memorial that got to me the most. The first were testimonials from people who were about my age or younger in 1994, reliving the experience of being forced to watch their parents being tortured to death. I thought of my own family, and simply cannot imagine. The other section I remember most was about children, detailing their hobbies, interests, and dreams, and finally when and how they were murdered. The memorial was a great thing to do, with exhibits dedicated to genocide awareness from other places like Germany and Cambodia, memorial gardens, and graves of 250,000 victims to give them a dignified burial.

We woke up Friday morning and had our first class, on law in general. It's going to be really interesting, I think justice relates a lot to economics and development, so I really will benefit a lot from this. The shower was rough- water pressure for hot water varies wildly. We left for downtown, talked to the driver a lot about driving and the police in Kigali. They are just standing on the side of the street and wave if you need to pull over. Naturally I told him about the opposite, police chases, in America.

We took a tour of the city later in the day and that was fantastic. Our tour guides were very friendly, but I got the impression as government employees they have their required talking points for tourists. We stopped at the memorial where 10 UN peacekeeping troops were killed, which was a little odd. There was no Kinyarwandan, the local language, there, since it was paid for by Belgium. With almost a million people killed here in 1994, it felt weird going to a memorial for 22 people total, white or not. We saw tons of UN offices, the  "red light district", the soccer stadium that holds 25,000, the very nice golf course, the pottery shop in a slum that a Canadian firm buys from for exports, and the very developed area with incredible houses. With all the slums in the vallies and development on top of the hills, they overlook people living on less than a dollar a day. However, everyone I talk to here says the development since 2ooo is unbelievable. From what I can tell, its businesses coming. I talked to a guy at the bar last night who came here from Tanzania because the economy is so much better. 

We went out for dinner, which is usually very expensive unfortunately, but I think we've just been stuck in the tourist areas so far. We had heard about prostitution, but saw it firsthand when a German guy sitting next to us came up and whispered that the women are very nice here as he led his girl back to his room. I wish I had to told him to get the hell away from me, but I had no idea what to do with lots of people around and just said I didn't agree with it.

Clubbing was a lot of fun- basically our whole group went down the street to the most popular club in Kigali. It was predominantly male (just like the States), but we had a blast and will probably be back. 

When we first arrived in Arusha I was really on edge about hygiene, like water and food and mosquitos. While I still am taking all the necessary precautions, we've definitely relaxed our standards and been fine.

We've also been meeting tons of folks along the way, locals and fellow travelers. Even here, a lot of people have Facebook and having a local phone number helps us to connect as well.  We've only met one other American group, from Baylor here for two weeks studying microfinance; I wish more Americans would come to Kigali and Africa in general, but I also like being unique and interesting to the locals.

Visit to Arusha

Hi everyone, welcome to my collection of thoughts on what I'm learning about the Rwandan genocide and the work towards reconciliation that continues.

I left May 15th from Hartsfield and arrived in Arusha, Tanzania the night of May 16th. The flight wasn't too bad, met a lot of interesting people and wasn't ever too jet-lagged. I was mentally prepared for pretty extreme poverty, which you visibly see occasionally on the streets of Arusha, but I found more in talking to people and understanding their daily grind. Many people work every single day for hardly anything, and what they make is often used to feed their families.

We went on a safari our first full day and drove past many of the markets which I found fascinating. Most people have no choice but to walk, and its along highways with hardly any sidewalks. Even if they had sidewalks, they're dangerous and unkept, but at least would give people some space from the road. As I struggled to figure out how best to take my contacts out when the water isn't safe and hand sanitizer is so dry, I realized that everyone here goes without corrective vision. It's just one more opportunity in life they are forced to live without.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was fascinating, emotional, confusing, slow, and disturbing. We were sitting directly behind the vice president of the Rwandan government overseeing the genocide, listening to him try and defend himself. The hardest part for me was figuring out what was going through Mr. Karemara's head as he was committing these "alleged" atrocities and continuing to deny involvement at every turn. One of the most eye-opening points in the day for me was the break, when the defendant walked over and made some light-hearted joke to his lawyer and they both laughed. Although innocent until proven guilty, I couldn't take seeing him get any enjoyment from life, even in that two minutes, after the tragedy and terror he orchestrated for millions of people.

We also were able to talk to the people who work in the ICTR; sitting on three court sessions was mindnumbingly slow- I couldn't imagine doing it all day everyday. They stayed motivated in various ways, one saying that the victims continue to cope so who is he to give up. Another cited successes in deterring other possible genocides, but I have so far not accepted this as fact.

We're in Kigali now and I love the city much more than Arusha, not to mention the guesthouse with free wireless!! The group's doing well as a whole, and we spend tomorrow at the genocide memorial which will be so difficult and something I can never be ready to see.