My partner, Sara, and I got along instantaneously. I think we bonded by all the books that we brought.
Our homestay was pleasant! There were two little boys, a 1.5 year old (Allen) and a first grader(little max), at first they weren't our biggest fans, but after while they finally warmed up to. We are served African tea for every meal, its basically a lot of hot milk with a little tea. Every night, dinner usually consists of some plain pasta, white rice, cooked bananas, cacava bread, beans, and meat. The family usually waited for us to finish dinner before they serve themselves, being guests here and back in America are completely different.
BTW. no running water. so that means bucket showers and adding water to the toilet everytime we want to flush it. and we ended up without water for a few days.
School was basically 'emergency' Kinyarwanda lessons with Francis, our teacher from 8-12. Lunch at some buffet around the school, which usually serves good food for low prices. Then an hour of lecture and three hours of some technical lab. For example, we built an extension cord and ECG simulator. After class, we usually go out and explore the city, after all we are going to be living here for a month. We found my partner's church across from town, a great shopping district, the neighborhood market, and much more. But everywhere we go we are called out as "Muzungos", which basically means foreigners. And as foreigners, everyone assumes we have unlimited budgets and so little kids come up to us from everywhere saying "Give me my money" hah.
Friday night, we went to some hotel bar/restaurant that had live music for dinner. Everyone was having a lovely evening eating the shishkabobs or bruchettes, when a very drunk man (who we later found out to be a politician) began to dance on stage. At first, all of the hip thrusting and twerking was very amusing! But then he pulled Sara up on stage to dance with him! After one song, Sara sat back down hoping there was going to be no more. BUT... a couple of songs later he pulled her up again! but this time one of our classmates ended up going up there with her. but then he pulled me on to stage! The good thing was that not long after, all 17 of us were dancing up on stage, practically being the entertainment of the night! hahah. We will forever call that man, "Khaky Pants Guy".
We had a very early start that next Saturday! We had to drive to the outskirts of town to visit a millennium village! We first visited a school, where children have to walk for very long distance just to get to it! But it is nice to see that, the top children go to a boarding school for free to further themselves in education. You could see the language transition from French to English everywhere! Which was really neat, all the kids wanted to practice their English and us our kinyarwanda.
We then went on to participate in "Umuganda", where the last Saturday of every month, all communities in Rwanda come together to do some service. It was our luck, that the village we were in, was creating mud blocks to put on the homes! When we arrive to the site, everyone was hesitant to go in and help the Rwandans as the mixed water and dirt, but not long after everyone just decided to hop in! We jumped into the pile of water and dirt and created mud. We then transported the mud to certain houses and started covering it from ground to roof with mud. Needless to say, I ended up covered in mud, everywhere! However, hearing everyone cheer us on and show their gratitude for the little work that we did, was so worth it!!
CAUTION! THE FOLLOWING IS GRAPHIC!
After cleaning up at the school, we headed towards a genocide memorial that used to be a church. It was honestly one of the most heart breaking things I have ever experienced. So the church was used as hiding place during the genocide, people thought they were safe there. But one day the militia came in and were merciless. They raped, mutilated, and murdered in cold blood 10,000 women, children and men. When you walk in through the doors, there are benches filled with old dirty clothes of all the deceased. There was a section towards the back where children were gathered and beaten with clubs and machetes and their heads smashed against the wall. There were blood stains all along the walls and on the weapons put on display. We were guided to an area downstairs where cases of skulls and bones were on display and underneath was a coffin of a woman. What happened to this woman was a symbol to what happened to many women during these horrible times. She was raped by multiple men and was the murdered by those same men sticking a metal rod from her genitals until it went through her skull. Outside was a underground burial site, that we were able to enter. On both sides were ten feet in of skulls and bones of all the victims. On some you could still see the machete marks on their skulls. If I were to make an estimate of how many skulls were down there, it would probably be in the thousands range. I will never lose that sight from memory, it will be kept as a reminder of all the terrible things that happened in Rwanda in 1994 and how it was forgotten by the world as a million people were murdered.
ALL CLEAR!
Afterwards, we visited a farmer who has to take care of 2 hectares by himself, but grows a large variety of things. From cows, pigs, 3 different kinds of bananas, avocado, mangos, cacava, and pretty much everything...We then visited a Women's weaving shop, were they given women a job and skills. I bought a couple of their creations but made friends with them. I managed to befriend one of their babies and after carrying her for ten minutes she did not want to get down nor go with anyone else. It was very precious!
Our last stop on the millennium village tour was at a reconciliation village where survivors and perpetrators had to live together in harmony in order to move forward after everything that happened. "Rebuild. Unite. Remember" the motto of Rwanda after the genocide. We heard testimonies from both sides, and then shared a banana beer with the whole community. And to top things off, a group of their girls put on a performance of traditional african music and then dragged us in to dance!!
Overall, it was a very eventful week! And I am excited for more to come!!
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