Post-volcano adventures

We made it back alive, and went straight to Centre St. Vincent, the hostel run by nuns, who laughed at our condition on arrival (we must have been a sight) and took really good care of us. Then I decided that I really needed a hot shower, so on Thursday I went to the beach to a nice hotel with a real bed and hot water and spent two days recuperating and sifting through my summer experience. Today I tried to make it to Uganda, but halfway there on the bus my digestive system rebelled and I had to get off at the nearest town to stay the night. Luckily, that town is Ruhengeri, and I'm back at St. Vincent's with the nuns.

In all the time I have had to think and write, I have come to some conclusions about life and my trip in Rwanda. Things like this always seem trite, but I'll try my best...

The most important things are ones we tend to ignore because they're right in front of us: time with family, shared daily activities like making dinner, a beautiful sunset, the chance to share a laugh ith a stranger.

No matter how busy and stressful life is, there is always time to say hello.

People who drop by uninvited and unannounced are not just friends; they become family. They should be seen as blessings, not annoyances.

Keeping relationships informal creates friends wherever you go. Paying with food or an exchange of services forges a bond that money can't touch.

Sometimes there are things competely out of your control: rainy season, public taxis, etc. Not stressing about them and focusing only on what you can control makes you much more effective at accomplishing things.

People generally pull through; trusting them will get you better results than doubting them will.

People are generally good. Acting on this shouldn't mean being naive or stupid; but fearing everyone cuts you out of some amazing relationships and experiences.

Do not pity poverty. People don't want your pity, or if they do it is only because they have figured out the most effective way of exploiting white guilt. What they want is exposure to the things you have access to, and some help getting their hands on the tools that have not been available to them. The rest they are capable of doing, and pitying them is limiting.

Do not idealize their traditional ways of life. Tradition can be stifling. Some aspects of it are beautiful, but coupled with those things are poverty, disease, oppression, repression, ignorance, and anger. This is not to say we should attempt to change their culture either, but to see their lives as idyllic is far too simplistic.

There is a fine line between respecting the culture tht you are a guest in and denying the person you are and your own culture. Sometimes modificatiopns in behavior and small lies of omission help things go more smoothly. But if people welcome you into their homes and their lives, it is because they, too, are curious about another way of life. Be honest with them, because they already love you, and it's not like they don't know that things are different where you come from. That's why they asked. Explain why you believe what you do, but also don't expect to change their minds on the spot. If there is something that you're going to try to convince them of (like the importance of gender equality) make sure you choose your timing and audience carefully. Make sure, as well, that you are in the right mood and frame of mind.

Always dress nicely and shine your shoes. It counts.

Ellen versus the volcano

Two asides before I start this. Number one: I am out of the news loop, but can someone please explain why Tony Snow AND Karl Rove are resigning? I am ready to jump for joy, but I also have the sneaking suspicion that this means something sinister has happened and we don't know the half of it yet. Number two: As I sit here typing this, in EQUATORIAL AFRICA, I am wearing a wool sweater, long underwear under my jeans, and a scarf. Seriously, what is up?

Now for the real story. Since I last updated, the following things have happened: I found travel buddies and decided to climb a volcano. The office of tourism did not manage to give us any of the right information, so we attempted to walk 14 km to Kinigi; the town where park headquarters are, but no buses go... Then we spent a sleepless night camping at a hotel, and then we headed out for the hike. This is a classic tale of overestimating ourselves and underestimating the mountain. For about an hour, things were amazing. We were so excited to actually be there after the horrendously complicated ordeal that preceded the excursion. Then we realized that only hiring one porter and switching off carrying the other pack was ridiculous. But the guide's porter was amazing and took our other bag in addition to the one he already had. Porters are incredible. So that solved our problem, and life was good again. Until the hike started to get really intense and involve shin-deep mud and person-height stinging nettles, which I am still covered in. But we kept our chins up. Until it started to rain tropical amounts of rain and soak all our warm clothes. But we kept our chins up. Until it started to hail. (For full effect, at this point you should know that I am wearing shorts, a t-shirt, a shell raincoat, and chacos. Brilliant, Ellen.) Now I'm starting to not be so happy. So we ask the guide, Espoir, how much longer we have until we reach the base camp where we will sleep. At the tourism office, the guy told us the hike to the base camp takes two hours, so we're thinking that we are probably close. Wrong. Espoir says that it will be two more hours, maybe one and a half if we really go fast. In those two hours, we will gain about 700 meters in altitude; and we're already starting to feel it.

After a few minutes, Myriam starts stopping a lot. (You should know that she has low-grade food poisoning and thus cannot keep food down, so is essentially running on nothing at this point.) And I'm doing okay, except I'm freezing to death, running on no sleep, and trying to mentally convince myself that I don't have food poisoning, which ultimately was not the case. So while we are stopped, I realize that I can no longer feel my hands and feet, and I panic a bit. I'm trying to explain in very broken kinyarwanda that I need to keep walking, that we have to split up into two groups because if I stop I'll never make it. Normally splitting up is not a good idea, but I figured it would be okay because accompanying Myriam and myself were the following people: Espoir the guide, two super-human porters, and 12 members of the Rwandese army, equipped with satellite communication devices, AK-47s, and a rocket launcher. (More on that later.) So we split up, and in my panicked craze, I made it up that mountain in record time, but I'm not really sure how because I sort of blacked out. I do remember hallucinating that trees were the base camp, though. When we arrived, I took off my wet stuff and ate lots of food, and was sane again. But I still couldn't feel my extremities. The army dudes made a fire, and I tried to dry my clothes but it was so cold out that they wouldn't dry, so I was left with jeans, one sweater, and a not-nearly-warm enough sleeping bag (which I had carried under my raincoat). We pitched the tent, and I got in it to conserve body heat. I passed another sleepless night, shivering the whole time, still not able to feel my hands and feet, and at 6 am we got up and came back down the mountain. On the whole, it was not as horrible as this account makes it seem, because situations like that provide so much opportunity for irony and self-deprication, and we all know how much I love those. And it was a major learning experience. Here are my big lessons: 1) What Oregonian does not have a rain cover for her pack? Seriously. 2) When the guide tells you that you should get porters, do it. 3) When the guide tells you that many people don't even make it to the base camp, listen and think. 4) Difficult hikes are tons of fun when you're in good shape, and not fun at all when you're not. Get your butt to the gym this semester. 5) The "dry season" excludes the Virunga volcano range. 6) As stated earlier, Africa is not always warm. 7) If the fees for climbing the volcano seem really high, it's not because they're trying to rip you off, it's because 12 military guys need to get payed for keeping you safe.

Safe from what, you ask? They tried to tell us that there are dangerous animals in the mountains, which is probably true. But we were skeptical that animals merited that many guys and a rocket launcher. Plus, the mountains do border DRC, and it is the region where many different militia groups chill out, most notably the former Interahamwe. After Mymi and I pointed these things out, they finally admitted that there was an ever-so-slight chance of an attack by one of those groups. Add that to the list of things to know before you go.

August 8

WOOHOOOOOO! Impact assessment officially finished. Today I actually got dizzy from staring at Excel spreadsheets for too long. I had to go walk around because my eyes were starting to freak out. But it is done: report written, appendices compiled. We present the research to the CEO, CFO, COO etc. tomorrow, which should be fine. I basically know everything by heart at this point. It feels good to have actually finished something, statistically unreliable though it may be… Our data wasn’t really clean enough to do any regression analysis, so we put everything in charts and graphs and used summary stats, which is fine because the purpose of this assessment is mainly for publicity and grant application purposes. I will see if I can get permission to put some of the findings on here, so you can check it out. Plus, this means that I can be done with work on Friday, so I can leave this weekend to travel! Here’s what I will be doing:

At the beginning of next week I’m going to climb Mt. Karisimbi, a volcano in the north of Rwanda on the border with DRC, near where the gorillas are. The climb takes a couple days and you sleep in huts on the top. It should be pretty genius. I’m going with one of the girls from Quebec who will be here for two more weeks. After we climb the volcano, we’re going to Uganda. We will go to Kabale, a town near the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. We will penetrate the impenetrable forest. There’s also a lake there, Lake Bunyoni, that is supposed to be amazing. There are some traditional Batwa communities in that area, and if there’s a discreet way to see them I really want to. Sometimes I feel like things like that are a “people safari” and that it’s really insulting for all these white people to come and take photos, buy weird-looking masks, and then leave with really no understanding of the culture at all. It’s the worst part of globalization. But, at the same time, there are communities whose economies rely on selling things to tourists, and sometimes when I’ve taken pictures with the village women at community bank meetings, they really love it. So I don’t know, I guess I will have to feel it out. From Kabale I’ll go to Kampala and Entebbe, and then to the Ssese Islands in Lake Victoria. If there’s time, I might go to Jinja and see the source of the Nile. It’s kind of far, though, and a major tourist destination (with good reason) but I’m kind of in the mood for more off-the-beaten-path type things. But, after Kabale I’ll be traveling on my own, so if off-the-beaten-path seems dangerous, then a lame tourist I will be. If anyone out there has been to Uganda, I would love some suggestions/input so I don’t rely solely on Lonely Planet.

I had kind of a cool experience after work, which I will attempt to relate, even though I feel like most of the stories like this that people try to tell never really hit on the main point. Anyway. Downtown (mu mugi) near my office, there are lots of mizungu offices. USAID, UN High Commission for Refugees, World Food Programme, Oxfam, HOPE International, and some embassies have their offices in the area where I work. And it’s in the financial district, so the government always has people cleaning things and it’s basically too beautiful and clean to be a third-world capital. So, sometimes, I feel like when I’m in town, I’m in pretend Africa or something, because it’s just weird. It does a nice job of exposing the paradoxes and ironies of Africa, though. Like the huge fountain in the roundabout that somehow always has water in it even though our running water at the house has worked a total of four days since I’ve been here. I see people with jerry cans going to get water from the fountain. And then the police chase them away. But they always come back, and the third or fourth time, the police are like, whatever, I’m not getting up again, just take the water, I don’t really care. It’s a great relationship.

That tangent was just to illustrate the fact that sometimes I feel like there is a whole city, an entire society, that lives right alongside the town that you see when you walk down the street. But you can’t find it if you don’t know where to look. I have had some glimpses of it, but it only ever appears when I’m with a Rwandese. Somehow, I can never manage to find it on my own. This mysterious city hides behind the visible shops and offices, and you have to access it through specific alley ways. But once you’re back there, it’s pretty amazing. I was first initiated when Marie, a lady from work, took me to her tailor to get a dress made. I would never be able to find the place on my own, even though it’s less than five minutes from my office. We took tons of turns down a really narrow alley/drainage ditch and arrived at a tailor, and it was like a whole other world. That’s really contrived, I know, but I’m not sure how else to describe it. Anyway, today I went hunting for a sweater after work because I need something really warm for the volcano. I went around to a few shops, but none of them had anything, and finally I found a guy who spoke French. I explained to him what I was looking for, and he took me out the back of his shop and around the block to another place. They didn’t have anything either, but one of the guys who worked there took me to another place he knew of, and so on a few more times. By the end we were so deep in the secret city that I had no idea which way was out. But I did eventually find a woman who sold sweaters, and I ended up with a cute green button-up wool sweater from… Old Navy. Where else? And either Old Navy is a luxury brand here, or they thought I was the biggest idiot ever, because they tried to make me pay 30 USD. But my bargaining skills are pretty awesome. I will be really mad at fixed prices when I get back to Montreal…

So I’m deep in the invisible city, and the guy who was helping me went back to his shop, so I had to find my way out. It was pretty awesome, and on the way I found a guy who prints things on t-shirts. Megan and I want to get t-shirts made that say (in Kinyarwanda) “If you can read this, say mizungu!” I eventually found my way out, and I was right by the bus stop place. What’s weird is that I don’t know how all those people and shops fit in between the street and normal shops. The laws of physics must be different here, which would explain why people are so good at carrying things on their heads.

August 5

Yesterday I saw the Quebec girls again. Some of them live in Montreal, and I’m really excited for us to be friends when I get back. They are awesome. It was their last day in Rwanda, so we went to the memorial in Nyamata and then to dinner. It was one of the memorials that I have seen already, but I saw it very early on in the trip, and it was actually harder to see the second time. Being here for two months and talking with people about their experiences, hearing about what happened firsthand really changed the way I related to the memorial. We were there with Asnathe, a friend of the Quebeckers who grew up in Nyamata, and during the genocide she was hiding in the forest right by this church, where thousands were massacred. Many of her family and friends died there. She told us about going into the church a few days after the massacre and seeing bodies piled halfway up to the ceiling. I was amazed at how composed she was through the whole thing, but then she told us that she goes to visit the memorial very often, so she is used to it by now. The guy who gave us a tour also grew up in Nyamata, and on the way back to Kigali we talked about what it must be like to work at a memorial like that. It is one thing to go and visit once in a while, but to have a full-time job that consists of talking about something that horrific must take a very strong character.

I have been really amazed at the way people are open about genocide here. When we were doing client interviews, there were some questions that asked about extended family, and people would just say “My entire family was murdered in ’94.” There were some people who had injuries that looked like genocide injuries, like they were missing hands or eyes or had large gashes in their heads that really looked like they were from machetes. They would just tell us “this is from genocide.” It is really hard to react in situations like that because what do you say to someone who had their head nearly cut in half by the Interahamwe? At the same time, I think it is good how the people want to tell us, they want us to go back and tell our friends, they want me to write this in my blog because they think that the more we are made aware of the atrocities that occurred, the more likely we are not to have another genocide like theirs.

After the memorial, we went to the market in Kimironko, the big market in Kigali, so they could smuggle sugar cane back to Canada. If they’re successful, I will also try to bring some back. It’s pretty great. It was fun for me to be the tour guide. I got us all on the right buses, showed them around the market, argued prices (in kinyarwanda!) and it was really great. I am just starting to feel at home here, even out in the city, and I’m sad to leave just when I’m starting to fit in (I use that term loosely…) It’s only recently that I’ve started to handle tricky situations with grace and humor. Like at the market, when you walk through the main gates, dozens of boys mob you and try to sell you bags, get you to pay them to carry your stuff, or just beg for money. It’s pretty intense, and definitely uncomfortable when you are going to a market to buy things and people ask you for money, because everyone knows that you have some so you’ve really got no good excuse. But I have several ways of accomplishing two key things: First, having a moment of shared humanity with the kids (like laughing together when they say “I want money” and I say “Oya, ndashaka amafaranga,” which means “no, I want money!”) and second, getting them to eventually leave me alone. It feels pretty great. Okay, back to the point. Then we went to dinner, had a great time, some really good goat brochettes, and banana beer. Warning: It is CALLED beer, but it’s actually 14% alcohol, which is a good thing to know BEFORE consumption. Just thought you all should be aware, you know, for next time you’re in East Africa.

I spent the whole afternoon and evening home today, which was great because I have been out a lot lately and haven’t gotten enough family/baby time. Neema and I hung out, and just talked about stuff and played with Wesley for hours. I am going to miss that baby.

August 2

So, life is interesting sometimes. I have had some seriously philosophical talks the last few days, and many of them I haven’t yet had time to digest, but sometimes I’m not sure what I think until I try to explain it to others, so that’s what this is. I talked with Megan for a really long time, and we covered many topics from how we will become undevelopment workers in N. America to why I can never be a part of organized religion to justifications for not having sex before marriage. I am realizing (in Africa, strangely enough) that there are segments of American culture that are equally foreign to me as Rwandese culture is. It’s weird to realize that while I have no problem sitting in my Arabic classes talking with veiled women, it makes me really uncomfortable to have people greet me by saying “Praise Jesus.” Slowly, I am pinpointing why I feel that way, and it is bringing a lot of things to light.

I have learned a lot about American culture on this trip, and that is something I hadn’t expected at all. It’s weird for me to admit this, but in a way I have had a very narrow view of some ideas/philosophies/ways of life. This was shaped in part I think by growing up in Portland, by my education, by the generation I’m part of, and partly it’s just the way I make sense of the world. Ironically, the ideas I have been unwilling to entertain are ideas that the people who share my intellectual/philosophical culture (those blasted pinko hippie environmentalist freaks) love to call rigid and narrow-minded. But the truth is, I had simply never allowed myself the occasion to discuss these ideas with someone who could relate them in a logical way. I had only ever seen them put forth by crazy people (televangelists, for example) who presented them in off-putting or hateful ways, which made it very easy for me to write them off as psycho right-wing Evangelical neo-con gay-hating freaks. Much the same way they dismiss the dreadlocked vegan anti-capitalist freaks. Coincidence? I think not.

It’s very easy to ridicule an idea or a philosophy if you manage to keep your understanding of it simple and one-dimensional. Illegal immigrants would be a good example. If you remain ignorant and disconnected from them, it’s pretty easy to argue that they are a burden, that they’re the reason the public schools and emergency rooms are so overloaded, that we should ship them all back and build a wall between Mexico and the U.S. But if you actually hear them out, and realize that as long as life is bad enough in their home countries to make it worth risking their lives to come to the U.S., arguing that the solution is building a wall sounds juvenile and poorly reasoned. It’s not comfortable for me to say this, but I definitely had a (carefully-guarded) simplistic view of certain segments of American culture. Specifically, social conservatives and Evangelical Christians. I realize that these two groups do not always align on all the issues, but in general they have many points in common, so just bear with the generalization for this blog entry.

I was always taught that people are basically good, that we are all equal, that people should be judged based on their individual merit and not based on race, religion, creed, etc. My liberal education, specifically at SMA and Scripps, seemed to put forth a very relativist philosophy. Whether it was intended or not, I (and I think most of my classmates as well) came out of that with the idea that there are many points of view that command equal merit. Our teachers rarely told us that there was one right answer (except in math class) and the rule of thumb was that you can pretty much argue any viewpoint you like, and as long as your defense is clear, consistent, well-supported, well-documented and logical, you aren’t ‘wrong.’ It was the argumentation that counted most, not your premise. Which is a great way to teach kids how to analyze, how to deconstruct an argument, how to intelligently discuss nearly anything, and to equip them with the tools they need in order to weed their way through the many misleading propositions they will be confronted with both in and out of school.
But, it also creates a climate where logical, analytical argument is king, and anyone who makes the leap from logic to inherent belief loses some credibility.

Due to that basic paradigm, I pretty much viewed anyone who claimed that there was one absolute truth (religious, philosophical, moral, etc) as slightly less than credible. Same goes for hard-line social conservatives: Who gave them the right to determine what is okay for me? Isn’t that a great thing about America, that no matter your personal views or private actions (private: i.e. not harmful to the public good), you’re still entitled to the same liberties and freedoms the constitution provides? But instead of actually engaging in conversation about some of these questions, and trying to understand how they arrived at their conclusions, I decided that somehow they were less worthy of dialogue than people who shared my perspective. [I would like to put in my disclaimer now, which says that I am not necessarily any more in agreement with the aforementioned ideas than I was before this series of enlightening conversations. But I am able to entertain the thought that these ideas can have well-reasoned arguments behind them, and that not everyone who thinks this way is insane. Some of them are, to be sure, but then so was Tre Arrow.]

Megan is my window into conservative America, or Evangelical Land as she likes to refer to it. Although we are in line philosophically on many things, especially social justice issues, we come from such radically different backgrounds that we always seem to approach things from the opposite perspective, which is awesome and really interesting for both of us. For example, in our talk the other night, we somehow meandered onto the topic of abstinence. She has made the decision not to have sex before she gets married, and I asked her if she could just talk to me about how she came to that decision, etc. She did, and it was really interesting. I wasn’t raised in a culture that pushed the no-sex-before-marriage idea. It was more like no-sex-before-committed-adult-relationship. She was raised in a family/church/culture that definitely expected people to wait for marriage, but it also seems to be a very personal decision for her. She was funny about it, saying that in order to be the token prude she has to assume that role and joke about it, or else people think she’s weird, which is an awesome attitude to have. There was a serious explanation as well, which I’m probably not able to relate eloquently, but at the end of the conversation I respect her more for having that well though-out a philosophy, and the conviction to stand by it for quite possibly a long time.

The following day, I went to dinner with Megan and Janine, and a three-hour long conversation about religion and theology sprung from a question I have had for a long time: What do people mean when they say things like “by the blood of Jesus?” I seriously didn’t know what that meant. It seemed like a catchphrase to be used when you want to be dramatic. And Megan said that most Christians she knows probably don’t really know what it means either but they never ask about it in any case. In other conversations we’ve established that she has more in common with me and my questioning of religion/faith than she does with people at her church who are so sure about everything. Megan and Janine talked about their spiritual journeys and why they stick with their religions despite the fact that they have lots of criticisms of the church, its leaders, its actions, etc.

They tried to explain a lot of concepts that I’m not really sure I can understand, but it was definitely enlightening and I feel like I understand people better now. I can never explain exactly what I mean about issues like this, so I hope this was somewhat coherent at least. But, one good thing about being here is you get used to not being able to fully explain yourself, and it becomes no big deal, so oh well!

Things I will miss...

I know I still have over a month here, but I can’t help thinking about the things I will miss when I leave. Here are the highlights:

Taxi motos. They are so cheap, efficient, fast, fun, and only a bit life-threatening
Fruit: Passion, papaya, mango, lemon (they are way better here)
The insect noises at night
Being woken up by goats and roosters in our yard
The way people greet EVERYONE when they arrive somewhere
Really amazing African tea and chapatis
The view of all the hills
The sound rain makes falling on the tin roof and the smell of the dirt roads afterward (which I miss already because it’s the dry season…)
Having family and friends drop by randomly to say hi
Girl time in the back bedroom with the baby
Preparing dinner outside (it’s actually really great, and the charcoal smells good)
The music in the public taxis
The paint jobs and tassels on the public taxis
Hitting the ceiling to signal that you want to get off the taxi
The taxi fare-taker guy who loves me because I keep my money in my bra. He says I can always take his taxi, even if it is full, he will make someone get off.
Okay, everything about the public taxis
Moms with tiny babies tied to their backs
The way that people don’t throw away very much stuff
That a coke costs 40 cents, a taxi ride 25 cents, dinner $2, a hotel room $12
The pervasive optimism even in the midst of very tough circumstances
Hearing people sing all the time
My little neighbor boy who says “Mizungu, bye!” every morning
The guys who sell stuff on the street. We call them the walking Wal-marts. They have absolutely everything, and you can send them on little errands (to get cold water, to bring you change, to find a specific thing that they don’t have) while you wait for the bus
Drinking soda (especially Fanta citron) out of glass bottles with straws.
The way that people I barely know (or don’t know at all) invite me to dinner, to their hometowns for a visit, even to their weddings
Geckos on my ceiling
The beautiful birds that live in our bushes. They are bright red, blue, yellow, or green, and really tiny.
Hilarious articles in the New Times, “Rwanda’s leading daily”
Commercials for SONARWA, which I will film and put on Youtube.
Awesome vegetation
Seeing laundry hung to dry on trees
Little kids in school uniforms
How the earth is red
Disorganized, beautiful terracing on the hills

Fooood!

Yesterday was one of the best days I've had this whole trip! In the morning Megan and her host sister Claudia came over and we made brunch for my host family. Scrambled eggs with veggies, breakfast potatoes, pancakes, fruit, and coffee. It was really fun, and I was amazed that it all turned out well even though I had never cooked on a charcoal stove before. People liked the food, except they thought I was weird for putting honey on my pancakes. No one really likes sweet things, except that they put about four huge spoonfuls of sugar in their tea, which I think is weird, so I guess we're even. The fruit here is really amazing. We had passion fruit and mango, and it was delish. I normally don't like mango(e?)s, because I think they're slimy in a weird way, but here they are fresh and I eat them all the time. Then I went into town with Neema's cousin Lina, who took me around to her sister's house, and from there we went to a party at one of their friend's houses. It was really fun. I have been trying to spend more time with Rwandese people outside of work hours, and yesterday was exactly what I've been looking forward to doing. We had a great time, and I'm going to maybe see them again on Thursday. Plus, Lina lives in Bujumbura, so this weekend if we actually go, she will show us around there! Apparently Bujumbura has the most beautiful inland beaches in Africa, great nightlife, and good food. Lonely Planet has not let us down so far, so hopefully this will be no exception!

Assessment survey part 1

July 19

We have done three days of interviews so far, and it’s been really interesting. Things have gone surprisingly well, after one of our translators evaporated the day before interviews began. We have reached our target number of interviews every day, and we got to the field on time! (The leaving on time thing may not seem like an accomplishment, but we are on “African standard time” here, which means that everything is late, even scheduled bus departures.) It’s interesting to realize that things we never thought would be cultural hurdles are actually posing lots of problems. For example, when we wrote the questionnaire and translated it, we checked with the Rwandese at work to make sure that none of the questions were culturally inappropriate. We have some about family planning, and we weren’t sure if it would make people uncomfortable. There are also questions that ask about the clients’ interactions with spouse/extended family, but those are touchy also because so many people lost their whole family during genocide. So, we fixed those problems, found ways to ask what we wanted to without being insensitive, but it never occurred to us to ask about the form of the questionnaire itself. It turns out that questionnaires like this are a very western concept, and the multiple choice questions are really difficult for people to understand. Who knew? One the questions that really throws people is this:

Describe your ability to meet your family’s food needs:
a) I am able to provide all the food my family needs, and it is not a concern.
b) I am able to provide all the food my family, needs, but I wish I could buy more food.
c) I am not able to provide all the food my family needs, and I sometimes worry about this.
d) I am not able to provide all the food my family needs, and I worry about this all the time.

It seemed straightforward to us, and it doesn’t even have a western bias because it asks about needs being met, not a number of meals per day or how often they eat protein, so we thought it was a pretty great question. But, it takes about 5 minutes to explain every time we do an interview. Dinah, my translator and fellow intern, tried valiantly yesterday, but we were in a poor, rural, uneducated area, and there was only one woman who seemed to really know what she was answering. The rest of them eventually said something, but Dinah thought they were just saying it so she would move on. The funniest part about it is that we are so embarrassed that we’re asking questions that are hard to understand, but the Rwandese interpreters are like, “Well, these people are just really ignorant, so we’ll do our best but sometimes they just don’t get it.” The other thing that’s hard to get at is anything that deals with the time-space continuum. The section at the beginning that deals with background info asks things like how long have you been a client, how many loan cycles have you been through, etc. People just say they don’t know, or they say it has been very many, but they don’t know how many. The only ones who are really sure about it are people who joined right after genocide, in 1997. And many of our questions are before and after scenarios, like the food one above has a part B that asks them to describe the differences in their situation before and after receiving a loan. Today was better, though, because we were in Kigali city, and the people who are in town are generally more educated. Must run, dinner is on.

One more stamp in the passport

July 16

This weekend was definitely one of the more interesting ones of my life: Janine, Sarah, Pierre and I went to Congo, and survived. There is a town on Lake Kivu, Gisenyi, that is near the DRC border. So close, actually, that we walked there from our hotel. So, we spent the day in Goma, DRC. It was interesting, but not at all like I thought it would be. It is immediately different, as soon as you get out of the border agent’s office. It was much dirtier, filthy actually, and not green at all. Which is weird, because it’s right on Kivu so it should have vegetation, but it’s gray and black. The UN headquarters blocks off the view of the lake (way to snap up all the cheap beachfront, UN!) so you can’t even see the water from downtown, and all the streets are ruined because a few years ago there was a volcanic eruption and it covered the city in magma. They speak different languages there, and the fashion is much different (apparently Congo is like the fashion capital of central/East Africa) but it was mostly that is just felt different.

Rwanda is an extremely optimistic country: Everyone is going to school and the politicians are constantly pushing for progress and reminding the Rwandese people of how far they have come since genocide. But there was definitely no optimism in Goma. It makes sense, of course, because the war in Congo has dragged on for so long, and has caused more deaths than any other war in the last few decades (I think, but don’t quote me on that). Because of its location Goma hasn’t really been ravaged, unlike the rest of the eastern border, which has been hit the hardest. The poverty was much worse than anything I’ve seen in Rwanda, every building was practically covered in razor wire, and there were AK-47s everywhere. It was definitely not as dangerous as I thought it would be, but the Rwandese border agent gave us a thorough talking-to before we crossed, and we followed his do and don’t list to the letter. We also went back early, to avoid the “roving gangs” that appear after dark, according to Lonely Planet and the State Department. [Note on the roving gangs: Our Swiss friend Pierre thought we kept saying roaming gays, and he couldn’t figure out what we meant for a long time, until he asked about the roaming gays, at which point we laughed for a long time, then immediately began making fun of him, which we will continue doing for some time.] And here’s a phrase I never thought I’d say: “Keep track of time, you guys, because we need to be safe in Rwanda by 6:30.” But when we got back across the border, I really did feel safe and sound. Rwanda is now really secure, but it was just funny to hear myself refer to it as a haven. On the whole, not a happy place, but very interesting for a visit. Plus, we found a place called the VIP Palace, and discovered a pretty good Congolese beer called Turbo King, which is definitely an awesome name for a beer.

That night we ate dinner at a hotel, swam in their pool, and froze to death (almost) afterward. It turns out that Africa, especially at the equator, is not necessarily warm. The waitress brought us a clay pot full of hot coals, and we huddled around it trying to get warm, but were forced eventually to resort to alcohol, which was much more effective. Sunday we went to the Serena hotel, which is one of the most amazing places I’ve ever seen, and used their private beach. It is such a beautiful place, on par with the amazing beaches in Malaysia. The lake is huge and has waves like the ocean, and they have big blue and white striped umbrellas in the sand, it looks like paradise. Then we had a good lunch, I met a guy from Portland (such a small world), and we came home. We laughed so much this weekend, my cheeks hurt by the end. It felt really good to relax because my work situation has been a bit tense, and I really needed to be away in an environment where I don’t have to censor myself so much.

We (the interns) are really trying to make Rwandese friends that we can hang out with outside of work, but it is hard! We’ve been invited to a couple social things, but they are always at church, and with prayers multiple times a day and church at least twice a week already, I am a bit hesitant to use my free time doing that. But there has been a good development on that front: We found a girl at work who definitely knows about Kigali nightlife. Plus, she’s really nice and super interesting, so she has now become our lifeline.

There are some things about home life that I’ve been meaning to write about for a while. Namely, that I am now allowed to help make dinner, and it’s really fun. I have discovered that Francois, the house boy, actually does understand a bit of French, which he has hidden up to now. So, we can talk a little, which is great, and the dinner prep takes forever so allows for some quality bonding time. And many laughs, of course, since I don’t know how to do anything. Today I came home right after work, which I don’t always do, and hung out with Neema’s cousin. We shared a mango and it was great. I am not super comfortable in situations where I can’t talk with people, since I like to talk so much, but I am learning that it’s kind of okay for me to say things in English that people don’t understand, and for them to say things in kinyarwanda that I don’t get either. But the mango was a good conversation substitute, and it was a good evening. There is lots of time to kill because we eat dinner so late, and since it has hit me that I don’t have very much time left here, I am determined to take advantage of the family time. I think tonight I will go ask if I can sing with the girls before bed. Neema, her sisters, and her cousin sing to the baby before they go to bed, and I always hear it a want to go too, but I feel awkward about it for some reason. But tonight, I think it’s time. It is tempting to pack my days full of things, but I know that if I do that, I will be sad after I leave that I didn’t invest more time with my family.

I just found out that Francois left to work for the family next door, and that Claude, Daniel and Neema’s previous houseboy, asked to come back to work for them. Being here makes me re-think my position on child labor all the time. I remember going to a lecture last year about child labor, and the professor who gave the talk was trying to make the point that legislation declaring child labor illegal is a bad idea because it addresses a symptom and not a root cause of poverty. So many people got up in arms, accusing him of being pro-child labor, but the point he made is totally valid. Prohibition was a perfect example of how useless laws can be, and how they can even worsen the behavior they are trying to prevent, if the society does not foster an environment that supports those laws. And I see that here daily: the cost of going to school is high, even though there are technically no “fees” for primary school, so for many kids it’s simply not an option. If they are already home, what do you want them to do? Nothing? Often, if one child stays home to work, they family is then able to send another to school because of the extra income. If there is a kid who may have a shot at a university scholarship, it could be considered wise for a sibling to work in order to assure that kid a chance. Especially because educated people who get good jobs often support many family members. Daniel takes care of his mom, a sibling or two, and several children, in addition to Neema’s sisters who live with us. It is obviously not the best-case scenario, but in order to get kids to go to school, laws will not be effective. They need to be able to afford it, which means not only lowering the costs but improving the ability of individuals to pay for that schooling. Also, there needs to be an environment in the country that values education and rewards people who invest in it. There is so much unemployment, and a shortage of jobs that require educated people, so in an environment where education doesn’t have a return on investment, why would you go to school?

Being allowed to help more at home is great not just because of the bonding but because I get more say in things, too. There isn’t a lot that is hard to adjust to as far as food stuff goes, except breakfast. No one eats much in the mornings, but I almost can’t make it to work without food. But peanut butter is saving me, and now I feel comfortable enough that I can get my own breakfast in the morning. But the other night, dinner presented a challenge. Luckily, the food here is pretty good (if unvaried) and there has been very little that I didn’t like. But a couple days ago, there was a dish with small eggplants, which are okay generally when mixed with rice or bananas, but they’re really bitter. Only this time, they were mixed with tiny dried fish. Since most of the time we have just one dish and rice or potatoes to go with it, you can’t just take a little bit of the thing you don’t like. I had a hard time getting it all down, but if that's the worst thing I have to eat, we're doing pretty well.

And as long as we’re on the topic of social faux pas, I made a huge one today: We are going tomorrow to Rwamagana tomorrow to interview clients, and this morning we had a huge meeting to discuss everything and nail down some last-minute details. We tentatively set a meeting time for tomorrow morning, but we needed to buy the bus tickets and confirm that meeting time this afternoon. The woman who said she would do it is the director of client training, so we said we’d be in contact later in the day to confirm everything. In the afternoon I went down to see ******* (not naming people), so he could call her and confirm for tomorrow. He is the person that I see most frequently at work, and he’s nice in his way and really tries to help us, but he is really frustrating to work with and his personality is just weird. He really creeped me out at first, and made some really inappropriate comments, but later I realized that they were not malicious, they just came off much more intense than he meant them to (I think…) And it’s hard to communicate with him because he is much more comfortable in French than in English, but he always wants to speak in English anyway, so conversations move at a glacial pace. I would be happy to speak English because I know it’s good practice for him, but in some business conversations there is no room for misunderstanding, and we should really pick the language that best suits everyone. Anyway, so I went to ask him to call about the bus tickets and meeting time. He called, and I thought he would just ask her, but instead he put me on the phone. I was surprised, not expecting him to hand it to me, and so didn’t know what to say, and just repeated the question. She answered me (we’re speaking in French) but I couldn’t really understand what she was saying. Her French is good in person, but she has a really strong accent so without gestures and lips to read, I was pretty lost. So I asked her to repeat, and I think she didn’t really understand me either, so I just asked her to hold on one minute. I handed the phone to ********, and asked him to speak with her (since they have a first language in common) but before I could stop him, he hung up the phone. So then I explained that she had still been on the line, that I just needed him to talk with her because I was having trouble hearing. I asked him to call her right back and apologize. But he just kept asking me questions about the interviews while I stand there freaking a bit because I’ve just hung up on someone, and he wouldn’t just call her back and say sorry. He eventually did, but I still feel really bad. I’m not sure how bad that is in Rwandan culture, but people are overly polite here and definitely don’t cut people off when they’re talking or anything. So I hope it’s okay tomorrow, but I felt horrible and helpless.

What am I actually doing here?

People keep asking me what I’m actually doing here, and the reason I haven’t really written about that yet is because it’s taken a while to figure it out. This is a really interesting time to be here because we are in the process of merging with a huge international organization, but that presents a lot of challenges as far as my internship, because no one has time to give us things to do, and authority is so diffuse that we never know who to ask. So there were many days of waiting around for meetings that never happened, but now I have a project! So here it is. (For people who don’t know, I’m working with a microfinance organization, which gives small loans (generally between $20-$100) to Rwandese people in order to help them start or expand small businesses. It’s an awesome idea, started by a guy in Bangladesh who won the Nobel peace prize for it in 2006. If you want to know more about microfinance in general, there are great documents and information on the following web pages: www.grameen-info.org, www.cgap.org, www.opportunity.org which is the organization we’re merging with, www.villagebanking.org, www.brac.net, and www.themix.org.)

I am working on assessing social impact. The clients obviously have economic change in their lives when they receive the loans, but I am personally more interested in the social change that occurs. Social change is far-reaching, it impacts not only the families who get the loans, but their entire communities and maybe eventually entire countries. Obviously, there are many areas of convergence, and some things like education are equal parts social and economic. But in my own studies and future work I really hope to work with the way that economic development affects the societies in cultural, interpersonal ways. It works out for the people at work as well because they have a lot of documentation about economic impact, but do not have a social impact study, which they really need in order to apply for grants and show to stockholders. So I’m working with one of the other interns on doing a study. We wrote it last week, and this week we’ve been working on the kinyarwanda translation with some Rwandese interns. Yesterday we tested it with clients in Kigali to identify problematic questions, and for the next two weeks we will be interviewing clients in the field. After that, data coding and analysis. I’m excited to do it, I think it will be a good jumping-off point for some research that I can use for my thesis. But because we didn’t really do anything for the first month, we now don’t have a lot of time to finish it, so there are some things that the report cannot include. It’s too bad that we couldn’t get on this right away, and time is so short now it will be a minor miracle if we actually have a final report by mid-August, but I think that even if we have to finish editing the report after we leave, it will be worth it.

It is challenging to figure out how to get things done here because the business climate is so different. It's a cultural thing that is partly in my favor, because they are pretty relaxed about things and want us to enjoy ourselves, but it's also extremely frustrating because something that would take a 1-hour meeting in the US takes a week to get done here. As with anything big and exciting like this, there will be a re-evaluation of expectations once it actually starts. And what I am realizing is that due to technological/financial/cultural/linguistic constraints, this internship is going to be much different that what I had expected, as far as what I will get out of it academically and as far as how much I will be able to make myself useful. They are really busy with the merger right now, and it feels like it's too hard for them to take the time to give us things to do, so we can't be very useful unless we do things on our own. Which is really hard, given that we don't know our way around very well, that we don't speak kinyarwanda, and that every time we try to do anything, they worry because we are women doing something by ourselves. It is also extremely difficult to comminucate because no one will give us a straight answer (cultural thing) and authority is so diffuse that we never know who should have the final say (merger thing). So, I am re-evaluating what is realistic for me to try to do while I'm here. I think the impact assessment will be the best mix of useful for them, useful for me, realistically accomplishable, and not mind-numblingly boring (as in, sitting in on meetings conducted in kinyarwanda for 5 hours a day.) Basically, the most intersting thing I'm learning is how to conduct business in an environment that seems to be un-business in every way. This something that I am slowly getting through my head, and something that I need to understand if I plan to work abroad in a development-related field. I didn't realize coming into this how deeply the cultural issues would impact my work experience. So, that is turning out to be what I am actually learning. Just as important, if not more, but very different.

Microfinance is so interesting because it is a relatively new concept in development, and it was originally conceived to reach the poorest of the poor. But it has morphed into something that reaches the poorest of the working poor, but not necessarily the destitute (people living on less than US $1 per day). But, it has caught on all over the world and seems to be generating some results. However, there are problems with repayment rates (it varies greatly by organization) and the long-term sustainability of the organizations is questionable. Most of them rely greatly on donor money right now, and do not turn enough of a profit to be self-fulfilling and sustainable in the long term, which is the problem that a lot of NGOs and aid organizations experience, and one of the reasons why more people don’t get the aid they need.

Culturally, all aid is touchy because sometimes it is hard to preserve culture when you “help” certain communities. Microfinance is especially tricky, because in some ways it helps preserve culture, but because it is so financial, it also necessitates huge cultural changes. For example, the loans can help preserve culture by allowing people to stay in their villages and continue with traditional forms of commerce like agriculture, crafts like basket-making, etc. Historically, there have been problems in poor areas (a good example might be border towns in Mexico) where large corporations install factories, mines, and other large-scale enterprise. The local communities often lose control of land that has historically been under their control, and they can no longer continue with traditional ways of life. So, to survive, they are basically forced to work in these mines or factories, and that creates a whole new category of social problems to overcome. In this way, microfinance can help vulnerable and rural communities become self-reliant without uprooting local culture. But for some people/cultures, thinking about loans, investment, savings accounts and loan repayment schedules can be a major change from the way money and property has traditionally been treated. The bank that we’re opening soon takes on some of these challenges by holding free training sessions, and specially training the employees to deal with clients unfamiliar with banking. They also use a special ID system with cameras and fingerprint machines, because many of the clients have no official ID cards or are illiterate.

The loans work like this: A group of people in a community find out about the program through friends, the market, word of mouth, etc, and they decide to start a community bank. The bank is assigned a loan officer, often someone who lives in a nearby village or the same town, who supervises the community bank’s (CB’s) activities. The CB has trainings to learn about how to save, how to repay the loans, all the basics. And then all the people come together and decide who gets to have the loans. They function by mutual guarantee, which means that all the members of the CB are responsible for each other, and if someone doesn’t pay, everyone puts up money to cover that person’s payment. People start out with small amounts, around US $20, and they can increase their loan based on their repayment history and the testimonies of the other CB members. After they participate in the CB for two loan cycles, they can take other kinds of loans, like village phone loans, home improvement loans, bicycle loans, etc. The websites I listed earlier will have more details, but this is the basic way my organization functions. Most of the clients I have met and spoken with have businesses like selling rice and flour at the market, selling things as a street vendor (like shoes, clothes, or fruit), running small shops, or sewing clothes. When the impact assessment is done, I will put some of the results up.

One small anecdote and then I really need to sleep, because the sun comes up really early so I’m usually awake by 5:30… Last night before dinner, we were sitting around talking, when I spied a spider on the floor. It wasn’t massive, but definitely larger than I’m comfortable with. (Its body was about the size of a nickel, and including the legs it was three or four inches across. One of my personal goals for the summer was to be okay with the bugs, and especially to get over my fairly intense fear of spiders. So I told everyone this, and went over to look at the spider. I kneeled (knelt? I never know) down by it, looked it over for a while, really examining it. It was interesting, definitely the closest I’ve ever been to one that big, and my heart rate even slowed down after a minute or so. I was thinking, “Good job, Ellen, you’re really okay with this.” So I decided the next step was to put it outside instead of killing it. Which was partially to spare it, and partially to not have to clean its guts off the floor. Normally, I let the Rwandese put the bugs outside, and their preferred method is to use a flip-flop to push them under the door. Now, a flip-flop requires your hand to be pretty close to the creature, and also allows for the possibility that it will scurry the opposite direction and possibly even come into contact with one of your feet. But I was feeling brave, so I went over to get a sandal and said “Okay, I’m going to put it outside.” Everyone pretty much thought I was crazy already for looking at it for so long, that they were like “Whatever, weirdo scaredy-cat American.” So I bent down, pushed it with the sandal, it darted TOWARD me, I dropped the shoe, screamed, jumped up, and ran to the couch. And everyone cracked up for about 10 minutes, while Daniel calmly pushed it under the door and off the porch. I’m thinking that was too many steps too fast, but I am definitely making progress. Although maybe next time I will use the bowl and paper method to trap it, which avoids accidentally touching it or seeing it run.

Weekend in Kibuye

Wow. I have been here over a month now, and it seems like my time left is so short. I knew this would happen, but it’s still disappointing. I want to stay forever! Well, actually not, but sometimes it really feels that way. Before I left, I freaked out when I saw the pile of malaria pills, one for every day that I’m here, because it seemed like so many. But yesterday I made a list of all the things I want to do that have to be done on weekends, like trips to other cities and to a national park, and there are the same number of things as there are weekends left! So, I am trying to still do lots of things but also not be stressed out about it, and at the same time being sure to invest in my relationships with the women at work and the family I’m staying with. I haven’t written in a while, because I’ve been really busy, but that means there is a lot to catch up on. We will start with the now-infamous weekend at Lake Kivu.

It was amazing, at least for the first day. Kirsten and I took the bus, which was an experience. They are buses the same size as the ones in town, which fit 18 people. Except that everyone had bags because they were going for the weekend, and there is nowhere to put them besides your lap. So, we got in, and made sure to get a seat by the window because air circulation is key on 3-hour trips in close quarters like that. And we were pleasantly surprised to find that the bus wasn’t packed to its usual capacity. Maybe they don’t fill them as full on these long trips so that we will have more room? Oh, silly innocent white girls. No, there was another stop at another bus station before leaving Kigali. As it turns out, to make it really worth their while, on the long trips, they pack you in even more. Yes, there were 21 of us on this bus, 5 across in our row (why only us??) and it is at this moment, when we’re discreetly trying to count the number of people (it currently holds the record) that we discover that our window is the only one that doesn’t open. Deep breath, okay. It was funny more that anything else, except the last hour of the trip which is the most excruciatingly winding road I have ever been on. Imagine Portland to the coast stretched and contorted, going way too fast, on roads only wide enough for one car, but miraculously allowing cars, buses, huge trucks, cows, bicycles, motos, and tiny children to pass simultaneously. It was actually pretty amazing. There is definitely order in chaos, this was proof.

But we got there, no one died, and no one was carsick, which are really the goals on any journey like this. And when we got into Kibuye, we were wondering how to get to our guest house (no taxis) or even where it was (no planning ahead…) when a really nice girl saw our helplessness and offered us a lift. She spoke French, and she and her boyfriend even came to translate our check-in procedure. So we got to our room, which was AMAZING in every way (as in super comfy, came with mosquito nets, had HOT WATER, and looked directly out onto a beautiful porch sitting area and the most amazing view of the lake.) All for $20 a night. I love this place. We went down to the restaurant to get some food, and as we were walking by the tables I heard a group of girls speaking Québecois French. We went over to say hi, and it turns out that some of them go to my university! It took us an hour of conversation to realize that two of them are friends of two of my friends in Montreal, who separately put me in touch with people they knew who would be in Rwanda this summer, and who I had forgotten about completely until sending them an email the day before, which they had not even received yet. Amazing coincidence. They are here with Québec Sans Frontières (Quebec Without Borders) and are staying in villages outside of Gitarama. So, we ate with them and had a great time, and Saturday they invited us to go on with them to some islands on the lake, via a very sketchy boat that definitely had holes in the bottom. But hey, we’re still alive! We hiked, were swarmed by thousands of bats, swam, had genius tropical fruit and ordered some goat kabobs for lunch. From now on, when I see animals that are possible food sources, I will take care not to develop personal relationships with them right around lunchtime. But there was this cute goat that we said hi to when we got to the island. But when it was time to order lunch, we had pretty much forgotten about it, until we saw the guy who took our order go untie it, and shout something to his buddy, who left, reappeared with a machete, and took the goat to the other side of the island. About an hour later, he reappeared with some kabobs and lit a fire. We were obviously a bit surprised at the whole affair, but after the goat had sacrificed himself to feed us, it would be really insulting not to eat it, right? And they were definitely the best kebabs I’ve had this whole trip. The non-vegetarian thing is really working out well. Later we were sitting with our chairs partly in the water, enjoying island paradise with a cold beer, when Kirsten come over and says “Um, guys, I just threw up. A lot. I think I need to go back.”

Stranded on an island inhabited only by the guy who slaughtered our goat is not really the place you want to discover that someone has food poisoning. Luckily the boat was docked and everyone else was thinking about leaving soon anyway, so we left and she made it back to the guest house. She went back to the room, and I hung out with les québecoises, and the following morning Kirsten’s host family sent their driver to come get us. The bus ride back would have pretty much been impossible. She is staying with an American family here, and this was one of the circumstances that made us remember that sometimes, that’s really a good thing. (They also have a washing machine, which I might use at some point…)

So, right before we got in the car to come home, my stomach started feeling a bit interesting as well. But I just made myself wait until we got home before I allowed myself to feel sick. The ride was going okay, we were taking the curves pretty well, until we ran into someone’s face. Seriously, a woman was walking down the street, and our mirror smacked her in the face. I didn’t really see it happen, I just saw the mirror collapse inward (thank god they are made to do that!) and then a bunch of people gathered around and made the driver stop the car. Now, I see accidents a lot here, which is to be expected when the rules are taken lightly at best and so many types of traffic share the roads. Generally I think it is assumed that if you get hit, you’re the idiot for not getting out of the way. But, when you’re in a car, and you hit a pedestrian, even if she was walking in traffic (which she was) you can’t help but feel responsible. So Kirsten and I were really concerned, and a bit rattled. But the lady walked over to the car, she wasn’t bleeding, and we took her to the clinic and gave her some money. I guess that’s just how people deal with things like that here, although I still think about it and wonder if there wasn’t something else we should have done. I really hope she is okay. We made it back okay, and that’s the end of the weekend.

An eventful weekend

So Lake Kivu did not disappoint. The weekend included the following events: the craziest bus ride of my life followed by being rescued by kind and helpful strangers, running into friends of friends from Montreal at our (amazingly beautiful) hotel, a very leaky boat ride, being attacked by thousands of bats, phenomenal scenery, personally meeting my lunch before eating it, and to top it off, our car running into someone's face on the way back. (She is okay, we went to the doctor.)

June 27


The strangest thing just happened: I was on my way home from the office with Megan, we take the same taxi, and we had just gotten off at the taxi park in Remera. We were walking to get taxi motos to go home, and were in the middle of a deep conversation, when she said to be careful about what is going on around us, not get too wrapped up in our conversation. I didn’t really know why she said that, but it’s good advice in general, so I said okay and kept walking. We were talking about the way that we are treated here, and the difficult situation we’re in, being white and being women.

If we are submissive, we submit because we are women, which is the norm here. [Note: I know that my understanding of Rwandan society is not comprehensive, and that gender inequality is a problem all over the world. So when I say that it is patriarchal, I don’t mean that as a condemnation, rather as an observation and a challenge for me to deal with. There definitely is a lot of inequality here, but every society has its own problems and concerns to deal with, and the Rwandese in particular have priorities like preventing another genocide, so it is not unreasonable that women’s rights are on the back-burner for the moment. I can’t be politically correct about everything!] But if we assert ourselves and demand equality or respect, it is because we are white, and it’s normal for white people to demand respect. (But not necessarily for women to do the same.) So, it’s tricky to know what to do sometimes. For example, twice this week I’ve seen convoys of army trucks with hundreds of soldiers drive by. I don’t want to stand by the road with my head down, looking meek so hopefully they won’t notice me. But, if I stand up straight and look at them like everyone else does, they stare and whistle and make lewd gestures and say things that I’m probably glad I don’t understand. So what do you do? I have been going with the head-down approach, but I hate it.

So we were having this conversation in the taxi, and just when we were getting out, the man sitting next to me grabbed my thigh as he was standing up. In these taxis, people touch. There is no way to avoid it when you’re that crammed in, and I’ve never felt that it was sexually-charged before. But this was definitely unnecessary and sustained one second too long. So, when we were off the taxi, I told her what had happened, and that tied into our discussion of the white/woman thing. Did he do that because I was a woman, as he would have done to a Rwandese woman as well? Or did he do it because I was white, because I so obviously don’t belong, because white people have taken power and respect from Africans for so long that (subconsciously of course) this was a way of reclaiming some? I am not suggesting that he had that in mind, but rather that in some way, it’s not as much of a transgression to do it to me, because it’s not demeaning a part of his own culture, but rather a part of a culture that has demeaned his for so long. Like in the movie Crash when Ludacris was more than happy to rob white people, but defended himself by saying that he would never steal from another black person.

Then the conversation morphed into the ambiguity of moments like that, where while it is happening, you’re not even sure of what it is, and then one second after it’s too late to slap his hand away, you realize that it was icky. (This happens on the metro in Montreal as well…) Just at that moment, we had to go through a dense crowd of people between two buses. Megan was behind me, and she was holding on to my backpack, and for a moment I felt someone get between us. I thought I felt my bag unzip, but I that would be impossible with her right there, holding onto it, right? But when we were out of the crowd, she asked if I had my wallet in the small pocket of my bag, which is where I usually keep it. (But no more, now it will get buried under a water bottle and a book.) And sure enough, the zipper was open and my wallet was gone. She said that she saw the guy take it, she saw it in his hand, but by the time she registered what had happened, it was too late to grab it, he was gone. Just like the thigh-grabbing. Really bizarre.

Luckily, things are so cheap here, that I usually don’t have more that the equivalent of $4 on me at any time, and today’s total loss was about 60 cents and one wallet that I didn’t even buy. So, as Megan said, I could have learned that lesson in a much more expensive way. But I still feel weird about it, and I’m not really sure why. I mean, it was definitely not as traumatic (or as much of a financial loss) as the time I got mugged in Brooklyn, but at the same time this was more sneaky and insidious. The guy didn’t have a gun or anything, he didn’t need it, he even took it while Megan was right there watching him.

June 26

And the week has begun. Yesterday we went to Bugasera, a village about an hour away from Kigali. It was very rural, more so than the village we saw on Friday. And on the way back, we took a “shortcut” on a dirt road, which was an experience, for sure. I have whiplash, but it was fun. We all laughed because it was the first time we had been in an SUV when it actually needed to go into 4-wheel drive. We hit our heads on the ceiling a lot, and almost tipped over once, but it was really fun. And cool to take the small road, because we passed animals and some kids who were carrying HUGE bundles of wood. We didn’t really get much of a chance to speak with the women about their loans, which was too bad, but we did get to see a village phone. It was really cool. It’s the only phone for a really long way, and people from surrounding villages come to use it. The rates are about half of what they charge in town, so that it will be more accessible to everyone.

I will write something soon about what exactly I am doing here, but at the moment I am not 100% sure… I know that at some point I’ll be doing field research, and on my own I am going to find women in Kigali to speak with about microfinance. I have also been translating things into French, and I am going to set up some English classes for the bank staff as well. I am really interested in how the loans are changing the social structure here (if they are at all). Because so many men were killed in the genocide, many families are headed by women and girls. And the loans target women, giving them economic power (suddenly) after centuries of disenfranchisement. The weird thing about it is that although this is happening, and everyone is encouraging it, Rwandan society remains extremely patriarchal.

A brief example, and then I have to go: The women basically do everything at home (which is in no way limited to Rwandan society, obviously…) and last week, we had some guests over. It is customary to offer them something to drink, so we served tea. When everyone was done, I took the mugs and spoons into the kitchen, not because it’s my “job” but because I was headed that way anyway, and just wanted to help out. One of the men who was visiting laughed and said “Oh, she knows what women’s work is.” Which might not have been so bad if not for the face that none of the men had even offered to do so much as stir in their own sugar, and the women who served them were me and and extremely pregnant Neema. More about this to come, because (naturally) I have a lot to say. I know that there are still some problems in the U.S. (glass ceiling, Congress, blah blah) and we should be no means stop working toward eradicating those inequalities, but this does make me realize how fortunate I was to grow up somewhere where it is okay not to have kids by the time you’re 25.

At least it's never boring...

Saw hundreds of soldiers coming back from Congo drive by in trucks today. Much whistling. Then saw President Kagame's motorcade pass, complete with armed special police pointing big guns at everyone. Then went to the market and bought bananas and fabric. Where I saw half a cow hanging from the ceiling of the butcher shop and a man get beaten with a stick. And two men told me they loved me. All in all, not a bad Saturday.

Okay!

So life is looking UP. Last night Neema had her baby. They are both healthy and I am going to see them in a few hours. I keep trying to post photos but it's not working, so sorry if there's no baby pic right away. I'll try to get one of the IT guys to help me... Last night I went to dinner with the other interns at an American ex-pat's house. He works with Opportunity and the bank, and he and his wife had 15 American interns over last night. It was great to hear what everyone is doing. There was a girl from the Clinton Foundation and Partners in Health who actually works with Paul Farmer on a daily basis (genius, genius man) and a bunch of teachers who are here on two-year contracts to teach at the school for diplomat and aid workers' kids. A couple other people doing various health care things, and us. It was great, we had fried okra and iced tea (the family is from Arkansas) and it was just what I needed: Some Americans, some southern food, and girl time. And, tomorrow and Monday we are going on field visits to meet some loan groups and see what they are doing, which will be awesome. And, Saturday I'm going swimming at a hotel and to the market to get some passion fruit. In short, things are good and getting better. Must run, I have spreadsheets to translate!

June 19, 2007

It’s Tuesday and already I am ready to be done with work this week. Yesterday was possibly the most tedious day of my life, and today I translated Excel banking documents into French. It will only last until Friday, but that kind of work is fairly unbearable. Especially since I am unfamiliar with banking terms in general, so forget knowing what they are in French. Also, there is one person at work who creeps me out, and I always end up working with him on stuff, so I never get a chance to evaluate if my creeped-out-ness is reasonable or not, because he’s always there being creepy… Next week, though, we won’t be working in the same office, and then after that if the weirdness continues I will say something. Okay, enough venting. But it does feel good…

Before delving into more serious topics, here is a list of lessons learned so far in Rwanda:

1. Do not take motorbike taxis in torrential rain.
2. Always decide on the fare prior to getting on.
3. Insecticide is awesome.
4. Bugs are smarter than mosquito nets.
5. Bananas are the most versatile staple food ever.
6. Patience is really, really, really important. And wears out fast.
7. Cars are like Mary Poppins’ bag: they hold 100x what you would expect.
8. Bucket showers are cool.
9. Refrigeration is highly overrated, and you can definitely eat meat that has been at room temperature for more than an hour.
10. Running water and electricity are not necessities, but cell phones are.

On to more serious things, on Saturday I went to see Pastor Francis and the kids he takes care of. He runs a child sponsorship program, mostly for orphans. The majority are orphans of genocide or AIDS, but some were kids whose families are simply too poor to feed them. He has 350 kids sponsored so far, and more all the time. I went to play with them, and it was really fun but heartbreaking at the same time. Some of the people who work with them told me stories that make you realize how sheltered we are. There was an 8 or 9 year old girl, but she didn’t seem older than 6, who basically is a mother to five younger siblings. Her father is dead and her mother is bedridden, so this girl begs for money, cooks, cleans, does laundry, bathes and clothes her brothers and sisters, and still finds time to make it to school on occasion. Another boy lost his whole family in the genocide, and now stays with distant relatives who are too poor to care for him, and who don’t really want him anyway. For years they didn’t treat his like a person, they called him ‘dog’ or ‘dead body’ and wouldn’t feed him anything. But now that he is sponsored, he brings home food and soap from the program, so they treat his like a human being because he contributes to the household. The woman who told me this said there are many stories like his, because so many kids were forced upon relatives after the genocide.

On the way home, I ran into some kids who were coming home from school (which the have on Saturday…) and they insisted on walking me all the way to my house. They didn’t believe that a white girl lived in their neighborhood. They were really darling, and taught me some songs. I took their picture, and if I can figure out how to post photos, they’re the kids in uniforms.

June 14

So I have officially been here one week. We still have no idea what we’re going to do at work, but yesterday we worked on a brochure and some excel spreadsheets. I am a master at merging cells. We also got to see the new bank hall today, and it’s really nice. I don’t care that much about the banking stuff, but it’s exciting to be here while they will open it. But, I really hope that when we figure out more specifically what we’re doing, that I am with the microfinance people. I mean, the bank is microfinance also, but since it’s in Kigali, it necessarily caters to the working poor, rather than people who do not even have “real” jobs. But at the same time, I want to be useful, so if they really need more people at the bank, I will do that.


I had an intense conversation with Daniel last night about Rwanda’s colonial history and the genocide. It’s the kind of topic that I want to hear about from people here, but you can’t just ask because you never know how affected people were. But earlier he said he moved to Rwanda in 1995 (he grew up in Uganda but is Rwandese) so I knew that at least he was not in the country during genocide. So, we talked about the things that set it in motion, and how the seeds were planted in the 1960s. I thought that it was the Belgians who sent the arms to the Interahamwe, but actually the French were the most involved. They even set up the “turquoise zone” and allowed Interahamwe to flee to Congo. I will go tomorrow to get a book about this, there’s one that came out recently, because I can’t believe that all the things he said are true. I mean, I believe him, but it’s so shocking and really awful that it’s hard to believe it could happen, much less that the French gov’t hasn’t apologized or at least acknowledged their role. We will go to the memorial here, which is supposed to be really good. There are other places you can go, like the church where Tutsis were massacred after they had sought refuge there, and you can still see the bloodstains on the floor and on the wall where they smashed babies’ heads. I don’t know that I want to go see that, or that could ask anyone here to take me, because I’m sure none of them really want to see that.

I feel unprepared to discuss the subject, although it was okay with Daniel, but it’s so hard because in the U.S. (and my life especially) was so shielded from large-scale horror and has been for generations. The Vietnam War was the last huge thing to affect us as a population, and even that was halfway around the world. One ninth of the Rwandese people were killed in three months, and some people that I have met here saw it happen. What am I supposed to say? So far I haven’t talked to anyone who saw things during genocide, but you can kind of tell. Like, if people say they grew up here, you know they were here when it was going on, and many times you can tell who is Tutsi just by looking at them. Also, sometimes if you are talking about peoples’ families, they will say “My mother has died” in this way that is so final, you just know.

Okay, so here is a brief (ha) summary of this week:

Thursday morning I arrived, and went straight to Daniel and Neema’s house. Daniel is at a conference in Uganda, and he will return tonight, so I have not met him yet. Neema has been very nice, but neither of us really knows what to do with the other, so we are both being overly polite. Their house is beautiful, and much different than what I had expected. I have my own room, a big one, and the bed is comfortable. It is much nicer that what I thought it would be, but also more basic in some ways. For example, they do have a toilet like the ones in North America, which I was not expecting, and a tv, dvd player, and a nice sound system. But, the kitchen is a charcoal oven outside, in its own little hut. Right now there is a problem with the water. Normally they have taps that work, but Neema said that for the last few weeks they have not been working, so we have a big barrel of water in the bathroom, and to bathe I use a pitcher (like the kind we make juice in) and pour the water on myself standing over the drain. They don’t have a tub, either, instead there’s a corner of the bathroom that is plastic and has a drain, but when you bathe the water kind of goes everywhere. To drink and brush our teeth we use boiled water, although Neema said that many local people drink the tap water, but that it makes them sick.

Today I was going to bathe, but there is no more water in the barrel. The house boy who goes to get it sometimes comes back with nothing because there are too many people, and they fight over it. So, I busted out the trusty baby wipes… (Thank you, Kate Englund, I would have never thought of that on my own.)

Yesterday I went to the Urwego office and met the other interns. There are four of us, all girls, and I think we will be good friends. Two of them are grad students at Johns Hopkins, and they have both done Peace Corps, one in Mali and one in Benin. The other girl is an undergrad as well, from Wheaton College, which is reassuring because I wouldn’t have liked to be the only undergrad AND the only one who had never been to Africa before. At Urwego, I took my computer to IT to get is set up for the wireless network, and the IT guys laughed at me because my software is too old to be compatible with their system! They spent an hour downloading new things and reconfiguring my system so that it would work. It was funny, because you wouldn’t think that the systems in Rwanda would be so advanced, but actually it makes perfect sense. Because the technology here is so new, they only have the latest versions of everything. Like, everyone has cell phones, but fixed (land line) phones are hard to find and very expensive. I bought a SIM card and some minutes for my phone yesterday, and it was $5 for the card and 5 minutes talk time to the US. Normally, I think it is even less than that, but because I was a mizungu (white person) the woman at the shop knew I had no idea what I was doing, and she just tossed out a number to see if I would bite. Lesson learned, always ask a local how much things should be. Also, must figure out how to Skype.

Saturday, we went to a wedding reception. It was not really like a reception, but more like a ceremony with local traditions. The families of the bride and groom invited each other to share milk from a special gourd that represents them becoming one family, and then the bride served food to the husband’s family and vice versa, also to show the joining of the families. There was lots of traditional dance and drumming, and two choirs who were amazing. The coolest thing about the wedding was how many people were there. Probably more than 500, and these are not rich people. They aren’t poor by Rwandan standards, but when they invited us (the day before) along with everyone at Urwego, I was pretty surprised. To have a wedding with 500 people could cost a year of private college tuition in the states. But Arthur (my boss) explained that things that we care about (such as having expensive caterers and enough chairs for everyone) aren’t really important here. The joy that the bride and groom feel is expressed by the number of people who come, and the community would take it as an insult if someone they loved had a small wedding and didn’t invite everyone. The invitations are issued through announcements at work and church, and also by sending text messages to everybody. One friend of the bride and groom will be in charge of tracking down all the phone numbers of the people they want to invite. Then, those people will bring their friends and families, and there you go. We got there a bit late, and there were no seats left, and barely any standing room. But, because we are guests. People offered to share their chairs. During the part of the ceremony where the families drink the milk, they passed around drinks to all of us as well, to show that we are part of their family, too. But rather than the tradition gourd of milk, it was bottles of Sprite, Fanta, and Coke. We ended up sharing, and when the food came, we shared that too. No one expected to be full from the meal, and were more than happy to share one plate among five or six so that so one would b left out. Then, there was a procession forward to present the gifts. Since I have just found out the previous day, I hadn’t had time to get anything (I hadn’t even changed any money yet) so I didn’t really know what to do. EVERYONE was going forward, and I didn’t want to be all alone on my bench. I was looking around to find someone I knew, when a lady grabbed my arm and pulled me into the line. She had a stack of three or four baskets, and gave me one to give as my gift. I didn’t know her, and didn’t get a chance to ask her name or anything. That really espouses the mentality here, I think: People don’t have very much, but they want to show that they have enough to share, and the community participation and sense of belonging is more important than impressing people, or getting credit for bringing a nice gift. It’s really cool.

On Sunday we went to church, and I was the only white person in a church of maybe almost 1000 people. I see white people at work (there are the four interns, and four other people who are with various NGOs who work there) and because Kigali is the capital, there are government people and aid workers from all over the world, so I think that was the first time I had been the only one in such a large group. It was hilarious, especially because the kids are so unabashed, they came up to me in groups and just stared, or tried to touch me, and said “Hi how are you?” but that is all the English they know. When I walk down the street they give me high-fives. I went with Daniel, my host dad, to church, and he introduced me to tons of people. Many of his friends at church are studying at university (he is too), mostly in business, finance, or economics. So, they have tons of questions for me about things in the U.S. related to that. I’m also surprised at how much they follow foreign politics. The press here is not free, really, and there is only one t.v. channel (run by the government, obviously) so I didn’t know how much information would circulate here. But I’ve had many interesting conversations with people about Bush, U.S. politics in general, and especially conversations about the global community and its impact on the situation of poverty and disease here.

Muraho!

Many stories coming soon...