Met a guy at the market when trying to find a lightbulb and we had a long conversation about so many different topics. He is a father of 6 and he is still not done having babies, so I asked him if he was rich (this isn’t rude here) and he said yes, that is why he is having so many. I told him that I want all my children to go to university and that is why I am only going to have 2 because university is expensive in America. I always try to give concrete reasons for family planning instead of just telling people that they should do it. That doesn’t help. You have to give them reasons why it will benefit them. Then we discussed marriage, and he told me about marriage in the U.S. which are contracts for a certain number of years and after the contract finishes, so does the marriage. I told him there is no such thing, that marriages in the U.S. sometimes end in divorce, but that there aren’t any that have an end date at the beginning. He didn’t believe me and kept telling me about these marriages in the U.S. with contracts. Then we discussed black Americans. He doesn’t think Obama looks black and wonders why we say people who look like him are black when they are very light and then asked me if both my parents were white because I look like Obama. He tried to set me up with the electrician who was near us while we were talking, so I told him I was already engaged and he was very excited to learn that my ‘fiance’ is Rwandan and told me that I must invite him to my wedding and that he will contribute to it. Here, friends and family contribute to the cost of the wedding, so he said he’d give me money or some tablecloths or some laminate flooring (he sells plastic tablecloths and laminate flooring). He bought me a fanta and made me drink it, even though I told him that I must go while the rain was on a hiatus, but he told me that in Rwanda it is very rude and impossible to say no to an offer, so I must stay and drink the fanta he wants to buy me, so I did. It was a funny conversation.

Last week, my boss and I had to walk and take the bus back to Butare after teaching at one of the coffee washing stations because our car was busy with VCT activities in other parts of the district. As we were going, she stopped and talked to the young ladies who were working with the beans and tested them on their health knowledge. Then we followed the trail and ended up at a river, which people were jumping over. Both of us are not seasoned river jumpers, so we stopped and stared for a while, trying to figure out how to jump it without dying, breaking something or getting wet. I threw my bag to a guy on the other side and hopped down to a rock in the middle of the river and up the other side, in one (not so fluid) motion. Then it was my boss’s turn and she had to throw her bags across beforehand also. We both made it unscathed, but we were both laughing hard at our ineptitude. We had to take the bus again, yesterday, but this time asked the ladies with the coffee beans of another way to go. We had to climb a hill and it definitely wasn't a short cut, but it saved us the embarrassment of attempting to jump the river again.

Went to see the gorillas with Piper, a photographer who came to Rwanda to photograph the women drummers who started the ice cream shop. While she was here we hung out a lot and I got to watch the women perform a few times and then after speaking to one of the ladies they enlisted me to be their English teacher for June (they’re busy preparing for a large festival in May). She asked me what I did and I told her I work for SPREAD and teach English to the ladies who work at the ice cream shop and she asked me why I didn’t teach them also, so now I have two English classes, but not until June and then only for a month, cause I’m coming home!

I went into Kigali Monday evening and stayed the night there then met Piper Tuesday, we had lunch at the Indian restaurant in town together before getting on a bus to go up to Ruhengeri and stay the night. We showed up and called the travel agency she had booked through and they took us to a small guesthouse in town. It was nice enough, but quite expensive for what it was, considering how cheap places usually are here, but Ruhengeri is a tourist town, so its hard to find things for cheap. It had hot showers though and that’s really all we cared about! We went out for dinner, watched some CNN while eating and went to bed early, as our driver was picking us up at 6:15am! I took a hot shower, got dressed and ready to go, only to realize that I should have brought a bigger bag. I ended up taking my purple, patent leather handbag up the mountain with me so I could carry my passport, money, gorilla pass, a water bottle, my camera and video camera. It was pretty ridiculous. We drove to the park reception and got out to a table of tea and coffee and waited for others to show up and form groups. We stood around for quite a while chatting with some tourists and then finally a guy told us to come with him and we met our guide. It was just the two of us! It turned out to be really nice just being us. He explained to us the group we were going to see and then we got back into the car and drove up the mountain. We were surrounded by houses and people the entire drive. Rwanda is very crowded! The road was TERRIBLE! I have been on some bad roads in Africa, but my goodness, volcanic rock is the worst! Getting stuck in mud, bumping around on sand, creating huge dust storms have nothing on the incredible bumpiness of volcanic rock roads! When we finally got to the parking site, we got out, were handed a walking stick and proceeded to walk up the road then through pyrethrum farms to the edge of the forest, where we stopped and he explained a bit to us about it. There is a large stone wall around the forest and no one is allowed in unless they get permission and it is to help keep out the buffalo and forest elephants (which I’m not sure still exist). We then climbed over this and up the mountain. My, oh my, it was slippery and difficult! I was very happy when he stopped a few times to explain small things to us, so I could catch my breath. When we got close, we stopped and could see 2 of the gorillas climbing in the trees. We left our sticks behind and approached them. It was crazy to me how much ruckus we could create and they didn’t even flinch. They just kind of lazily gazed at us as we approached and came to a tumbling stop. The first gorillas we saw were 6 of the 12 in the family. A few teenagers, some females and a baby! One of the females kept walking towards us and we had to keep moving back and sideways to make space for her. Watched them eating a bit and then one of the gorillas stood up on a log and beat its chest before flinging itself down towards another. We stayed and watched them for a while before venturing up the mountain a bit further to find the silverback, Charles. We found him and very soon after we arrived, he decided to go down and join the others, so we just followed right behind and ended up where we came from. When we were getting ready to go, I said I still hadn’t seen the silverback’s face and the guide took us down and around so we could see his face. So glad I asked for that! His face is really what makes him look so massive. His head is HUGE! He stared at us and looked so bored and uninterested. Seems like he was thinking “will you stop staring at me and just go? I’m tired.” It was drizzling a bit while we were on the mountain so it was truly ‘gorillas in the mist’. One of the most fascinating things was that as we sat looking at the group, you could see the town below. People’s houses and farms were right there. I guess I always thought of wild animals deep in the jungle, but these gorillas truly are right on the edge of civilization. It is so necessary to educate the surrounding community and ensure their understanding and appreciation of these animals or it would be so easy to push them out. I pretty much slid the entire way down the mountain, sitting on stinging nettles and was covered in mud by the time I got back to the car. We drove back down and I had the guy stop at the market for me so I could buy a plastic bag to put my dirty clothes in to bring back to Kigali. We also stopped at a small craft shop for Piper to buy some souvenirs to bring home, as she was leaving the next day. Got back to the guest house, showered, changed and then went to town to eat some lunch and jump on a bus to Kigali. All in all, TOTALLY WORTH IT! It was so much fun. The rest of the week was full of birthday celebrations for Adam’s mom and me. Had dinner at his aunt’s and I finally met his grandmother. She is so cute and was so funny when I greeted her in Kinyarwanda, she just giggled and giggled. Next day, we had drinks and a delicious dinner of thai curry and sushi and then Adam and I went out with friends to a new bar and had some drinks and hookah then we went dancing until morning. Saturday, we went to a friend’s BBQ and then had a party at the house for me with a big chocolate cake! I stayed until Tuesday because my boss was coming in for a meeting and said she would drive me back to Butare. There was some super intense rain and I had to run up to my house and hurry in. Except I had put a padlock on the door and I forgot. It was dark, so I just kept pushing on the door confused until I felt it and pulled it off. I hadn’t even locked it! The next morning the housegirl came to clean and when I went to open the side door for her I saw the point of a pick ax wedged between the door! I called her over and she clucked her tongue, said it was a thief and then said god is good cause he didn’t get in. I went out and pulled it out and saw they had first tried to get at the handle and lock before trying lower to pop the lock out of the doorjam. When I tried the key it wouldn’t turn. She then tried, failed and went next door to get the houseboy because he has “ingufu”, strength. He couldn’t turn the lock either and she explained to him what had happened and he told me to let him know when I leave next time and he’ll watch the house more closely. I put the ax in my house so they couldn’t find it and use it again. I talked to the police on Thursday morning and they told me they’d talk to my neighbor and try to figure things out. The gate between my house and the neighbor’s house was open when I got home, and my housegirl told me that is where they escaped. I was really happy that I found it when she was there cause she was able to keep me a calm and we were able to talk about it a bit (considering the language barrier).

"If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart." – Nelson Mandela

I find this quotation to be so true. There has been many times here that I have felt out of place and alone. I would be walking down the road and see a mother glaring at me as she walked past (not knowing that the look on her face was really mean and scary looking) and as soon as I would say “mwaramutse” or “mwiriwe”, she would break out into a smile and say good morning back. When others would shout “Bonjour!” or “Good morning” and I say back the same, but in Kinyarwanda, they are less likely to harass me for money afterwards. Speaking Kinyarwanda has opened so many doors and has started so many conversations for me. I think by far the most common phrase I have heard during my two years here has been “Eh?! Azi Kinyarwanda?!” (What?! She knows Kinyarwanda?) said with excitement and a bit of confusion. So, while I know French would have been a more helpful language for me to learn once I am out in the working world, I am happy to have learned to speak Kinyarwanda and to have this funny, difficult language in my repertoire.

English class has been going well. Taught about nutrition and health and the women already knew the food groups! I was happy and impressed. Decided to teach about health topics because that’s what I know and I don’t know how to teach English, so I get my vocab from health lessons and then teach verbs if needed and how to conjugate, etc. Did a lesson on family planning and HIV/STI prevention and brought in condoms to do a demonstration. The ladies asked if there was HIV in America and if in America we have a drug to cure it. They say drugs here are fake and don’t work well and they say the same about condoms, that the kind they get here are bad and in America we have the good medicines and the good condoms.

So, there's a challenge going on to live like a Peace Corps volunteer for one week. There are different requirements for each country and Rwanda doesn't have its own, but I made up some for people to follow.

This is the schpeal from Peace Corps:

On March 1st this year Peace Corps will be celebrating it’s 50th

anniversary and as a part of the activities in our year long

celebration currently serving volunteers have developed the “Live Like

a Peace Crops Volunteer Challenge” As a participant in this challenge

individuals back in the U.S. are asked to give up some everyday

conveniences for one week, in part to help raise awareness of the

Peace Corps mission and also to give the participant a small taste of

Volunteer life. You have received this email as a part of our March

push to recruit challenge participants. Please take a moment to find

out more about our “Live Like a PCV Challenge” by visiting

LiveLikeaPCV.org even if you decide not to take part you can be a huge

help to us by simply forwarding this email, and if you have a Facebook

account marking our FB page as a favorite. (you can find our face

book page through LiveLikeaPCV.org)

And here are the requirements I created for PC Rwanda:

These are based on my current living conditions and as a disclaimer; I live pretty posh compared to other PCVs both in Rwanda and in other countries.

· Only cold shower, or you can heat up water and put it in a bucket to bathe with.

· Only eat food that you cook. No restaurants! No foods that need refrigeration (cause you don’t have a fridge!)

· Must buy only locally grown produce (fruits and veggies, rice, potatoes, meat, etc.) [I know this is going to be hard, but if you can, do!]

· No packaged foods, no prepared foods [dried pasta, rice, bread okay, no cookies, chips, prepared meals]

· Cannot drink water from the tap! Must first boil the water and let it cool or spend way too much money on bottled water. No cold drinks! (cause again, you don’t have a fridge!) [this is easy to do if you boil your drinking water the night before. By morning it will be cool enough to drink]

· No TV at home, no internet at home. Can use the computer to watch things as long as they are files you own and not streaming from the internet or DVDs.

· Can only use one burner to cook meals with and no oven or microwave!

· Try your hardest to cook in only one pot or pan because you don’t like doing dishes and don’t want a lot to clean up! [haha, I do this all the time!]

· No washer or dryer! Must wash clothes by hand and hang them to dry.

· No dishwasher! Must wash them by hand and put them in a rack to dry or dry with a towel.

· No warm water comes from any tap in the house, can only use cold water. Only cold water is available unless you heat it up yourself on the stove or in an electric kettle.

· Must greet everyone you see [that you know, and some you don’t] with a handshake and asking how they are

· Only use your phone for texting or short phone calls [airtime is expensive!]

· Read an entire book this week

· Watch an entire season of a show (on your computer, you don’t have a TV and you especially don’t have a DVD player… or BluRay!)

· Wear only sandals the entire week

· Sleep under a mosquito net every night

· Can only use cash. No debit cards, no credit cards, but you can get your cash from an ATM

Some things from my old lifestyle (when I lived in the village) and from other PCVs in Rwanda

· Only go to the bathroom outside in a latrine [I know this is impossible, but thought I’d add it because this is SOOOO common]

· In the early evening shower outside using a bucket of water heated in the sun during the day

· Cook outside on a fire or with charcoal, or if you’re fancy with a gas burner

· Only use water obtained from rain or from a tap near your house [you don’t have running water in the house, so you must go outside to get it]

· Lose power for at least 2 hours every night

· Have the water go out for half a day

There was an expo at the university, Thursday and Friday. I had to pretty much do it by myself because my boss ditched me Thursday and Friday didn’t even come. I gave a million condom demonstrations; I wouldn’t give out condoms until they could demonstrate that they knew how to correctly use it. There were many creepy guys, but some who were almost academically interested. Some women came also; I liked talking to them best. I talked about SPREAD and the health program and how it integrates with our coffee program and then a lot about family planning methods and a little about the other things we do. We had a whole table with the different family planning methods available in Rwanda, so that’s what most people saw and asked about. I got into a philosophical debate with a pharmacy student about the emergency contraceptive. He was telling me that in Rwanda abortion is illegal and that some people see this as abortion and that it is not accepted in Rwandan culture. I told him that this pill is legal in Rwanda and that in my view his morals should not interfere with him doing his job. His job is to serve his clients and if they believe that this is something they want, then he is obliged to give it to them. I don’t like the idea of other people making decisions for some. It’s a personal choice and therefore it is up to the individual, not the service provider. Which is why I am pro-choice on abortion and assisted-suicide. Sucks for a service provider if they disagree, but it’s not their place to decide for someone else.

There is a crested crane who has perched in a tree on my road and squaks non-stop in the mornings. They are so beautiful, it’s hard to remember that they are wild and not part of a zoo.

Monday, I taught English and went to gym tonique, took a cold shower and had pasta for dinner with chunky vegetable sauce.

Tuesday, I went out in the field and taught nutrition and incorporated a bit of family planning. You cannot properly breastfeed your child (recommended to two years) if you have another right away. Taught the increased nutritional needs of women when they are pregnant. Then I went home and read, watched how I met your mother, cooked fried rice, had Elizabeth over after she was banging at my gate to get in during the storm and calling me 3 times to let her in and me not hearing it because its impossible to hear during thunderstorms here. What with the rain on the tin roof and the incredibly loud thunder… So, when I finally saw my phone and called her back, she was already at her meeting and soaked to the bone! She stopped by on her way home and ate some dinner and brought me apple juice.

Wednesday, went out to the field again and got stuck out there because the driver came back to town. Had to wait an hour for him to come pick us up after we finished, so didn't get home until after 2:30 and missed English class and was hungry!!! Gym on Wednesday was crazy. Its been raining, so its quite cold here and as soon as i got one foot in the door of the gym, my glasses fogged up! Grosssss! Neither of us were too excited to go to the gym, but pushed each other to go and it ended up not being so bad. Went over to her house after and had a delicious dinner and a hot shower and stayed the night.

Few things I forgot to mention about vacation: while at a bar in Nairobi two Israeli guys asked me if I was Israeli! Was wearing my hair down and curly, so think that might have been it. Adam and I went to visit one of his brothers who has triplets in Dar. They were crazy, but super cute and kept yelling “bye auntie!!!” as we were leaving (and bye uncle, but that’s not as cute, haha).

Had my COS (close of service) conference in Gisenyi. Stayed at the Serena! The fanciest hotel in Gisenyi, with hot showers and comfy beds and giant comfy robes and slippers. I wanted to steal a towel so badly! The only crappy part was that we were stuck in the conference room until dark most days, but I still swam in the pool one night. And the amazing food! I ate sooo much! Lots of different cheeses, a pasta bar where you get to choose your ingredients and they make it for you, an omelet bar in the morning with like 6 different cereals to choose from. That was awesome.

Had dinner with one of Adam’s brother’s wife. She works for Save the Children, so I told her about a job I want and hopefully she’ll be able to hook me up! After we watched jets/patriots game, didn’t get home until 3am!

When I got back in Butare, 8 monkeys jumped across the path on my way home. I taught English to the ice cream shop women, taught the word greed, but didn’t know how to explain it well, so I told them it was in the Bible. One girl had an English version of the New Testament, so we looked up Luke 12:15-31. I got two ice creams because Richard came to buy milk and bought me one (I had already gotten one for myself when I first arrived and was waiting for the ladies to be ready). I now teach them every Monday and Wednesday afternoons, most times with Elizabeth, but sometimes alone.

Ran into my host mom and baby on way to work two days in a row. Went to lunch at their house the third day. We ate with our hands, ubugari (cassava paste) and a vegetable mélange with dried fish in it. Didn’t realize there were fish until I bit into one… I shared a bowl with baby and was pretty sure I was going to be sick, but it ended up being okay. After eating baby brought in some more water to wash our hands and she spilled some in the hallway. As Queen (the older daughter) was leaving, she slipped in the water and then just ran out of the house. Mom, dad and I all started laughing so hard, then we went and told her sorry and asked if she was okay. The girls did my hair, and baby called me “Alicia wanjye” (my Alicia).

Watched the U-17 football championship match between Rwanda and Burkina Faso. We lost, but it was a really exciting, fun game. It was absolute madness trying to get in though. We decided to get some food before going in and then by the time we got there, they said it was full and we couldn’t go in. We tried lots of things and there was a lot of pushing and pulling, but they let the other white people we were with through, so they then kept trying to get the rest of us in. Wore them down with their annoying insistence, so we finally got in and then got front row seats!

Had lunch with nuns and afterwards they gave me a girl to clean my house. Beforehand, I had to pray with them in French in their chapel at the house. I tried to follow along, but got lost many times and wasn’t too keen on singing.

Been going to gymtonique with my friend Elizabeth every Monday and Wednesday. It’s so hilarious. The guy who ‘teaches’ wears the shortest shorts and makes us do the funniest things. We run in circles, jump up and down, kick the air, do ‘butt kickers’, jump side to side and then there’s this one song when it comes on, we partner up and slap each others hands while jumping in the air, then we hook arms and swing round and round, both standing and squatting. Then we squat jump in a circle forwards and backwards, it’s quite a quad workout! I’m constantly laughing, but think it’s a great workout because there is no way I would jump in place for 5 minutes on my own. I’d get bored and stop.

The 31st (yesterday) Elizabeth and I went to gymtonique and on the way back we stopped to get her airtime, then saw lightning. Neither of us had food at our house, so we were planning on going out to dinner and had texted another friend to meet us at the restaurant at 8:15. Gymtonique went a little long, so we ended up leaving before it was completely finished and as soon as we finished putting the airtime on her phone, we saw the rain. We saw it and saw people running before we felt it. We were already outside and the restaurant wasn't too far, so we decided to run for it. We ran in the pouring rain down a muddy road in the dark. The only time I could see where I was going was if a moto passed me or if the lightning lit up the road. At one point I stopped to see where Elizabeth was and couldn't see her, so I started running again, then realized she might have fallen in a ditch or twisted her ankle in a pot hole, so I stopped again and she was right behind me! Just couldn't see or hear her. I wore my glasses, so they were covered in rain drops and fogging up, so my vision was thoroughly impaired, but I made it with no broken bones or twisted ankles! When we got in though, the lady who owns the place just clucked her tongue at us and said "sorry", then told us she would get us towels, but they were in the other building and she'd have to walk through the rain to get them, so she didn't. I asked if they had a dryer (we were at a big fancy hotel!) and they said no, but the guy I asked offered me his jacket. I was soaking wet for the two hours we were at the hotel, and Elizabeth offered her hot shower and bed, so even though I didn't have a change of clothes or my toothbrush, I accepted and she let me borrow clothes and i brushed with my finger. I was freezing!

Went to Kenya with Adam and met his college roommate. We had a lot of fun. Nairobi is awesome! Had some great food (got some sushi, which I didn’t have in the states), watched a movie in a real cinema, hung out in real shopping malls. When we were in the mall, we decided to look in at the Japanese restaurant to see if we wanted to eat there and ran into one of Adam’s friend’s parents. He knows everyone everywhere. Don’t think there is a country we could go to without running into someone who knows and loves him. So, they had us eat lunch with them and invited us to their house the next day. Had some good vegetarian sushi. They live in Karen, which is a suburb of Nairobi and is named after Karen von Blixen, the woman who wrote Out of Africa. You might have seen the movie with Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. I’ve watched the movie before and knew it was at the base of the Ngong hills, but 1. I didn’t know where the Ngong hills were and 2. didn’t realize that the expanse of wild land she lived on is in Nairobi! one of the biggest and busiest capitals on the continent. The mom took us to Karen Blixen’s house and we took a tour of it, then we went to the Giraffe center, but it was already closed. I was so excited to play with giraffes, so I was super disappointed. Ya’ll know how much I love animals. Then we went back to the house and had a nice big dinner and then went back into his old roommate’s part of Nai and met up with other friends for the night.

We left on Monday to Dar Es Salaam and when we got off of the plane we got hit with a wet, stifling heat. We had to endure this heat the entire week. Every morning we would wake up early, sticky and disgusting and never could just lay in bed and relax, had to jump up and shower and get out of the house! Did a lot of visiting family; dad, sisters, and brothers. One day we went to the beach and it was great! The only time I wasn’t constantly covered in a layer of sweat. Went swimming and then lay in lounge chairs with an umbrella and a nice cool breeze. The beaches are beautiful, the water is nice, but if you want to spend time in the city or pretty much anywhere else, it’s HOT! Went to a shopping center so we could walk in the air conditioning, sat at an outdoor restaurant with a breeze and fans and even choose our lunch location one day based on the fact that they had AC. It was nice to meet the other side of the family and see Adam’s old house and school and stomping grounds AND they have a Subway restaurant! We ate there twice and it was wonderful. Didn’t have any Subway when I was home, but I got some in Tanzania! One evening, Adam’s sister and sister-in-law took me to a kitchen party, a party they have with only women before the wedding. I’m not going to go into details, but it’s a party to teach the bride things she needs to know to be a good wife. I was there for a different night, but one night it is all about cooking. It was a very interesting experience and I was glad they brought me and that was the night I got home and finished watching the movie I had started on the flight from San Fran to Amsterdam. Adam was out with some of his brothers when I was with some of the sisters. When he got home, we went out and met up with one of his friends at the fancy bar we went to the night before, only the night before it was a lot less crowded and a bit more fun. And that night, a girl said hi to Adam and then came over to him later in the night and asked if he was from Kigali. She recognized him! Haha

Overall, the vacation was really nice. Had some fun and good food, met some of Adam’s friends from middle school all the way up to college and got to meet the other side of the family. But we were both glad to be back in Rwanda with the wonderful climate and be able to use a blanket again!

Went home, saw friends and family and it was great, but too short. I was sooo not ready to be back on an airplane! And everything got mixed up. In Seattle, I asked for my bags to be checked all the way through because I had a 23 hours lay over in Amsterdam and didn’t want to be carrying them around with me (I packed a LOT). She tried doing it and it wouldn’t let her even though the night before we called KLM and asked if they would be able to keep the bags during a 23 hour lay over and they said yes, anything less than 24 hours. Well since the time change and everything, I left Seattle on the 7th and didn’t leave Amsterdam until the 9th so it showed me having 2 days of travel and the computer wouldn’t let her check the bags through. We tried a million things and then she finally went and asked someone else and he said to check them to San Francisco and try doing it there. That I did, but when I got to San Fran, I wasn’t on my flight any more; my name was there, but I wasn’t booked! She must have unbooked me from my flight when we were trying to figure everything out, so I had to call Alaska airlines and get things situated, but while I was on the phone the lady at the desk said, Oh, okay, I got you, so we hung up (Auntie K and her friend met me at the airport and helped me). Checked the bags through and had some lunch, a sourdough bread bowl! Yum! I also got pasta to take on the flight with me because since I was unbooked I was unsure if they’d have my vegetarian meal. Turns out they didn’t, but I got a good seat, a 3 seat block to myself! Got into Amsterdam, played around the airport, got bored, went out and got more bored and it was FREEZING! I was so cold, I bought a long sleeved shirt and scarf from H&M. I wanted to go out and see the city, but figured if I was dying in the airport, going out into the elements probably wasn’t a good idea. So, I sat and read, fell asleep, ate a sandwich, looked in shops, etc. Then when I went to catch the train, it didn’t show up! I had someone waiting for me at the train station to pick me up and I was late! I felt so bad! When I finally got in, he drove me to Adam’s cousin’s house and I hung out with his wife and the two kids. She is really cool and I really enjoyed talking to her and the kids are so cute! His cousin got home right after I went to bed, so I didn’t see him until morning when he took me to the airport. Again, I wasn’t booked on the flight, and I was afraid I’d have to call Alaska again to figure it out, but Europe is a lot more lax than the states, and the guy she called just put me back on it. Thank goodness! I got through security pretty quickly, but still had to zoom over to my gate. This flight was FULL! And I got a crappy seat. In the middle of the middle behind the bathrooms, so no seat in front of me with a screen. As I was getting ready for landing, a guy came and sat in the seat at the end of our row (he moved earlier because the lady next to me had a baby and they wanted her to have two seats) and pulled up the screen that was below the seat!!! I spent 10 hours on the plane thinking I didn’t have a screen to watch things! I kept thinking, I should just ask if they have a portable one to bring me, but never did and on the previous flight, I started a movie and didn’t finish it because I though, Oh, I’ll just finish it on the next flight! Bah! But Adam’s brother in Tanzania had the movie, so I watched it at his house and it was actually better because I could finally hear what was being said. I hate those crappy headphones they give you on planes. Made it back to Kigali with no problems and Adam met me at the airport. I felt bad because he had to work the next morning and my bags didn’t show, so I had to spend about an hour trying to figure out how to get them back. Got one the next day and one the day after.

During a nutrition training I got asked what food category urusenda (chili pepper) is in and I said, none really, its just kind of for taste, then one boy said something and everyone giggled. My driver translated for me and I guess it’s said that if you eat urusenda then your sex will be hot. Hahaha. My driver loves to make jokes and always has to explain them to me afterwards. On the way to the meeting with the youth health workers, he told me that one of the mountains was called ibisi by’umucecuru (unfertile land of the old lady, or something like that) and he doesn’t know why. He thinks that an old lady must have lived on that hill. We forgot to tell the CHA’s that they needed to come back tomorrow for a lesson on growing mushrooms (we started a mushroom project to help get more protein into a persons diet) and so we drove up the path they were walking on and he yelled out to two of the guys, “hey, give me that money back!” (we give them money for transportation when they come for a training) and the guys looked so sad and started to reach into their pockets. He then told them he was joking and they all had a good laugh.

On my way home from work on Thursday, a secondary school student stopped me on the road and said she has seen me walking often and that she likes white people and wants to be my friend. Her English was really good and we had a nice, short conversation and exchanged numbers. It’s school break right now, so she was heading to Kigali to stay with her family during break and when she comes back we’ll hang out. Friday, I went and hung out with Richard and Elizabeth at their house for a bit before Adam came. We met up with them again Friday night at the bar and then 3 of Adam’s friends from Kigali were there on their way to Bujumbura for the weekend, so we all hung out together and then went to the club. While Adam and I were dancing, the pants that I finally got around to fixing this week (I got them taken in because they were too big) ripped right up the back! All the way! So, he helped cover me and I took off my over-shirt and tied it around my waist and we just went home. The pants are completely ruined; no way can they be fixed. The rip is a good foot and a half long from the waist to the thigh! It was so embarrassing, but hilarious. Saturday, we watched some football and then Richard and Elizabeth met up with us and a lady whom they gave a ride to earlier in the week called and met up with us at the bar. Turns out she is CRAZY! We all were just in shock at her and couldn’t wait for her to leave and then had a good laugh about it. She said something about Richard and Adam being spies? Haha

Ran into Canisius, a nurse from the clinic in Mwezi who is now at a health center in Simbi, about a half hour from Butare. He called me when he got in, but I didn’t hear my phone and just happened to see him on the road. It was funny. I think his English has gotten even worse than when he lived in the village because we spoke only in Kinyarwanda. It was good to see him. Monday morning, as I was walking to work, I heard “Ali!” and turned and saw Nepo walking, so we said hi and asked how each other were. It’s nice, I feel like now I am starting to be part of the community. Having people to talk to on the street and such. Monday and Tuesday, I went into the field and gave the post-test for the nutrition lesson I gave. I also read over their monthly reports and answered any questions they had and then gave a short refresher on the nutrition information. Monday, someone asked me what to do if the mother is sick and she is breastfeeding. I told her that even if the mother is sick, she should still breastfeed before 6 months of age. There are not good replacement foods here and the ones that are good (the Nestle formula) are way too expensive for the majority of Rwandese to buy it. I also told them that if the mother cannot produce milk while she is sick then they should give the child goat milk instead of cow milk, which is more common practice. Goat milk is much more nutritious, but isn’t as commonly used. The problem I have though is if they will really listen to me and take me seriously. I can just be saying these things and answering their questions, but they may just be like “yeah, okay muzungu” and not change their actions. I try to explain to them why they should do this or that, but when there are deep-seated traditions or ways of thinking, it takes a lot more than just one session with someone to change their ways. Even if they believe that it is better, the community might think they are being strange by doing things the new way and so they won’t do it. It takes a long time for behaviour change and it takes many people changing their beliefs and ways before it becomes a common practice.

Tuesday, I did the same with the other group of youth community health agents and there weren’t as many questions. I don’t know if they were just not asking or if they really didn’t have any. It’s hard to tell. I did get asked what food category urusenda (chili pepper) is in and I said, none really, its just kind of for taste, then one boy said something and everyone giggled. My driver translated for me and I guess it’s said that if you eat urusenda then your sex will be hot. Hahaha. My driver loves to make jokes and always has to explain them to me afterwards. On the way to the meeting with the youth health workers, he told me that one of the mountains was called ibisi by’umucecuru (unfertile land of the old lady, or something like that) and he doesn’t know why. He thinks that an old lady must have lived on that hill. We forgot to tell the CHA’s that they needed to come back tomorrow for a lesson on growing mushrooms (we started a mushroom project to help get more protein into a persons diet) and so we drove up the path they were walking on and he yelled out to two of the guys, “hey, give me that money back!” (we give them money for transportation when they come for a training) and the guys looked so sad and started to reach into their pockets. He then told them he was joking and they all had a good laugh.

After work, Trish and I met up and went shopping for gifts to bring home. I am so poor now! Bought way too much (awesome) stuff, but still have more things to buy! I want to bring home coffee so people can taste it and the tea and I just have so many things I want to share that I just keep buying and buying. One more week and then I’ll be in the US!

I’ve been sick, so I have had to go in and out of Kigali the last week. Its annoying, but was nice seeing Adam on week days. My doctor at the hospital was really cool too. It sucked because I had to wait almost 3 hours to be seen, but it was nice once I got in there. He explained everything and was showing me all kinds of stuff. He was really nice.

Saturday, I went to a wedding of a friend of a friend. One weekend a couple months ago the lady next to me on the bus started talking to me, then stole my iPod for an hour and we exchanged numbers. Well, turns out she works at the church next door to me, so I have run into her on occasion in town or on the road on her way to work, so one time she invited me to the wedding of the girl who was sitting on the bus beside her. They go to the same church. I said sure and she gave me an invitation. I see her all the time and she’s one of my only ‘friends’ in town and I live right next door to the church, so I felt obliged to go. I showed up 40 minutes late, but the pastor was still preaching away. He was up on stage while the two couples (they do simultaneous weddings here) were sitting below him facing the crowd. Both grooms had on white suits with red shirts underneath. But not just any white suit, shiny white suits! One was pin striped with satin or something shiny, the other was just all over shiny and the red shirts beneath were satin as well, so they were shining away! The groom that I was there for had a bright red shiny shirt, with a white and gold brocade tie (it looked kind of like a curtain or some sort of upholstery), the other groom had a more subdued, darker red, but it was still satiny and shiny (I don’t remember what his tie was like). The pastor was talking to the husbands telling them to respect their wives and something about not beating them because they are now one and one cannot beat oneself. Then he came down to the couples and they swore to love each other forever, exchanged rings (while reading vows off of a piece of paper) and then the grooms lifted their brides veils to show the crowd how beautiful their wives were. They did it soooo slowly though. It was funny. The grooms slowly rolled up the veils and then… nothing. No kiss. Nothing. They just stood there. The best man and maid of honor kept wiping the faces of the couples and fixing their clothes and jewelry, all on camera and in front of us all. It was strange. Then the couples got down on their knees and people stood around them and prayed and then a giant dancing party showed up and the collection bowl was set out, not for the couples, but for the church like it was regular Sunday. The pastor had all the married people in the church stand up and wave to the new couples to welcome them into their new life as married people and then had us single people stand up and wave goodbye to them.

After the church ceremony, we all drove over to the museum and took pictures in the gardens and with the kings palace house. I didn’t bring my camera cause I figured I wouldn’t need it, this being the 5th wedding I’ve been to and I don’t really know the couple, but now am I so upset! They were really nice pictures and we took ones in front of the house and in the house. They kept pulling me into the pictures and I wasn’t dressed all that fancy, so I felt a bit self-conscious. We went to the Petit Prince hotel afterwards for the reception and they had a huge cake stand with 8+ cakes and a banana tree in the middle of the cake stand and they had tied bunches of small bananas to the tree. The bride and groom fed each other wine and then went over to the tree and picked a banana and fed it to the other. Everyone got very excited at this point and were all yelling and whistling at the couple. The choir came and sang songs, they cut up the cakes and passed out pieces of it with napkins and we all drank sodas. Then I decided I had enough (it was about 4 hours by this time) and was supposed to meet up with the RPCV who has moved to Butare and was already 20 minutes late, so I told my friend that I had to go and she pointed out to me the way I should walk. It was a nice, quiet walk; not many people around.

Met up with Richard (the RPCV) a while later and we went into town and met up with 3 of his friends from Kigali who spent the day hiking in Nyungwe and were spending the night in Butare. We had dinner and then were going to go get drinks, but they were charging a cover and we refused on principle. So, we went to Richard’s house instead and I got to see it and we had a beer on the balcony overlooking the valley. Then I walked home with a headlamp.

My new friend calls me by my Kinyarwanda name only. All during the wedding she would introduce me as Mukobwajana, or when she needed to get my attention she’d call it out and I had no problem responding immediately. I really respond to that name now and know that if I hear it someone is talking to me. At the PC office, in the official PC database, my name is Kimbrel, Alicia Mukobwajana! Haha Everyone always asks the same questions when they hear my name. "do you know what it means?" and even if I say yes, I know what my name means, i've had it for two years, they still explain it to me. Its annoying. I know what my name means!!!!

On Sunday, my landlady came over and told me that they’d have to construct something at my house to catch the rainwater. She said they would come on Monday and I said that was fine, and they could come at 7. There were a lot of other words exchanged, but I don’t know what she said, and she doesn’t know what I said. She speaks a lot of French to me and honestly, its more confusing than if she’d just speak Kinya. When she was leaving she said that she would call my boss, Jeanne (I’m guess to explain to her, so she could explain to me in English). Later that day, she showed up again with the village leader. He is a lecturer at the University, so he speaks English well and he explained to me that they’re fixing the roads, so my rain water can’t go out onto the road anymore, so they have to build a rainwater catchment thing. Then he told me that I had to turn on my outdoor light every evening to make the street safer for those who walk along it. He said there are thieves on the road, but that they come from Save, a neighboring town, not Butare. He was very insistent on this point. haha. I asked him to ask my landlady to put back the outdoor light on her house because I don’t have one on that side of my house and hers shines on the outdoor sink that I do my dishes in. The last month I haven’t been able to see to do my dishes because her light went out. I also showed her my sink, which is broken and won’t turn off unless you use the knob below the sink. Its annoying, but livable, so I don’t think she is going to fix it for me.

The construction guys came Monday morning along with my maid, who has been gone the last 2 weeks! I was so happy she came back! I was trying to find another one, but to no avail, so I was doing my own laundry and dishes and was getting tired of it and I really didn’t want to mop the house (but I did clean the bathroom). She said she has been sick and then something about breastfeeding… I don’t know what that was about. The guys who came dug a huge hole in my concrete and were pulling out all this rich, dark earth, so I thought, ‘that’s some good, fertile soil. I should use that for my garden!’ So, I told the guys not to take it out and dump it wherever they were dumping it and to instead put it in my garden. Well, they decided to help me build a real garden and we borrowed the hoe from the neighbor and then collected rocks to make a barrier around it and make a nice little garden! The guys were there until the evening and one stayed a LONG time because he got stuck in the rain. It started raining a little after 5pm and then it just kept up and it got dark. I last saw him peeping in my window around 6:30. I don’t know when he left, but he must have walked home in the dark in the pouring rain (this was no light rain!). Poor guy.

The next morning, I got up late after battling with the crows on my roof before 6 and so didn’t leave the house until around 8:30, when I opened my gate, the guy who got stuck in the rain was sitting there outside my gate, so I handed him the lock to the outside gate and went on my way. I then thought about how long he probably had been sitting there. They came at 7 the morning before and most Rwandese start work as soon as the sun is up (6am), so he could have been sitting there for an hour and a half at the least! I don’t know how to say ‘knock’ in Kinyarwanda or else I would have told him its okay to knock and I’ll let him in. At work, I got really into making amazon wishlists of food I want to bring back to Rwanda with me, so didn’t leave the office until 1pm for lunch and when I went out, I found out that I was locked in the office! I only have a key to my office, not to the front door! I tried the backdoor and the side door and all were locked! I called my boss and she laughed and said she would call our receptionist, who lives nearby, to come let me out. I saw the guard/landscaper and asked him to let me out, but he didn’t have a key. He told me the key was 'wapi' and to 'ihangane'. I only had to wait 15 minutes, so it wasn’t too bad, but it was funny and a bit embarrassing. I went into town to buy a few things and ran into Madison, another PCV, while she was walking the other direction but said she was going to the market soon, so I waited for her there after shopping. While I was waiting, I bought an airtime card and the guy scratched it for me and I won a bandana! I haven’t bought airtime in a long time, so I didn’t even know they were having this promotion. The guy selling the card said he didn’t have one and then tried to take the card from me. I took it back and then he said, ‘okay, go to the store and they’ll give it to you’. Madison and I walked over there and picked up my free, bright yellow bandana. We then went to the market and sat in the café and had lunch. After lunch we waited for the VSO volunteer to come in and then sat together for a while talking and then two more VSO walked in and sat with us. We were at the café about 5 hours! But the TV was on and we had a fun time laughing at the ridiculous music videos that were showing and then the stupid MTV shows, Punk’d and Room Raiders and I stole some movies from Madison’s external hard drive. Madison came back to my house for a bit before her bus left.

Tuesday, I called Abdoul to meet up with him for lunch because he called the night before and wanted to get together and I don’t like leaving my house after dark. He ended up being about 20 minutes late, and since I went to a buffet place to eat, I was finished by the time he came. The buffet place I had never been before, and while I was dishing myself food, a lady came to me and said its 600 francs if she serves me, and 900 if I do it myself. I think they do that because here when people serve themselves they take a massive amount of food! But I wasn’t getting meat or half of the carbs they were serving, so I didn’t want her to serve me because she would load my plate with carbs and give me meat, so I said I would do it myself. Then she asked me after I was done if I was having meat and I said no, and I thought she said it was cheaper without meat. So, when I was leaving, she was no where to be found and I just left 700 francs on the table, cause I took a normal amount of food and no meat, and went to the supermarket to buy some things. She tracked me down and demanded the other 200 and I didn’t have any, so I had to break a bill and give it to her. It was stupid. The rules here are ridiculous. I took a small amount of food and no meat, so I don’t think I should have had to pay 900, but I did in the end. Abdoul finally called while I was at the market and we met at the café in the supermarket and ran into two VSO volunteers. We sat with them and Abdoul ordered lunch and then another VSO showed up, so we had a big table of people. We hung out for a while, while they were eating, talking and I found out that one of the VSO, the last one to arrive, lives here in Butare, so we exchanged numbers and now I might have another friend! She was pretty cool. I wandered around town for a bit and saw the other 2 VSO getting onto their motor bike (yeah, they are not only allowed to ride motos, they get to drive them too!) and so I helped them with their bags while they got on and watched them drive away. Ran into a PCV on her way back to site and then went home and did my laundry and dishes (my maid hasn’t showed up in two weeks), talked to mom and read a bit, before getting a text from the RPCV I had dinner with last week asking if I wanted to meet up. I met him and one of his friends at a motel for drinks and they got brochettes and beer and some chips, which I helped out on. We got one plate of chips and they each got a brochette, then we were still hungry (it was about 7pm), so ordered another plate of chips and he got one more brochette and his friend left. They brought two plates of chips and two brochettes! I guess they know the guy and gave them for free and we did end up almost finishing both plates. I got a call from another PCV who was staying in town that night with her parents and met up with her after leaving the motel and they were having fondue! I didn’t know that we had fondue in this town! It was just the hot oil fondue to cook meat, but they offered me some salad (which I took gratefully to try and get some thing other than fried potato into me) and we had a nice night talking and they bought me dessert and then drove me home! It was a nice night meeting up with so many people. I got home at 10:30pm. I usually get home from work, eat lunch, read for hours, cook dinner and watch something on my computer before going to bed, so it was a nice interruption to my ‘routine’.

Spent Halloween weekend in Kigali. We went to a place called One Love and it was filled with people in costume. It was a lot of fun. We danced and met new people and just had a lot of fun. I dressed up as a Chilean miner (which was easy cause I just put on my hiking boots, my headlamp and tied a rope around me with a carabiner), Adam went as Clayton Bigsby from Chappelle Show and there were a lot of other funny costumes, such as a girl who was John Benet Ramsey, a Baobab tree, a shower, a disco ball, etc.

On the way back from Kigali, I got a double seat to myself and was so excited, until we went down the hill and a grandma with TWO kids got into the seat next to me! It was the seat over the wheel, so there is very little legroom. She sat in the seat, put her legs up on the wheel, then put one of the kids on her lap and the other between her and me on the seat. They were small, so didn’t take up a lot of space, but still. Then someone was bringing back a giant number of cushions, so the guy next to me put one on his flippy seat, the guy next to him put one under his bum, one behind him and one on the side of him next to the window. Then the rest were passed around for people to sit on and a group of 5 tied together were placed in the doorway of the bus. Halfway home, the guy in the flippy seat got off the bus, so I put the girl next to me in the flippy seat, only to have to put her back 5 minutes later when we stopped and picked up more people. Then the girl got tired and leaned forward and rested her head between my backpack on my lap and the seat in front of us. It looked so uncomfortable, she was leaned to the side with her head wedged between the seat and the backpack, so I pulled her up and just had her lay on me; but then I got really hot and the villagers on the bus hate wind. There was one guy who was fighting with the others about keeping his window open because it was hot and they don’t like wind, no matter if they’re sweating or not. I liked that guy.

I've been in a war with the crows that land on my roof. They are so loud!!! They land with a crash, then click along my tin roof with their talons and just make it impossible to sleep! I get woken up anywhere between 5:30-7am, usually right at 6am. I don’t usually get up until 7, so it’s very annoying. I have been getting up, throwing rocks at them and then crawling back into bed. One morning though, they jumped on the roof around 5:50 and came back 4 times! So, I had to get up, put on slippers, unlock the door, grab a rock and throw it, go back in, lock the door and climb back into bed 4 separate times!!!! It was so annoying. I HATE those birds. Adam came one weekend and I ended up getting sick Friday night, so we pretty much just hung out at the house all weekend while I rested. Pretty boring. I felt bad.

I got a call Tuesday from a PCV in the East asking if I wanted a free beer from a RPCV from Benin who just moved to Rwanda and was in Butare for the night. I of course said yes, and told him to give my number to the guy. He called and we met up at one of the hotels where we had beers and dinner. Abdoul ran into us and so sat with us and he bought Abdoul dinner and a soda as well. It was really nice of him and we had a good conversation. He'll be here about 10 months working at the university on a Fulbright scholarship.

I got to go out to the field by myself for the first time last week. Everyone was very busy and they told me to go by myself, so the driver and I went and I had him come in with me in case I needed a translator. I did. I collected their reports, gave them the work plans and had them fill them out for the next month and did all the usual tasks, then asked if anyone had questions. Most of them were confused a bit by the method beads we handed out last month. They’re a family planning method like the rhythm method, but using beads so it’s a bit easier. I explained it to them using a mix of Kinyarwanda and English, which my driver translated for me. They were confused on how to use it and also had some questions about other methods and which are the best to use and where they can get the beads. A lot of what we do is in collaboration with the ministry of health. We take what they want to be taught and give the information to the health agents to spread in the community. So, with the method beads, the villagers who are taught about them want to have the beads and ask where they can buy them, but they are available for free at the health center and when they go to the health center, they are able to hear about the other methods and choose which is right for them as well as get a check up to make sure they are healthy enough for the other methods (this is what I had to explain to the health agents).

I went to Kigali this weekend for Adam’s graduation from the leadership academy thing he did. It was nice, on the top floor of the Rwandan Development Board building. There were speakers and presentations and then drinks and appetizers. I went on a shopping spree the day before trying to find a dress to wear. Found a pretty coral colored strapless dress from Express, but it was a size 12! So, I looked at other dresses and found 2 that were really nice, but he wanted too much for them and so I went back and got the coral one and got it taken in and had the lining shortened (after she took it in, the lining was showing out the bottom) all for 9,000Frw! (about $15), the other dress he was wanting almost $40! It’s used! After the graduation ceremony, Adam had blackjack night with the boys, so I went and met up with Sonia and two of her friends at a restaurant in town. While we were talking, the guy sitting next to me mentioned that he works on an online database for the ministry of health, so I said, “oh, yeah I was just using one of those yesterday” and he asked which one and I told him and turns out he is the guy who I had to talk to on Thursday when my boss got confused. I was just on my computer, having no idea what she is doing and she comes up to me and asks me to help her and hands me the phone. So, the majority of the time I was on the phone, I was talking with my boss trying to figure out what she wanted me to ask the guy! It was a bit embarrassing and I felt bad for him, especially because it turned out that she was on a different webpage and he had no idea of that database and was wondering why we called him to explain someone else’s webpage… It turned out ok once I realized that we shouldn’t be talking to this guy about this and I hung up. So, that night we laughed together about it and when he was leaving he yelled back to me “I’ll talk to you later!”, haha. We then went over to a guy’s house and everyone there was francophone, so I felt a little dumb that I wasn’t fluent in French and was just standing around nodding my head. It was a beautiful house though! His dad had it built in the 60’s and it has a huge outdoor sitting area with a giant fireplace and a full bar, very good for entertaining. I want something similar when I finally buy a house. Then we went to a UN party for a guy moving to Congo. It was pretty nice, but everyone knew each other cause they all work together, so I didn't have many people to talk to. So, I danced. Met up with Adam and the boys at Papyrus afterwards.

Sunday, it was raining like crazy when I had to leave to catch the bus, so I decided to stay until Monday morning. Adam and I went and met up with the boys to watch the Arsenal game and then went to a fancy dinner at the new asian restaurant. I had phad thai and while it didn’t taste completely like phad thai, it was good. Adam got chicken satay for appetizer and I stole some of the sauce and it was amazing! I wish they had a veggie satay dish. Woke up early and caught the 7am bus to Butare and was at work with ample time to spare before heading out to the field. (I’m sitting at work now writing this waiting to go out.)

Monday it was 110 degrees out in the sun! HOT, but surprisingly didn’t feel excruciating. Went into work and played on the internet after writing up the plan for the nutrition component for 2011. Went out to lunch with Abdoul, then came home and read after a short workout with my jump rope. My bosses want me to teach them English, which I really don’t want to do…at all… but I said I’d do it. So, was waiting for them to come when one of them showed up at my gate saying she was trying to call to tell me she and the other couldn’t come (I was talking to mom and there’s no call waiting). Right after she left, it started raining for the first time in almost 2 weeks.

Tuesday, went into work and played on the internet again. My boss was working on the data in Excel and called me in to help her with creating a new page. It was pretty funny how easy it was, but she caught on quick, so I didn’t have to sit and go over and over it. Went and bought a few things at the shop on the way home for lunch (bread and yogurt). Pretty boring day.

Wednesday morning I was having trouble closing my lock for my gate and a lady walking by yelled up “bonjour!” so I said good morning, then told her my lock was broken and she came up to help me. While she was trying and failing, she recruited two boys walking on the road to come up and help, they couldn’t do it either and told me I needed oil, so I opened the gate and yelled over the fence at the houseboy next door for oil. He brought it, I handed my lock over the fence and he oiled it and opened and closed it a few times (after I passed him my keys). I said thank you and the boys were still waiting at my gate, while the woman had gone. I closed and locked the gate and said thanks to the boys. Surprisingly, I wasn’t that late. Same boring stuff, except that today I had to write up a summary of the nutrition program for the report and my boss asked me to summarize a paper on bereavement for her. She asked me if I was busy that day, and me hoping for some work to do said no, then she asked if I could do something for her that was personal, not work. I reluctantly agreed and ended up reading a paper on bereavement and old age and summarizing each paragraph for her. I tried to use simple language because her English isn’t very good, but it was hard sometimes because it was a technical paper. Anyways, I finished it Thursday. Neither of my bosses came in on Thursday and I don’t know why. They usually tell me when they go somewhere. So, I just was in the office by myself and I left early.

Friday, I didn’t go into work because there was a party for one of the PC staff in Kigali who is leaving back to the states. I met up with Trish in Butare and we took the bus together to Kigali. When we got in, I went up to the Chinese store and bought two pillows and pillowcases and then took the bus to Adam’s where I made jello shots for the party that night. I don’t have a fridge, so I had been holding onto this jello for months waiting for an opportunity to make it, which came when Adam was having his housewarming party. I went to the PC party and it was really fun! I was one of the first ones to arrive (as in, when I got there, there were only 20-25 people!), so I helped cook a few things. We made so much food; I was stuffed to the brim! Mini pizzas, veggie samosas, salad, chapatti quesadillas, chips and salsa, hummus, cheese dip, etc. Almost all the PC staff, from the drivers to the administrators was there along with almost all of the PCVs from the first group and Franchesca’s friends whom she had made in Kigali during her time here. We cooked, ate, talked, jumped on her giant trampoline!, played with the kids and just had a good time. When we all finally filed out, I went back to Adams to get ready for the party. He was still out doing a presentation for the leadership group and my timing was pretty good, because just as I was walking up to the gate, Louis was putting his key in. Just hung out at the house for an hour or two when everyone started showing up. We had a fun night with lots of people, including some PCVs.

Saturday, Adam woke up before me and got up and went to the market to buy stuff to make me guacamole! It was so cute. He had to google how to make it and there were no tortilla chips, so we ate it with regular chips but it was good! Some of the boys came over and sent Adam and I to pick up pizzas so we’d have full bellies for beer fest. We ate our pizzas (I wussed out and had to put mine in the fridge) and then drove over to beerfest! We were some of the first people there and as soon as you got in, there was a table with beers waiting on it, so you walk in, grab a cold beer and then continue on. We had a long night of fun and dancing. I ran into a LOT of PC people and other friends whom I haven’t seen in a while, so that was fun too. And even though everyone swore up and down that we would NOT end the night at Papyrus, we did. Sunday, we slept a lot and I went back to Butare.

Went to Kigali Friday after spending a few hours at the office alone (everyone had gone to Cyangugu for my driver’s dowry ceremony). Adam was still in class when I got there, so I sat on the steps at the gate waiting for Louis to come let me in. He found me there and just laughed at me. When Adam got home, we went over to Gavin’s house to have some drinks and dinner and then went out to the bar. Gavin is leaving on Friday, so it was his last weekend in Rwanda. Saturday, we met up with everyone at a restaurant where they were watching football, then stopped and got some food at a different place and then to a shady bar where a lot of people came. We decided Saturday would be a bar exploration night, so we went to a different one in another part of town after about two hours, had 2 drinks there where Adam and I just sat watching music videos by ourselves the last hour (there was some Michael Jackson marathon on), then went to another bar down the road for another 1-2 drinks before ending up at Papyrus to end the night. Sunday, we stayed in until evening and I made grilled cheese sandwiches on the boy’s new sandwich maker. Adam and I met Gavin for dinner at the ‘Indian’ restaurant next to his house and we were the only people there. The food is expensive and not that good, but I still feel bad for the owners that its doing so crappy. Monday, I took the bus back to Butare in the morning only to find out that we had a staff meeting in Kigali that day and I could have gotten a ride home. Why don’t they inform me about these before?!

Tuesday, I went with the head of SPREAD in the US to visit a coffee farmer whom he is friends with. When he was here (in Rwanda) last time, he took pictures of the farmer’s family and had them framed, so we went to visit him and give him the pictures. He was brewing coffee when we got there (coffee he grew himself and his wife roasted in a clay pot on the fire and then ground in a mortar) and they offered us some. I didn’t try any, but he and another coworker both tried it and the American said that it was the best coffee he has had in the country so far. Both the coffee we brew at the office (the coffee from the bag, brewed in the machine) and at the fancy hotel he is staying at are worse than this guys home grown, roasted, ground and brewed coffee. I think maybe because it’s so fresh and it was made that day from roasting to brewing. The kids were pretty cute, 6, 5 and 2 and the mom was pregnant again! I don’t think my family planning messages are working very well. After visiting them, we went to one of the coffee washing stations to see a new mushroom growing project we started where they use the coffee bean pulp to grow the mushrooms. The spores were in plastic bags on tables in a dark shed. Where they got the plastic bags is unknown, since they are illegal here, but they work really well and I don’t know how it would work using paper bags. The plastic seals in the water so you don’t have to constantly water them. Seems super easy and cheap to do and it’s a good way to get another source of protein. I’m just not sure how well they will be integrated into the Rwandese diet. I talked to the boss-man about it and he thought it would be a good idea to have a short nutrition lesson about the mushrooms along with a cooking demonstration (so they know how to cook the mushrooms) and a taste test (so they can try it and decide if they’ll be able to eat them). He wants to talk to me more about it and maybe I’ll get to design the lesson and demo!

Wednesday, had to wake up at the crack of dawn because we left at 6am to drive up north for a meeting with the other health team. We stopped in Kigali at the main SPREAD office to pick up the M&E manager and all got out and had tea and talked and filled up the back with boxes of condoms and Sur Eau, a water purifier, before getting on the road again. The drive north wasn’t too bad, but the whole day we listened to Kinyarwanda radio, they spoke in Kinyarwanda and I could only understand words and phrases, so I knew what they were talking about in general, but didn’t know the details and couldn’t participate in the conversation. By the end of the 2 days, I was so sick of Kinyarwanda! We stopped in Musanze to drop off the boxes at the office, and then went to Gisenyi to meet the others at the hotel. It was a nice hotel up on the ridge above the water, so the view was nice of the lake and Congo. We ate lunch and then worked a bit on the COP (country operation plan) together with the Musanze team. It was a bit frustrating because no one had read it yet, so I went over what I think we still needed in the plan, but when Jeanne (the head of the health program, my boss) went outside to take a phone call and told me to continue, no one listened to me. One person started playing on their computer, another got up and made a phone call, etc. I had being the underdog. If you don’t have authority in this country people don’t listen to you. So, after working for a while, we decided to go into town. We all packed into the car and drove down into town. Went into a few shops where the women wanted to find clothes and shoes, but didn’t find anything. I called Portia and met up with her and we walked around town together then she packed into the car with us and we drove around town a bit more, before driving down to the border with Congo. We got out of the car and it seemed like they were going to cross, but didn’t and we all packed into the car again and drove along the lake before heading back up into town and dropping Portia off at home. I was hoping that we’d have dinner in town and then get a free meal for Portia, but we ended up eating at the hotel again. The food is surprisingly bad for such a nice hotel. I ate just veggies and French fries for dinner. The next morning, we met again and finished up the COP and then worked on the Work Plan for 2011. They were all speaking Kinyarwanda to each other and then would give me a short summary of what they said, so I just sat on my computer writing up other things and cleaning up my iTunes. We had lunch and then took off to go back to Butare. We stopped in Musanze so they could go to the market, which I guess has cheaper potatoes. We were there for almost an hour as they shopped and I sat in the car with the driver. We stopped again at a roadside market, where they bought pineapples, sugar cane and some meat. Then again at a shop where I and others bought some biscuits. We didn’t stop again after that, thank goodness, until we got to Kigali to drop of the M&E guy. The sun was setting as we got to Kigali and theres one part of the road that goes along the ridge of a hill, so as we were driving along, I looked down and the light was reflecting off of the river below in the valley and it was beautiful! It was just a long slither of sliver across the land. We got into Kigali and dropped off the guy and I was kicking myself for not packing enough for the weekend so I could just stay at Adam’s that night. Didn’t get back into Butare until 9:30pm! I quickly ate some ramen noodles, brushed my teeth and went to bed. Had to wake up at 5:30 the next morning to go into Kigali for a meeting at 9. We got into Kigali, dropped Beta off at the Sotra bus station so she could pick up a book she sent earlier in the week and then waited for the woman from the Musanze to arrive on her bus to drive with her to the meeting. We were a few minutes late, but were still one of the first ones to arrive. As we sat waiting, we looked over the powerpoint print out they had given us and realized that there wasn’t anything for the health programs on it. After about 15 minutes of the meeting, we realized that we were in the wrong meeting! They sent us an email asking us to come on October first, so it wasn’t our fault, but it was still embarrassing telling the lady. The worst was when she asked us questions about the coffee farming and we just sat there silent and then let out a small ‘I don’t know’ before revealing the error. We still sat through the meeting because there was no one from the agriculture department there, and I thought it might be necessary information for them, so I stayed to take notes. Martin then drove me to Adam’s and dropped me off. He was sick in bed, so I just hung out at the house watching things on his computer, until later in the evening when we went to MTN center for drinks. There we met Adam’s ‘big bro’ and talked with him about his wife and baby. I need to go see the baby again, she’s so frickin cute! One of the guys there who Adam knows bought me a shot of scotch; it was hard to drink! Got home at a reasonable 3:30. Saturday, we hung out at the house for a while but it was sooo hot! Sunny wanted to go swimming, but I didn’t have my suit with me. We went over to Penny’s house for a little bit before heading over to a houseparty for a girl Adam knows that’s leaving to Canada. It was super fancy and the guards at the door had a list of names of people who could get in. Minega and some of the other boys didn’t RSVP, so Adam had to find the host and she had to go to the gate to let them in. It was a fun party. Afterwards, we went to Papyrus and got home around 6am! It was light out. I had to take the bus back to Butare that day, but didn’t make it out of Adam’s house until around 5pm. The bus back was dark and boring because my iPod was dead and it was too dark to read my book. We ended up dropping off a lot of people along the way, which slowed down the bus and then we picked up some villagers and had to drop them at various points along the road. I didn’t get home until 8:30! I made pasta, watched Mad Men and went to bed.

Adam came to visit and we went to Abdoul’s for an Eid party. It was pouring rain and we got pretty wet on the way. He invited a LOT of people and didn’t think of where to fit them all if it was raining, so we all tried to squish into the house. It was kind of funny. We ate dinner and drank some fanta and chatted with people around us waiting for the rain to end so we could make a break for it. There was a lull in the rain, so we ran out and tried to get transport back into town. I got about half way there when the rain started again. We got soaked and sat at the bar freezing! Saturday, we didn’t do much. Went and had some food at the hotel and saw Adam’s housemate’s little brother. Sunday, it was just raining and raining all day. Didn’t leave the house and the power went out so I couldn’t cook anything (have an electric kettle and a hot plate only), so we ate a bag of goldfish crackers (thanks g-ma and auntie terri!), then around 3pm, we went and got some real food and adam got on the bus to go back to Kigali.

I taught another group of peer educators the permagardening and nutrition the next week and this time had two students from the university to help me. We started on Tuesday for two days with the Youth PEs and then thursday and Friday with the adults. Thursday after work, I went out to get a drink with the students and they took me to a bar I didn’t know existed, so that was fun. I always like finding new places to go. It was called the forest bar or something to that point, because it was in the middle of nowhere surrounded by trees. It was cold! We had two drinks each and I called Abdoul because I figured he’d be at the University studying, so he came and joined us for the second round. Then Abdoul and I went to dinner. Friday, we left the training early (didn’t eat the free lunch) so that Martin, my driver, and I could catch our buses to Kigali. Mama Adam was in town and I met Adam, Louis and her at the big supermarket where they were buying things for the new house. After shopping, we went and got some dinner then met up with others for drinks at a bar none of us had ever been to. It was a little shady, so we decided to go to the nicer bar that we knew of down the road, but it was closed, so we ended up in some hole in the wall that was actually really fun! By the end of the night (early morning) we were the only ones there and the bar keeps seemed more than ready to go home and sleep (one fell asleep in a chair by the door). Saturday, Adam took me to a BBQ for the new Young Professionals Leadership group thing he just joined. It was pretty fun and at the end of the get together, they had a drawing in which I won the main prize! I got a free pass to go see the gorillas!!! I am really excited because I haven’t done it yet and I have been wanting to since I got here. I almost went in August when Jon visited, but now I get to go for free! After that, we met up with Mama Adam, Minega and Louis for dinner at the fancy Indian restaurant and had a delicious meal; all in all, a really good night. I left Sunday back to Butare.

Monday and the rest of the week, didn’t have much to do. No trainings or anything, so just stayed in the office on the internet and working on the COP (country operational plan) that we need to turn into USAID to get our PEPFAR funding for next year. I also spent copious amounts of time trying to figure out my flight home, working both on the internet and on the phone with mom, but finally got it and I’ll be home November 24th for 2 weeks! Wednesday, a friend from Nyamasheke came and stayed at my house for the night with her friend who was in PC Jamacia. We hung out at the house, got bored and went out for drinks at the motel near me. We saw lightning and heard thunder, but decided to go anyways, since it was close. Well, we got trapped in a little hut thing outside with the rain blowing in and the thunder and lightning interrupting our conversation. We got sick of the rain blowing on us, so we up-ended the table to block the doorway. There was a small lull in the storm, so we ran to pay and to get home, made it just in time! The rain pick back up ferociously right after we got in the door (after I slipped and fell, again!). We made popcorn and just hung out for a few hours talking when the power went out. It came back on not too much later and then we decided to call it a night and go to bed. Oh, and the RPCV from Jamacia did some laundry that night before we went out to the motel…needless to say it was soaked! They stayed for a bit the next day and Katy and I went to the office to use the internet, while her friend went to the museum to check it out. Afterwards, we went to have lunch and then to the ice cream shop. I got hot chocolate instead. There, we met a white guy who Katy had met a few weeks before at the airport and he is with an organization here who works on gardens for nutrition, so we got talking about our work together and he gave me some documents that he thought might be helpful. He was really cool. Went back to my house to get their bags and saw 8 monkeys jumping around outside at the neighbor's.

The rain has returned. First rain was last Sunday. Felt a few drops while getting my bus ticket back to Butare, thought something pooped on me. There have been ‘teaser’ clouds for a while, but no rain, so when I saw the clouds that morning, I didn’t think it’d actually rain. That night during the blackout, it started raining, not very hard and not for very long, but enough that the dust was a bit diminished the next morning. Also, when I got on the bus, I was sitting in a double seat with my bag next to me, because I was just going to wait for the bus to fill up before moving it to my lap, and I heard this guy say in Kinyarwanda when he got on the bus that he was going to sit next to the white girl and practice his English. There were a million empty seats on the bus, so I was a little annoyed and I was tired from the weekend, so I did not want to be chatting the whole two hours with some random guy. He sat down and asked me a few questions, which I answered, then he said something about us talking and I said “no, I’m very tired” and he asked, “so, we’re going to sit the whole two hours not speaking?” and I just said “yes.” I’m a bit mean, but I just wasn’t in the mood for a conversation with someone I don’t know and who doesn’t speak English well. It’s tiring always trying to figure out what they’re saying and how to phrase your sentences in a way that they’d be able to understand. So, we didn’t speak and I think he was actually pretty mad at me. I thought about at one point turning and talking to him, but didn’t want to start a long convo and by the time I actually wanted to, it was too late to bring up again something he said an hour ago.

I spent the weekend after Jon left in Kigali and Sunday, Adam moved into the new house! Its super nice and in a perfect location, right on the bus line (which I have to take due to PC restrictions on taking motos) and within walking distance to the PC Office. Monday, I spent at the PC office finishing my nutrition project and then caught the bus back to Butare. Its still crazy to me that I can spend a whole day working either in Kigali or Butare and get to the other before dark (ok, so not the whole day, but until the 4pm bus). Much different than my previous site, where I’d have to leave early in the morning to make it to Kigali or back before dark.

I did the gender lesson again with a different group of peer educators and they had some that I didn’t agree with (along with men being the only ones with strength). They mostly all agreed that only men have intelligence and make family decisions. The other two times I taught this lesson, those were put into the ‘both’ category. It was Ryan’s last week here and he wanted to go see the chimps, so we tried to figure it out, but were unable to make it. I was really excited and am disappointed it didn’t happen, but after looking into it, I now think it’s fiscally possible for me to do at a later time.

Went into Kigali Friday and met up with Adam at the new house and got to meet the new puppy! She’s super cute, black and brown with a little bit of white here and there. She’s a Rhodesian ridgeback mixed with mutt. After playing with the puppy a while, we went to meet up with a girl who is making a documentary here and needed Adam’s help getting in contact with people. Ryan came and met us there and we went to the pork place, only to find it closed. We went to a different bar instead and then out to another before coming home. Saturday, Adam had a housewarming party, so everyone came over there and we just had fun at the house. Sunday, we got woken up early by the new maid who came to see the house and she decided she wanted to start working Monday, so the mess from the housewarming party was left to fester for a day. I came home Sunday evening and the power went out for 3 ½ hours and when it finally came back on, I read for a few minutes before falling asleep on the couch and waking up in the light an hour and a half later! My computer battery wasn’t full, but still had about 3+ hours to it, so during the blackout I watched a million episodes of The Office. I have a hot plate, so was subjected to eating only things that didn’t need to be cooked, aka an orange, cashews and bread (I know, I know, really healthy!).

Monday, I started my permagarden training. It went really well and we built 3 beds in one day. I have a translator with me who is a student in the agriculture program at the national university and he was a big help! I tried to show them how to dig, and they laughed at me and took the hoe away from me to do it themselves, but there were quite a few times when I had to do it to show them how. It’s a different kind of digging, where they have to do a ‘double dig’ so I had to stop them and take the hoe and do it myself, even though my hoe’ing skills aren’t very refined. There was a lot of laughing at the muzungu trying to dig, but it was fun and productive and I think they’re buying into it. When things start growing, they’ll really be able to see how great of a technique this is and then introduce it in their own homes and in the community. During the digging, one of the women decided that my hair was too unruly and tied it up for me with one of her cloths. SPREAD provided us all with lunch, so they were happy and I am happy that I’ll have a concrete example of a meal that is not very healthy for my nutrition lesson (we ate rice, beans, spaghetti, cabbage and carrots, sauce, fries, meat and green bananas which are like a potato; so 4 carbs, one veggie dish, and two proteins). After lunch, the car was still out and so couldn’t come pick us up, so we went to catch the bus. It was a good 50m away from us when it pulled up, so my translator and I had to run to the bus with our bags and supplies (markers, flip charts, etc.)

Sitting at home after work a monkey jumped on my roof again, SO LOUD! I went out to see and he was just sitting there and then walked along my wall towards me then past me into the neighbors’. The girl next door, while I was taking my clothes off the line, saw me and started yelling nonsense, then yelled “good morning”, so I said back “good afternoon” then she said 4 times “I speak in English” all the while hiding when I’d look up. As the monkey was walking across the wall into the neighbors though, she yelled out “there’s a monkey behind you!” Where that fully developed sentence came from, I have no idea! But I was very proud of her and quite impressed.

The nutrition lesson went well. I gave them all a quiz to do before the lesson, to get their knowledge level, and my goodness it is NOT impressive! Very few got many answers correct. But now I know what needs to be taught, so that’s good. We went over the food groups and I made nutrition cards, where there’s a picture of a food an its name in Kinyarwanda. They sorted these into the food groups and then used them to make complete meals. It was sort of difficult for some of them, but by the end of it, I think it made more sense and they were able to do it on their own. I tried to teach that eating many different types of fruits and vegetables is good and eating massive amounts of carbs is not. Carbohydrates are necessary, but when a meal consists mainly of carbs, that’s not a good thing. After the nutrition lesson, we went back to the garden and added manure, compost and coal dust (for the carbon), and then ate lunch (after washing our hands, of course). We thought we’d have to take the bus again, but we just had to wait 20 minutes for the car to pick us up on the way back. About 3 minutes into the drive back to town, we saw a truck that had fallen into the ditch hood-first. So, we all got out to gawk and talk to people and find out what had happened. The guy’s tire popped and turned him into the ditch. His wife got hurt and had to go to the hospital, but he was ok. They tied the back of the truck onto the back of a bigger truck (one that hauls things) and pulled it out of the ditch. After the excitement was over, we got back into the car and drove to the office.

I repeated the same lessons, permagardening and nutrition the next two days with the youth peer educators. We didn’t make another whole permagarden, just added another bed and looked at the previous beds made by the adults. They were annoying and frustrating to work with because they just kept giggling the whole time and not really paying attention.

Thursday (12/8), I called Nicole to wish her a happy birthday, and then went into work for a few hours before jumping on a bus to meet Jon at the airport. We got really bored trying to figure out what to do in Kigali and eventually went and ate dinner at the Chinese restaurant before meeting up with Adam and the others.

Friday, we caught a bus up to Gisenyi and met up with Portia who was letting us crash at her house. We walked around town, saw areas of Gisenyi I’ve never been to before and ate some lunch. I tried asking the guy if the croque madame was made with eggs and cheese and he just kind of grunted, so I asked again to no avail and finally just asked if there was meat on it and he said yes. I asked him if I could get a sandwich with egg, cheese and tomato and he said sure (which is amazing b/c most Rwandese make you order EXACTLY what’s on the menu and you cannot change anything up! Example: I tried to get an omelet with onions, tomatoes and cheese and the guy said it was impossible, even though there was an omelet on the menu with onions and tomatoes and one with tomatoes and cheese. After a long debate and me telling him exactly how much more I would pay, he went into the kitchen and came back saying it was possible and that I should pay the amount I had previously stated). When my food came, it was an omelet with cheese, tomatoes and toast imbedded in the eggs! It was hilarious and I took a picture that I’ll try and post soon. I was a little concerned when he wrote down, in this order:

Eggs

Tomatoes

Cheese

Sandwich

I think sandwich is code for slice of bread. It was pretty tasty though. Last time I was in Gisenyi for Nicole’s birthday, I ordered an omelet with tomato, onion and cheese and I pronounce tomato the French way so as not to confuse her, but I got an omelet with onion, cheese and fries (potato). Ariko, the French word for potato sounds NOTHING like tomato (pomme de terre).

Okay, back to Gisenyi this time around. The whole omelet sandwich thing ended up being extremely expensive, so I asked to see the menu and we agreed on a fairer price afterwards (ex. A whole circle of cheese is about 2700 and he was charging me 1000 for putting a few pieces in my omelet). That night we ended up going back to the same restaurant for salads and they were pretty delicious. Saturday morning, we got up, went over to Portia’s school where she helps with the deaf education unit and since Jon is a deaf ed volunteer in Kenya, he wanted to meet some of the kids. They weren’t there that day, but we did get to see Portia’s permagarden she built with the kids. Then we walked over to the Serena (the fancy hotel on the lake) and got beach chairs on the sand and laid in the sun and swam in the lake, read some books, listened to music, ate a yummy lunch and took a nice shower. A very buff Rwandan was walking around the beach and he caught Jon’s eye and we were both staring at him when his friend walked up and asked if we would take a picture with him. Turns out he’s a model and thought we were attractive enough to take a picture with. Jon took a picture with him on his camera, so I’ll have to get the photo from him first before posting it. It was a wonderfully relaxing day. We weren’t really hungry after a day in the sun and our big lunch, so we just went and got tea and a chapatti at the restaurant next to Portia’s house for dinner. Sunday morning, we got up and went to the bus station for the bus back to Kigali. We got in around noon and ate lunch at the cheap Indian restaurant and then hopped back on a bus to Butare. We ended up running into Trish who was on the same bus as us and as we were walking up to Simba (a supermarket with an outdoor café) to get a drink before the bus, my wallet was stolen! Some jerk stole all my money, my PC ID, my ATM card and our bus tickets! I LOVED that wallet too!!!! I was super upset but knew there was nothing I could do. I think the thief was probably pretty upset that he robbed the poor muzungu in town though. My ATM receipt was in there and my PC ID, so he could see how pathetic my bank account balance was and that I was a volunteer, so hopefully he felt bad about robbing me. We were able to get on the bus anyways after explaining to the bus people that we had already paid for tickets but they were stolen, along with everything else. They were all really nice about it. We got into Butare and dropped off our bags at the my house, then went over to Abdoul’s with Ryan for a breaking of the fast with him and his family. There was lots of food and it was pretty delicious.

Monday, I took Jon into my work and introduced him to people at the office. I did a bit of work and let Jon use the internet and then we went to lunch with Ryan. After lunch the boys went to the museum and I just waited for them at the house. We hung out at the house and I cooked dinner. I made ‘biryani’ (pretty much just fried rice with Indian spices, cashew nuts and raisins). It tasted really good though! Then we watched ‘creep show’ some 80’s horror flick someone at PC office put into the case for Ghosts of Rwanda. It was terrible. We made Ryan watch Glee and he liked it! Tuesday, I taught my HIV, sexual decision-making lesson while Ryan and Jon went to Murambi, one of the genocide memorial sites. I didn’t think I could take being there again and I had to teach, so just let them go themselves. The lesson was pretty fun and I think it really got them thinking because afterwards they were all sitting and standing around discussing.

Wednesday, Jon and I stayed in Butare and walked over to the Arboretum for a short hike, had some ice cream and met up with some other PCVs who were there. We sat and chatted with them for a while and walked back into downtown together. We bought some chapatti at a restaurant and cooked fajitas for dinner with guacamole. Ryan came over again and we watched some Glee. Thursday, Jon and I went into Kigali and ate some pizza for lunch before going to the genocide memorial there. The taxi driver who drove us came in with us and went through the whole thing with us and took us back for only 5000! It was a good 2+ hours. After, we took Jon’s bags to Adam’s house and laid there for a bit before heading over to the Ethiopian restaurant for Gavin’s birthday dinner. We were so early, we sat and had a drink and they brought us small bowls of popcorn. There was a little kid there with his parents who kept trying to give Jon his food. He was very entertaining running around and playing with the waiters, so we weren’t bored. My and Jon’s food was good, Adam and Gavin’s food was terrible and they both were so disappointed and swore off Ethiopian food forever. We then went out for a bit to the bar and then home. Jon left early Friday morning back to Nairobi and Mombasa.

SPREAD got an intern, Ryan, from Texas A&M for a month. He’s pretty cool and now I have someone to hang out with again. Had a 4-day weekend this weekend (6/8-10/8) due to the presidential elections. Friday, I had a half-day at work then went home and pretty much stayed there. Saturday, I woke up, did some laundry and then Ryan came over and we went out around town. Went and watched Eclipse in the cinema (which was pretty apparent it was a pirated copy), then walked over to the theater because earlier in the day a Rwandese friend of mine told me she was putting on a play at 7 that evening, so we went and met her outside and she told us it was going to start late. Walked in and sat down and then picked up one of the few programs scattered on seats (1 to every 10 or so) and realized it was in French, so went back to the cinema and watched the new Alice and Wonderland, then went home to bed. Sunday, Ryan and I were going to meet at the market and get food to cook dinner, but it was closed (he’s tired of hotel food). We ended up going over to Abdoul’s house and since it was elections the next day, his houseboy left to go to his hometown to vote, so we ended up making the dinner. Abdoul and I peeled and cut up a million potatoes to make fries and we started the fire and then his sister took over after our batch of frites weren’t too good (they were pretty soggy and not at all crispy, but still tasted fine). We had fries, rice, beans, avocado and tea with an apple for desert with Abdoul and his family and two friends. We watched Hitch and Enemy of the State from a disc of all Will Smith movies (they sell DVD’s here with about 5-6 movies on them).

Monday, while I was lying on the couch reading, Ryan banged on my gate. I wasn't too keen on walking around and disrupting the election process, but he said that not much was going on, he didn't see many people walking around in town, and besides everything was closed until the afternoon. We played checkers at my place and afterwards went out to the video store and rented ‘Thank You For Smoking’ only to take it back and find out that it’s a French copy. We returned to the shop and exchanged it for ‘True Blood’ (after making sure it was in English). It’s a pretty good show so far. Only watched 2 episodes. I stopped in one of the bars to see if there was any news about the elections yet, but it was all in Kinyarwanda and there was no data being shown, so I just moved on. Got a text from Adam though telling me that PK won by a landslide (to be expected).

Tuesday was a holiday because of the elections Monday, so no work. My cleaning lady came and cleaned the floors and did laundry and I went into the office for a bit. Afterwards, I went jean shopping and got a new pair I really like! On my way home, I saw two women standing and staring into a tree. So, as I got closer I stared into the tree too and saw a group of monkeys and a boy throwing rocks at them. Two jumped across the road into the field and one ran up my steps, jumped up onto my wall and then onto my roof. I was kind of scared to go into my house and turned to the ladies when I saw he was headed into my house and told them “crap! That’s my house!” (eh! n’inzu yanjye!!) They just laughed and I got into my gate with no problem, then went and got my camera and took some pictures of the guy. He stayed on the roof for a bit, then came back down onto my wall and finally jumped into my mango tree and off to find the others. My cleaning lady and I were laughing about it together.

Wednesday, went into work, found my boss, she told me another family member died (that’s 3 in the 2 months I’ve been here!) and left. So here I am, yet again, alone in my office with nothing to do.

Wednesday (21/7), when I went into work my boss asked me to go to a conference for her in Kigali and take notes. She told me about it, but forgot to send me the email, so when I got into work Thursday and asked her again when the conference was, she goes “um, I think its today and tomorrow. I didn’t send you the email?” So, she sent the email and I saw that it started at 8am Thursday. She asked me to go for Friday’s session anyways, so I stayed at work, went and ate some lunch and bought a ticket to Kigali. Then Peace Corps came to take a look at my new house and gave me a ride to Kigali. I went out to dinner with Marine at a Chinese restaurant and then went to Adam’s. The conference was at 8am and Adam’s cousin was leaving the house at the same time and offered to give me a ride. I got there a few minutes late, but the whole thing didn’t start until after 9 anyways. It was pretty interesting, but there were a lot of arguments. We were working on the country action plan for women, girls, gender equality and HIV. They were making recommendations about how it should be changed to be gender equitable and how to include specific policies that focus on girls and women. There was a lot of arguing and people repeating things over and over and then someone would get the mic and just go on a rant. The host needed to be stricter and tear the mic away from them and get things moving. We were about 2-2 ½ hours behind and I had to catch my bus back to Butare. I went and saw Adam at his new job and we hung out for a bit, then jumped on a bus to Butare. The University students had gotten out of school, so all the buses were full. I had a friend call and reserve me a ticket, but when I showed up they said that I wasn’t on the list. I got lucky though b/c a guy at the ticket desk wanted to change his 4pm ticket to 5:30, so I got his! Got home and met up with Imogen and Trish and we went out to dinner. Marine jumped on a bus after work and met up with us and we all had a fun night. Saturday morning, we tried to get a bus to Cyangugu to go to the kickball tournament in Nyamasheke, but they were all full also. We thought about staying in Butare for the weekend, but the girls weren’t too keen on the idea, so we jumped on a bus again for Kigali, after some shopping at the coop and Kenya market, eating some ice cream and having a beer by the pool. So, my weekend consisted of a bus to Kigali Thursday, bus to Butare Friday, back to Kigali Saturday and again to Butare Sunday. Kind of ridiculous, but it was fun.

A bunch of PCVs returning from the kickball tournament stopped in Butare for the night on Monday because they were unable to make it back to site before dark. So, I met up with them after work at the ice cream parlor and while sitting outside eating our deliciousness, I saw a large line of identical white Hilux trucks going past. I started counting and there were 21! All with almost identical mud markings and only one person in the car, the driver. I thought it was crazy, but Wednesday, I saw one (this time empty and clean) and told my driver about what I saw on Monday, and he said it was probably a shipment of trucks going to Burundi. Two PCV’s stayed the night at my house Monday evening. We went out to dinner and were going to watch a movie at the cinema but instead stayed at the restaurant too late and ended up going home and to bed before 10!

On the way to work on Tuesday I saw a giant bird that I think might have been a parrot at American corner. It was grey with black and a little bit of white on the wings. I don’t think there are any grey, black and white parrots, but it looked like one.

My boss’s father died Tuesday, so Wednesday, for the Family Planning training with USAID, I had to go by myself in her place. The training was at the US Embassy, and when I first got in, I had to surrender my cell phone, computer and ID and then walk through a metal detector. Then I went into the building and was told to sit and wait because I needed to have someone escort me around the premises. I sat and waited and waited, while talking to the guard in Kinyarwanda and reading Ebony magazine the guard gave to me. When I realized that it had to be 2pm already (there was no clock, I wasn’t wearing a watch and didn’t have my cell phone), I went up to him and asked what the heck was up. He finally got me someone to take me there and I was a half hour late. I HATE being late to things, especially when its for some ridiculous reason. The training was pretty interesting and there were big wigs from PSI, FHI, JSI, and other international NGOs and then there was me, a volunteer from the smallest organization present. I think I held my own though and made a good impression. I participated in the conversations, gave some correct answers and interesting insights on a few topics. Hopefully a few of them will remember me when its time for me to get a job. We drove back Wednesday evening and Thursday and Friday, I was in the office by myself working on a few things, but mainly checking email and Facebook. I did manage to finish a course on the USAID center for global health education though.

The whole week (26/7 – 30/7), the entire town was getting ready for President Kagame who was coming to town Friday. Everyone was working hard to decorate (trees all the way from Kigali to Butare were painted white and banana trees were placed alongside the road). There were banners and streamers, and a big sign dug into the hill and then filled with white chalk saying “Tora Kagame” (Vote for Kagame). Prisoners were recruited and spent the whole week working to clean up the area next to the stadium (the stadium was too small to fit all the people) and constructing the stage and site. Friday morning, on my way to work, I saw villagers singing and dancing down the street waving a PK poster, bus loads of people singing and banging the sides on their way to the stadium. I got frisked by some soldiers because my office is right next to the stadium, but didn’t even get to go into work b/c we were closed for the day because of all the activity. I went into Kigali Friday evening with Imogen, ate dinner at the wonderful Indian restaurant, went with the boys to the Sports Club and had a few drinks and watched TV while they exercised, then went to the shady bar and then Papyrus. Saturday, we tried to drive to the lake to go swimming, but the car overheated and we ended up going to Bambino’s. We sat in a village at a bar drinking while they “fixed” the car. Were at the roadside town a good 2+ hours when we finally got going again but the car quickly overheated again. We stopped, added water, but decided to go back towards Kigali, which is where we found Bambino’s fun city (or something like that). It has a pool and fair rides, like the swinging chairs one and a Ferris wheel, but by then it was dark, so we didn’t swim or go on the rides, but got some food. Then we went to a small bar by Adam’s house and went home early. Sunday, Adam and I just stayed home most of the day watching movies, and then I had to catch my bus back to Butare.

Went into work Monday and Tuesday, but no one was there. Tuesday, Imogen came back from Kigali and packed up all her things and I took her to Kigali to do her gift shopping and spent one last night with her in Kigali. Her flight was supposed to be at 4 the next day, so we ran around town getting everything done before 2 and then around 6:30 I get a call from her saying she’s stuck in Rwanda, her flight has been cancelled! They put her up in a hotel room and around 10:30 she said they told her she’s flying out at 1am. So, now my house is empty, just me. Not too bad so far.

From some of my PC friends:

A 2 year old cutting grass with a machete taller than themselves = normal

Carrying a backpack on your head = normal

Men holding hands = normal

Women holding/carrying babies on motorcycles = normal

Things I’ve seen on the back of a bicycle:

People, side saddle or straddle, including women with babies tied to their backs

Goats

Pigs

Big inconspicuous bundles in rice sacks

Tables and chairs stacked upon one another and tied down

Jerry cans

Bag of rabbits (alive and skwirming)

Giant bags of charcoal

Hanging live chickens (though they're usually tied onto the handlebars)

Sunday, Imogen and I went to the pool to swim and sit in the sun a bit. We ate lunch and then got an ice cream cone at the new ice cream parlor that opened last month. It was a wonderful day! We watched the World Cup final at the café in town. She had to leave before it finished because she had to get up early, so I stayed and watched it alone, surrounded by Rwandans rooting for Spain. I walked home sad in my orange shirt.

Monday, we had a staff meeting in Kigali, so I got to go with and meet the Kigali staff and the whole meeting was in English! It was so awesome. I was the only white person, and they weren’t doing it for my benefit, they speak English all the time.

Taught my first lesson to the community health workers at KOAKAKA and Buffcafe. I taught on the difference between gender and sex and gender roles. It was pretty interesting to see the way they thought of gender. It was confusing to them at first, the difference, but once they understood, it was easy to explain. I wrote up a bunch of cards with words like, to be pregnant, to go to the market, to drive, beautiful, smart, decision making, authority, etc.and had them place the cards either for female or male and then we discussed and they regarded almost all as for both! I was pretty thrilled about that. The older men didn’t always agree with the younger’s perceptions and a few, such as: to be weak (women), to be strong (men), to build a house (men), to be pregnant and to clean the house (women) they did not say was both. They all agreed though that those activities (besides to be pregnant) could be done by both, but that it just wasn’t done in their culture. They said women were weak because they get pregnant. I thought that was kind of funny, but also sad. I see the women here carrying huge, heavy things on their heads and working so hard in the fields, I can’t imagine them thinking that they are weak!

Finally got up the courage to go to the American Corner that I pass by every day on the way to work and have been wondering what it was for the last month! I had Imogen go with me. It’s a collaboration with the National University of Rwanda and the American Embassy and there is a huge collection of American magazines and books and movies! I took 3 mags home and Imgoen took 3. Got Entertainment, Oprah, Discover, Popular Science and New Scientist. So excited to have somewhere to get info about home. The mags are about 2-3 months old, but its ok. And no real smutty ones like People or OK! L

Saturday, was the gusaba of one of my bosses. She got married in Burundi about 10 years ago, but until now didn’t have a legal Rwandan marriage. The gusaba is where the fathers negotiate the bride price and then they bring the girl to introduce her to the family. It was pretty funny, but I didn’t understand a lot. The husband’s family is Muslim, so they do not drink beer and the wife’s family kept asking them for alcohol to seal the deal, so they would bring bottles of juice or coke saying “here is your alcohol, like we promised”. And then they were joking about religion and saying we cannot give our son to a family who doesn’t believe in Allah and who are a bunch of drunks! It was pretty funny, the parts that I understood. Two young guys and a young woman brought the cows and did a ‘performance’ where they told stories about how good the cows are and sang traditional songs. My other boss kept leaning over and explaining to me that this was a very traditional part of the ceremony. Oh, and she made me wear a traditional dress, called umushanana. I felt a bit uncomfortable at first, because when we showed up, Imogen and I were the only people under 50 who were wearing one! Then others showed up and I got some compliments saying I looked very nice, so I felt a bit better about the situation. We had to go to a shop in Butare to rent it and it cost $6! I’ll post some pictures soon.

Went to my first funeral for the dad of one of my friends. I’ve never been to a burial before. We went to the church service, the burial and after the burial to the washing of the hands (gukaraba). My friend Felli explained the washing to me as washing away the bad spirits encountered at the graveyard, instead of washing your hands of the person whom you just buried. I didn’t think it was the later, but all I could come up with was that back in the day, maybe they had to dig the grave themselves and so everyone goes and washing their hands afterwards and its just stuck. But I guess it’s really something that everyone has to do. You cannot just go home after the burial, but all must go to the place and wash your hands together. The president came to the church service and I saw him walking out. Mourning here is very different from in the US. People all go to the house and stay until late in the night everyday before the funeral and then for a week afterwards. It must get so expensive because at the house, they must provide drinks for over 50 people for about 2 weeks! I came on Saturday after the wedding and went to the house in the evening with the family and friends. Sunday, we did the same. The funeral, burial and gukaraba was on Monday afternoon and evening. Monday night, we went to dinner at Sole Luna and participated in trivia night and won AGAIN! And we were the smallest team! I have such a smart boyfriend. I contributed about nothing. So, we got our dinner and drinks for free! I think I’m going to order the most expensive meal next time and a fancy cocktail!

Monday evening, after the first day of the conference, we all went downstairs and were given free drinks and enough hors d'oeuvres to fill us up! AND we got to watch the Rwandese dancers perform. It was awesome, I love watching the dancers. I was happy too because Imogen and Marine got to see the dancers, which without this I don't know if they would've been able to before leaving. The dancers came down and grabbed us and made us dance with them for one of the dances. I tried, but had no idea what i was doing, just tried to copy the girl I was dancing with. But it was fun!

Went to business expo last week with one of my colleagues. There were mattresses, plastic jewelry, traditional medicines, Kenyan products (jewelry, clothes and sandals), foods, biofuels, orange-fleshed sweet potatoes (aka yams, which I just designed a new program for that we’re going to implement with the community health workers), beer and wine, etc.

Visited my boss, Jeanne, at home, watched Cartoon Network with her kids, ate, drink wine, husband is impressed with my vegetarianism, says it takes a lot of restraint.

Petrol truck turned over on the main road, so sad, everyone running with buckets to clean up water in fields. Turned over into the river and the community had diverted water from the river for their fields, so it spread like wildfire into all their crops! Felt so sad to see everyone terrified that their crop was going to be destroyed.

Watched the Holland game alone, American girls sitting at another table didn’t talk to me. We got back late from the field and the game started at 4:30, so had to immediately run to the restaurant to watch the game and I was starving because I forgot my breakfast that morning and it was the first time I ate that day.

Went off-roading in Nyamagabe (Gikongoro), needed a sports bra, but there were beautiful views, could see everything we were so high up! World Vision went down one of the roads about ¾ of the way we traveled and built a primary school and health center. Didn’t end up finding anyone that we were looking for (went out into the field to watch the community health workers in action). Bought amakara (coals) because we saw smoke and its cheaper to buy it from the source and we stopped to get tomatoes because they’re cheaper in the village.

Almost got ran over by cows. Walking by two and Imogen grabs my arm and tells me one is running at us. I just started running and she stood there almost frozen, thinking if she ran it would chase after her.

Saw VCT (voluntary counselling and testing) at a washing station and the theatre group perform. Had the lady from the radio come and she recorded them doing the skit and then interviewed them afterwards. Wanted to interview me, but I refused. Helped out a bit with the VCT, writing on tubes, etc. all the “skills” I learned working at the HC in Mwezi. My boss was taking out her twists and saving the hair and took a piece of mine and twisted it with her used hair. Haha, wasn’t gross though, kinda funny. I wish more women would wear their hair natural. When she took the fake hair out, hers was still in the same shape as the twists and down to her shoulders and looked really cute! I don’t know if she’d be able to do it like that though without having the fake hair to twist it around.

Went to Kigali, met mama Adam, she very nice but I was so nervous. Watched the football matches, happy Holland won! Adam went to a Dutch embassy party to watch the game with other Dutch people and then met up with us later. Went out dancing, took Imogen around town to see Kigali. Monday, we went to run errands, change Imogen’s flight, register for the conference, etc. Ethiopian Airlines’ system went down, so we didn’t get to do that, then we went to the hotel to check in and signed in under our friend’s name and got a card to her room and just hung out in the lap of luxury! It was so nice. I was in heaven! Just laid on the bed watching TV, enjoying the air conditioning and using the fast internet. We didn’t want to leave. Tuesday and Wednesday, had a conference on child and maternal health. While walking to the hotel Tuesday morning, I ran into a piece of steel rebar sticking up from the sidewalk and cut my toe open, so we went into the hotel and got a bandaid and then up to our friend’s room to clean it in the tub. The conference was good, lots of interesting information, but a few annoyingly bad presentations. After the conference every day, we would go up to Marine’s room and wait for her to get back from work and then go out to dinner or what not. Monday evening, we went out to trivia night at one of the restaurants. The girls and I decided we wanted to eat there first, so we went early (trivia didn’t start until 8) and had pizza and drinks. Then the boys showed up and we WON! I totally didn’t expect us to win because we didn’t get many answers correct, but we got a few obscure ones (Adam answered something about an economist author). I kind of contributed, but I think that every question I answered someone else had the answer also. If you win, then your food and drinks for the night are free! So, we stayed until everyone left ordering drinks and the boys got pizzas also. Wednesday evening, after the conference finished, we went out to watch the Spain Germany game and then ended up at karaoke at the bar across from the one we watched the game at. It was pretty fun, and since it was a Wednesday, we ended up closing the bar. They finished cleaning and were just sitting waiting for us to leave. Came back to Butare Thursday and met up with a guy from Mwezi who was in town for the preparation of the health clinic’s imihigo. Nyamasheke won the award for best district in Rwanda this past year! I’d like to pretend that I had something to do with that, haha.

So forgot to mention last week a few things:

First, on the way to work, we ran into 5 monkeys running across the road from the neighbor's house to the field across the way and then today (28/6) I heard a really strange noise when I got out of my gate. It was a cross between a crow and a frog and then I saw a blue butt and long tail jump down from a tree! It was a huge monkey, not like the small brown ones I saw last week, about the size of a toddler. Don't know what it was, but it was loud and running around the neighborhood. Saw two white guys walking down my road as I was going up, so I said good morning and warned them about the monkey. They seemed a little flabbergasted.

Secondly, my British roommate and I went to watch the England and USA matches which played at the same time, so she stayed at one place and held down the fort for me while I ran back and forth between two places to watch each game! I was running with my beer in hand around the building from the cafe to the cinema. Had to pass 3 shops and the small market and got many strange looks, but it was worth it! America beat Algeria, only to lose to Ghana in the next match. I feel like its a consolation prize though. We watched the US Ghana game in the Cinema with a bunch of Rwandese and one of Imogen's friends from the hospital called to laugh at me after the first Ghanaian goal. The guy sitting in the row in front of me kept turning around to heckle me and I finally just waved my hand at him and yelled "I can't hear you!". The Rwandese are so excited for an African team to be in the finals, that it makes it fun for me to watch the games, so even though we lost, I'm glad that it was to an African team and it'll be fun to watch them play again.

I had my mid-service training in Kigali for a week and the Saturday after Alyssa came to visit! We stayed at Adam’s and I introduced her to everyone and took her out then we went to Mwezi and I showed her off there and got to show off my village to her. Took her all around town and to the clinic where she got to watch me in action and got an earful from the titulaire. Wednesday evening, the clinic gave me a goodbye “party”. They gave speeches and we drank fantas and beer and they ate brochettes. One of my favorite speeches came from one of the janitors. He said when I first came that he didn’t expect me to talk to him because I was white and he was dirty. He was very surprised and happy that I would greet him in the mornings and talk to him and help him out sometimes and he encouraged me to continue this at my new house and job.

Then Thursday, Peace Corps came to move me to my new site and my new job! Thursdays are when I meet with my cooperative, so we ran up there early to meet them and so I could tell them I was leaving and why, etc. They were upset, but I promised I would come back to visit. The nun who has been the most helpful to me during my time in Mwezi, sister Mary Immaculee, came to say goodbye Wednesday evening and said “it feels like die” while clutching her heart. I was so sad. Miraculously, I fit all my stuff into the car, along with Alyssa and her bags and two people from PC. When I got to Butare, we first stopped at my new office and picked up Beta who took us to the house. They weren’t quite finished with everything, so we ran into a LOT of people hammering, sawing, painting and cleaning the house. My landlady is pretty nice and her son came to say hello and welcome me. He has visited the states quite a few times and was interested where I was from in America and how long I’d been in Rwanda. He speaks English perfectly and seems like he’ll be a nice person to visit every once in a while. We moved all my stuff in and then went into town to eat lunch while they finished up in the house. I couldn’t cook yet cause I didn’t have my stove set up, so we ate dinner out also. After dinner it was the first world cup game and we watched it at the ‘cinema’ with one of my friends who lives in Butare. It was so exciting watching it with the Rwandan guys. They were so excited about South Africa playing and were so loud! It was fun. The next day, we went into my office for a bit and she told me to just settle into my house and come in on Monday, so we went to Nyanza to see the King’s Palace and ended up going to the art museum also. It was interesting and we got a ride back to Butare with an American tourist. When back in town we met up with some other PCV’s who had come into town for some things. I showed them my new house and we went to the ice cream shop that just opened up and then watched more World Cup. Saturday, we went to Nyamasheke to stay the night at a friend’s house and go swimming in the lake. The president was in town and so when we got off the bus, it was like a ghost town! I had never seen it so deserted and it was impossible to get a taxi because they weren’t letting cars down the road, so we set off on foot. We were walking about half an hour when a moto went by. I flagged him down and put Alyssa on it and then continued on foot. Turns out, he hit a road block and couldn’t go any further, so I ended up meeting up with her sitting on the side of the road surrounded by a bunch of Rwandans. Luckily, there was a bus waiting at the roadblock so we were able to jump into that and it took us to town. The president was literally in my friend’s backyard! She lives near the school and behind her house is a huge sports field and that is where they set up the stage and all the chairs. I think there were around 5,000+ people there. It was a sea of people that was never ending. It was for the entire district of Nyamasheke, so there were a LOT of people!!! A few of us went down to watch the speech, but I wanted to take Alyssa swimming, so we just went past the field and down to the lake. When we got back to her house, everyone was ecstatic because one of the girls just asked if she could meet the president and she went on the stage, shook his hand, thanked him for letting us into the country, complimented the people and the country and then got her picture taken! I got a call the next day from another PCV whose entire village was talking about the PCV who was on the radio talking to the president! It was crazy and I was so jealous that I didn’t get to shake his hand. But we had fun swimming. That night was the USA vs. England game and there are two British VSO volunteers in that town, so we all went and watched the game after making an American flag out of a rice sack and crayons (the VSO girl had an England flag and we felt left out). It was fun watching with them and heckling. It was a tie and the British guy was horrified and I was relieved. The next morning, we took a walk around town and ended up getting a ride in a boat by some guys who sang songs and did tricks with their paddles. Then we ate some lunch at a place on a cliff that overlooks the lake then caught the bus back to Butare. We went into my office again on Monday and went out with them to the field for a refresher course with the community health workers at one of the coffee washing stations. It was pretty cool, but we were very hungry by the end of it and so they dropped us in town and we ate a late lunch and watched the end of the Holland game. Tuesday, went into the office again and played on the internet but not much was happening, so I asked if I could leave and take her to the museum. There was a dance troop at the museum that some tourists had paid for, for a special dance, so we weren’t allowed to watch, but we stood from afar and watched a bit of it. Then I took her to the coop and she bought a bunch of gifts and I got a woven side table and trivets. We watched more World Cup games that day and tried to stay awake. Wednesday, we came into the office and then went into Kigali afterwards. We went out dancing that night after watching world cup. The next day, we had some Chinese food for lunch and then got her all packed up and to the airport. Sucks having friends leave!! L I still didn’t have all the things I needed for my house (cutting board, dish drainer, knives, mosquito net, etc.) so I took the rest of the day and Friday to purchase things before heading home. I also got to meet Adam’s new boss and we had a nice dinner together.

Have a new roommate for a month and a half. She’s a British medical student and is interning with SPREAD and shadowing at the hospital. She’s pretty cool and it’s nice to have someone to talk to when I get home and to go with me to watch the games. I hope I make some friends here before she leaves. We’ve been going out with SPREAD to the community health worker trainings and have been showing them the videos on the disc ‘Sinigurisha’ which means, ‘I am not for sale’. They are videos about sugar daddies and sugar mommies created by different high schools in Rwanda to warn mainly young girls about accepting gifts from men. Afterwards, we have a discussion with the people about what they saw and how they can help to reduce the occurrence of intergenerational sex. Thursday, we went to a meeting with representatives from the 5 health centers we work with when we do mobile testing and asked them how they felt things were going and any problems they were having. Most said that it is difficult to go out and do this because of time restraints and expenses. When SPREAD finishes, its going to be difficult to get these clinics to continue working on this program because there will be no money given to reimburse them for the travel to the coffee washing stations to do the mobile testing. Got hit by a giant dust cloud on the way to work Friday. Saw it coming, so I closed my eyes and turned my back, but it still got up my nose and in my eyes and covered me with a fine layer. I went and picked up a package from the post office for a fellow PCV and they kept asking me what my name was, and I kept telling them her name, then finally they asked me “You are Patricia?” and I said “no, she’s my colleague” but by then I had already gotten the package and paid for it so they couldn’t give me crap. A girl in secondary school said to me this morning “hello girl. What is your tongue?” I told her English and then she asked me if she could talk with me, but I was late so I told her no that I had to get to work. I just thought it was funny that a 16 or so year old girl called me girl.

Sunday (May 23), I took the bus home to Mwezi and when I arrived, my host family was visiting, so I came in and said hello and scared the baby into a fit of crying and screaming, but he soon calmed down with some sweet, milky tea, which he slurped from his mom or dad’s spoon, it was really funny to watch! He kept looking at me and smiling and then the next minute would make a whine and look terrified. By the end of the visit, he was all smiles, but still wouldn’t let me hold him. He did give me a high five a few times though. And they brought us 6 eggs, 2 cabbages and a bunch of bananas! The eggs were bad though, which I found out while cracking them into the pan.

Monday, I went to the sector office to meet the co-op women, but they weren’t there! So, I went into the clinic and saw I had a box and took it home and opened it. It was from grandma and full of goodies!!! Walking in Mwezi is full of interesting smells, you get the good ones, like the smell of the eucalyptus trees on the road to the clinic or the smell of squashed guava that someone dropped and then there are the bad: the smell of grinding cassava root (it smells like puke), manure after the rain, people who just finished a hard day working in the field… Its always surprising what smell is going to hit your nose, sometimes you are nicely surprised and it makes your day.

Tuesday, I was the designated photographer again and tried to get people to let me take their photo for their work card and then Desire’s (the accountant who got married in January) wife came with their baby for vaccination and he asked me to take family photos.

Got kidnapped by the titulaire Wednesday morning into sitting in the hygiene meeting, taking pictures for him of the clinic, and walking with him to a meeting at the primary school, then I escaped and worked in PMTCT. The hygiene meeting was just a yelling match between the workers and the titulaire about how the clinic needs to look better and be cleaner and then one of them mentioned human waste that they found that morning. We went and looked at it and it literally was right behind the toilets, still on the concrete of the building! Someone walked past all the toilets and then squatted down next to the wall and relieved him or herself there. After seeing this, the titulaire went to the hospitalization and asked the people from last night who did it, no one came forward, and so he fined every one of them 200 francs for being dirty. I thought it a bit harsh, but also a little funny. The social affairs guy from the sector office came and took Emily and I out for a fanta at the restaurant and we had a hilarious conversation! I asked him about his baby and how he was and then realized I didn’t know his name, so I asked and Emily piqued ‘Homie’, so we both laughed and he asked us what homie meant, so I told him it meant friend and he said “yes, you will be his homie” and Emily told him that other children will be his homie and he disagreed by saying “No, children can be your homie”. I died laughing!

Went to the coop on Thursday and Friday Adam came to visit! We pretty much just hung out at the house, but I tried to take him over to the nun’s one evening, but only one was there. On Sunday, the nuns had visitors who were leaving in their car and they offered us a ride to Kigali, so we accepted. Didn’t realize that they were going to pack 9 people into the car and poor Adam had to squish up his legs the entire time and was in quite a bit of pain by the end of it. The driver also was ridiculously slow and we got passed by the buses!!!

Monday (May 31)I had my Mid-service training. Got there early and went swimming with people.

Sunday (May 23), I took the bus home to Mwezi and when I arrived, my host family was visiting, so I came in and said hello and scared the baby into a fit of crying and screaming, but he soon calmed down with some sweet, milky tea, which he slurped from his mom or dad’s spoon, it was really funny to watch! He kept looking at me and smiling and then the next minute would make a whine and look terrified. By the end of the visit, he was all smiles, but still wouldn’t let me hold him. He did give me a high five a few times though. And they brought us 6 eggs, 2 cabbages and a bunch of bananas! The eggs were bad though, which I found out while cracking them into the pan.

Monday, I went to the sector office to meet the co-op women, but they weren’t there! So, I went into the clinic and saw I had a box and took it home and opened it. It was from grandma and full of goodies!!! Walking in Mwezi is full of interesting smells, you get the good ones, like the smell of the eucalyptus trees on the road to the clinic or the smell of squashed guava that someone dropped and then there are the bad: the smell of grinding cassava root (it smells like puke), manure after the rain, people who just finished a hard day working in the field… Its always surprising what smell is going to hit your nose, sometimes you are nicely surprised and it makes your day.

Tuesday, I was the designated photographer again and tried to get people to let me take their photo for their work card and then Desire’s (the accountant who got married in January) wife came with their baby for vaccination and he asked me to take family photos.

Got kidnapped by the titulaire Wednesday morning into sitting in the hygiene meeting, taking pictures for him of the clinic, and walking with him to a meeting at the primary school, then I escaped and worked in PMTCT. The hygiene meeting was just a yelling match between the workers and the titulaire about how the clinic needs to look better and be cleaner and then one of them mentioned human waste that they found that morning. We went and looked at it and it literally was right behind the toilets, still on the concrete of the building! Someone walked past all the toilets and then squatted down next to the wall and relieved him or herself there. After seeing this, the titulaire went to the hospitalization and asked the people from last night who did it, no one came forward, and so he fined every one of them 200 francs for being dirty. I thought it a bit harsh, but also a little funny. The social affairs guy from the sector office came and took Emily and I out for a fanta at the restaurant and we had a hilarious conversation! I asked him about his baby and how he was and then realized I didn’t know his name, so I asked and Emily piqued ‘Homie’, so we both laughed and he asked us what homie meant, so I told him it meant friend and he said “yes, you will be his homie” and Emily told him that other children will be his homie and he disagreed by saying “No, children can be your homie”. I died laughing!

Went to the coop on Thursday and Friday Adam came to visit! We pretty much just hung out at the house, but I tried to take him over to the nun’s one evening, but only one was there. On Sunday, the nuns had visitors who were leaving in their car and they offered us a ride to Kigali, so we accepted. Didn’t realize that they were going to pack 9 people into the car and poor Adam had to squish up his legs the entire time and was in quite a bit of pain by the end of it. The driver also was ridiculously slow and we got passed by the buses!!!

Monday (May 31)I had my Mid-service training. Got there early and went swimming with people.

My birthday was fun! I went into my office while Adam went to work and I played on the internet and read birthday messages from people. Adam and I met up after work and he got me a pedicure. It was sooo nice! It felt so good to have clean, pretty feet again. After, we met up with his ‘big bro’ and cousin for a drink and then went out to dinner with friends at an Italian restaurant. After dinner, we went out and met up with more friends and spent the night dancing. The next day, my friend Nicole came into the capital and I met up with her at the market to try and find her something to wear to a fancy dinner with her donors. We went to the market and ran into the group of new PCVs buying housewares. I bought a pair of pants, gave them to the tailor and bought a pair of sandals and earrings and Nicole got a pair of heels for the night. We ended up finding a purple dress for her in town about an hour before the dinner. She went to the dinner and I met up with Adam and co. for drinks and she met up with us afterwards. We all left and went dancing around midnight. I had my phone in my pocket and it was getting annoying so I took it out and put it on the table that some friends were sitting around. I forgot about it and as I was in the parking lot, I realized that I didn’t have my phone, only to go back in to find it gone. L Totally my fault, but still sucks. Saturday was ‘brothers with issues’. Nicole and I went out to lunch first and then were going to go get me a new phone, but on the way, we got picked up by a friend who was going to BWI, so we just got a ride all the way there. Nicole went home that night and Adam went to meet up with his ‘big bro’ and cousin, who I met up with later. Got to play with the dog a bit and see the baby. Then, on the way to meet up with friends Adam stopped at his office to plug in his phone, but it was a Mother’s day dinner, so we ended up going in for a while and I met two of his ‘aunties’.

Sunday, we went to watch the two big football matches on TV with friends and then Adam and I tried out a new Chinese restaurant before meeting up with his cousin for one drink before going home.

Monday, I had to go to the dentist to get a cavity filled. I went to my office first and played on the internet and picked up my papers to bring with. While walking down the dirt road to the dentist’s office, a man stopped and asked if I was going to the doctor, I said yes, and he said “get in, I’ll give you a ride”. It was her husband and he was really nice. It’s a strange set up. The office is just a part of the house, so while she is working, family members will walk into or through the room. The husband came in twice while I was in there. When I lay in the chair, the hygienist reached out and stroked my cheek with one finger, I would think this is weird, but a lot of Rwandans seem to like my skin. One of Adam’s friends says that I look like I’m made of wax and always touches my cheek when he says this and my cheeks are one of Adam’s favorite places, so I wasn’t creeped out when she touched me, I just laughed. I got a lot of anesthesia and was numb for over 2 hours afterwards. While walking to the shopping center, I saw a car stop on the road and it was Adam’s big bro and cousin, so they gave me a ride. I couldn’t eat for 2 hours after and was so hungry by the time the 2 hours were up, that I ate even though I was still a little numb. Adam and I didn’t go out Monday night and I tried to get him to watch the Princess Bride, but he fell asleep! Came back to Nyamasheke on Tuesday and was just watching the clouds moving through the forest, knowing that it was raining at home. The bus stopped at one point to drop someone off and since I was in the first seat, a big group of teenaged boys saw me and came and stood by my widow staring at me and talking to and about me. Then one of them had the balls to touch me and then they all got the courage and so they were all reaching in and touching my arm, so I tried to close the window and they opened it again, so I yelled at them to go away, which just encouraged them and then everyone on the bus because now they knew that I could speak Kinyarwanda. The rest of the bus trip, the guy behind me would lean forward and ask me questions or the bus driver would ask me or someone further behind would just yell something. I finally pretended to sleep and just listened to them talking about me. I was not in the mood to be the entertainment. I just wanted to sit and listen to my music and zone out. Sometimes, I get in a bad mood and can’t take being the ‘toy’. I know that’s not what they think of me, but sometimes that’s what it feels like. I am just something to stare at and play with and they don’t care or, I guess, understand that it makes me uncomfortable or angry. I’m usually pretty understanding and don’t care, but that day I just was feeling really irritable and so every little thing that happened built on all the others and by the end I just hated everyone. Though when I got back to Mwezi, I was happy because people knew my name and would hug me and not just call me muzungu and stare. Mama Vanessa got a flashlight and looked in my mouth because I told her I went to the dentist. The week was pretty normal. Went to the clinic and to the cooperative meeting on Thursday. I was put in charge of taking pictures of the staff for their new ID cards, since I am the only person with a digital camera, so I did a lot of picture taking and helped with the pregnant ladies. Sister Dormina asked me to take pictures of her school for her on Friday morning, so I went there before going down to the clinic. It’s a technical school for students who finish primary school, but cannot afford to go to secondary school. They learn carpentry and sewing and English. I got woken up early Saturday by sister Dormina, who wanted to get the pictures I took for her on Friday. I went over to their house Friday evening, but she wasn’t back from work yet, so she came Saturday morning. I went over there and put the pictures onto her computer and took some Kinyarwanda songs from her. Turns out a lot of them were videos and they are HILARIOUS!!! I spent Saturday night watching the videos and laughing to myself. Sunday, sister Mary woke me up and took me to church. It is the day of assumption, so the parish in Gashashi was bringing a cross down to our parish. They were about an hour and a half late, so I was invited into the Priest’s house and had some tea and then we went out to the church and saw the cross being carried in. They carried it on their heads dancing and singing all the way from Gashashi!! Our church gets it for 2 days and then we are in charge of bringing it to another parish and so on, until it makes its way around the whole of Rwanda! The incense they burned smelled like pinesol and that mixed with the smell of hot people dancing wasn’t very enticing. I went home early, because I couldn’t understand the sermon, even though occasionally sister Mary would translate parts for me. But I was still at the parish a good 3 ½ hours. I made cottage cheese after church to eat with my pineapple. While I was boiling water later that day to put into the filter, two boys came to the fence and yelled “mwiriwe” (good afternoon) to me, so I yelled back “go away” and then went out to see whom it was. I didn’t recognize them, but they said “Alice, its been many days since we’ve seen you. We came to greet you.” So, I said hi and talked to them for a bit, then remembered that I had a bunch of empty water bottles and asked if they wanted some. They said yes, so I gave each of them a bottle then said bye. They didn’t leave and were just standing there playing with their bottles a good 5 minutes before asking me for water. I didn’t want to give them dirty water because I knew they were going to drink it, so I filled it with water from the tap, which they can see, and many rwandese think is clean water, and added Sur Eau, a water purifying solution. I asked the boys if they had Sur Eau at home and they said no, so I asked if they drank boiled water and they said yes. I told them it was good to drink boiled water or water with Sur Eau because it keeps them healthy. When I gave them the bottles, they left and hopefully took my lesson with them.

Monday, I took the bus to Nyanza and had to walk from the main road to the training center. It was a LONG walk and a bunch of kids walking home from school surrounded me and walked with me asking me questions and talking to me. It was nice. Kids in Nyanza are used to the bazungu from PC because the trainees worked in the schools there during training, so they aren’t so shy and don’t just stare at you, they talk to you! I liked it. The training was amazing! It was about permagardening, which is a form of permaculture that includes the techniques of biointensive gardening. We learned a lot and I am really excited to introduce this into my community and help people to grow better. Rwandese know how to farm, but this is just an extra tool to help them increase their yield. I was in Nyanza from Monday to Thursday doing this training and then came to Kigali to visit Adam for the weekend and check my email and use the internet.

Some observations about wearing pants in Africa:

You know it’s a gross bathroom when you have to roll up your pant legs before entering, skirts are much more conducive to these environments.

As soon as you step off the bus in Nyamasheke, roll up your pant legs because they will get dirty; immediately! especially in the wet season

The end of April was pretty uneventful. When I got back from Kenya, I had to go to the doctor for my mid-service exam and go to the dentist for a cleaning…where she found a cavity! L I finished up some grant applications and turned them in (for the maternity ward) and went to Nyanza to the Pre-Service Training (PST) for the new group of health volunteers to teach the biology of HIV and the function of ARV medications. I also helped with a few exercises and told them about my experiences thus far. When I got back to Kigali, I went to a friend’s house for pizza and game night. We ate pizza and played Balderdash and I ended up leaving my phone in a friend’s car, so I couldn’t leave the next morning to go back to Nyamasheke. I was unable to get my phone back until Sunday at the volleyball tournament. We went out dancing Friday and Saturday night and I left my cereal and milk behind the bar Friday. Saturday, when we walked in I asked the bar tender and he had put my milk in the fridge for me and had my cereal waiting. I was happy! When we tried to eat the cereal though, the milk had gone sour and we only ended up getting one bowlful (cause I ruined two with the sour milk). I went back to site and it was child immunization week again. This time we were only giving vitamin A supplements and deworming medications, so no needles. Not to say that it wasn’t still difficult though! Lots of crying and kicking and screaming and spitting. I mostly gave vitamin A and got a nice spraying of it from one girl all over my face. On Thursday, I met up with my women’s cooperative and saw all the amazing things they had created while I was absent. One woman made a bag with braided handles that the other women were gawking over. It was really nice to see and made me very happy and proud of them. They totally don’t need me; they are so innovative and creative. Once I get the funding to help them buy supplies, they will totally be able to sustain themselves. I came into Kigali for the swearing-in ceremony for the new group of health volunteers. The ceremony was held at the American ambassador’s house (as ours was) and the food was amazing! After the ceremony, I came back to the office and hung out with some other PCV’s and then we went to Indian food. I met up with Adam and the boys afterwards and we drank until midnight when they wished me a happy birthday! Oh, and I saw my first snake the other day in Nyamasheke. Didn’t think they could survive in the cold, but I guess they can.

Friday (4/9), I forgot that the PC office closes at 1, so I came in around 4 to pick up my credit card, passport and WHO card so I could fly and no one was here! I called the duty officer and apologised profusely and she tried to figure everything out for me. Our medical officer left us for Morocco, so we have an interim lady here and she doesnt quite know where everything is and our medical secretary had left for the weekend to visit her family. We couldn't quite figure out how to get my WHO card until Saturday, when I came and picked everything up. I flew out on Sunday and without my credit card, I was unable to purchase my second ticket from Nairobi to Lamu, so as soon as I got into Nairobi, I had to quickly leave the airport and rush over to the smaller, local airport and buy a ticket on the flight leaving in one hour! I got the last seat on the plane and made it with more than enough time. I ended up buying a $2 kit kat while I waited! The flight down was crazy full of white people, we stopped first in Malindi then continued on to Lamu. A lady sitting next to me was part of a wedding party and the bride came around offering cake and to be nice offered it to me also. It was pretty good. I got into Lamu and had to take a boat over to the island where jon was waiting. We hit the ATM, then took another boat over to the jetty and then caught a ride with someone to his village and the walked to his house. His house is really nice. He is the 3rd volunteer to be at that site, so when he got there it was fully furnished and already had a lot of things, so he used all of his settling in money to decorate and make it homey. Its really flippin hot and humid though!

Monday and Tuesday we took the boat over to Lamu, then Monday we walked to Shella beach and Tuesday we took a boat. Shella is a very touristy area and is beautiful! Monday, we saw some rain clouds rolling in over the ocean, so we quickly packed up and ran to one of the fancy hotels where we sat and had drinks until the rain stopped. It was high tide, so we couldnt walk along the water and had to take a path through the 'forest' to get back and catch a boat to the mainland. Tuesday, we spent the whole day at the beach, but didn't make it before the rain began. We jumped on a boat to go back to Lamu town, but got caught in the rain while on the boat. We got SOAKED! But it felt good cause it was so hot out.

Wednesday, while waiting for someone to come through town going towards the jetty, we saw a big bus and jumped on that to get a ride and there were 4 PCVs on there going to Lamu for vacation, so we showed them to their hotel and hung out with them that day in town. On the way back to Mokowe (Jon's village), we got caught again in the rain on the boat and had to wait for a bit at the jetty before catching a ride and then we had to walk through the rain, trying to avoid the giant puddles that had formed in the last few days (when I arrived, there was one small puddle, by the time I left, it was a giant wet lands and there were no dry areas to walk on) back to his house. Thursday was super cloudy and rainy and we were unable to take our Dhow trip, so we went into town late and just hung out with the girls in town and got food and juice (Lamu is known for its juices). Friday, we got up early and went over to Lamu to take our Dhow trip. The 6 of us went with 4 crew and we sailed out into the Indian ocean where we went snorkling, fishing and had lunch on an island. I cut my foot on some coral after snorkling for only about 10 minutes and couldnt get it to stop bleeding, so I spent most of my time in the boat. The captain got me to help with the fishing for lunch and I caught one! They made the most delicious lunch with coconut rice from real coconuts (which we got to eat some and drink the milk), a vegetable stew, grilled fish and lots of fresh fruit. We sailed over to an island and walked through the water a bit to get onto the land and ate lunch there, but the tide came in quickly and we ended up having to swim back to the boat. It was definitely the best part of the trip! We stayed in Lamu that night and slept at the hotel the girls were staying in and caught the early bus to Mombasa the next morning. It was about a 7 hour bus trip (which is my travel time from site to Kigali) and when we got in we immediately walked over to the other bus company to buy a ticket for the next morning to Nairobi. Little did we know it was so far! Its already so hot and humid in Mombasa, and a 20-25 minute walk with luggage in the city is NOT fun. We took a tok tok (the three wheeled cars) to the hotel afterwards and just laid in the air conditioned rooms. We met up with 6 other PCVs and all had lunch, then went back to the hotel after going shoe shopping for Jon. We met up again for a late dinner and then went out to a bar cause it was one of the guy's birthdays. I went home early because i was tired and really excited about the AC! I had my own room, so I just sat and watched CNN for 2 or so hours before sleeping. I actually got too cold at one point, quite a luxury after being so disgustingly hot the previous 6 days. The bus to Nairobi was almost 9 hours and by the time we got there the cut on my foot wasn't looking so good, so Jon called the PCMO and she said she'd send a car for me in the morning to take me to the office so she could look at it. I had dinner with all the Kenya PCVs in Jons group and we hung out that night and Monday morning I went to the PC office in Nairobi and got my foot cleaned up and bandaged. I got a ride to a shopping center where my taxi guy who drove me to the other airport when I first got in was meeting me to take me to the airport. I walked around with one shoe on and went into clothing stores, book stores and grocery stores (yeah, Kenya and South Africa have grocery stores in their malls). He was an hour and a half later than I asked him to be cause of some crazy traffic, so I got picked up from the shopping center an hour and a half before my flight and got to the airport less than an hour before my flight. Luckily, there were no other passengers waiting to check-in, so I got checked-in and through security in less than 5 minutes. Even had time to shop around in Duty free before flying back!

Had a wonderful time, but I'm happy to be back. Rwanda really is starting to feel like home to me. I was constantly praising this country and defending it when the other PCVs would ask me questions or criticize. Kenya was awesome, but I love Rwanda.

1/4: April's fools day. Didn't pull any tricks. Went to Kamembe with the priests and nuns. The market wasn't really open so early, so I was about to catch the bus down to the AIDS Relief office when I ran into Tricia. We went into the food market and bought a few things. Not many people were there yet, but I got carrots, garlic and cucumbers and a small package of curry powder to send to Cindy in Guatemala. Then I went to the shops and bought a small packet of Rwanda tea and some Ugandan gin (Waragi). I took the bus down the hill and went into the office, but they were all in a meeting to I put together my package and took my letters to the post. The guy asked me what the bottle was and i told him Waragi, but not to worry because it was in a plastic bottle and all he said was "it tastes better in glass". haha, i thought he was going to reprimand me and tell me you cant send alcohol in the mail. When I got back to the office, they were out of the meeting and I met the new head of CRS who is an RPCV and who was a country director of peace corps before and really interested in getting us things to do! I am so happy! I finally have things to do, but I told him I am always open for more and am very willing and excited to have things to do. I also met a new AIDS Relief staff who lives in Kigali and she was PC a few years ago and also is very excited to have us and wants to give us more to do and invited us to her house any time we're in Kigali to watch TV and play Wii. Sweet. I used the internet and then went back up the hill to wait for the ride home. I sat and had a small Primus and then ordered and sandwich while watching a chinese show dubbed in french. I called the architect who wrote the budget for the maternity ward, but he couldnt come meet me until 2:30, so I waited by myself eating my sandwich and drinking my beer. I was bored and lonely and then got a call from the nuns when the architect said he was 5 minutes away. Called him back and cancelled and went to meet the nuns. The priest called the guy and had him meet me at the gas station while they filled up and i gave him my drawing of the building and asked him to reduce the budget if possible. I bought fabric and batting in the market and almsot got away with the fabric scraps for free, but went back to ask for more and she asked for money.

2/4: Only 10 pregnant women today! Very slow day. Went to update the HIV data for March, but found the computer with all my grant proposals on it dead!!!! I almost cried. I printed out most of it, so I have it, just need to retype it all. March 2010 had zero positive HIV tests!

3/4: Went to Parish to meet with architect to get new budget. Drink beer with the priest, see the floor plan he came up with and the 3-D image of the building. I asked to make a few changes and he did and then we went to the clinic to print it out and to show him the current maternity building. It was raining, so I got stuck. Didn't get home until 3 and hadn't eaten lunch, so i was hungry! Emily left, I packed for Kenya. The guard came while I was packing, so I went out to say hi and he tells me that holidays are when thieves like to steal because everyone is gone at church, so he said he was going to beat them with a stick and kick them tomorrow.

4/4: Went to the 7:30am mass. Didnt get to say hi or see any of the nuns (which is the whole reason I came because they asked me to). I sat in the back by the door and left a few minutes early to catch a moto at 9:30 to go to brunch with other PCV's. There was a taxi right at the end of the dirt road, so I was able to jump in and go right away. Got to their dirt road and there was a moto there who could take me, but he was the only one and it was raining and it was Easter, so he charged me 300 extra. It was so muddy and slippery, we had to stop 3 different times, and i had to get off and walk and then we fell between the logs on a bridge and we almost slipped over and had to have two other men come and help right the bike. I finally got there and asked a guy where the muzungu lived and he said with the nuns, so we went to the nuns and I asked them if they knew my nuns and they did and asked me my Rwandese name, so I told them and they were so excited and happy and wanted to take a picture with me and then gave me "coffee" (it was a splash of coffee with lots of hot milk and sugar) and sweet bread. Everyone else had gone back to Christa's to start cooking brunch, so I had to have a nun walk me to her house since it was the first time I was visiting. We had an amazing brunch and i think it was the most i have eaten in a year! Went back and slept at Tricia's house.

5/4: Caught a bus to Kigali with Tricia. Got in and they changed the taxi stand for my bus to my office, so I have to go back up where I came from. Went to the office to drop a few things off then met up with Adam.

6/4: Happy Birthday Maria! Went to PC Office and worked on grant applications and my blog. Watched soccer with a bunch of people that night.

7/4: Start of Memorial week, stayed in and then Adam had some people over to the house.

Rest of the week was pretty laid back, I went into the office every day to work on finishing up the grant applications and we went over to people's homes or had people over cause most places closed early. Went out for dinner one night and had some delicious ravioli and I met the guys who are building a casino here.

1/3: Took bus back to Mwezi and the rain came half hour after I walked in my door. Mama Vanessa (the women who holds my helmet for me at the town on the road) gave me two fantas to take home with me for me and Emily. A kid yelled "umuzungunyarwanda" at me while I was taking the moto. Made me happy cause it means I am a white rwandan. Also, saw a bunch of people I knew, so waved to them and had some more kids yell "Alice". Its always hard coming back to the bush, but its nice to have people who know me now. Had one girl yell "Hi! I love you!"

2/3: Meeting with the community health workers, supposed to start at 8am, so i showed up at the clinic early, even though i knew it wasnt going to start on time. Started at 10. I taught about kitchen gardens and handed out copies of the directions and materials list in Kinyarwanda to the different cells. After the meeting I helped in child vaccination.

3/3: Worked with the pregnant women. Saw a CRS car go past the clinic up the hill towards my house. The moto driver had just come down the hill, so I asked him where the car was going and he said my house, so he gave me a ride up. They brought our packages to the house and then gave me a ride back down to the clinic. I got a box with 4 skirts in it and opened it in front of my housegirl, so I gave her one of them. She was very happy, but tried to iron it. The head for the Artisan Center came with the Sector head of cooperatives to the clinic and I met with her and asked her about the women selling things in the center. She said it was possible, but they needed to pay a joining fee and fill out some paperwork. I asked her about the quilted bags and my women will be the only ones with that product, so I'm pretty excited they have the entire market (at the center). Took a cold shower cause it was so humid and hot!

4/3: Meeting with co-op. Started hour and a half late, but was very successful. The head of the artisan center came and explained everything to the women and gave us the paper work. I started teaching how to quilt using my pieces and a chalkboard, (the women only speak Kinyarwanda, so my little French is of no help). The women asked about getting money for supplies, so I am looking into a few PC programs. Emily left, so I was home alone that night and ate an early dinner cause i was bored and then packed for tomorrow and tried on different outfits for the wedding.

5/3: Got into Kigali early and stopped at a few shops to buy black shoes to go with my outfit and a black, leather bag. Found both after going into about 12 different shops. Went to the wedding, it was really nice. The bride and groom were followed in by about 20 dancers and then they performed. I've only really seen friends or girls dancing, but these were professional adults, men and women and it was amazing. I really enjoyed watching the dancing. The wedding was a bit like the ones i've been to in that the men shared a beer together and both spoke of fulfilling their promises (give cows, give a good woman). The president just walzed in unannounced in the middle of some guys speech. It was in Kinyarwanda, so I was kind of zoning out and looking into space and then I saw a guy come in and then realized it was the president and it kind of caught my breath "holy crap! Thats Kagame!". Didn't expect him to walk in so casually, all alone. We left early cause they were only serving sodas and this was unacceptable to the boys, so we went to a bar for a bit, then to the fundraising concert. There were not as many people as we hoped, but it was still pretty good. Went to a bar afterwards and then home.

6/3: Woke early to go help at Operation Smile. There were SO many people there from all over the country hoping to get the free operation. There were newborns up to an 86 year old woman. I played with the kids, coloring and reading book and blowing bubbles, but the kids stole my books! :( Should've given a disclaimer before handing them out. They were getting so many other things for free, how were they to know these were only for sharing? I helped with patient files and taking the photos. The photo taking was extremely difficult because we had to get the kids to put their heads just so, in 4 different positions. Kids were screaming and crying and kicking and twisting (reminded me of the vaccination campaign). One little girl came and stood between my legs when I was sitting and then she laid back and put her head in my lap and she just hung out with me for a good 20 minutes. She was so cute, I'm mad I forgot my camera. I was there all day and then went out to pizza. I got take out to bring to Adam, but when I showed up at his house it was full of people and I felt bad I didn't bring more. He got bamboozled out of his pizza and only got to eat one slice.

7/3: Back to Operation Smile, much quieter and calmer today because it was mostly adults and older children. We redirected patient flow so things ran a lot smoother and faster. I helped with photos and patient files again. There were 371 patients by the end of the day. Went to the bar with the volleyball court afterwards, but every one had finished playing, so we went to the sitting room. After we walked over to the club, but there was a cover and we didnt want to pay, so we went to a little hole in the wall bar for an hour then home.

8/3: It was Women's Day, so the bank and my office were closed, so I couldnt do my errands. Met some friends for breakfast, but by the time I got there they were having a staff meeting, so I couldnt order food. Went back to Adam's and then out to the bar and mom called then home. Early night.

9/3: Mom and g-ma's birthday! Went to my office to turn things in, went to the Rwandair office to buy my ticket to Kenya then went to the bank to get a password for internet banking. As I was leaving in the morning, I was on the small path up to the road and two boys came up and gave me hugs. It was nice.

10/3: Went back to Nyamasheke. Went over to the nun's and they fed me and gave me tea. There were a bunch of white people on my bus! It was strange. I'm not used to seeing so many come my way. 4 got off in Gisakura, so I called Kate and told her I dropped some bazungu in her town.

11/3: Woke up feeling really bad. Barely made it out of bed and was a half hour late to the meeting with the co-op. 3 women were already there by the time I got there, but 20 show up by the time I go home. I filled out the VAST request for money, helped with their bags, but went home early cause I did not feel good. I did some laundry, read and then took a nap. I went over to teach Sister Dormina how to make pizza because she had asked me the day before, but she had gone into the city.

12/3: Went to work, finished with the pregnant ladies by 10:30ish then had to borrow money from the Social Affairs head to buy some eggs. Turns out they were hard boiled. Tried to crack them into my pan to make an omelette, but nothing came out! I read a LOT! Started and finished New Moon, after finishing my first book.

13/3: Felt worse this day so I didnt get up until 10:30. Didnt eat until around 4 when I had some soup. Emily got home and I went over to the nuns to make pizza. It was fun and they really liked it. I ate a slice and drank some tea. Operation Smile performed 242 surgeries by the end of the week.

14/3: Worst day. Couldnt move. Stayed in bed all day, didnt eat. Had a fever, read a lot, slept a lot. Fever finally broke around 10pm

15/3: Stayed home with housegirl. Feeling better, able to move around a bit and eat a little. I organized a few of my things and found 38 dollars in an envelope!

16/3: Went into work and collected HIV testing data from PMTCT and VCT. Put it all into an excel file for 2009 by month and calculated the percentage. Showed it to the nun and a few other employees and talked them into doing a big testing campaign in December. I said it was dispicable that we only tested around 150 people in the month of December because December 1st is World AIDS Day and we should be testing everyone!

17/3: Lots of pregnant women! Filled out charts, took blood pressure, tested for HIV and syphilis. Learned how to ask in Kinyarwanda when the date of her last period was and how to calculate the date of birth.

18/3: RAIN! Got a list of names of the co-op members. Only 5 were there by 9am, but by noon around 15 were there. Two had finished their coin purses with zippers and all and they looked really good. I took picts and will post soon. Helped one cut pieces to make a shoulder bag. One of the women is in charge of collecting 100 francs from each woman to save up to pay the joining fee. They did this all on their own and even had a note book to keep track of who pays each week. I'm happy its becoming so sustainable, so when I go they can keep it up! I got prices for a few things so I can write my budget for the project proposal and get some money for the women to buy supplies. Met a guy from the Ministry of Justice whose first question to me was "Are you in the Peace Corps?" I have never met someone who knows PC, so it totally threw me off guard, but I guess he had a gf in PC back in 93 and they still keep in touch. Got home to two boxes, one from g-ma jo and one from dad and mary.

19/3: Worked with pregnant women. Translated handwashing materials from King County Public Health and distributed copies to all the schools to put near their toilets.

20/3: Went to buy beers. Went to agasoko (small market) and bought some tomatoes and then heard a moto, so I turned around and it was Adam! We walked back to the house together and then the nuns got home and he met them. I made a quiche.

21/3: Watched TV shows on Adam's computer, went over to the nuns to introduce him properly and stayed to chat and drink fanta and beer. Made mac and cheese. Had some teenagers come to the fence and demand food.

22/3: Adam went back :( Housegirl asked me if he was my brother!

23/3: Emily left in the morning. Used internet at health center, got the applications for Peace Corps Partnership Program and Mothers to Mothers to fund the construction of a new maternity ward at the clinic. As I walked home for lunch a boy said to me in English "Good morning. How are you? Sit down." Haha

24/3: Worked on applications, realize I have no idea how to write the budget, ask if we can get someone who works in construction to write one for me. Found dried peas at the shop, bought them, but they take FOREVER to cook. Games day at the primary school, heard lots of singing and banging of sticks and cheering.

25/3: Meeting with co-op. 15 came. Lots of finished products! Told them I was going into Kamembe next thursday and if they wanted me to get them something to give me money before wednesday. Cooked peas on the nuns stove (so I wouldnt have to use my gas for 3 hours) played with their cat, had some tea and taught Dormina English.

26/3: Sooo many pregnant ladies!!! Got their charts, wrote weights and took blood pressure. There were 4 long benches of women, so I scooted down and across each while taking the blood pressure. Would've been a funny picture. One muzungu in the middle of the women facing backwards on the bench. Sister Mary came over with the budget that night when I was eating and it was WAY more than she first proposed. I gave her some of the fried rice and she asked me to teach her how to make it.

27/3: "slept-in" (9ish), read, listened to the radio and my ipod, did sudoku and word searches.

28/3: Was planning on visiting people, but it was super foggy and rainy and windy. I washed my blanket in the morning before the clouds rolled in, worst idea! didnt dry at all! Cooked peas at the nuns again and played with cat and taught English to Sister Kizito. Ate some bread with butter and honey and drank some tea with milk from Mutesi (my neighbor cow). Watched their house girl grind meat by hand. Cleaned up the wings from the crazy, plague bugs. Some kids came to visit after church and I gave them juice (Tang!) biscuits and pencils and we colored in coloring books and then took photos. They were just taking random pictures then they started posing. It was funny! I gave them bouncy balls and they were estatic! Kept saying "thank you. thank you." while shoving thumbs-ups in my face. I visited at the nuns and met a priest who works near the Cyamudongo forest. The tea kettle broke, so I opened it and Macguyvered a solution. I took a spring from a pen and put it into the top to hold the opener. I was pretty proud of myself.

29/3: Worked on the grant proposal and read a lot.

30/3: Worked on grant proposals. Used internet quickly at the clinic to send an email to one of the organizations. Boys from the secondary school came to visit after school. Learned that the clinic has to send weekly text messages about the number of people sick with certain diseases and number of deaths to the district hospital. Took photos of the clinic for the grant proposal. Noticed that the child immunization charts have changed from saying UNICEF, Global Fund and Rwandan Ministry of Health, to only Global fund and MOH to just MOH.

31/3: Worked on grant proposals. Nun not at the clinic so went to find her at home, but she was sleeping. The guys from the electricity company had come, so had to let them into the house to see the fuse box. They are giving us our own meter, so we have to buy our electricity ourselves instead of paying the nuns. They put up a box with a meter and started to run the lines to the main one, but ran out of wire, so had to stop and come back a different day. Ate lunch with sister mary while going over the grant proposals. Played with the cat, did laundry and started packing for Kenya (I get too excited about vacations). Asked the Priest if I could go in the car to Kamembe tomorrow. The community was fixing the roads in the morning, but they were taking the grass off the slopes! Doesnt make sense to me, cause now the rain is just going to wash the dirt into the trenches they were digging for the rainwater.

12/2: Lil bro’s birthday! Called and he didn’t answer :(. Took moto to Kamembe on the back roads and foot paths with the clinic moto driver for an hour and a half! Longest moto ride ever!!! Thought he was going to go to the main road and drop me to take a taxi bus, but he kept going on small, bumpy, dirt paths until we hit the city. My body was sore after that. Finally saw where the hospital was located in the city, went to the bank, went down to the AIDS Relief office and hung out with people and got some mail. Went to the market to buy garlic and cheese and some alcohol for the party then got in another taxibus to Nyamasheke town to stay the night at Katy’s. We made tortilla chips, guacamole and salsa for dinner.

13/2: Went down the hill to the lake (yeah, she lives walking distance from the lake), swam and saw K-topia, the island kate, katie and katy have claimed. We brought a basketball and got followed by a group of kids. It was bothering me that they were just staring, so I told them to come swim and one girl shyly came down to the waters edge and took off all her clothes and jumped in with us. We played with the basketball and soon all the kids were naked and swimming with us. A few didn’t know how to swim so we made sure they stayed where they could stand. When we got out they surrounded me and we were just talking then one was brave enough to touch me and soon they were all braiding my hair into messy, differently sized braids. It was funny. I looked like a fool, but it was nice to be interacting with the kids rather than just being stared at. I took some pictures and let them see and then they started telling me “take another of us dancing, etc.” I’ll post them as soon as I can. Off in the distance I saw a canoe coming towards us, as it got closer I realized it was kate and katy with a bunch of boys. I guess they got tired swimming back from the island and talked the boys into giving them a lift! Then Tricia got into the boat and went on a small journey around on the lake. After swimming, we went back to Katy’s and made pizza and a calzone for lunch. Emily made and brought a King’s cake for Mardi Gras and I found the baby in the cake! Went to Gisakura for a party at the hotel that evening. There were 5 of us and we all took motos to get to the main road, it looked hilarious. There are rarely cars and motos going up and down the road and then there’s this giant procession of 5 motos all banded together. While we were walking to get the motos a kid behind me was singing “Oya, wigenda” which means “no, don’t go”. It’s a real song on the radio, but I thought it was hilarious that he was following me and singing it as I was leaving. Party was fun, lots of good food and dancing. Slept on the couch.

14/2: Watched lots of smutty TV, aka E!, for HOURS! It was wonderful. Also watched some of the winter Olympics which was pretty fun and took a hot shower. I was able to use the internet for a bit and then we took a tour of the hotel. It’s almost done now and they’re just installing the furniture and decorations and its beautiful! I wanted to sneak in and take over. There's an infinity pool overlooking the forest now and the hotel lobby and sitting room is gorgeous. We walked back to Kate’s house to get our things and head home, but when I got to the town on the road I got a text saying that I left my purse at her house, so I went back and stayed the night and left in the morning. I love her site because the kids will come hold your hand and walk you to her house and give you hugs.

15/2: I walked down the hill from Kate’s to Buhinga and went to the Artisan Center to talk to the boss about letting a cooperative of women in Mwezi sell things there, but she wasn’t there, so they let me in to look around and gave me her number. Then I went home, but the moto I was on stopped about 5 minutes into my dirt road and left me there saying he had to go fix something and another moto driver came to take me because the other guys moto couldn’t be fixed.

16/2: Met with the guy in charge of cooperatives for my sector and told him my idea of getting together a group of women to sell things at the artisan center in Buhinga. He told me he was going to get together a group of women for me (women with HIV and widows). He set a date for meeting with the women the next week and we went to visit a woman who makes agaseke (woven baskets) and she showed me some of her things.

17/2: Worked with pregnant women at the clinic, taking blood pressure and testing for HIV and syphilis.

18/2: Drew lines in a book and copied things from one book to another. No one had filled out the book since the first week in November, so I had quite a few months of work to do. Really boring and tedious. A few people from AIDS Relief came to the clinic and I talked to one of them about the problems between the testing and counseling and we tried to figure out where things were going wrong. When someone tests positive they are supposed to sit and talk with a counselor and then be entered into the database. The number of people in the database hasn’t changed in a few months, yet I know for a fact that people have been testing positive. Painted my toe nails.

19/2: Took 6:30 bus into Kigali and met Adam and his friends for lunch. Went to the PC office and played on the internet and hung out with the other PCVs there. Met back up with Adam at a bar, we went to go get pizza and came back and then went to a different bar. I had given my bag to Kevin during lunch and he took it to Adam’s office for me, so we had to go to the office to grab my bag before going home and found two of the guys there drinking wine and playing computer games.

20/2: Watched Avatar in the morning on Adam’s computer, then went over to his “big brother’s” house to visit with him, his wife, baby and their cousin who came in from Holland to visit. The baby is only 2 months and is so cute. She was smiling the whole time, her name means sun (Izuba) in ikinyarwanda, but they call her izzie for short. We ate lunch and had some drinks and I played with the baby and their yellow lab, then we went back to Adam’s where a bunch of friends came over. We got some drinks and ended up playing “I’ve never”, I was too tired to go out after so I just went to bed while everyone else went to a friend’s party.

21/2: Watched Sherlock Holmes and How I Met Your Mother in the morning then went to the bar to nurse the boy’s hangovers and then went to the bar with the volleyball court. The boys played in the mud and rain, while others of us played pool (I’m really bad). We went down the road afterwards to a bar that’s like a sitting room with couches and a TV and ended up watching an HIV prevention movie from Kenya. Adam, his cousin, a friend and I went out to Chinese food and it was delicious.

22/2: Caught the bus home Monday morning and at one of the stops saw a girl out the window waving at me and yelling “muzungu”. I waved back and then realized that she was carrying a small doll and blanket with her and made me think of when I went everywhere with my doll and blanket. I got a comfortable seat next to a skinny guy, so I had my own space and the driver was fast and there was no rain when I got back to Nyamasheke, so I’ve decided that Mwezi is appreciative that I am now doing something (the cooperative) and doesn’t hate me anymore. While on the moto, the cooperative guy at the sector office came by on his moto, so he had me get off and get on his and he gave me a ride home. When I got to the last hill before my house, the kids had just gotten out of school, so they chased the moto up the hill the whole time yelling “alice” (ah-lee-say, which is the name I get called the most in my village). Meredith had come to visit so I got to hang out with her that night.

23/2: Meredith left in the morning and I was feeling under the weather, so I didn’t go into work and just did some laundry. There was some crazy sunshine rain in the afternoon. It was super sunny but raining like the dickens.

24/2: Went into the clinic early to talk to Jean de Dieu before he left for a training about starting the kitchen garden trainings with the community health workers. Helped with the pregnant ladies.

25/2: Saw a chameleon crossing the grass in the nuns yard on the way to work. Drew lines and copied things from book to book again. Rained from 4pm that night until 6am the next morning! The mud was epic. That night there was a plague of insects around the lights and getting into the house under the doors. Literally thousands everywhere! It was gross and difficult to get in and out of the door.

26/2: Next morning I woke to millions of insect wings and bodies inches deep outside the door and covering the floors in the house. Had the meeting with the women for the cooperative at the sector office. It went well, they seemed interested and excited. There are about 20 of them. Raced home after the meeting and packed quickly and caught a moto to the road and took a bus to Butare to meet Adam and friends for Gad’s birthday. They have been fixing the road and the drivers haven’t gotten used to it yet, cause we hit one bump and honestly my entire body flew about a foot in the air. My bum was off the seat, my feet were off the floor. We drank at a hotel outside on the veranda then went out dancing at a club.

27/2: Woke up and took a cold shower, with the water stopping intermittently, then went to find a bus back to Nyamasheke, only to find out that they werent going to Cyangugu that day. "Do you have a bus to Cyangugu?" "Yes, let me go ask.... No, not today." So, ended up going back to Kigali on a bus with a preacher man who got the boys into a conversation about God and religion (I tried to stay out of it). I didnt pack for an entire weekend, so I stole some of Adam's clothes and washed mine. Took a nap, watched a movie and then a bottle of Black Label showed up and I drank some. Lots of people came over to partake in the Black Label, then we went out to a bar and got a ride home from a friend.

28/2: Worst Hang Over Ever! I'm never drinking whiskey again! Slept in too late to get a bus back to Nyamasheke, so stayed another night in Kigali. Watched how I met your mother, did more laundry, went to a volleyball tournament and Adam's friends won both 1st and 2nd place! So, they got free alcohol and food. Adam and I went to eat chinese and when we got back to the bar, everyone was finishing up and we were going to the sitting room bar cause its cheaper, but it was RAINING! Adam ran, but got soaked, I got a ride in a car with the other girls. On the way home, stopped at a nice bar to use the toilet.

It was my friend, Nicole's birthday, so we went up to Gisenyi to celebrate. We got there in the afternoon and immediately hit the beach (after a trying time finding a place to stay). We put our toes in the sand and rolled up our pants to wade in the water. It was beautiful! We met a girl and her brother on the beach and when we were leaving to shower and get ready for dinner, the girl jumped in the car with us and came back to our room. Then she invited her brother and his friend over and we got a little uncomfortable, so we asked them to leave so we could change and we'd call after dinner. They stayed outside the room knocking on the door a good half hour!!! We went to dinner around 9:30pm and got back to the room late and just went to sleep, after repeated calls from the girl and her brother. The next day we went to the fancy hotel's beach and bought lounge chairs (with cushions!) and sat under the umbrella and drank iced coffee. We went swimming and just lounged on the beach all day reading Cosmo and Elle (she brought them from the states). It was a wonderful day! As we were leaving we noticed we were looking a little red. We showered and went out for dinner and when we got back to the room we were in pain! We just laid on the bed in our underware and ended up falling asleep at 8:30. We woke up again around 11, but it was raining, so we just went back to sleep. The next morning, we wanted to go visit an orphanage in the area, but no one seemed to know where it was. By the time we found it, we realized that it was really far and was going to cost a lot of money to get there and back, so we just jumped onto the bus back to Kigali. Some of our friends were in a volleyball tournament, so we went to watch and they ended up getting second prize and we all split 5 pizza's. Afterwards, we went to a bar to watch the superbowl. It started at 1:30 in the morning and didn't finish until 5! I heard the call to prayer as I was walking in the door! I pretty much was sleeping the second half and just woke to the sounds of cheering and caught the replay. The next day Adam and I watched the game again at a decent hour with a bunch of people who missed it the night (morning?) before. I got ridiculed by an American behind us because i asked if it was Eli or Peyton who was playing. "Are you American?" "Uh, yes" "And you dont know who's playing?! You had to ask the Rwandan!?" Jerks. But they ended up bring pretty cool. I just felt like an idiot. I currently look like rudolph and am peeling from head to toe! Stupid equitorial sun...

I was the last person on the 9:30 bus. Had to run from the ticket place down the hill to the other side of the circle to catch it, but i made it! On the bus ride home, i wasnt feeling very well and the lady next to me bought one seat for her and her 3 children! She had a baby girl on her back, a 3 year old boy and a 6 year old girl. She sat with the baby, while i had the 3 year old on my lap, head on my chest, sleeping and the 6 year old slept on a teenage boy in front of us. Children in Africa are like communal property. Its completely normal and acceptable to touch other people's children. It made me feel better to cuddle with a baby, so it wasn't too bad. The baby stole my waterbottle though and i just let her play with it, but then the mom opened it and started giving her kids drinks. That sucked, cause i was still thirsty. The lady on the other side of me kept putting her had on my thigh and that made me uncomfortable! Personal space is not something people really care or think about, so its not really weird to me any more to be touched by a stranger, but her hand kept creeping up and i didnt not appreciate that. But she was old and I think just trying to keep her balance on the multitude of turns, so i just tried to ignore it.

Got home right after the rain so I didnt have any of my usual suckiness (slipping and falling in the mud, etc) So I was pretty happy. Emily's friend from Cameroon had informed her that she had two friends traveling in Africa who wanted to come by Rwanda, so we got mattresses and made up the beds for them and they arrived Tuesday night. We ate dinner and played rummy and then watched a movie. Today (wednesday 2/10) they are visiting the health clinic and going to check out the market (which is really not much). They have been traveling all over the continent and will continue for another 25 or so days before going back to the states.

sorry haven't written in so long. My computer died. but a quick update on whats been going on since being back in Mwezi:

The water went out, so we had to catch rain in buckets and the nuns lent us a worker to go gather water for us from a well. we didnt get to shower cause we had to use the water for drinking and cooking and washing dishes.

my computer died and i went into kigali to try and find a new cord. found a new cord, but when i brought it home and plugged my computer in, it didnt work. i plugged it into my computer when i was in kigz, and the charge light came on, but when i got home and plugged it in it didn't charge it and i think i fried my battery cause the voltage coming through the cord was 24v and the input into my computer is only supposed to be 12v... so no computer, but emily is sharing with me

got home to 4 christmas boxes!!! Two from g-ma and auntie terri, one from grandpa and grandma groesbeck and one from mom. Had so much fun opening them. Emily came into my room and made me open them first thing when i got home. I have a funny picture of me with all the stuff crowding my room i will post at some point. it was great to have the boxes cause they were filled with activities (puzzels, games, etc) that i can do to entertain myself without a computer. that night there was a huge storm and the power went out for hours on end. had a nice night in the dark with candles, cooking with a headlamp.

saw a chameleon crossing the "street" on the way home from work on the 21st. wanted to pick it up, but there were people behind me and i didnt want to look like a crazy person. then later that day we went back to the clinic for a farewell party for our titulaire who is moving to the city to continue her studies. Our favorite nun who speaks english and has been so helpful was named titulaire until another arrives. we ate some food, drank some beer and fantas (they gave me a beer and i spilled it on myself and the nun cause i'm not used to drinking out of bottles, didn't finish it and gave it to one of the workers)

That weekend, emily left to visit one of our friends and it was pretty much the first weekend i was by myself in the house. my ipod was about to die and without a computer to charge it and the silence in the house deafening, i trapsed back down to the clinic after lunch to charge it on one of their computers. everyone was still gone at lunch when i got there (2pm) so i had to find the keys and unlock the building to get to a computer. i sat in the building all alone for over an hour watching silent music videos because the sound on the computer doesnt work. it was pretty funny. that evening, valentine, one of the community health workers, emmanuel, her brother and a teacher at the primary school and her son came to visit. i gave them cookies and tea and we talked (or tried to, but had emmanuel translate for us most the time). her son is wanting to go to seminary in the big town, but she cannot pay for the fees, so she was asking me to loan her money so she can start selling things and she would pay me back. she already has a place to sell the things, just needs the start up money. I am not allowed to personally deal with money, so i told her i would look into organizations who do that sort of thing and into cooperatives in the area and get back to her. I am thinking maybe we could start a coop of entreprenurial women in the area to all put money into a pool and then each draw from it when needed and keep each other accountable for paying it back.

saturday i just did some laundry and read an entire book

sunday i went to visit emmanuel and see his new house (he just got married). i went over and looked through pictures and ate a small meal and visited with him and his wife, then we 3 went to valentines house where she served us beer and fanta. she gave me a glass and i poured my soda in and when it was getting low, emmanuel poured in his beer and mixed the two. it actually wasnt bad, but the rest of the visit he only let me drink that mixture. we played old maid (one of the card games sent to me in my christmas box from g-ma and terri). it was pretty funny and they all got the hang of it and we were laughing and having fun. i slipped in the mud on the way to valentine's house so my butt was covered in mud the entire visit. boo. that evening, i decided on a whim to go to tricia's house because we had a training the next morning in the big town and she lives an hour closer. so i quickly packed up and locked up the house and called the moto driver to come and get me. i didnt make it before dark and she had moved so i got a little lost, but luckily one of the hospital workers recognized me and showed me the way to her house.

we woke up early and went into town that morning for the meeting and it was great. its so nice to have some intellectual stimulation again! the main speaker was a tanzanian maasai from baltimore. got a free lunch and then had to go back to tricia's for the night because we left our things at her house. Emily came that night and we all 3 went together the next morning for the training and stayed 3 to a bed in a hotel in town tuesday night. wednesday we went to the meeting, but afterwards went back to tricia's cause another volunteer was coming to do a kitchen garden demonstration with the community health workers at tricia's hospital. it was fun having 4 of us all together and the next morning we had about 20 people in her backyard learning how to build a kitchen garden. it was crazy, but really fun. stayed the night at tricia's again

woke really early the next morning because tricia and bryna were going to kigali and had to catch the bus. we got back to mwezi before we usually arrive at work! it was super foggy too, so the ride through the tea fields we couldnt see anything. it was like driving through a cloud.

the 29th was our one year anniversary in country! we didnt do anything special.

Sunday, went and visited our host family, the baby like always was scared of us and took about an hour to warm up to us. the mom's niece is so cute and she was really fun. emily gave them christmas gifts and the girl shared her chocolate with the baby who was so confused by it that he kept tasting and making a weird face and then tasting again. After visiting them we went over to the secondary school teachers house who always calls me a liar cause i say i'll visit and never do. it was fun, we looked through pictures, played with the baby, ate some doughnuts with honey and some pineapple and tried the local brew. it was nice and less stressful cause they speak pretty good english, so we didnt just sit in uncomfortable silence. we then went over to the nun's place to ask about one of them who went into the capital because she was sick. she's doing okay and we got some tea and avocado.

didn't have to work monday cause it was hero's day a national holiday (which last year, one one of our first days in country we went to the celebration in the stadium in butare and sat for about 6 hours in the blazing heat in our nice clothes watching people parade in a circle around the stadium). we made chili and cornbread for dinner and a chocolate cake which we brought into work on monday to everyones enjoyment!

Warning/Disclaimer: This is just me complaining... a lot.

My village hates me! It was dry all day the day before and all day the day I was getting back until an hour before I arrived and a huge thunderstorm rolled in. I had a large bag with me from my vacation, so I knew that I wouldn’t be able to carry it up the hill if the moto stopped at the bottom. I tried to call a friend to see if I could stay at their place for the night and go home tomorrow morning when it was dry, but they weren’t at home. So, I waited in the town on the road for about half hour for the rain to let up, but realized it wasn’t going to, so I got on the moto. It was raining really hard by the time we got to Mwezi, so the driver stopped at the bottom by the market, about ½ or ¾ kilometer from my house. We went into a small shack with no electricity and by this time it was really dark, so I was sitting in a shack in the dark with everyone talking about me for another 20 or so minutes. Then the driver told me that I could get someone to help me carry my bag, but I’d have to pay him 300 francs. So, a boy came in and took my bag and two of them carried the big one. It was still pouring down rain, the sunlight was almost gone and there was lightning and thunder. I had to take my shoes off halfway because they turned into 5-inch platforms weighing a kilo each due to the immense amount of mud that accumulated on the bottom. Then by the parish, I slipped off the path and fell to my knees, covering my pants in mud. When I got home I gave the 3 boys 100 each and two hershey’s kisses, then jumped in a cold shower to wash the mud off and scrubbed the mud from my pants. Later that night I realized that in the debacle of getting home I lost the 5000 francs of airtime I bought on my way home. After all the crap that happened in SA with my wallet getting stolen and my flight getting cancelled, I just was fed up with saying “oh well, stuff happens”. I want to yell “what the F?! Why me?! Its not fair!”

Then the next night the gas ran out in the middle of my cooking dinner and the nuns were praying, so I couldn't go over to use their stove for an hour.

I knew I should've staying in Kigali.

Friday Dec. 19th I traveled to Kigali and stayed with a friend. Saturday, we went to Gisenyi, a town on the lake in the north by the Ugandan and Congo border. We stayed at a beautiful hotel that night, my room was a circular room that looked like a little hut and it had its own bathroom with hot water. We went out to a bar Saturday night that had a pool and we all jumped in! Sunday, we took a boat out to an island to hang out and we floated in the water with the life jackets and swam to another island. I was the first to get there and they all said it was cause I was white and all white people know how to swim well. We came back to Kigali Sunday evening. I went to the airport on the 23rd to catch my flight to South Africa, only to be told that my flight had been cancelled and I needed to go back into the city to the office to change my flight. The alternative flight for that day was already booked, so I had to wait for the next flight on Christmas Eve. So I had to call my friend and ask if I could stay with him another night. We had a fun night and I got to the airport again the next day. I was sitting waiting to board and the time to board passed, the time my flight was supposed to take off passed and finally a half hour after I was supposed to take off, we started to board. It was a short 2 hour flight on a plane with propellers and they fed me! I was shocked that they gave food on a 2 hour flight. I got into Nairboi with less than an hour to catch my next flight, so I quickly hit the rest room, and then went to the transfer desk where the guy helping me gave a short surprised “eh!” when he saw what flight I was on. He called the flight to make sure I could make it and called and told someone my baggage claim number. I came into gate 1 and left from gate 12!!! Had to run all the way down the airport. I sat for about 3 minutes before we started boarding. I watched a movie and had a delicious vegetarian Indian dinner. I arrived in Jozi after midnight and we just went straight to ryan’s house. His house is awesome, big cushy couches, big flat screen tv with satellite, big hot showers, flushing toilets, washer and dryer and a fridge and microwave. I like the first world. We went to his uncle’s holiday house just outside the city on the river and swam in the pool and bbq’d and sun tanned, it was great! One of his friends came on Christmas day in the afternoon and we all had some drinks and food and then went to bed really early. The next morning, I woke up early and called my mom and realized that the friend wasn’t there. I woke up ryan and told him the friend wasn’t in the other room and he got up and saw that his car wasn’t there, so he texted him to ask where he was and we got a call from a relative that he was in the hospital. He decided to go home that night and flipped his car and ended up flying out the back window and got pinned underneath his car. He broke his knee and got pretty bruised and scratched, but the worst was when he was under the car, the engine burned him. He had 3rd degree burns from the middle of his back all the way down his thigh. We went to see him Sunday as we drove back. He had surgery on his knee and is waiting to get a skin graft. Ryan had to work Monday, so I slept in and then watched hours and hours of TV. Tuesday was pretty much the same story. Wednesday I went to work with him and spent hours and hours on the internet. Thursday I went to work with him again, but it was only a half day so we left early and went to the post office to pick up my Christmas box from mom. I opened it and unwrapped all my gifts in the car! We went to the mall so I could buy a pretty outfit for new years and while shopping someone stole my wallet. I went to pay and it wasn’t there. Had my driver’s license, American credit card and all the $200 that I exchanged. Crap way to start the New Year. We went to one of his friends houses for a pre-funk and then over to another friends where I had margaritas!!! Haven’t had those in a year! Friday, New Years day, we drove back out to the dam and 3 friends came with with their pug! Such a cute dog! We swam and drank and drove out to a little country village type thing with crafts shops and such. Wish I had some money at that point cause there were some cool things. I ruled at beer pong and we set up the basketball hoop next to the dug in trampoline (it was flush with the ground). It was the type of hoop where you put sand or water into the base to stabilize it, but I guess no one put anything in it cause when I went to dunk, I held on and the hoop came with me! Good thing I was on the trampoline cause I just landed softly on the tramp and the hoop extended over the tramp and landed on the grass.

The only way I knew I was still in Africa were the random goats and cows crossing the roads, including the highways! Another strange thing: they have grocery stores in the malls!

Highlights:

My host family’s first and only baby was baptized. I went to the church thinking it was a private baptism only to find out that about 50 other babies were being baptized at the same time!! The priest dipped his hand in water and just flung it out over the crowd of parents holding their babies. Then we took pictures outside the church and walked to the family’s house to continue the celebration. It was super long and I got very tired and bored.

Went into Kigali for medical reasons and ended up sitting in the hospital for about 3 hours, then I got stuck in the exam room afterwards (they guy said, okay we are finished, but the door I had come in he locked and didn’t unlock afterwards and he didn’t turn the lights back on so I was confused and just sat there for about 10 minutes until he came back in and said okay you can go), and then, I got locked in the bathroom and a maintenance guy had to come let me out. Met up with a lot of other volunteers and had a lot of good food! Really, really fun weekend.

A funny conversation I had with a girl at the clinic after I got back:

Me: I had pizza in Kigali!

Girl 1: Oh, pizza, I love pizza, you will make me pizza? I want to eat some pizza.

Me: Sure, I just need to build an oven first, then you can come over and we’ll eat pizza.

Girl 2: What’s pizza?

Girl 1: I don’t know.

Went to Kigali again with a friend and saw the Seattle Sounders vs. Chicago game on the TV!

I now am a pro at taking blood pressure using the cuff and stethoscope.

I got to see the twin babies whom I felt in the moms belly when she brought them in for vaccination.

Mama came over Wednesday afternoon to help me make the peanut sauce she served us and brought baby and her niece. Emily played with the kids while mom and I cooked. Then I got to play with them for a little bit before they left. We got out the bubbles and seasame street books and some paper and colored pencils. It was pretty fun. The food though didn’t turn out so well. I think the peanuts I bought went bad. They smelled kinda funny, but she didn’t seem to mind, so I thought it’d be okay. It wasn’t. It was gross. On Thursday, I helped with VCT (voluntary counseling and testing). I sat and listened while my counterpart talked about how to prevent HIV and the ways HIV is transmitted. I had brought a little booklet with me that is in Kinyarwanda and he used that for teaching. Then he asked me if I had any questions for them. I didn’t know what to say, so I asked, how can you prevent HIV? (which I am sure he already went over) Someone said wear a condom, so then I added wear it correctly and then I asked them if they knew how to correctly use a condom in terrible kinya (mubizi gute gukoresha neza agakingirizo-you know how to use well a condom?), but it got the point across. They said they didn’t know, so we got out the wooden penis and did a demonstration. We also had a female condom and one of the women looked really interested in it and asked how to use it, but my counterpart didn’t want to open it and show her because there were picture instructions on the package. My favorite guy of the day was a 73 year old man who was wearing a Sponge Bob t-shirt. He answered most of the questions and giggled like a girl when we brought out the wooden penis.

Friday, I measured bellies like always and found a mom who had twins in her. She was 36 centimeters and I couldn’t find the head. The nurse tried and couldn’t find it either and then determined that its because this giant belly is because she has twins, so we had to send her to the hospital.

Saturday, I got picked up by some guys who live near Kate. They are building a resort by the forest. We had met them when we were in town a few weeks ago and she had seen them a few times near her work. They came and picked us up and we went to the hot springs. None of us had been there before, so we were just driving along and had to ask a few people along the way if we were going the right way. We finally made it there and it was a beautiful day. It was too hot outside for the springs to feel good, so we all got in for a few moments and then just hung out on the grass drinking and talking. We had a crowd of about 8 people just staring at us and then a giant group of school children came and were just standing around us staring at us for about an hour. It got old really fast and one of the guys decided to chase the kids. He lunged at them and chased them all over the park and then every time he moved after that the kids would jump back thinking he was going to chase them again. One of the guys asked us to teach him something in Kinya that he oculd say to the kids so kate told him to say mfite impiswi (I have diarrhea). They thought that was pretty funny. After about 2 hours of being stared at, a guard type guy came around with a stick and herded the kids away. I was so thankful. I am not that interesting, I have no idea what they could’ve found so entertaining about us just sitting on the grass talking. After the hot springs, we went into town to get some food for a braai (South African bbq). They made steak, chicken and cheese sandwiches and a salad. It was delicious, but I got peer pressured into eating a bite of chicken and now mfite impiswi. We drank drinks and watched music videos and played with their pet pig. We spent the night at their house and then on Sunday morning we all went to the lake. Of course, Sunday it was a bit cooler, so the lake was cold. But it was still really nice. We all swam out to the floating dock and laid in the sun, then hung out on the grass. After the lake, we went to a restaurant that’s on a cliff overlooking the lake and got some food and drinks. Then they drove us home. It was a really nice weekend. Two of the guys are from South Africa and one is from Siberia, so the mix of accents was interesting. They like the way we say bananas, but not how we say tomato. One of them kept making fun of us saying do you want a banana or a banAna. I learned a few words in South African slang, so I’ll totally fit in when I go down there for world cup. Haha.

Its the same album as always, but just jump to the end to see the new ones.

Mwezi

Thursday we had our regional meeting with PC in Kamembe. We left in the morning on the motos and about 15 minutes into the drive, we see a gigantic mass of people on the road. We had seen people running and going in big groups together, but thought that it must be an ubukwe (wedding), but when we saw about 200+ people on the road blocking our path, singing and beating drums, we had second thoughts. Weddings here are usually huge, but don’t take up the entire road! I guess there was so pilgrimage type thing going on with the catholic church and people were walking from my town to who knows where. Well anyways, so we got past the stragglers in the back, but could not get through the masses, so we would stop and wait a while, then ride up to behind the big mass and repeat. Finally we went off onto a footpath and were able to stay on that for a while until we headed them off. While on the footpath, passing people was so funny because 1. there are never motos on the path, and 2. we are white. The look of shock mixed with confusion was priceless. We waved a lot while on that path. It was a beautiful drive and I wish I would’ve been able to get out my camera more to take pictures. When we got close to the paved road, the motos stopped and we had to walk the rest of the way to the town on the road because the police were stopping people up ahead to check for insurance. I think my moto driver is not registered to be a taxi, so he is not allowed on the main road. When we got into the taxi, the police man we were talking to in town got in with us and when we were almost to Kamembe, we pulled up behind this giant truck and there was a boy hanging onto the back. Well the truck was going very slowly up this hill, so the police man jumped out and as soon as the boy saw him, he jumped off and ran into the woods and the police man chased him for a second then got back into the ibisi (taxi bus-its really just a minivan) and we kept going. When we got into town, we went into a shop that has a refrigerator and got cold yogurt and drinks and then went into the market to look at igitenge (fabric used to wrap as a skirt). As soon as we stepped out of the shop, four boys started asking us for money. One of them grabbed my hand and started shaking my arm and wouldn’t let go for the next 20 minutes and followed me all through the market. I just ignored him after the first few minutes and attempts at saying no to him. He finally gave up after we left the market and went to the post office. My favorite driver came and got us and took us to the center where we had lunch and started the meeting. After the meeting, we all went out to a hotel by the lake and had drinks and ordered dinner. The soccer matches were on the TV, so I got to see the US beat Spain and then Brazil beat South Africa. The power went out after the US/Spain game for about a half hour. The hotel didn’t have a generator, so we sat by candle light and with a huge lantern waiting for dinner. The driver and I were hanging out in the car listening to a CD he put in and the Cops theme song came on. I sang the part that goes “whatcha gonna do when they come for you” and the driver said “I’m gonna run”! haha. Then we got into a conversation about how in Rwanda if you don’t drink a lot of beer with your friends they ask “Uri inkoko?” (are you a chicken?) and I explained that that is called peer pressure and we use the same phrase in the US. I split a vegetarian pizza and lasagna for dinner with one of the other volunteers and no one wanted to try the lasagna! I tried to share and pass the plate around, but all the Rwandans looked at it like it was poison. When we got back to the center, the game was on and a bunch of men were all sitting around watching it. I was the only woman. That night, I slept okay, but I woke up to a dog barking like crazy and then the church bells rang for I swear 5 minutes straight at 6am, the bell tower was right behind my building. The center was beautiful. It was located on top of a hill that overlooked the lake and Bukavu, DRC. The conference room was pretty sweet too; it was a circular building with an amazing view. We got really lucky on the way home, we got a ride with PC to the town on the road and the motos were there waiting for us. Saturday we sat around the house doing nothing and then on Sunday, we went for a hike up the huge hill next to us. The hill isn’t that bad, but the path has no switchbacks so it just goes straight vertical! We were dying, but met a lot of people on the way and got followed by a bunch of kids. When we got to the top, the road continued on pretty much on a flat, so we went along that and found a little town. After our sweaty adventure, we jumped into the shower quickly and then the nun took us to visit our resource family (FINALLY!). They live pretty close and they have a 4 month old baby boy. He is so cute. We just played with him and they gave us fantas and some food and we got stuck because it started raining. But if you have visitors and it starts raining they say you are good visitors (abasitsi beza) because you brought the rain.

I walked home with the nun who is a nurse at the clinic and speaks pretty good English, and I asked her about the babies I saw on Monday (she usually works in maternity, so I knew she would know. Also Rwandese's favorite past time is talking about anything and everything and everyone). She told me that it was a spontaneous abortion caused by the mother working too hard. Women here are so strong and work so hard, in the fields and carrying pounds and pounds of produce up and down the hills to the markets. This particular woman had walked all the way to a big town to sell at the market there. The town is almost 3 hours by bus! She got home and felt some pain so she came to the clinic. She was very sad they had died and she will be burying them in her garden. The nun thinks they were 5 months old. If she was in the U.S. they probably could've been saved.

On Thursday, I was helping out with the child vaccination again and one of the nurses came to say hello to me, so I asked where he was working today and he told me he was working in psychiatry that day for people who were affected by the genocide. I didn’t know we had this service, so I asked him if I could come see and he showed me the paper he fills out while talking to people. It went over trauma, mental health problems, asked if the patient has any scars, and a few other things, that I couldn’t translate. He saw people of all ages, from old widows to young girls in secondary school. I am very interested in and elated that we have this type of service. Mental health care is very difficult to come across in lower income countries. Before teaching English and the crazy rain, the neighbors came to visit again and the oldest girl and one of the smaller ones braided my hair into about 10 lopsided uneven braids. I didn’t care. It felt so good to have someone touch my head. I gathered them all up and put them into a pony to go to class.

So, on Friday during the testing of pregnant mothers, one woman came in whose husband was HIV+ and she was not. The nun had me get everyone else out of the room and she shut the door to talk to this woman. She was asking her if her husband uses condoms and the woman said that he refuses and started crying. We tried to console her and talk to her and the nun asked her to bring her husband in and they would test her again and talk to the husband, but I could see the fear and frustration and pain that this woman felt. There is no way for her to make her husband use a condom and she knows that she will contract the virus and die. Her husband is dealing her the card of death, putting the whole family at risk. The children already born will be orphaned and the one in her belly might also get the virus and die, but there is nothing she can do about it. She cannot say no, and even if she does, it won’t help because there is no such thing as rape inside of marriage. I almost started to cry, but my friend came in, so I went to meet her. I tried telling Emily about it, but found that I could not without bursting into tears in front of everyone. Its just so frustrating having no hope, knowing that there is this thing you can prevent, but not having the power to prevent it. I am still so angry about it and so sad for the woman, but know that I can’t do anything about it and she is unable to do anything about it. I just hope that the nun will be able to talk some sense into the husband and let him know that he needs to protect his family; he cannot leave his children without any parents. Its terrible and sad that he has this virus, but it wont do any good for his wife to contract it as well.

Monday, I helped out with family planning and then got the list of drugs in our pharmacy to make a pharmacy sheet. Right now, everything is hand written in a book, as it comes up, so you have to look through what you wrote for the day every time you have another patient (to record how much is being used), so I decided to make a sheet in alphabetical order with a place to record how much is used and the totals for the day. Then we went to the market, ate lunch and went to teach English. While I was rounding up students, one of the girls took me into the birthing room and I thought she was going to check how much one of the women was dilated, but instead ended up pulling out two fetuses and showed them to me. I knew what was it was before I saw them. They were wrapped in paper and put into a box and just sitting on the shelf. I am pretty surprised that I had no reaction to them. I still don’t really. I don’t know how I feel about it. I am not disgusted, or sad or angry. I feel very nonchalant. I don’t know the circumstances around the babies. I don’t know if the mother went into early labor and they just couldn’t survive, or if she was having complications and they needed too be aborted or if she had an elected abortion. I am trying to figure out if all those anti-abortion pictures and videos of aborted fetuses and the ones I saw in formaldehyde during biology lab prepared me enough to be able to see theses babies without feeling, but I just don’t know.

Our friends came to visit again on Monday. They came in the house and we sat in the living room in our stupid, uncomfortable chairs. Emily gave them lollypops and I took some pictures and we played with the baby and she peed on the floor.

Tuesday, I helped out in vaccinating babies. I wrote in the baby’s ifishi (medical record) and gave polio vaccine. I also finally got up the soap for the clinic at the handwashing stations by the bathroom. I used a modified version of the tippytap. I was ashamed and thought it to be setting a very bad example that the health clinic did not have soap for people to wash their hands after using the latrines, so I asked the titilaire if there was any money in the budget for soap and she said yes, but was afraid that people would steal it. The genius of the tippy tap helps in many ways, not just to clean hands, but also to keep soap from being stolen! (I’ve posted pictures of the contraption in the Mwezi album on picasa) The boss from AIDS Relief came and we FINALLY got a job description! I am so happy. We ate lunch together with some of the other staff who were with him and it was awesome, having someone besides Emily to speak English to is always great. So, back to the job, we are here to help increase patient adherence to their ARV (antiretroviral) drugs and to make sure they are being taken care of sufficiently. Many HIV+ mothers fail to bring their babies in at the appropriate times to be tested. I knew this is what I was supposed to be doing, but he told us exactly where the clinic is failing, what we should be looking for and showed us the patients records, so we know where to mark these things, what information to look for and to get it filled in if its missing, etc. I am so happy. I enjoy doing all the crazy things they have me doing, but I guess I am the type of person that likes being told what to do. I was always frustrated that I didn’t have something concrete to work on. We had an electrical storm Tuesday night. I didn’t hear anything, just saw some flashing to the south, so it was either that or Burundi was bombing something.

So, on Tuesday, I taught “oh shoot” “dang it” and “darn it” and Wednesday after class the lab tech, a nurse and I went to the school and played volleyball and the lab tech missed the ball and said “oh shoot!” It was awesome.

THE RAINY SEASON IS NOT OVER!!! My goodness the rain came back with a vengeance!! It hasn’t rained in almost 2 weeks and today was a DOWNPOUR, a deluge. I wish all of you could experience Rwandan rain; it is completely inexplicable. The bad part is that it starting during class, so we had to walk home. We didn’t leave the clinic for a good half hour after class when the rain let up a little. I was terrified that I was going to fall again! The classroom was leaking really badly and there was a river, and I honestly mean river-it covered my feet, running through the building. I grabbed the converter box off the floor so it wouldn’t get wet and then went to pull out the plug and electrocuted myself. Not badly, but my arm felt weird for a while. The lab tech whom I played volleyball with on Wednesday while walking through the river said in English “I am swimming”. It was funny. I love it when they use what they learn. My shoes got covered in mud, as did my feet, and I slipped but didn’t fall. When we got to the little shops where everyone saw me fall last time, I could hear them all whispering in anticipation.

Friday, our friend who works in the town with the hospital hitched a ride to our village in the ambulance with some coworkers who had to come do some follow-up at my clinic. I showed her around the clinic and then made her lunch and caught a ride back with the ambulance to her town to stay the night with her. There were 12 people in the ambulance on the way out. We got to her house and made some guacamole and chapatti for a party at her neighbor’s house. We arrived at the party around 6pm and stayed until 11. There was a potluck dinner and lots of drinks and a dance party out on the lawn. It was really fun. The baby was dancing with us (he’s about 1 year) and was so dang cute. There was a little girl baby around the same age and I was dancing with her and she pulled herself into my arms and wouldn’t let me put her back down, so I danced with her on my hip for a long time. When the little boy came back, she let me put her down and she danced with him. We made delicious pancakes Saturday morning and then walked the half hour to the main road and waited for a taxi bus for another half an hour and finally made it into town 15 minutes before the bank closed. Emily and I went to the bank and our friend went to the market and then our other friend who lives in Nyamasheke met up with us in town. The our coworker from AIDS Relief picked us up and brought us to his house where we had a nice lunch and watched a movie. He had a friend in town and has two roommates, so we all hung out at the house a while then went to the hotel by the lake and went swimming in the pool. It was cold, but nice. We stayed at the hotel all night drinking and talking and finally got a taxi back to our friends house around 10. We slept at her house again, had some more yummy pancakes then hit the road to come back to Mwezi Sunday morning. We got to the main road, had to wait a while to catch a bus to Ntendezi, then waited in Ntendezi for the motos for a few minutes and then just decided to start walking. We walked for over a half hour when the moto showed up and took me home. Emily continued walking until it came back and picked her up, which took about an hour from when I left her to when she got on. So she walked about half way home (an hour and a half). We had gotten cheese while in town, so we had grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner!!

Thursday, we had a meeting with the community health workers. We were told the meeting began at 8am, we never usually get to the clinic before 9 because the staff meeting goes until 9, so we showed up around 8:10 and the meeting didn’t begin until 8:45. I introduced myself for a whole 30 seconds and then sat in the corner over 3 ½ hours! Being stuck in a meeting sucks, but its soo much worse when you cant fully understand what is being said. I know they talked about nutrition, hygiene and the mutuelle health insurance, but that’s about it. We finally just got up and left (which is not an uncommon nor a rude thing to do in Rwanda, but its difficult for us being American because I feel that it is extremely rude and it took me about an hour to build up the courage to just go). After the meeting we had lunch and Emily took a nap. I sat outside and finished my book and had my first real visitors. I was sitting reading when I heard a child’s voice yell “mwiriwe!” I yelled back then went to the gate and there was a young girl there with an older girl. We tried to communicate, but it didn’t really work and we just stood around not talking for a while and then I tried to get them to go because I wanted to shower and I had to write my lesson plan for the day, but they didn’t get the hint and when I came back out of the house, they were still there, so I asked them some questions and I told the little girl to climb the mandarin tree to pick some and we stood and ate oranges together and then I told them I would come visit them tomorrow, so they pointed out their house to me and left after being here for an hour. Imagine my shock when they show up again an hour later with three more children! I was bored out of my mind and figured they were too, why would they want to come back and endure that awkwardness again?! But Emily was up by then so we all sat out on the steps and “talked”. There was a baby this time and he was super cute. He enjoyed playing with my toes and water bottle and pen. He also peed on the steps (they don’t have diapers here). Two of the girls left after a while and then Emily painted the oldest girl and the younger girls toenails. It was cute. (I was able to get a shower in between the first and second visit).

Friday, I went into the clinic and helped with the pregnant mothers again and while I was measuring bellies, a nurse came running in and said a lady was giving birth, so the nurse I was working with told me to come along. I’ve never seen a birth before so I was pretty excited, but after hearing the nuns tell me that I would become one of them after seeing one, I was a little nervous. When I got into the birthing room I saw a teeny, tiny lady on the table with a bucket of bloody gauze below her. Two of the nurses decided she should be moved to the other table, so one took her under the arms and the other grabbed her legs and they moved her to the other table while she was moaning out in pain. I wont go into the gritty details, but my goodness, birthing is not pretty. I stood at her head because I didn’t want to see what was going on below and I was in sandals and didn’t want to get junk on my feet. Even that didn’t do the trick and after a while I got a little nauseated and light headed and had to go sit down. The nurses laughed at me and I tried to smile then they sent me to get another of the nurses. As soon as I got out into the fresh air, I felt better. I brought the other nurse in and ascertained that the lady was having complications, the baby’s heartbeat was slowing and she needed to go to the hospital, so the nurse than came in last checked her, wrote some stuff on a piece of paper and went to call for the ambulance (we do not have a car in our village, so the ambulance has to make the hour and a half drive to the clinic to pick someone up, so all in all it takes about 3 hours for someone to get to the hospital if need be). So, I never got to see the baby, just a woman in pain and some nasty stuff, not exactly what I pictured for my first birth.

I got home late and was starving and nauseated and had to eat quickly and get dressed for a wedding. One of the drivers was getting married and we were invited to the wedding. It was a hot day, and my dress up clothes are not the coolest ensemble, so I was sweating pretty badly when I got to the church. The ceremony didn’t take place in the church, everyone just met there before proceeding to the couples house, where a canopy and a million benches were set up. The procession of people came singing down the road. The first group of people to come in were carrying things on their heads. They all carried the things down and then people made a production line to bring the things into the house. Then they started seating people. The poor bride and groom had to stand in the sun until everyone else was seated, which was a LOT of people! We then sat and some songs were sung, speeches given by both fathers, and banana beer from a gourd was shared among the families. Then some fantas and beers were given out and plates of food were handed to people. They made me and Emily a plate with eggs on it instead of cow. I hate and love that they cater to us (hate because I feel bad and don’t want them to make special arrangements for me, but also love so I don’t have the awkwardness of turning down food). We ate some and then passed the plate to others who didn’t get good food (there was definitely a hierarchy to whom got what food). I also gave away my sodas that I didn’t finish, when you hardly drink soda its hard to have 3 in one sitting! Then came gift giving time. Here, when you give a gift, you have to get up in front of everyone and hand your gift to the person and give a little speech or sing a song. I was too embarrassed to do so, so I just waited and gave them the gift later. The Rwandans around me were laughing at me and telling me to go up and give them the gift, but I refused. It’s so awkward and Emily pushed it onto me. She had the envelope but gave it to me to do! The wedding was pretty long, but it was interesting and fun. The bride is a good foot taller than the groom, so that was pretty funny. The house was a good half hour walk from our house. We were told it was close, so Emily wore high heels and my shoes decided not to cooperate, so we both got home with many a blisters and were big bags of complaints.

Saturday morning I was awoken around 3:30/4am to my second earthquake! We had one while in Butare during breakfast one morning. They are pretty small, but scare me a lot because I live in a cinderblock house. Not the most earthquake friendly structure. It was pretty quick and small, so I didn’t even bother getting out of bed and there were no aftershocks, but my heart was racing for quite a while afterwards and it was difficult to go back to sleep. We had some more visitors Saturday evening. They live near us and came over to say hello and introduce themselves and tell us that we shouldn’t stay cooped up in our house all alone, that we should go out and visit our neighbors. I know this is true, but it’s so nice to sit and read a book and do my laundry and not be stared at and talked about. I like having the weekends to be alone. Today, I borrowed watering cans from the nuns and we watered the garden. Our timing was totally off on the whole planting process. As soon as we finally plant something, it stops raining. Hasn’t rained all week! It is not easy watering a giant garden with only little watering cans. Took about an hour I think. Wish I had a hose with spray nozzle!

Sunday, I awoke to drumming. The catholic church had some kind of feast and there was a procession from the church to a place on the hill next to ours. The drumming was consistent and did not stop for longer than 10 minutes at a time for the first 4 hours of the morning (7am-11am). Then it stopped for a half hour and began again at 11:30, by noon, it sounded like they were in our back yard, so em and I decided to go check it out and as we were walking down our path, we see the priest in full white gear go running past from the nuns house down past the water tank. We got to the end of the path and looked in the direction he ran and saw HUNDREDS of people all gathered about 100 yards away. While we were peeking around the bushes at all the people, the head nun came walking up and caught us. She told us we were free to join them if we wanted. We decided instead to go into the cows yard and look through the fence at the people. We also found out that there are rabbits next door also. I thought we just had cows and pigs, but there are some rabbits too. We just went back into the house and listened to the drumming and singing, my goodness noise carries well here. The singing and drumming finally ended around 2pm. The girls who visited earlier came over again and took us to their house. its pretty close, on the hill next to ours. we sat in the house a while and they cut up some pineapple for us and then we went outside and played the "iki n'iki" game (whats this) and then emily and i decided we wanted to see what was on top of the hill. So, they all walked with us up the hill. it was WAY steeper and more difficult that I imagined, but the view was AMAZING!!!!!!! We are going to do it again someday when i have my camera so you can see. it is like death going up that hill though. i think i lost a year of my life. and i am pretty conditioned to climbing, i do it everyday and have been doing it every day for the past few months, but this hill is VERTICAL! I'll climb it again soon so you can see photos.

The rainy season is officially over! It hasn’t rained in 3 days. The weather has been absolutely perfect, warm and sunny with a slight breeze to cool you off when hiking up the hill. I forgot to add that while swimming, I lost my toe ring again. This time it was not found, but luckily I just received a new one in my birthday box from mom, so no naked toe for me! I have a cold that I think I picked up from one of the people at the party. Not sleeping probably had something to do with it also. Oh, and I burned my leg on the hot water pipe in the shower at the party also. I forgot how to use hot water and when I leaned forward it caught my leg and burned me, not a bad burn, just a little red line across my thigh.

Our girl who cleans the house is helping us to plant carrots, so she came today and dug up the garden and found us some potatoes! I made curry fries tonight for dinner with them and they were delicious!

We had a visit from PC on Tuesday and the driver who is the one that drove me here to drop me off brought me chocolate from Kigali! We became friends very quickly when we met (he’s a new driver, hired on right before we all left to site, so I didn’t get to know him during training at all) and I think he is the coolest person I have met so far. One of the first things he said to me was “don’t let them give you any shit” and that totally threw me for a loop! How did he learn that phrase! He lived in Kenya and South Africa for a few years, so he has had a bit of western influence and it is hilarious. Wish I could see more of him, but he lives and works in the capital and I am just too far.

I went into the clinic on Friday and ended up doing prenatal exams on pregnant women. I got to measure their bellies and feel for the head to determine if the baby was fixed or not. I actually caught an at-risk birth; the baby’s head was fixed, but not in the birth canal, so I called the nurse in and she felt it then called in the other nurse to come feel it and they had to send her to the hospital. I felt like a real maternal nurse that day, it was awesome. I saw about 15 patients. Then the nun sent me and Emily home to eat lunch and rest (they think we are weak muzungus), so we came back and packed our bags and sat around for a few hours until the motos arrived to take us to the main road for the OAF party. I had to ride with the accountant who is a TERRIBLE driver! He doesn’t really know what he is doing and he acts like a teenaged boy. He goes really slow because hes not very confident on the bike but then he has to prove his machoness by gunning it the next second. It was not a fun, relaxing ride like I usually have with Ambroise, the main driver. We got picked up at the main road and driven to the house. We had a delicious dinner complete with salad with macadamia nuts and goat cheese!!! There were 12 expats in the house, it was crazy. 11 from the US, 4 were RPCVs from West Africa and a Kenyan. It’s like heaven going to their house with all the good food and fun things to do. We had a dance party that lasted all night and the next morning (or more accurately, afternoon) we had a yummy breakfast and then went to the lake for swimming and picnicking and we played some Frisbee and volleyball. It was a beautiful day. I swam out to the floating dock and lay there a while listening to the kids on the shore yell at me (they can see me no matter how far off I am). When we got back we had another amazingly delicious dinner and more alcohol and dancing. We played taboo and UNO and I won both! (well, I won one hand of UNO which ended up being the last b/c we were playing where I got the points from the cards still in peoples hands and I caught everyone when they had a million cards, so I got all the points in one hand! And in taboo I was on a team, so it wasn’t a solitary win, but still!). During the day, Tricia and I practiced some acroyoga, which we began to do in Butare. It is really fun. I’ve always wanted to be in circle de soleil and acroyoga is kinda like that. It’s a lot of partner acrobatics. I am the flyer and Tricia is the base. I’d like to try to be the base, but I don’t have anyone smaller than me to fly. We showed the others and Tricia ended up flying two of the other people also, so we started a movement of acroyoga in Rwanda! We did some more Sunday morning after another amazing breakfast and then we watched a movie, Lord of War, which was pretty interesting, on their giant projection screen with surround sound! We were driven home late Sunday night and slept in Monday morning and just went to the market and to teach English in the afternoon.

Monday, I helped out in the pharmacy, counting pills and putting them into baggies (they don’t have pill bottles here, just baggies) with the nun and this one guy came in to get some medication to treat syphilis. Well, the nun was furious and started yelling at him in Kinyarwanda and I couldn’t understand enough to figure out why she was so angry. When he left, she told us that he had 4 wives and didn’t bring any of them to get treated. She threatened not to treat him until he brought his wives in and held on to his meds for a little while. She yelled at him a second time and then gave him his medication. That evening, I taught phone vocab, one of which was “off the hook”, I tried my best to explain the slang meaning of this phrase, but failed miserably. I thought it was so funny and was giggling every time I read that phrase, so I thought it would be only fair of me to explain why I was laughing, but it just doesn’t translate.

I went into Kamembe on Tuesday because we were flat broke. I went to the bank which only took 10 minutes, which is unheard of in Rwanda (we’ve been known to wait 4 hours before), so I was pretty stoked about that. I then went to the market and bought some peas and carrots, which are unavailable in my village (I’m gonna teach the importance of variety in ones diet) and then sat around. One of the other volunteers in Nyamasheke said she was coming into Kamembe that day also, so I texted her to see when she was going to arrive and found out that she hadn’t left yet, so I decided to make the trek down to the AIDS Relief office to see if I or em had any mail. I was walking down the hill and decided I better ask someone if this was the correct hill, so I turned around and asked this guy who said yes, this was the right way, but heres a short cut. My goodness that short cut was STEEEEEEEP. We went traversing down this vertical muddy footpath first through houses and then through the forest. It was the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen. I am flabbergasted that I did not slip and fall. I finally made it to the office after about 25 minutes and went to the post with one of the staff to see if there was any mail. I got a box, Emily got an envelope and Tricia got a box. It was a good day. While I was waiting for the other volunteer to come (she was going to give me a ride back up the hill because now I had a large envelope and box to carry along with my moto helmet and backpack), I opened my box and read some Newsweek. That lasted about an hour, then I got on the computer and checked my email, played some solitaire and played with this electronic dictionary that has French, English, German and Spanish. Then I made some tea and sat outside looking at the lake and Congo for a while and then after about 3 hours of just sitting at the office getting in the way, I asked if the driver could take me up the hill. He was on lunch, but could take me when he got back. I finally made it to the top of the hill around 2:30 or so and went to the taxi stand to get a taxi back to the town on the road. The taxis don’t leave until they are full, and since my town isn’t very popular there was only one other person in the taxi when I asked, so I decided to eat something first. Ordering food in Rwanda always takes a long time, but this I know. It took about an hour to get my food and pay and then I had to sit in the taxi another half hour until it filled up before we could go, so I didn’t get moving until 4pm. It took an hour to get to my town because of all the stops we made along the way, so the moto driver was trying to beat the sun on the way back and my goodness my legs are sooore from gripping onto the bike.

Wednesday, I helped pass out mosquito nets to the people in the sector who cannot afford one. It was madness and I thought of a million different ways to increase the productivity of the day. I taught English later in the day and after went to play volleyball at the primary school. It had rained that day, so there were huge mud puddles on the court and my arms and hands were a different color by the end of it. I played with boys and girls and teachers, so it was a good mix and really fun. A lot of people on their way home stopped to watch the abazungu play (to pluralize people in Kinyarwanda, you change the prefix instead of adding an s on the end, so umuzungu, becomes abazungu when theres more than one).

Thursday, emily talked me into staying home to make chapati for lunch (it takes a long time), so I did some laundry, taught english to the one nun, fixed the clothing line and read. it rained around 1 and then again at 3. it finally stopped around 3:45, so we were late going to teach, but it doesnt matter because they're always late coming in. during the night, there was an electrical storm in which one flash was so bright i thought something exploded and then the thunder was so loud that it stopped my heart and my whole body got goosebumps for about 10 minutes. I have never been so scared of thunder before in my life. I cannot explain how loud and scary it was. I was shaking and covered in goosebumps and on the verge of tears. i feel silly saying that, but this was like nothing i have ever heard before and the flash was so bright and scary, it just added to the terror. I'm okay now, but my goodness that was scary!!!