Travels in the Country

Just now returned from a longish weekend away, and I’m sitting on my bed in Shyorongi, finally clean again, finally dressed in comfy and non-stifling clothes, kind of feeling at home in this place.

Many things to write about since Ross dawdles so, and I had them organized in my head but now they’re jumbled again, so here’s what I remember:

We traveled the country! We had a rollicking two weeks between orientation and the start of school, since the first day was pushed back to allow for more English training for secondary school teachers. After spending about a week (well, five days, minus one or two days spent in the capital) at our sites, my fellow vols and I got a little bored and decided to make the rounds visiting each other. My favorite J’s from the south, Jane and John, came up to visit me on a Friday night, and they got the full Shyorongi experience: nothing to eat but stale donuts and tea (read: sugar water) and a townful of locals staring them down as they walked to get it. The next day, we went to visit some friends up north. The journey takes about one and a half hours, and we kept waiting and waiting for a bus, but none would come, so Jane and I jokingly suggested that John flag down a passing truck and see if they would give us a lift. John did this, and without flinching the driver named his price: 3,000Rwf. We quickly haggled him down to 2,000 total (about $1 per person) and hopped in the truck bed. My first experience hitchhiking! Man, it was glorious. The weather was warm, the day was clear, the northern Rwandan scenery so, so beautiful. We were driving slow enough that every person and town we passed could see that we were muzungus (white people), and countless hoards yelled good morning at us in various languages and laughed and clapped and cheered at the sight of three rare foreigners hitching through their villages. The phrase “liberation of Holland” kept floating through my mind, inexplicably, weirdly. Twas an unforgettable ride.

Me and Jane hitching (photo stolen sans permission from Jane; murakoze inshuti anjye Jane!)

The north was as beautiful as they say it was; our friend Meghan essentially lives in Jurassic Park, and we did some nice hiking the next day before heading back down to the capital (where you basically have to go to get anywhere). Jane peeled off at that point to visit our most remote comrade in the northeast, while John and I headed east for one day and then southeast the next. Other memorable snippets from the trip include:

Relaxing for a few hours next to a pristine, picturesque lake in the eastern town of Kayonza with (the other) Jo and Chelsea, eating chapattis, sambusas and pineapple, reading, talking and generally feeling the sun on our skin. Probably the most relaxed I’d felt in Rwanda thusfar, so pleasant.

Hiking up to the top of a cliff overlooking the Akagera River, which divides Rwanda and Tanzania and contains beautiful Rusumo falls, with a sweet passle of guys: Hewsan, Kyle, John and Mitesh. About halfway up, Hewsan orders us all to be quiet, and as I look up ahead of him I’m delighted to see a pack of about twenty baboons monkeying around (!) in the trees in front of us. They amble up the path and we trail in their wake all the way up to the top of the cliff. Tiny little baboonettes sit on their mothers’ backs for the ride. I’m vaguely aware that a baboon could rip my foot from my leg in one clean motion if it wanted to, but I still feeling like taking one by the hand and doing a jig.

Earlier on that same hike, Mitesh, Kyle and I decide that we want to hike down to the level of the Akagera River, so we scramble down the dense growth of the bank and realize when we get down there that we can’t see our way back up to the top at all. We start making our way back up the embankment through the thick fields of sugarcane (I think?), which we basically have to climb up because it’s so steep. Finally, close to the top, we literally hit a cement wall stretching out and blocking our whole path. With no other options, we climb the wall and drop down on the other side, somewhat surprised to find ourselves in a dining room at a restaurant, full of lunchtime patrons. The bewildered locals mutter “muzungu” while shaking their heads, and we give them a wave and a bow and exit through the front of the restaurant onto the street. Success!

Spent a few days in the capital after that, which was heavenly (I really didn’t care for Kigali at first, but now I’m just in respectful awe of how convenient everything is there, and of the variety you can enjoy), before heading back to our sites. I spent the next few days lesson planning for the first week of school, then made one quick trip back into Kigali to watch the finals of the Australian Open and the African Nations Cup (both, frankly, disappointing), then squeaked back into Shyorongi just in time for

THE START OF SCHOOL

which I will surely write about in my next post.

So lovely to hear what you brothers of mine are playing at. Oh, for the record, I love Neutral Milk Hotel as well, and credit myself for getting Dad into it. I’ve been listening to them a lot on the busses around Rw, as they fit the mood pretty well.

Alright, now I’m off to watch one of my school’s football matches, our first of the year. Go [insert unknown Stella Matutina mascot in plural here]! Miss y’all Copleys wherever you may be.