Here we are again

Our 20 minute view over Lake Kivu before departing

Those of you who follow the blog regularly must have wondered what has happened to us. Are we still in the land of the living? Why has Stephen stopped writing? What’s going on? Where are we? Well, it’s been somewhat a hectic seven weeks since the last time I wrote. Great happiness with a visit from our friend Helen (she was in Guyana with us) followed by a rush home for two weeks as Mary’s father was very ill and we wanted to see him and then a week of preparation for workshops.

Our rush home started when, after a week of Helen’s visit, we had planned to go to Lake Kivu over in the west. It’s two buses away via Kigali, through the rolling hills and you eventually get there after 5 or 6 hours travelling. We booked our tickets back for Sunday and were walking to Home St John, a beautiful hostel nestled in an outlet on the lake, when we had the call suggesting that we might come home as Dad was very ill. A difficult decision to make but one that had to be done. So, one hour later we turned round, got the bus back to Kigali and a taxi to Rwamagana where we got our passports, packed and got the plane out the next day. VSO had done a brilliant job booking the flights and because it was last minute we got an upgrade to more comfortable seats and a smaller cabin (both ways actually). We arrived home, a little shell-shocked but in one piece! Dad is doing better now and out of hospital so after 2 weeks we made the decision to return and try to finish our placements. It took over 32 hours to get back to Rwanda because our plane from Nairobi via Bujumbura in Burundi, couldn’t land in Kigali due to fog and had to make the journey back, again via Bujumbura again, where we waited for hours, getting back to Nairobi after six hours on a plane and not travelling an inch

Our House left to Helen and Cam

We’ve decided to come home for good when the third term ends in the beginning of November which means we have 7 weeks left. We are determined to have the maximum impact even though we are returning a little early and so we have planned 7 more Methodology Workshops, 14 Planning Workshops, a two day Deputy Headteachers workshop and have been asked to contribute to a Conference for all Headteachers in the District, delivering sessions on Strategic Planning, School Finance and Performance Management for Headteachers – a tall order, I know, in just five weeks because not much can be done in the last two weeks of term due to exams.

We’ll be flitting about on motos all over the place and delivering workshops almost every day.

Looking at the job

Hard at work

It wasn't going to be just sightseeing. There were schools to be seen, workshops to be done and the sloping container truck office to be experienced.

We went to Groupe Scolaire Nsinda for a discussion with the Headteacher and delivered a workshop on planning in GS Rutonde, both a moto ride away from home.

Happy to meet up in Rwanda

Helen is upright. It's the office that slopes

Nursery children in Centre Cesar

Volunteer classroom building

Proud Headteacher

New Maths

Helen helps out

Evaluation at the end

Stephen breaks down on the way back

A Glimpse of Life in Rwanda

Selecting Fabric in Kimironko Market

Being a former VSO, flexible, adaptable, sensitive and hard working (all the VSO Dimensions) she was able to muck in without any problems. We visited schools, one for a half day Planning Workshop, our District Office with its sloping container truck floor, Lake Muhazi (our own Eastern Province Lake, Akagera of course, the Genocide Memorial Centre, Kigali, Kimironko Market, the sights and sounds of Rwamagana, the local “Solidality Bar”, the Dereva Hotel for a Rwamagana Meal, partook of a “melange” in Centre St Agnes and the aborted trip to Kibuye and lake Kivu.

We had already made contingency plans in case we had to go back and had asked our nearest VSO neighbour, Camilla to take over, if we were not there. As expected, she did a brilliant job and Helen was able to see even more in Kigali and especially Camilla’s Teacher Training College which involved a return trip on a moto over seriuously challenging ground of over an hour each way. Helen, you are a star and for that you are awarded the……

Higher Advanced Rwanda Moto Pillion Rider’s Award

Well Done!

I’ll just let the photos tell the story

Everything you want in Kimironko

Beans Galore!

Sifting Flour

100RWF a bag

Market Day

After going to the market, we went to the Centre Cesar. It's run by a Canadian woman and is a centre for widows and orphans of the genocide. They make artefacts for sale, have a nursery, teach ICT and motor maintenance and sponsor hundreds of children in school.

Widows of the genocide make products for sale in Centre Cesar

Centre Cesar Nursery

To find out more about the Centre Cesar and its work, follow the link below.....In the afternoon, we went on to see the Genocide Memorial Museum in Kigali. Click below for a link to the site. 250,000 Genocide victims are buried there. It is a very tasteful reminder of a very bad time in Rwanda's History 17 years ago, hopefully never to be repeated again.

Centre Cesar

Kigali Genocide Memorial Centre

 

View over Kigali from Memorial Centre

Highest point in Kigali in the centre of town

Kigali Memorial Centre Gardens

Back home on the Rwamagana bus from Kigali

Bus Park Mayhem!

Helen in Africa

Helen makes herself at home with the facilities

At relatively short notice, our friend Helen decided to visit us here in Rwamagana. She was a Guyana VSO with us and would be up for sleeping in the kitchen as there’s nowhere else. Being an expert guide leader, she knew how to nestle in under the mosquito net with all her stuff laid out on one side so she could sleep on the other just like a tent! Sleeping in the kitchen was no problem. At least she had access to everything she needed. Better than a 5 star hotel.

All the facilities right by the bed

Dormir dans la cuisine. Pas de probleme!

She had to hit the ground running because the day after she arrived, we were up at five and in a 4 X 4 on our way to Akagera, the National Wildlife Park over in the East. It was a great day with many animals around. We were in the same car and the same driver as last time but without the mishaps. The giraffe were more in evidence and we saw most of what the park had to offer except the 100 or so elephants. How such large creatures managed to hide from us, we will never know.

I think the pictures will speak for themselves.



Buffalo taking it easy

Mary enjoys the ride

Nonchalant Giraffe

Enjoying the Safari

 You can see all of the photos in the slide show below.....



Click on the picture below to see all of the photos full size

Akagera with Helen

Just a few bits and pieces

Comment - to the person who made the anonymous comment about the yellow snake, I am sorry that you did not understand my humour. It was about Jerrycans and how important they are to Rwandan life and to our lives whilst we were there. In order not to cause any more misunderstandings and indeed offense if any was taken, I have adjusted the article to make it more straightforward.

Starting early
In recent months, a spectacular red brick wall has sprung up as you enter Rwamagana on the left. It’s at least 100m long and 2m high. We’ve watched the whole process from beginning to end. The final stage was tidying up the pointing. Like many jobs, including mixing the mortar and, in fact anything, a job for women. There were six of them meticulously cleaning up the straight lines of the wall with trowels. Four had babies strapped to their backs, one looked as though she would give birth at any moment and the sixth was child free or so I thought. Her little tot, no more than 18” high and a babe who should be in arms was sporting a trowel, copying Mama, learning his trade. They start early here in Rwanda!

The interminable, metaphorical yellow snake

Collecting the daily water

Well, it’s not a snake at all really. It's a row of Yellow Jerrycans - sometimes as many as 20 or thirty of them when people are collecting their daily water. The row keeps moving, six inches at as time and gets longer and longer at the back and shorter and shorter at the front. They can be seen in many places in Rwanda, as people queue for water and chat as they wait. They come in all sizes and little kids look after the little ones. Some carry them on the back of bicycles and others can sometimes be seen on the heads of women.

They are essential to the survival of the nation They are probably one of every family’s greatest possessions. They transport the water from every available standpipe, well, river and water hole and lubricate the nation, keep them alive and smiling as well as healthy. It’s the humble “ijerrycani” as they are known here.. Everyone lines them up and moves them forward until it’s their turn to fill. Veritable “Eau de Vie!!!!”

When is a banana not a banana?
When it’s a stopper for a Jerry Can? Which came first the banana or the hole in the Jerry Can? Did bananas evolve to their unusually small size to be a water bung? Who was the first person to use one as a bung? What happened to all the little red caps? Unanswerable questions but nevertheless a normal part of Rwanda life?

When is a bed not a bed?
In our house when it’s used to store rice sacks, pens, rulers, markers, card, motor cycle helmets, shopping bags, jigsaw and board, worksheets, paper, flipcharts. Where does it all go when someone comes to stay? The bed's in the kitchen and there's nowhere else to store all the things we need to do our work in schools.

Where will the guests sleep?

The Humble Elastic Band
Perhaps the most useful accessory in our household and especially in the kitchen is the elastic band. It’s versatile, it’s cheap, it’s recyclable, it comes in various sizes and most of all it stops disease.

There are few things that don’t need wrapping up, tying up, protecting that cannot benefit from an elastic band. Imagine the earwigs in your cupboard, the cockroaches on your floor and the occasional gecko. They can wreak havoc with your flour, your oats, your herbs and all the other stuff that by rights should be in your fridge but when you don’t have one, the elastic band creates an impenetrable seal well away from the reach of these critters.


They are good for hanging curtains, securing candles in bottles as well as the usual uses associated with offices. The best 150 RWF we ever spent.
And that brings me to my favourite quotation about travel..........

"Travel has a way of stretching the mind. The stretch comes not from travel's immediate rewards, the inevitable myriad of new sights, smells and sounds, but with experiencing firsthand how others do differently what we believed to be the right and only way."
Ralph Crawshaw

Watch this space for more interesting facts about

our life in Rwanda.

Global Schools Partnership

Rwamagana Heads in partnership with Nottingham

There are quite a number of schools in Rwanda that are linked with the British Council / VSO Global Schools Partnership. About six weeks ago I was in the office of the Préfet d’Etudes of St Aloys Secondary School in Rwamagana. He told me he had such a partnership with a UK school (although not through GSP). He was keen to show me the pictures and immediately, totally taken aback, I recognised the uniform of John Fisher where our two sons had attended and nephew currently attends. Out of 24,500 schools in the UK, this joint venture had been embarked upon by schools we knew well in both countries. Whilst we were home, we went to John Fisher and gave a presentation to a Year 10 Group about the Rwamagana District and St Aloys in particular.


Rwamagana Display in John Fisher

Following the same theme, the Rwamagana District where we work has been partnered by the City of Nottingham. I had been working on this for a few weeks before we went home. Last Friday, there was a workshop in which we were involved with the coordinating committees of the ten schools which will be linked with the same number of schools in Nottingham. One snag might be, however, that some of the schools here of 2,500+ children will be linked with UK primary schools of around 350.

Perceptions of UK

We gave a presentation on facts and figures relating to Nottingham and another of the perceptions of our Rwandese colleagues of the UK. Understandably, without access to real information, they came out with many stereotypical views of England which often were far from the truth. They were shocked when they heard that English people drank tea and thought that it would make you fat (African tea has at least four spoons of sugar per cup). I was saddened when they were surprised to hear of one parent families, a population who didn’t go to church or even believe in God and that Old Folks could be put into a home and not cared for by their families. The concepts of credit cards, online shopping and women who might be independent was totally alien. But why would they not be? Rwanda was alien to us when we first arrived. The truth of the matter is that both cultures have systems, family structures and ways of doing things that are different, and in many cases, better and sometimes worse than the other. I have no doubt that the same exercise with Nottinghamshire teachers will produce the same results. Whichever way you look at it, it is two groups of educationalists hopefully doing their best for the children in their care in different cultural circumstances and the joint venture can only do some good in terms of breaking down those perceptions into understandable and realistic insights into the two totally different ways of life.

Fantas and Mandazis

As a total aside, we were reading the headlines of the Rwanda New Times yesterday and spotted the following quotation from Andrew Mitchell, the UK Minister for Overseas Development……

“Rwanda is one of our most successful development partnerships. It means that at heart we are friends of Rwanda……… It is one of our best development relationships we have in the world…….It has being piloted as a new pilot programme

for assistance to Africa.”

Group Discussion

Talking of Wine

What shall we choose this time?

Mary’s sister, Ann, had been given a present to go to Vinopolis by the banks of the Thames. It’s a wine tasting extravaganza. She kindly shared the evening with us and we sipped, slurped, sniffed and salivated through wines of all varieties from all over the world. Starting with yet more food on the South Bank with Paella and meatballs (strange combination but delicious) and people watching, we developed somewhat a taste for the fine wines after a few hours and returned home by train with contented smiles on our faces after a wonderful evening. I think the pictures speak for themselves. Thanks Ann!

Red or white?

Vinopolis

Enjoying the experience

Sisters and good friends