In the throes of busyness.....

            It has been yet another month since a blog posting, although it doesn’t feel that way. I guess the long spaces between postings really just calls for longer blogs. Hopefully they’re still interesting enough for all of you to keep reading. Time has been going really fast and I’ve been kept absurdly busy this past month. My animal husbandry project is in full swing now. Although there have been the inevitable hiccups, hair-pulling moments, and moments lost in translation, it is progressing and seemingly progressing towards a positive conclusion. I had a meeting on Monday with the District Veterinarian, which effectively pushed back our training a week, but after some really impressive guilt laying by my counterpart, the Veterinarian agreed to do both trainings (one for chickens, one for rabbits) for free, which is amazing and awesome. So the trainings are on the calendar, and now it’s time to buy materials, which has been an adventure.

Months ago, I asked several people over and over if they agreed with my specs and if they agreed with my pricing. They all agreed, nodding excitedly, impatiently asking me when all of this would reach fruition.  For months I uttered the stereotypical “ihangane” or “be patient” as I submitted the grant with the budget based on the figures they all approved for me. We waited, I made three or four rounds of corrections to my proposal and finally the grant was approved and the money was deposited into my account. So it’s time to buy materials. The tin roofing had to come from the next town over, about a 20 minute moto ride. So, I decided all the tin roofing should be ordered at once and brought to the health center.

Thus we met with another challenge. Now, everyone tells me that one piece of tin roofing is RFW 6,000 ($12) instead of the original RWF 5,000 ($10) that they told me initially. Crunching the numbers I discovered that this is a difference of about $40 which I don’t have. So I wandered about in a panic for a while. I felt frustrated and somewhat hostile that seemingly no one was listening to me as I asked dejectedly what I should do. They told me we must pay the RWF 6,000, to which we circled around over and over with my claim of, “but I don’t have that money.” Somewhat exasperated, I decided I needed to go for a walk to, I decided, visit the nuns. This is not to say I sought spiritual guidance through the somewhat terrifying institution know as Catholicism. Rather, they are members in our project and I needed to inform them of the new training date.

 

Once I arrived, I was greeted with one of the normal full body, body slapping hugs, and amazingly warm greetings, that was so needed at that moment. One of the sisters took me on a tour of their compound, which had an expertly built chicken coop that had just been filled with 100 teenage chickens, backing up against a tranquil garden with flowers and heads of lettuce. We joked about the importance of lettuce in a salad rather than the common cabbage that is served in most salads here. We discussed how we like to cook soup regularly, which is also very un-Rwandan. She brought me into their living room and offered me a cup of coffee, which again, is very strange. More commonly I am offered tea. After the home tour, I was shown where the rabbit hutches will be built, then they took me back to visit with the disabled children who live with the nuns. They are possibly the sweetest kids ever, and their smiles are so big. The whole visit was kind of like therapy and renewed my positivity for the animal husbandry project, simply based on the enthusiasm emanating from the sisters.

So I returned to the health center with my counterpart. On our walk I apologized to her for being so stressed out. “I think that everything is going wrong,” I told her. To which she replied, “Everything will be ok, and we will find a way to make the project work.” I breathed a deep sigh and told her, “I think I needed to hear you say that.” Although I receive positivity and encouragement from my Rwandan community regularly, I also never expected her comment. I never expected that kind of support and resolve. It was an amazing moment, to which I thanked her profusely, along with everyone else helping me with this project.

I like to think that I do a good job of recognizing and acknowledging other people, whether this is true or not. I try to remind myself regularly to thank people, to appreciate people, and appreciate even the littlest thing, like translating a word for me, or letting me borrow a pen. Maybe this is due to years of excessive “You must write your thank you cards” from my mom, or the occasional frustration of going un-thanked when I do something for someone else. Somehow all of the years of being reminded to say thank you, amongst all the other factors has led to this internal, seemingly uncontrollable need to thank. Speaking of which, if I’ve ever not thanked one of you for something you did for me, I’m sorry, and know that it did not go unappreciated.  

 

Anyways, when I first arrived in Rwanda it drove me crazy that there wasn’t a word for please in Kinyarwanda. The language is seemingly designed full of commands, full of demands. Anyone who knows me, even in the slightest knows I don’t really like to be told what to do, I’m very much like my big brother that way. Where did this particular trait come from? I think I should probably spend some quality time trying to figure that out. But anyways, when I first arrived here and people told me “Give me that pen,” “You must come to church,” “You must do this, you must do that,” and my personal least favorite, “You must get a husband, you are old, and you must care for him, cook for him, do his laundry, take care of his children, be a good [subservient] wife.” Ok, so you have to choose your battles, right? After a year and a half of thanking people profusely when I make these same demands, I’ve noticed they have started to do the same to me.

So as I thank all the people helping me to make this project happen, I’ve noticed that they are telling me they’re happy to help, and that they are thankful to me as well. In retrospect, this is an amazing transition, me going from hostility, wanting to scream at the next person who orders me to loan them my pen, to feeling like I am an appreciated and valued member of this country and this community. That’s not to say everything is completely hunky-dory, I mean, I am human, and after my meeting with the veterinarian and being called “muzungu” or white-man like ten times, all energy was drained from me and I went home and took a three hour stress nap.

Post-stress, I was greeted at work the next day with a man carrying five pieces of lumber on his head into the health center. I rushed to the accountants office. “Is that wood for our project,” I asked her. We inspected the wood and she confirmed its quality. The whole time I was thinking to myself, “Holy crap, this is actually starting to happen and finally come together… holy crap!” For once things actually felt like they weren’t really on Africa time. Granted, by 2PM, only 12 of the 50 boards had been delivered, but it was happening. A crew had been ordered to come the next day to begin building the chicken and rabbit houses at the Health Center. The old house was being torn down to make room for the new house. Things are happening. So I went into town to buy nails, hinges, and deadbolts for the houses to distribute to the participants during the training next week. I returned with four kilograms of nails or about nine pounds, and put in an order for a further fifty pounds to be picked up the next day, along with more hinges and more deadbolts, which was all picked up and paid for surprisingly without a hitch.

In spite of the challenges thus far, things are moving forward, but much like life (so it seems) everything that was once at a relative standstill is now moving forward all at once. Over the last month, with the help of some other PCVs, we distributed over 500 applications (to come to “summer” camp) to at least nine local area schools. Since then, we’ve done at least 100 interviews of the students to test their English (speaking and comprehension), their motivation, and their confidence to decide which 50 girls, and which 50 boys can come to camp. My co-planner is amazingly organized, and we work well together, so fortunately we’re on a good timeline, all the lessons are written, the certificates are getting signed, the project is in a really good place.

Not surprisingly however, the camps project has had its obstacles as well. Due to the US Governments bizarre (if I may say so) fiscal calendar, it appeared for a while that we wouldn’t be able to receive the funding until the middle of November, which would effectively leave us one week to buy everything we needed to put on two one-week youth camps. Needless to say, that debacle was frustrating, but of course worked out as well, and the funding has been received. Now for some shopping sprees. I’m really excited for camp this year. My co-planner and I are implementing a lot of different ideas that have not been used at other camps before, so hopefully it goes well, and turns out to be a good model that could be used by other camps in the future.  

 

But now camp is in four weeks. My animal husbandry project participants don’t want to wait until January to receive the chickens or rabbits, so I also have four weeks (hypothetically speaking) to monitor 24 animal houses being built, purchasing all the materials to build the houses (in five different communities), and also purchasing 53 chickens and 45 rabbits. So, as I said… everything kind of seems to be happening all at once now… after much down time/idleness. Life is very strange, and if I may say so, very obnoxious at times. But I have no one else to blame as I definitely got myself into this. And, I am definitely happier when I am busy. After all, I didn’t decide to spend two years in Africa simply to be a white be-speckled tourist attraction, at least I don’t think I did.

All of this going on has been coupled with many trips out of my village to do said shopping, organization, and have a plethora of meetings with everyone from other PCVs to the Mayor of Nyamagabe district, headmasters, merchants, and others in between. It has been hectic, but also nice to pretty much always have something to do, somewhere to be, and friends to see. Speaking of friends, I spent three days last week visiting my host-family in Kamonyi. They have their first male PCV living with them (after 4 girls), and I kept commenting on how much things have changed and how much the community has gotten used to our American presence after my group (the first one) arrived in their homes and in their villages a year and a half ago.

 

Since then the community has had four groups of American Peace Corps trainees, approximately 100 people, living there, learning Kinyarwanda and preparing for their two year stint in Rwanda. My host family has gotten so used to having an American live with them, there seems to be none of the awkwardness of expectation wafting through their house anymore, at least not as much. When I was there, we all seemed anxious and constantly in anticipation of what we should all be doing and when. It almost seems calm and easy-going now… that’s not to say that it’s necessarily entirely easy for anyone involved, but the whole atmosphere felt different somehow.

 

In other news… A good friend of mine, in my village, got married a few weeks ago, and she asked me to be in her wedding. It was a strange experience, and although I didn’t quite know what was happening all the time, I tried to follow the lead of the other “bridesmaids” and it all seemed to work out well. That being said, based on my relatively extensive Rwandan wedding experiences, I actually prefer being an observer of these weddings than actually in them. It was hard to get all of the pictures that I wanted of the wedding, as I was being, or trying to be, a good quiet participant until something was needed of me. The dress was also surprisingly uncomfortable.  

But, the wedding all in all was really great, and it felt like half of my village was there. I knew so many people, and I constantly felt like I was greeting another smiling friend. Never did I feel like I was the random white stranger who only knew the bride or the groom, or some random person in the audience that wanted me to come to a random wedding. Ultimately it was a lot of fun, and the whole thing lasted for only about ten hours… hahaha. Most of the pictures in this posting are from that wedding. So anyways, now for some words regarding the inner workings of my head. I often spend time thinking about being back in the states now, as it will soon be upon me. I think about being able to walk through the house barefoot, and to feel carpet beneath my feet, having a TV, staring out windows onto the snow that is starting to fall again. I watched on a movie the other day someone drinking water directly from the tap, and I was lost in awe for a good five minutes. As ready as I am to go home, I’m equally not as ready. This has become such a prominent and surprisingly wonderful reality for me. Am I ready for it to be over? Now… no, I’m not. But, will I be ready? I ponder this question regularly. I’ll let you all know when I do finally figure it out.

 

I will try to post again during camp, if not before with updates from animal husbandry land. If not, you should all expect an impossibly epic blog posting including animal husbandry, camps GLOW and BE, my dad’s visit to Rwanda, climbing Kilimanjaro, Christmas day in Dar Es Salaam, and swimming with the turtles, eating seafood, and laying on the beach in Zanzibar. I have a lot to look forward to and be a part of in the future. It feels fulfilling, and I am very happy… if not ready to hibernate! (Sometimes I wish humans could hibernate like bears, speaking of which, why did Winnie the Pooh never hibernate… something to think about)! Until next we meet… may the world spin madly on. Oh, and Happy Halloween!

Pictures: 1. A girl who lives in my village, enjoying food at the wedding. Her sister was another one of the "bridesmaids" 2. After the bride and groom got the final approval by the pastor, before they entered the church 3. Yves and Adele (my co-worker) and me before the reception 4. With the bride and groom 5. My sitemate Nick and me with the bride and groom 6. The wedding party 7. The woman in blue is my co-worker too and also Yves' mom 8.Chickens outside my front door 9. The sunset from my house 10. BABY GOATS (they're so cute!)