Musanze
As soon as I stepped off the plane on thursday I realised that the months I spent debating whether or not it was justifiable to come back here were completely pointless because to be honest I think my mind was made up all along!
So here I am. I was met at the airport by someone called Justin who took me across Kigali to catch the bus out here... it's very handy to have a Rwandan by your side when you've just stepped off the plane & are feeling slightly dazed! Along with Duzi he is now trying to teach me some Kinyarwanda... anyway we got the bus & I tried to stay awake for the journey back but I was so tired I didn't quite manage it. Still, from what I saw the country is every bit as beautiful as I remembered it. All green hills & the countryside is only cut up by all the crops that they're growing at the moment. It's stunning.
We got back to Musanze some hours later & I met some of the other people that are volunteering out here at the moment... Everyone seems pretty nice & I'm hoping we will get on fairly well in the coming weeks!
Yesterday we went up to the Property for much of the day... the land was bought several months ago & it was all cleared so that they can start to build a school. There were loads of kids up there... we split them all into groups & did simple lessons - fairly basic things like maths & English. They're all really playful too, not to mention the fact that a Mzungu is always amusing to have around so they climb all over you & mess about. It's good to see them all laughing though! And in this context I can quite imagine that I look a little strange to them, being the stupid mzungu that I am!
This morning we went to the market to buy goats... we chose 11 in all, & they will be distributed to the different families that need them. It's all part of Vision 20/20... so when you see politicians or whoever making up all these goals they want to achieve this is how it all starts. By something as simple as spending a pound to buy a goat so that the family can breed it, or get milk or meat etc etc. The goats took up all the space for the drive home so we all walked back which took quite a while, because all the children wanted to come & say hello & walk with us - everything takes that little bit longer when you can't blend into the background & hide away!
The kids are adorable (mainly!) but if they had the extra resources they could achieve so much more. For example, one of the boys has the money to pay his school fees but not the $6 to buy a uniform so they won't let him go! We're going to sort that. We also found out the other day that one of the girls (she's 13) has leprosy so they took her to the hospital where, because she was with a white person, they let her cut the line for treatment. One of the volunteers here is studying medicine & he was with her, apparently they were just ripping off her skin without any anaesthetic... can you imagine?! She was in a lot of pain but the WHO fund the drugs so hopefully she will get better.
I'm going to go back now & make flashcards or something for lessons next week. It's so easy just to say "If we had such & such then the situation would be so much better..." but obviously you can't just find the money & materials to magic the problems away, so it's a case of little by little. I'm really looking forwards to the next few weeks though - fingers crossed!
I hope you're all well & I apologise again for my rather dramatic trip home earlier this week!
xXx
So here I am. I was met at the airport by someone called Justin who took me across Kigali to catch the bus out here... it's very handy to have a Rwandan by your side when you've just stepped off the plane & are feeling slightly dazed! Along with Duzi he is now trying to teach me some Kinyarwanda... anyway we got the bus & I tried to stay awake for the journey back but I was so tired I didn't quite manage it. Still, from what I saw the country is every bit as beautiful as I remembered it. All green hills & the countryside is only cut up by all the crops that they're growing at the moment. It's stunning.
We got back to Musanze some hours later & I met some of the other people that are volunteering out here at the moment... Everyone seems pretty nice & I'm hoping we will get on fairly well in the coming weeks!
Yesterday we went up to the Property for much of the day... the land was bought several months ago & it was all cleared so that they can start to build a school. There were loads of kids up there... we split them all into groups & did simple lessons - fairly basic things like maths & English. They're all really playful too, not to mention the fact that a Mzungu is always amusing to have around so they climb all over you & mess about. It's good to see them all laughing though! And in this context I can quite imagine that I look a little strange to them, being the stupid mzungu that I am!
This morning we went to the market to buy goats... we chose 11 in all, & they will be distributed to the different families that need them. It's all part of Vision 20/20... so when you see politicians or whoever making up all these goals they want to achieve this is how it all starts. By something as simple as spending a pound to buy a goat so that the family can breed it, or get milk or meat etc etc. The goats took up all the space for the drive home so we all walked back which took quite a while, because all the children wanted to come & say hello & walk with us - everything takes that little bit longer when you can't blend into the background & hide away!
The kids are adorable (mainly!) but if they had the extra resources they could achieve so much more. For example, one of the boys has the money to pay his school fees but not the $6 to buy a uniform so they won't let him go! We're going to sort that. We also found out the other day that one of the girls (she's 13) has leprosy so they took her to the hospital where, because she was with a white person, they let her cut the line for treatment. One of the volunteers here is studying medicine & he was with her, apparently they were just ripping off her skin without any anaesthetic... can you imagine?! She was in a lot of pain but the WHO fund the drugs so hopefully she will get better.
I'm going to go back now & make flashcards or something for lessons next week. It's so easy just to say "If we had such & such then the situation would be so much better..." but obviously you can't just find the money & materials to magic the problems away, so it's a case of little by little. I'm really looking forwards to the next few weeks though - fingers crossed!
I hope you're all well & I apologise again for my rather dramatic trip home earlier this week!
xXx