More Living, Less Blogging

That's just the way things go sometimes.  I have a lot more to tell you, but less time to tell you, so you'll just have to imagine most of it. It has gone from crazy busy to ludicrous speed around here and I just to not have time to catch you up on everything.  All is well.

The girls in Eleanor Roosevelt family are working hard this term to get involved in everything in the village (drama clubs, dance groups, choirs) and also working hard in school to learn to write compositions and improve foundational math skills.  By and large, they are healthy and adjusting to the village pretty well.  We have the types of problems you might imagine with 15 girls living together.  ("I fetched water for a shower and someone else took it."  "She took my notebook."  "She borrowed my shoes and didn't wash them.")

I still love eating meals with Grace, Yvonne, Noeline and Josianne.  Ornella and Adelaide have been getting quite serious about basketball.  Happyness is dancing and singing all the time.  Honorine wrote a poem and read it at village time!  We are having vision screenings and the girls who had dental screenings last term have been getting teeth pulled.  Time marches on.  I can't believe I've ben here almost 6 months.

We miss Jeanette and are planning to go and visit her gravesite as a family on Saturday, July 6.

I am busiest teaching TOEFL prep for the top 16 students in Sr. 6. These kids are amazing and I am really enjoying working with them.  They all dream of winning Mastercard Scholarships to American universities like Stanford and Duke. They do well on the reading comprehension and writing sections.  Grammar is harder and grammar lessons are no fun. I am really stretching to explain things like the present perfect and past participles.  I wish Mrs. Howe, my 4th grade teacher, was here.  She would know what to do.  Additionally, we are especially struggling with the listening comprehension section because hearing actual Amercian English accents at real speed is not something the kids have much experience with.  We are listening to a lot of NPR World Story of the Day podcasts.  They do not love this, but I think practice is the only way to improve here.

"Somehow*" I am working on The Big Project (R) for JC.  Just, you know, writing a hit pop song and then directing a video for YouTube that will go viral.  No biggie.  As you know, this is my area of expertise.  Anyway, we are inspired by Hot Cheetos and Takis and I am working with an amazing Student Leadership Committee to write and record a fun song and we will see what happens.

I am still working in the Student Resource Center to help students write CVs and cover letters and leading a ridiculous thing called "tutoring club".  Every minute of the day is scheduled and honestly generally double booked, so I just do whatever I can before I fall asleep standing up around midnight.  If you are waiting on an e-mail back from me, do not hold your breath.

I had an amazing birthday.  Thanks so much to my mom who mailed me the highest tech, best coffee mug (and a whole box full of other awesome goodies). [Suck it Mega.] My sister sent me some high tech quick dry pants from Athleta.  Here in the village, my housemates decorated my door with construction paper and made me a 'cake' out of amandazi and nutella.  It totally made my day and reminded me of when my sister used to decorate the bathroom we shared for me  on my birthday when we were growing up in New Jersey.

Later in the day some of the volunteers took me out to a restaurant in Rwamagana where we had chicken and bananas stew and some beers.  Then they gave me a real honest-to-goodness chocolate mousse cake that was like a real dessert from America (unheard of in Rwanda).  We were all flipping out.  It was a coordinated effort that involved getting keys to a refrigerator and a matatu/bus ride back and forth to Kigali with a cake (no small task) and it really was the nicest thing in the world.  The cake was super wonderful and delicious.  [It did almost kill Jerrod, who is deathly allergic to almonds, but that was a small price to pay in my opinion.]  I also got a gift bag from some of the volunteers with amazing treats like a Snickers and Doritos and some hand carved art.  I was touched that everyone went so all out and I had a really fun day.  There are some cute photos out there of the day and I'll add them here later if I can get my hands on them.

In less uplifting news, I still cannot run without pain.  Achilles tears are no joke.  I have been doing my rehab exercises since April.  This blows as running was one of my favorite things to do in the area and a major component of keeping me sane / stress management.  I'm broken hearted about missing the marathon and more importantly not really being able to work out at all.  I am doing this lame circuit training to still pretend like I am exercising but it pretty much only serves to make me angry.

Even worse, last weekend, I got super sick and had to go to a cray third world health clinic.  Actually everyone at Polyclinique Du Plateau was incredibly prefessional and nice.  What I know now is that I had a bad cold, and then I contracted a nasty stomach virus.  What I knew then was I had a fever, vomiting, other extreme gastro intestinal symptoms, a bad cough, a runny nose, ear pain and generally felt like every system I had was failing.  I went to the clinic and they gave me IV fluids and some IV stomach calming meds and some tylenol for the fever and I felt much better in 12 hours or so.  They wrote me about 7 prescriptions, some of which you can see here:

Also here's me in bed, running my mouth, like I do:

I am so miserable and weak in this photo and Hassina, village director of Health and Wellness is taking pics to entertain me.  My thinking at the time, was that the only thing to make up for how much discomfort I was in would be fishing for sympathy later on the blog.  The logic holds.

I was feeling pretty terrible for a while there, but am much better now.  Also, then all the other volunteers got the stomach flu, and once we knew what it was and that it ended in about a day it didn't seem so scary, but since I was patient 0 everything seemed so strange and unpleasant.

I spent the night in the clinic and had three bags of IV fluid and two examinations and the bill was about 130,000 RwF, (about $200), which is pretty low compared to what I would have paid for that kind of care in the US I think.

Now I am better and back in the village and just working and trying to deal with a minor hostage situation.  I'm delighted to hear the Spurs won game 5 and I wish them the best, but closing out at Miami is no small task.

Hope you are well.  I am busy here, but generally doing okay and trying to find a few meaningful interactions a day with kids amid all the chaos.

*I should probably write an entire post on how Rwandese use the word "somehow" but it is ubiquitous on any topic and is a reducing modifier that means, kind of or sort of or might mean complete disagreement.  For example, "Do understand me?" "Somehow", by which is meant, "no."  I love it and use it all the time, somehow.

Hostage Situation (so *this* is happening)

Background: I was given a bag of Doritos for my birthday from the other volunteers, which is a prize possession around here, 1) because I love Doritos and 2) because they are very difficult to source in Rwanda.  I hadn't eaten the Doritos only because I have been sick (stomach virus and a sinus infection, more on that in a separate post...) and I wanted to be able to taste the Doritos.  I was really looking forward to them.  Then on Friday, the bag went missing.  I went ballistic and immediately began a thorough and noisy search of the village to no avail.  Then late on Sunday night I received the following email:

Dearest Courtney,

I think I have found your Doritos. Ever since you told me about their disappearance I have been searching the internet far and wide for any clues. I found this image on a Boko Haram website. It appears your chips have been taken to northern Nigeria where they are being held hostage by the rebel group. 

Kome has reached out to some of his friends in Nigeria to help with the negotiations. They told us that if you want to see your chips again you must either send 1 million USD (for some strange reason they have specified that they only receive payment in nickles) or publicly perform any song by Brittany Spears and send a video clip for proof. 


Let us know what you want to do and we will facilitate the transaction through Kome's contacts in Lagos.


We know these are stressful times and want you to know we are here to help any way possible.

Sincerely,
Miki & Kome 

My response:
On Mon, Jun 17, 2013 at 7:33 AM, Courtney Kelly <courtneymkelly@yahoo.com> wrote:

This very serious communiqué has been received and is being analyzed for clues back at Langley. Please await a detailed response.

  

And a few hours later:

Hi Courtney,

                    Now you must understand the seriousness of the situation at hand. You must know that time is of the essence here. in Warfare, hostage taking is common and they more often than not are silenced after a few days if they are not high priority.

My contacts have asked me to inform you that getting Langley involved is of no use.  You cannot win this one, you are on African soil and there is precious little they can do. But if you insist and get them involved, then Miki and I would withdraw our services and from that point on you take responsibility for whatever happens.

regards,

Kome & Miki


I really can't tell you what will happen next, but I do know this situation is likely to escalate.  In the hopes of a peaceful resolution, I am asking youo to tie Dorito colored ribbons around trees in your front yard.  (Those of you who live in apartments should buy houses and move to facilitate this request.) Barb, fire up the prayer vigil. Thank you and please stay tuned for more instructions. 

Dictionary Distribution Drive! - Delighted Denizens

You guys never cease to amaze me.  THANK YOU SO MUCH.  The folks at Scripps Networks Interactive Knoxville (with some other helping hands) have sent a huge shipment of Kinyarwanda/English Dictionaries to ASYV.  I am so excited and so overwhelmed with gratitude.

I know that it was a concerted effort and that many people donated books, so many thanks to Vikki Neil for coordinating that and thank you to everyone who got involved and pitched in. Extra thanks to Jillian, Amy & Erin who I know were excited to help from the start and gathered donations.

The books have allowed us to place several dictionaries in each of the 32 family homes as well as many in the school and other libraries and study locations around the village. Additionally some books have been held back in reserve as awards for the winners of the upcoming spelling bee and village quiz night.

I opened the large boxes with a few of my girls from the Eleanor Roosevelt Family: Yvonne and Josianne. (Aren't they beautiful?) Some photos of that are below (Photo Credit: Jerrod Popham).  

Yvonne & Josianne helped me to distribute the books thoughout the village.  You can see the smiles.  However, what we really needed to convey the excitement is sound.  The girls were giggling and couldn't help opening and paging through the dictionaries right away.

Think about that for a second.  These are teenagers.  Giddily, eagerly flipping through a dictionary.

The sounds in each house when we brought the books were like Christmas morning with bikes and a new gaming system.  All of the kids shouted, "Wow!" over and over and hugged each other.  I'm not kidding or exaggerating.  If you got a "wow" out of an American kid for a dictionary it would probably be sarcastic, but these students were genuinely thrilled to have a key to unlock the language they've been working so hard to learn.  I really cannot express how grateful and excited you have made 500 kids, kids that I think are just amazing.

I can't imagine how frustrating it's been to try and learn a foreign language without a dictionary, but I know it will be much easier for them now.  The dictionaries will be used every night while students do their homework and throughout the day at school.  Starting now and years from now, when these students have better chances than they would have at scholarships and jobs due to improved English, this effort will be the reason. It's a real, substantive change that's been made and I am so appreciative.

Here's a few pics of us opening the boxes:

(Thanks so much to fellow volunteer Jerrod Popham for taking and giving me these photos.)

And here are a few more of my thoughts in interview style:

How does it make you feel that these people at Scripps sent you so many dictionaries?

 Overwhelmed with their generosity.  I know why I give to these kids.  I work with them every day and I know they are so deserving, but that people half a world away who have never met them care is a real testament to the generosity of the good people at Scripps in Knoxville.  It makes me proud to know them.


Where you surprised they wanted to get involved, since you were at Scripps as a consultant and not an employee?

In a way, yes, but in my time consulting at Scripps I was continually made aware of how Scripps gives back to United Way and many other generous charitable campaigns.  The staff I worked with in Knoxville were very supportive of my endeavor and interested in my plans, and I know they are just wonderful people, so I'm not really that shocked that they once again decided to get involved and make a difference.  As a consultant, Scripps employees never made me feel like an outsider, but instead treated me with genuine Southern hospitality, welcoming me into friendships and their homes, and when they learned about this great cause, they got involved, regardless of the labels.

How has this donation affected the Rwandan people you are working with?

 It directly impacts the lives of 500 vulnerable orphans in the residential youth community where I work.  They take all their classes and tests in English but learn it as a second or third language, after Kinyarwanda, their native tongue, and French, the official language here in Rwandan until 2008.  These students are so dedicated, but they really struggle to learn a language without a Kinyarwanda /English dictionary.  That's where Vikki Neil and Scripps stepped in to get involved. When I was handing out the dictionaries, the kids were celebrating like they just got the best present in the world.  They were so immediately appreciative and excited.

(reference: http://www.africaportal.org/articles/2012/05/31/costs-and-consequences-rwanda%E2%80%99s-shift-language-policy)


How has this donated affected you?

Does it sound sappy to say it has re-affirmed my faith in humanity?  In a large sense, I feel great that my friends and colleagues care about this organization for orphaned and vulnerable Rwandan youth and want the best for them.  On a micro level, I work with these kids every day and I have grown to really love them.  I am so excited for them to have these dictionaries and learn English better.  So the effect on me is that Pacifique, who works so hard, has another tool to help him learn, and that Agnes, who is too shy to ask questions, can learn straight from the book. And there's 498 other kids with stories like that who will truly benefit from this.  

Working' Five to Nine, What a Way to Make a Living

One of the things that continually surprises me about life here at ASYV is how thinly the local staff is stretched.  They all work so hard and no one flinches when they are asked to do even more.  It's impossible for me to imagine the village working in America with the same number of staff and still providing all the same services.  Let's just say this is not a union shop.

The same kitchen staff makes every meal of the day.  They arrive at 4 AM, to prepare breakfast that will be served at 6 AM (porridge and rolls) for 500 students.  As soon as the breakfast dishes are done, those same employees will begin making lunch for 500 students and about 200 staff and visitors that will be served at 2:00 PM.  Mountains of rice are prepared.  Thousands of carrots and potatoes are peeled and chopped by hand.  Beans are cooked with a sauce.  Other vegetables are often added to the sauce.  Somehow, before lunch is served the staff also finds time to tend to the kitchen garden, often planting and hoeing and also finds time to bake tomorrow's 500 or so breakfast rolls. Once lunch is wrapped up by 3PM they have 5 hours to get ready for dinner.  Another 500 students and maybe 100 staff served more potatoes or cooking bananas, rice and sauce.  Once the kids finish eating by 9, the kitchen staff clean all the serving dishes and the whole kitchen and are finished for the day around 10 PM.  These workers get one day off a week.  In a lot of places this would be two (possibly three?) shifts of work.  Here it is a typical day.  Look out if there is something special to prepare like salad, fruit or meat, then the day is even longer.  There are also special meals to prepare for some restricted diets. Most surprising to me is that this whole staff is friendly, smiling and greets anyone who visits the kitchen warmly.  They also never fail.  Meals are always ready, and there is always enough to eat. That's an 18 hour day folks.

Another great example is the drivers: There are three drivers who work for the village.  To pick up the teachers all over Kigali and drive them to ASYV they start work at 4 AM, driving all around the city and getting to school around 6:30 AM, I guess. (I am usually not up at that hour.) A second driver picks up the administrative staff like the finance department.  The third driver is alwas in the village if there is a need to take a student to a hospital or other errands.  All day, those drivers run errands picking up supplies for the village or taking sick kids to the hospital.  Add to this insanity: sporting events, field trips, and sometimes shuttling kids or staff for special programs.  Then when the school day and after school meetings are over, that same driver drives the teachers home and gets everyone dropped off by 7 PM or so.  Then they get fuel and get ready for the next day, so are probably done with work at about 8 PM. 16 hour day is just the standard for their position.

Take the role of the family mother: These women are asked to parent 16 kids, get them up at 5 AM for breakfast and supervise, chaperone and love them once they are back from school from 3:00 PM to lights out at 11 PM. During the day while the kids are at school there are staff meetings, english lessons, computer lessons, securing supplies from the village inventory for the house, visiting with health & wellness for any problem kids and more often than not, caring for at least one sick kid at home.  In the afternoon, many lead Extracurricular Programs teaching sewing, traditional weaving and even carpentry.  They work 12 days in a row, then get 2 days off to see their external family (some have husbands and biological kids). 

Then there's the village IT coordinator who has to try to keep about 100 rickety machines that kids download every virus under the sun onto functional.  The machines have 3 possible operating systems (Windows, Linux or Ubuntu) and a wide array of software products.  Also, in addition to doing this full time job, please just imagine this for a second, the village asked him to start teaching an IT class in the afternoon 4 days a week.  He teaches from 3-5:30 PM Monday - Thursday for about 50 students. He assigns and grades homework and tests and plans his four 150 minute classes per week.  All this while evaluating software the village needs to run the finance department, print report cards and helping people map a network drive and connect to a printer.

I've done a little org design and optimization, and honestly if I was going to try and staff this place for an American workforce, I think I would about triple the staff, which of course would blow the budget. I'm not entirely sure what to make of it. I think part of it, certainly, is that the job market here is terrible, so employers have a lot of leverage to ask whatever they want.  On the ground though, to really feels like the staff are so committed to the kids, and to the future of Rwanda, that any request is received and acted upon.  Every full time employee here sacrifices seeing their family, sleep and any notion of free time to keep Agahozo-Shalom running and do the best they can for the kids.  It is truly awe- inspiring dedication.  It's not a job for them, it's a calling.

(One last case-in-point: Every minute of the day is scheduled from 6 AM to 10 PM, so if you have something unplanned to deal with, you need to scheduled it outside of that time.  I just left a 10 PM - Midnight meeting where everyone but the Americans sat patiently. I don't know if Rwandans are just genetically harder workers than any Americans I've ever known, or if the aftermath of the genocide changes you in ways where anything else seems tolerable, even reasonable by comparison.)

Clown for Dancing Party

This is the 2013 Agahozo Shalom 'class of cousins'. I.e., this year's ASYV volunteers. We're 9 people from the US, Israel and Nigeria and in addition to being assigned a family we all have different jobs.  Though everyone get's pulled into all kinds of things, here's a rough rundown L-R:

1. Elizabeth is from NYC and is working with the Alumni (college aps, scholorship search, etc.).
2. Michelle is from Pittsburg/Philly and coordinates English Learning for kids and staff.
3. Avi is from Israel and organizes guests and visitors (& teaches carpentry).
4. Kome is from Nigeria and organizes the sports programs the village (teams and rec).
5. Shira is from California and works on village internal and external communications.
6. Miki is from Florida, back for a second year of lording over the Science Center.
7. Isabel is from DC and Middlebury and teaches Art.
8. Me - Professionals Skills: CV creation, Career Awareness, Teaching TOEFL.
9. Jerrod is from Denver and teaches Music and Theater.

Want to be in next year's photo?  You can apply here:  http://www.asyv.org/application

If you do, you might get to see a lot of interesting things, including:

a)  A neon orange moth on your sink when you get up to brush your teeth: 

b) The scariest mask.  [The small print describes this item as a "Clown for Dancing Party" Indeed. I will not be attending said "Dancing Party" thank you very much.  RwF 2500 is ~ $3.75]

 c) This is my gym now.  These are two paint cans filled with cement separated by a broom handle.  Since I hurt my Achilles and can't run I am trying to lift to still do something at all for fitness.  Hopefully this is the amount weight you like, because in Rwamagana there's no adding 5 pounds a set until you max out.

Groundhog Day Wake (In Kinyarwanda)

• It begins with the scraping of chairs.  16 kids arrive in our small family room, each with a chair brought from their family's house.  It's a long process to get the chairs all in and arranged and a bit like that game where you can move one of 25 plastic tiles to get the photo of the tiger back.
• Then there is a 'game'.  This involves all of the kids from the visiting family drawing a number 1 through 16 and then being paired up with a girl from our family of a previously assigned number to sit together, or for one visitor, a chorus of "Oh, Sorry!" and being handed a framed photo of Jeanette.  (If the other family is a boy's family, this game is accompanied by copious giggling, like you might imagine would happen in a 6th grade PE class forced into partners for square dancing.)
• Then an 'emcee' from our family welcomes the visitors.  There is a strict protocol.
• There is a moment of silence.  
• The emcee invites one girl from Eleanor Roosevelt to speak, who thanks the visitors for coming and for being with us.
• The emcee invites one child from the other family to speak, who stands and offers condolences.  
• The emcee invites one girl from Eleanor Roosevelt to sing a sad song.
• The emcee invites one child from the other family to sing a sad song.
• The emcee invites our family mother to speak.  She gives the same speech about God picking the fresh blooms off the rose bush, and Jeanette being a good girl who was very obedient (possibly untrue?) [Look, I loved Jeanette, but obedience was not a strong suit for her, and definitely not a defining characteristic. One of the things I loved about her was that when Momma would ask her do something ridiculous like mop an already clean floor she would scrunch up her nose and make a face and move as slooooowly as possible to do the task. I always liked that she was showing her personality and a bit of backbone.]
• The emcee invites the visiting family mother to speak, who invariably claims a close connection to Jeanette, and then encourages the girls of Eleanor Roosevelt to make the most of opportunities at the village that Jeannette did not get the chance to, and to study hard and dedicate their effort to Jeanette.  
• The visiting family offers a gift, usually a package of biscuits for each girl, or a bag* of milk or some candy.  As with all food in the village, this generates significant excitement.  (*Not a typo.  Like a pouch really.  Not that different than a capri sun, sans straw.)
• The emcee invites our family big sister to speak and she and talks of death as a natural part of life, and how we must not be selfish, that we will all be together in heaven soon.  Simultaneously, the gift is being distributed, so there is much rustling of packaging and perhaps a minor disturbance if there is not enough for everyone. 
• The emcee invites the visiting family big brother or sister to speak and s/he says that Jeanette is an angel in heaven watching over all of us all the time, a possibility I find troubling on a number of levels.  Rustling continues
• The emcee invites me to speak, and I struggle.  This is the first English of the night and the kids are all well into their snack at this point, and tired.  I look at 31 bored faces.  Over the rustling and chewing sounds, I try to honor Jeanette and also be honest about how we are feeling at that point in the long, rote ceremony.  I usually talk about how she was funny, and a joker and brought a lot of joy and levity to our family.
• The emcee calls us to stand again, and invites someone to lead us in a closing prayer.  The prayer is long, and fervent and maybe even a bit evangelical seeming in cadence and volume.
• All the chair scraping begins in reverse.

So far we have been visited by 14 of the families in the village, so this will happen 17 more times. 

Update: Whether cowardice or sloth I'm not sure, but I bagged it for the half-marathon.  The Achilles still hurts enough when I walk and I just don't think I could gut it out.  I'm mightily disappointed. 

Home Visits

Over the break between Term 1 & Term 2 in April, I had the chance to visit a few of the girls from Eleanor Roosevelt where they stay on their school holidays.  I skewed my visits toward the girls who have more English because they are better equipped to translate for the adults where they live.  

[There is an interesting debate to be had about sending these kids 'home' over school holidays.  Most of them come from pretty rough situations.  I think in the US it would be unheard of to send some of these kids back out to these conditions.  That said, Agahozo is a strange type of place in Rwanda and the mission is to make these kids productive citizens of Rwanda.  If they come out after four years speaking Hebrew with no connections to where they came from they'll be ill equipped to integrate back into society.  The thinking is to help them maintain some connections with guardians, neighbors or some other support network outside of Agahozo.  Luckily for me, I have no say in this matter at all.]

I went to visit Ornella in the Kimironko suburb of Kigali, near the big Amahoro National Stadium.  Ornella was home with a bunch of other kids aged 14-4.  We goofed off and talked about basketball practice and fashion.  It felt like visiting any kid in the states except maybe she was more polite than you would expect.  She made me tea and freaked out when I didn't take sugar in it.  (Rwandans like their milk and sugar with a tiny bit of tea flavoring.)  We talked about the loss of her mom, and how that has affected her.  She's very proud of her mom and protective of her memory.  Doing right by her mother's memory is a source of motivation for her now.

That afternoon, I went to visit Yvonne in the Nyamirambo suburb of Kigali.  That was quite a moto ride up steep and rain washed dirt roads. She lives in a modest house with her 90 year old 'grandsister' (this could be any older relative, really) and her sister who is 14.  Her younger sister is in one of those Christian sponsor-a-kid programs and she has an album full of photos and letters of people from Michigan she's never met. The program provides most of the nutrition in the household, and I was glad for it.  Yvonne's grand sister was very embarrassed not to be able to offer me tea, as hospitality is the custom for guests, but I tried to assure her I was just there to see Yvonne and to visit.  Yvonne was beaming and laughed the entire time.  We went for a Fanta afterwards.  She is an absolute dear and I will probably try to put her in my carry-on bag when I come home. 

Yvonne, her "Grandsister" and her younger sister

The next day, I visited Samila in Rwamagana, who lives literally feet from the bus station there. I met her Mom, or her aunt who she calls mom. Relations can be quite fluid. She might mean this woman serves as her mom now.  There were maybe 7 or 8 other kids in the house who came to meet me and Samila was helping to care for lots of them.  This woman could not believe I was not Jewish.  She was under the impression all white people are Jewish.  They made me a large meal with cooked bananas and also offered me 'ground nuts' peanuts, which is a big treat and usually reserved for celebrations.  Samila also tried to translate a strange story for me about a chicken and a dog eating the same food, and the chicken says the dog smells, but I think the fable was lost in translation.  Maybe they were saying I smelled bad.  I really have no idea.  This woman also asked me, "Are you a poor?"  [person is implied, in Kinyarwana the word for poor is like a degenerate.]  I had to pause.  Okay, I know by no stretch in the Rwanda comparison scale am I "a poor".  I am "a lucky".  But I am here to work for a year and help out however I can, but not field every request for money.  People ask me all the time for money.  Kids in the village ask me to buy them things all the time.   I was afraid the next question was for a donation.  "No" I finally replied.  I am not poor.  Would I be willing, in that case, to take Samila back to New York with me and send her to college?  "No, that is not possible."  I guess it never hurts to ask.

The next day I took a bus east to Kibungo to visit Adelaide.  I met her brother, sister and grandmother. Her grandmother makes these beautiful traditional tiles out of clay on wood.  Adelaide was happy to greet me. She made me sweet milky tea and 2 (two!) Blue Band sandwiches.  This is not my favorite food, but it was a very kind gesture. We visited for a while and talked about faith.  The word mercy came up a lot. Mercy is a concept I can get behind.  The home seemed safe and comfortable and they had a TV, the first I'd seen. Adelaide's grandmother insisted that Adelaide come with me to the bus station to put me on a the right matatu (bus-ish van) to Sake to see Grace. (This was a bit embarrassing and perhaps attracted a bit of mazungu attention, but that was mostly coming my way anyway.)

Adelaide's brother, her sister, Adelaide and her Grandmother proudly showing off some of her Grandmother's artwork.

Me and Adelaide

At the bus station in Kibungu I boarded my matatu for Sake, headed toward Gafunzo City to see Grace.  Matatus leave whenever they have at least 5 more than capacity for the van, so we sat there for a while. I didn't know exactly where I was going or when I would get there, or how I would get home from there, but I was going to see Grace, the very first of my girls to ask me to come to visit her.  The trip was on no paved roads, and they were pretty bad due to the rainy season. This was not my favorite journey.  Eventually, I saw a sign for the Gafunzo primary school so I asked to get out.  Once I stepped out of the van there was general alarm.  What was a Mazungu doing here? Where exactly was I going?  Moto drivers surrounded me.  Men left bars to come and see what was going on.  I called Grace and waited for her to come and fetch me.  Gafunzo city was like a slightly bigger Rubona, with a market, a couple of informal restaurants and shops, a school and a medical clinic.  

When Grace came to fetch me there was a crowd with her. The entire time I was at her house, people kept just stopping by, entering without knocking even, to see the Mazungu in Gafunzo city.  I guess they don't get many tourists in this small suburb if Sake.  Grace was so so so so so excited to see me.  She took me on a tour of the town. She took me back home and offered me a meal. When she took the lid off the pot I almost cried.  She had made me spaghetti. She knows, because I usually eat at her table, that when we have spaghetti in the dining hall I love it and have seconds or thirds. For me, its a big treat to switch away from the rice for a meal. The kids, in general, don't really like the spaghetti and see the event as unfortunate. Grace had asked her mother to purchase and make spaghetti for me.  I can only imagine what percentage of the family food budget for the week (month?) was allocated for this luxury.  Further mystifying to them is why anyone would pay more for this food which they do not like.  When the meal was served, only Grace and I ate, not the 6 or 7 other people in the house, though the small kids looked on wistfully.  There might have been a better way to handle this I guess, but I didn't want to show anyone up and insist we divide what was there 9 ways.  Mostly on these visits I go along with the advice of the host and just do what they say.  I hope I am following custom and I'm afraid to push for things to be different because I don't have all the details. Hopefully it all evens out eventually.  

Grace made me spaghetti!  (Sorry for the bad light.)

 Grace and her older sister

 Grace's sister and some of the kids living in this house. (Dorbs!)

Grace and her mom.

Oh my goodness, how gorgeous is Grace's mom?  This is Grace's actual mother, and I also got to meet her older brother, and older sister.  

I also, went to Rugalika to Jeanette's grave site, to see her home and younger sister.  She is buried right next to the family's two cows, maybe 6 feet from the house.  We will be working to install a gravestone for her, more on that in a future post.

Preview: I may take a handful of ibuprofen and try to run a half marathon on a pulled achillies tendon this Sunday. Stay tuned. 

Serengeti Safari

Back during the break in April, I went on an incredible Safari in Tanzania with Ellen.  We went to the Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Manyara, and Tarangire National Park.  

At the time I had a million things to tell you about it but then I came home and the frenetic pace of life at Agahozo took back over. I saw many amazing animals and the scenery was breathtaking.  Highlights included: seeing 5 lioness go on a hunt, watching graceful giraffes graze on tree tops,  watching hippos graze out of the water like cows, and watching baboons play on a river bank.  (Arusha is nothing special, but it was even kind of fun to learn that.)

Like with the gorillas trip,  I took just a few crummy photos with my iPhone. At some point I'll link to Ellen's photos with the nice camera and you can get a better sense of what I saw. 

Still even from these you get the idea:

Our guide and our rover 

 Awesome fancy camping lodge just outside of the Serengeti

 Ellen snapping some 'Phants

 Baboons were super fun to watch play.

About a zillion impalas

 The mannequins in Arusha emphasize different features than you might expect.

Here's the rest of the pics.
And even more good pics from Ellen:
https://picasaweb.google.com/mellengilman/201304AfricaCourtney03?authkey=Gv1sRgCKHcjcO10ZaRbQ&feat=email#

I had a lot of fun, though four days in a safari rover is definitely enough.

A few more of my faves:

(Thanks Ellen!)

Live Long and Prosper - Mountain Gorilla Trekking

This is from over a month ago, but I've been away, and busy and also not feeling like blogging, but I did want to capture some thoughts on this experience.  The event was like a wonderful, brief encounter with aliens who are more evolved than us and not that interested in getting to know us better.

At the start of the school holiday in the beginning of April, I went with my friend Ellen to see Rwanda's #1 tourist attraction: Mountain Gorillas.  There are about 600 Mountain Gorillas left in the world and 300 of them live in the Virunga forest on the border between Rwanda and the DRC.  Volcanoes National Park was made a wildlife preserve in 1925, and claims to be the oldest national park in Africa.

I love animal-based attractions and I've been to see Koalas and Cheetas before, but nothing compared to the experience I had Gorilla trekking.  It was, no exaggeration, one of the best experiences of my life. 

The day before our permit to trek, we hired a driver take us from Kigali to Musanze where we stayed in the Muhabura Hotel, which fit all the Rwandan Stereotypes for fruit plates, crummy pasta and frequent playing of Kenny Rogers.  (I guess Kenny was at the height of his fame in the USA in 1983 and I cannot for the life of me explain the frequency his songs are played on Radio Rwanda 30 years later, but if you are out and about you are pretty much guaranteed to hear him a few times a day.  Rwandese love themselves some KR.)

On the morning of the trek, we rose at 5 and met at the park headquarters in Kinigi at 7:00 AM.  The headquarters are surrounded by a ring of mountains and it was a gorgeous sunny day.  When you arrive, the park rangers divide you into groups which will each go to visit one of the 8 gorilla families habituated for tourists.  Some of the groups are quite easy hikes, while some of the gorilla families are further up the steep and slippery trails.  I was hoping for a fairly strenuous hike to be part of the experience and make it feel more like an excursion and less like a petting zoo.  It was a 30 minute ride from the headquarters to the start of the hike for our group over quite bumpy 'roads' and at one point Ellen almost asked to get out and walk.  

Our group was about 8 tourists, a lead guide, Augustine, and about 5 porters.  There are also additional security/ park ranger staff stationed throughout the hike to protect the gorillas from poachers.

Once we got to the start of the hike, it was about an hour or so up a fairly difficult jungle/forest trail to where the spotters had last seen our assigned gorilla family.  The hike was not too difficult, but did get my heart rate going.  The only real problem were stinging nettles which were everywhere.  The trail was lined with them the entire hike and they stung me through my performance gear shirt and quick dry pants.  When you go, wear jeans and rain pants and a couple of long sleeved shirts. I was stinging pretty much the whole time, but so excited abou the gorillas I almost didn't mind. 

After about an hour, our guide said we were getting pretty close and we put down our hiking poles and bags.  Then we went through a clearing and honestly I was expecting to start looking around to 'spot' the gorillas.  Instead, there was a large male Silverback maybe 5 feet from me, so it was more like opening a door on an apartment and 'spotting' the couch.  He turned around and approached us curiously while our guides told us to move back and simultaneously made this low purring/ cooing sound that is supposed to soothe the gorillas.  Then the silverback suddenly turned back around and went down the hill a bit to eat shoots.  

The gorillas don't use the trails, so the next hour or so, was our group moving through thick foliage and tons more stinging nettles to angle to see members of this gorilla family.  We saw gorillas eating in groups of two or three or on their own.  Mostly they would keep eating for a while and glance over at us some, and then eventually relocate for a better leaf pile or some privacy.

I could not believe how peaceful and quiet the whole experience was and how close we were to wild members of this severely endangered species.  It was a beautiful experience.  It feels like I'm under selling this, and I guess I just can't explain it well, but it was high touch, high access, and didn't feel rushed or exploitative.  The gorillas, while habituated to people are still basically living a wild gorilla life and seem more or less unharmed by the daily one hour visits of small groups of tourists.   It just feels like you are right inside an episode on Gorillas from Animal Planet or Nat Geo and that is my kind of snow globe.

I didn't take many photos myself, because Ellen had a great camera with her and took some high quality ones.  I'll add a few of those to this post later, but for now here are just a couple to give you a sense of the experience.

Here's a picasa link to a few more, but none of these are the best pics really, I know.

After the gorillas we headed to the Lakeside town of Gisenyi on the border with the DRC to relax for a few days at the gogoeus Palm Garden resort.  It was a nice spot for reading by the lake and I wouldn't mind going back.  I did almost walk to the DRC in the dark, and that was a minor mistake I'll have to tell you about more in person, but other than that Gisenyi was a quiet, sleepy, pretty place to relax for a couple days.

Jeanette Nyiransengimana (1998 - 2013)

Jeanette Nyiransengimana 

2 September, 1998 - 6 April, 2013

Jeanette died.  Little rabbit.  

I got a phone call with this shocking news while I was on Safari in the Serengeti.  I felt powerless and confused and hated that I was so far away.  I felt like I had been punched in the stomach.  I felt like this must be a mistake, a wrong number, a misidentification, a horrible prank.  (What are the steps of grief again: 1) denial, 2) rage, 3) more rage, 4) sadness, 5) avoidance?  I think I'm well on my way to step 3.)  

She was (seemed?) perfectly healthy when we left the end of the first term.  She made it home okay to her village, Rugalika, and was staying with her aunt and younger sister.  It's a very small, very rural village like most of the villages in Rwanda.  Then apparently about one week in to the break she got very suddenly sick with vomiting and shortly after that she was dead.

This is how the Director of Informal Education, Training and Philosophy put it in an email to the staff on the evening of Saturday April 6:

"Dear All,

It is with a profound sadness to announce to you the death of Jeanette Nyiransengimana from Ishema grade (Enrichment Year), Eleanor Roosevelt famIly of Mam Daffy, Grande soeur Erica, and cousin Courtney.

Jeanette hadn't notified any serious sickness; neither during this only one term that she passed in the village, nor in her family of origin. Since yesterday, she complained of strong stomach cramps with serious vomiting; this morning, she was taken to Kigese health center, Kamonyi district, Eastern Province (Editors note: Kamonyi is in the Northern Provence, about 45 minutes west of Kigali), where she passed away shortly after arriving there.

It is so sad for our community of ASYV and her family to loose a young dreamer, role model, calm, respectful, and lovely person like Jeanette. 

As Asyv family, we are joining our hand to the family of the de cujus in this difficult moment. The burial ceremony is planned tomorrow at 1:00 PM at Rugalika place-Kamonyi.

Educators and kids from Asyv will participate in this event. The departure is fixed at 10:00 am at Kigali house- Kiyovu.

We are in contact with her family, and we will share with you any updates.

May her soul rest in peace!

JMV Issa Sikubwabo,

The Director of Inform Education- Training and Philosophy."

They ended up putting off the burial for a day to perform an autopsy.  I have had it awkwardly translated to me that the autopsy results showed that somehow her intestines were blocked by being twisted and that this intestinal blockage was quite severe and quickly led to her death.  I have been told that there was no prior condition that caused this or anything that could have been identified ahead of time, that this is simply an unfortunate tragedy with no real root cause. (If I sound skeptical, I'm just wondering if this is really the type of thing an otherwise healthy kid dies from in White Plains, NY.)

They had to do an autopsy because apparently when someone dies from vomiting in Rwanda everyone suspects the person has been poisoned and everyone was jumping to that conclusion here because the onset was so sudden and she was so apparently healthy until hours before her death. Even with the autopsy, two of my girls had psychosomatic "poisoning" attacks anyway and had to be taken to hospitals for evaluation.  (The hysteria is not unfounded.  Poison is historically a method of choice for corrupt African leaders to attempt to remove the opposition and many of these events have been widely reported in the media.)

I have spent angry hours asking myself if anything more could have been done for Jeanette.  If she had gone to a proper hospital and not to that local clinic would she have been given more help? [Kigese health center, where they took her, is not even on a fold out map of Rwanda that has hundreds of small villages including the tiny town near ASYV, Rubona that I've blogged about here before.  This health center was likely very basic and very ill equipped for a serious condition.  They are usually able to provide malaria medication and some limited first aid. ] If this had happened while school was in session would the village staff have recognized the severity of the problem sooner and gotten her to Kigali's King Faisal hospital?  I can rattle these questions around in my peabrain all night and none of it matters in the end because nothing is going to change the outcome.

Ever since I heard the terrible news, I just wanted to get back to Kigali (from Tanzania).  Then I was miserable in Kigali and I just wanted to get back to Agahozo and now I am back at Agahozo and I still cannot fix it and it still doesn't make any sense and there is nothing I can do that is going to make this okay for Jeanette or any better for my girls.  You can't imagine how sad the scene is in the Eleanor Roosevelt house: 15 girls crying, Jeanette's empty bunk-bed, Jeanette's empty usual place in the dining hall. 

Needless to say things are insane here, or even more insane than usual.  I'm unable to console girls well in a second language and feel particularly useless.  I'm both really upset that she's gone and still somehow half expecting to see her when I round some corner in the village.

This is all compounded for me (it's all about me isn't it?) because Rwandan adults seem to grieve and deal with death very differently than I am used to.  If this were an American high school people would be flipping out and talking about yearbook spreads and dedicating her locker.  There would be 1 million tragic Facebook posts.  Here, it seems to me, people are sad, and then get on with it.  In the same meeting this topic was covered with the staff, there was also a lot of levity.  Tonight in the dining hall during the moment of silence some older kids were joking around. My suspicion is that death is simply common enough here to not be that big a deal, to not merit a full-scale freak out.  People die all the time and getting all worked up about it doesn't help anyone. Even Jeanette's Aunts seemed pretty casual or stoic about it at a ceremony I attended at their home, the gravesite. (Strangely, several Fantas were provided.)

On top of that, this is Genocide commemoration time in Rwanda and everyone is busy morning the death of 1 MILLION PEOPLE and pretty much everyone lost many relatives this time of year 19 years ago, so for them this is just one more death to lump in so much sadness and grief and it is like a rain shower when you're already treading in the ocean.  Maybe they notice, but what's a little more water?

In Jeanette's timeline, it's especially tragic because she was a coiled spring.  She had so many opportunities in front of her at Agahozo. She spent the first term at ASYV getting adjusted to so many new people and things and coming out of her shell from shy to joker and I really felt that Term 2 was going to be a great learning term for her and time for her to sink her teeth into a favorite activity.  

I was really worried when we were heading off on the break about a few girls.  Some of the girls in Eleanor Roosevelt have pretty tough situations to go 'home' to and I was very worried about getting them back to the village safe and sound.  In my spectrum of concern, Jeanette was at the low end. She was looking forward to seeing her Aunts and her younger sister, Julianne, and it seemed like she would be in a safe secure place.  You just never know.  Go hug your kids. 

My friend Ellen happened to come visit me from the states at the end of the term and she took a few photos including the one above and this one, which is now the only existing complete photo of the Eleanor Roosevelt Family:

Of course we will miss Jeanette dearly and I am hoping the rest of this year can be a tribute to her spirit.

She brought a lot of light and levity into the house and ironically we could really use her silly sense of humor right now to get through this.  I'm worried of course, that this will cast a shadow on the term or the year for 15 other girls primed to start taking advantage of their opportunities and I am determined to try and help them through this.

(In other news, I am back from a long three weeks away from the village that included touring Rwanda with Ellen, gorilla trekking in Volcanos National Park, an incredible safari in the Serengeti and then back in Rwanda visiting the homes of some of the ladies of Eleanor Roosevelt.  More on that when I can find the strength.)

Editors note: (May 31, 2013): My Dad always used to talk about the record keeping in Africa when we talked about the age of Dikembe Mutombo (my favorite ever 55). There are a lot of different 'takes' here in the village on the spelling of Jeanette's name (Jeannette, Janette, Jannette) as well as her birth year.  It might be 1997 or 1998.  It seems even her surviving aunts's disagree on this topic.  I might not know her actual age, but I think that tells a different story entirely about record keeping here and anyone's interest in this child while she was alive, that no one can even agree on her birthdate.  These are details '(facts?' 'truths?') that interest westerners much more than Rwandans in my experience.  Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Editors note: (June 17, 2013): erm.  Well.  This is still under dispute.  She was either born in 1997 or 1998. I'm going with 1998 for now.  I guess it just doesn't really matter.