Alrighty

So I am back in the states. Specifically I am home in Seattle, though I have come to call many places home in these past five months. Traveling in Italy and France was rewarding, though definitely stressful and challenging at times. Dan and I basically had a spiritual pilgrimage, or at least that is what it felt like. We traveled from Rome to Pisa after a few days getting to know Rome. We spent the night in the Pisa train station with other homeless people; it would not be the truth if I recounted that I slept. We walked from there up the coast until Dan's foot began troubling him. We were also walking along a main highway, stupid Google Maps, so we decided to ditch the road. We trained it up to the Cinque Terre and spent a day exploring that beautiful region, partly by boat. After that, we abandoned our tourist bearings and found our way by train to the middle of France, near Lyon and Macon, to a monastic community called Taize where we spent two weeks. They pray three times a day with all their guests and it was awesome. The first week we just acclimated ourselves to the monastic life and acquainted ourselves with the other guests, including many Germans and Swedes. The second week we both went into silence. They moved us from our tent into a nice house where we each got personal rooms to facilitate reflection, meditation and outer silence to better adopt inner silence. I read the Bible, met with an elder Scottish brother and got to know the Burgundy countryside. I am not sure what I learned, but I know I learned a lot. Plus the Taize songs still run through my head. After that, we headed back to Rome, camped for a few more days and tried to process what we experienced in Taize and also on our trip. We continually encountered God's providential grace on the road. It was humbling, but also amazing to experience the fullness of life that comes with presenting empty hands (or jars like in the Cana of old) to the Giver of life. That sounds a little bit overly spiritual, but we certainly benefited from other people all those times we were lost, hungry, at wit's end and without any place to lay our heads.
All in all, it was quite the adventure. 

Departure

I leave tomorrow. I am almost officially done with my program, just a half day of formalities tomorrow. I will spend the next month in Italy, possibly France, with Dan Overholt, my brother (as Rwandese would say). I will not blog for a long while and then suddenly I will arrive back in the states. I will see you all again soon-ish

Photographs and Memories

Suddenly the time has come to leave. It is weird to start thinking about packing and plane tickets when I feel like it was just yesterday that I complained about the winter cold, while looking forward to sporting my Chacos. I've washed my last clothes with Alphonse and the remaining days now number in the low single digits. I guess I do not really know what to say about this whole experience. I find it hard to recall all I've learned; I have no words to wrap this all up nicely. I guess I will be wrestling to remember and organize my experiences here into a coherent whole for a while to come. 

I am worried that I will forget things, especially the oddities of Rwandan life. I guess that explains why I have journaled compulsively everyday and tried to capture life via photographs. It is a fated exercise though; I cannot capture everything in my journal or camera. Even my memory will fade and that scares me. I do not quite know how to take that which I have learned or undergone and transplant it. I think I will try to do the little things first, like hand wash clothes or eat rice and beans more often than not. I guess I do not know where to go from that shaky start. 

And you shall go forth again, skip about like calves...

Hey, sorry about the grumpy tone of my last post. I guess I should not blog when I am tired. Sometimes it feels like a chore to blog, so I have decided to only do it when I feel compelled, not obligated. That is probably why I have not blogged in a good long while. This might be my last blog post for a while, because this friday, I leave for Rome. My cousin Dan-O will meet me there and we plan on an adventure, though the details have yet to coalesce. I looked into couchsurfing to find a free place to stay in Rome and the two people I felt comfortable requesting their couches both turned me down rather quickly. Oh well. I find it odd that my colleagues will return home in a few days. Though I miss home, I cannot imagine being there quite yet at least.

Today is my last Saturday in Rwanda. Every time I remember that, it floors me; I cannot believe how the time has passed. Sometimes in the semester, the days could not pass fast enough, but now on the tail end of my semester, I realize how short four months really is. It has gone by in a flash and I have seen a lot, too much to recount or even to recall with looking at my fastidious journal.

School is winding up and the second half of the semester actually required some academic know-how and time commitment, which made me happy. Life on permanent vacation quickly becomes mundane. I enjoy having work to do when I like the work. I have realized this semester that physical work is something I really enjoy and relish. There is nothing so peaceful and simple as working with a hoe barefoot. We started a small garden at our house. I terraced it to protect against the rain so now it looks like a wedding cake.

This Easter, we had a big feast at our house. Everyone could invite guests, provided they cooked a dish per guest. I invited the neighbor kids with whom I play soccer and I made a huge fruit salad. They showed up early in anticipation. Right before dinner, a street musician showed up at the gate. He had played me a song four weeks before right in front of our gate and I gave him a bunch of bananas in return. He has a nasally voice and a homemade, out of tune guitar. Together, he manages to sound decently good. Randomly, he showed up at our gate on Easter afternoon and began to play me another song. I do not know whether he was expecting more bananas or what, but I invited him in. He ended up entertaining all of us with many more songs. Him and his brother then stayed for dinner. He has one eye. The guests packed into our living room around four long tables, friends I knew and friends I did not know, to share a meal together. It felt right to open up the table to even a stranger, much less our friends, like a formal recognition of the universal body of Christ and a sign of the diversity of the Kingdom. Maybe I am over-thinking it, but all in all, Easter went splendidly. For the first time, I looked past the superficial Easter celebrations to see how vitally important Easter is for Christians. The resurrection is a big deal theologically and ethically, don'tchaknow.

I like the rain here. We are in the middle of rainy season, which means that it rains at least once daily. The sun can be out in full force only for a drastic change to occur in a few minutes that sees the arrival of torrential rain blowing sideways. I took a shower in the rain today, freezing cold but it saved some water so I considered it worth it. I have started birdwatching again, though it might be more appropriate to say that I have started noticing the many birds around me, though I cannot successfully identify most. It is amazing how alive the world is when I actually take the time to open my eyes. I do not want to live with my eyes shut.

Update (to be read in a monotone voice, though not so that it sounds like an angst filled teenager)

I do not much feel like blogging, but here is the deal. I am nearing the end of my study abroad program, which startles me to think that I have passed nearly a whole semester in Rwanda. I do not want to try to summarize my experience here in nice, trite understatements, nor do I want to prematurely analyze what I have learned or gone through since I still have a fair amount of time here. But here is my life for the past few weeks. I go to class every day except Thursdays. I run. I traveled to Gisenyi to revisit my practicum site and the friends I made there. I bought two 'african' shirts for myself. I have put off journaling so that it now feels like a necessary chore. I do not take pictures because I am not a tourist. I talk about hell and universalism with my friends, we mostly do not come to any sure conclusions. I wash my laundry by hand and enjoy the starchiness of the dried fabrics after they come off the clothes line. I have hung out with my Rwandan friends in Kigali, often visiting them in their houses. I try to ignore the boisterous girls. I like to pick out Bookends on the guitar; Simon and Garfunkel astound me daily. I go to church, usually at the Free Methodist church. They always make us sing a song for them; this week we sang "there is power in the blood" but it did not go over as well as I had hoped. We danced a lot during the Palm Sunday afternoon service; it got really lively and stuffy.

Alright, that is enough seemingly pointless blogging from me. I do not like writing to no one in particular, or maybe just no one in general, so I will stop here. Good night, ijoro gyiza.

Remembrance

Seventeen years ago today, the Rwandan genocide started. Seventeen years ago today, the killing would have already been going for nineteen hours. Thus, today, officially declared a national holiday, starts the nationwide Mourning Week to remember the genocide in Rwanda. On my walk to the memorial service at Amahoro (Peace) National Stadium, I witnessed an immediate change in the way Kigali went about its business. People looked more somber and did not greet each other like they did even yesterday. The once busy streets usually filled with moto taxis and crazy drivers, seemed passive and deserted. The city air felt heavy laden with grief, sobered up as if God had splashed a bucket of water into its inebriated countenance. Noise, once a mainstay of the capital city, had disappeared and was replaced with a grim and solemn silence. I am not lying when I report that the city had tangibly changed in observance of the holiday; every step further towards the stadium confirmed my uneasy sense that something was indeed amiss. On such an anniversary, how could it not be? I did not speak because I felt the need to respect the mournful atmosphere. 

At the stadium, I joined a long line of other Rwandans waiting for the armymen to search them so they could peacefully enter the stadium. We waited through the rain; a lady offered me refuge underneath her umbrella for the worst part of the storm. Thousands of people packed into the stadium stands and I quickly found out that I could not see the stage, I did not know what was happening, and I could not understand the proceedings because they said everything in kinyarwanda. At first, many of those around me wore smiles and even chatted a bit as the service started. Most people sported all forms of clothing in the color purple, even Boy Scout-esque bandanas around the neck, because purple signifies healing. All the signs and banners about the genocide were purple as well. 

As the service progressed, I noticed that people's moods changed. I could not understand the songs playing over the loud speakers or what the keynote speakers said, but I observed how the people around me now held their faces in their hands, or gripped their necks like those afflicted by worries or bad memories. Then, I heard a new sound. It confused me at first because it sounded so far away. But as it built its chilling crescendo, I perceived a heart-stopping scene. A woman, maybe a hundred rows away from me, was screaming her heart out, crying, visibly burdened and broken with remembering. The people around her tried to console her, but she did not listen to them. Instead her disturbing wails grew louder and more intense. Her exclamations sounded like what I would associate with a dying animal. It terrified me. Rwandans are usually quite composed in public and they hide their emotions/opinions well, so whatever was afflicting that woman's brain must have been dreadfully powerful and real. Her screams filled the empty air that hung around the stadium. Men came, some in white shirts, some in the uniform of the omnipresent Rwanda police, and they helped escort her limp and lamenting body out of the stadium. I heard her body-curdling screams fade as they carried her off. That poor lady set off a chain reaction that was perhaps fated to happen. All around the stadium, people, mostly women with the occasional man, would erupt suddenly and startlingly into bouts of piercing wails. They projected a terrifying sound. Many collapsed as they shrieked, hollered and yelped, physically encumbered with the horrors of yesteryear that managed to extend their terror into the world seventeen years later. 

The whole second half of the four hour long service, I heard these mournful and transfixing wails crescendo and decrescendo like a dirge. I watched as limp figures were carted like the deceased out of the stadium. These poor folks, probably survivors and/or victims, were completely overcome by the weight of remembering. As I did not know what was happening in the official service, the wailers of chilling exclamations captivated my attention. A couple times, people near me broke down and began screaming. I have never heard screams like those before. They echoed across the stadium. Even those who did not break down into shrieking were affected; a woman directly behind me sobbed the entire service. In remembering the genocide, a spirit of real terror still tormented many of those present. I cried too, for no other reason than I could see the sufferings of those in my immediate surroundings. I cried because I felt disturbed. I cried because life is tormented, tragic and heart-breakingly sad. Peering outside the bubble, life can be hell on earth.

Final Thoughts On Practicum

So practicum is over and I am now back in Kigali, gearing up to start new classes for this last six week stretch. Sometimes six weeks seems like a long time, sometimes it does not seem long enough. My perspective probably depends on my current mood. As it is, the past few days I have really done nothing but hang out. I played football with my neighbour friends for four hours straight one afternoon and even got in trouble with a neighbour who was crotchety every time the ball went over his fence. Some people just cannot abide fun and childish innocence, I guess. More and more lately I have been feeling like a kid, reclaiming my childhood both in my memory flashbacks and in the activities I do. It is freeing to live like a child, to "stuff your eyes with wonder [...] see the world. It is more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories" (Fahrenheit 451, 157).

Let me try to reflect on my practicum experience. The first two weeks our boss babied us and made us tag along with him as he went around to various sites on bureaucratic/administrative visits. We got to work, but the experiences were irregular and disappointingly few and far between. I especially despised how we had to ride in our boss's car for at least three hours of commute every day. We lived in Gisenyi town, but all the sites were far away, tucked back up into the hills. This made the sites quite scenic, but hard to get to, especially by car. Plus, the car seemed to channel its diesel and exhaust into the car interior right into my nose, so I came to rather hate that car. It brought on fits of childish anger and resentment. While there were definite moments of good and beauty in these first two weeks, I generally felt frustrated with the trajectory of my internship. My expectations had not been fulfilled even partially. While I found complete solace and peace in the work they allowed us to try, those occasions did not obtain nearly enough for my liking.

The last two weeks took a turn for the better. It may have just been an attitude change, but I noticed a definite change in the freedom and trust our boss gave us. Instead of riding in the car and arriving to work three hours late, we used public transportation and motorcycle taxis to reach our sites, which got us to work only an hour late. The tree planting workers start their days at 7am and work until 1:30 in the afternoon, which gave us free afternoons but limited our work time. We usually arrived to work around eight or 8:30 when we took public transportation since we did not have to wait around for Jean-Baptiste (we called him JB for short behind his back) or tag along with him on his errands. I began to develop blisters. While they hurt and made wielding a hoe decidedly uncomfortable, I was proud to bear the marks of my assumed trade. With this increased freedom, we laboured for longer hours and began to develop friendships with the local workers.

At first, they regarded us as naive but eager fools. They thought it funny that Americans wanted to try using a hoe since we have a reputation for only using machinery at work. I do not want to ever fit that stereotype and I enjoyed breaking it. I tried to work hard and avoid stopping because they would persistently pester me with questions like "are you tired?" or "are you hungry" because they thought I could not handle their work. A couple of people even told me I was tired; that just made me work all the harder. There was a weird double standard at play because while I would be labouring and getting peppered with accusations concerning my fatigue and endurance, all the other workers, the women especially, would just be watching me, neglecting their work to stare with curious eyes at the white skinned fellow. I later learned that it was okay to admit my fatigue when I actually felt tired, because that work is dead tiring on the arms and the back. It requires great stamina. Rwandans weather the storm by taking short but frequent breaks in between the holes or trenches they are digging. Sometimes they break in the middle of excavating a terrace. I watched and learned that habit, which helped in the last days of my practicum when my arms threatened to quit on me and just fall off.

In the afternoons, we had free time. JB gave us our lunch money so I often frequented the Gisenyi market. I got to know the fruit area, especially the mango lady, and I became good friends with the guy who sold green beans (for a ridiculously cheap price). Actually I already knew the green bean guy, nicknamed Master P, from the local pickup football games I played in regularly. I went on a daily basis in my trainers and competed with some local fellows of all ages. Once, I almost started a fight because a guy kicked at my heels and calves. I turned around and gave him a shove as well as my best threatening eyes. I later felt sorry for overreacting, even though he totally was hacking at people's legs the whole game. However, my almost-fight was nothing compared to another fight I witnessed. Two guys went into a tackle with high cleats and then started to talk heatedly at each other. This turned into a shoving match, which drew the attention of the other players who crowded around the guys to separate them. Stephen, the aggressor, managed to kick the guy in the stomach with his cleats. It looked like it hurt, but the guy retreated. I thought it was cooling down, but he returned shortly with a big ass rock in his hand. He rushed at Stephen and hurled the rock at him. Fortunately, his aim sucked and Stephen dodged it. The rocked sailed close past my ankle. I do not think I have ever been in a soccer match that escalated to rock throwing before, so that was interesting to say the least.

Some days I ran to the lake shores and found a spot to jump in. The lake water was cool and refreshing. The last night, Devon and I decided to skinny dip in the lake because our guest house did not have running water at the time. I brought my soap down to the lake shores and bathed in the cover of darkness like a true Rwandan. That was a laughable thrill. French really came in handy since we lived five minutes away from the francophone DRC. I used it multiple times daily and it often helped because our boss frequently stranded us with supervisors or workers who spoke little English. My french got us out of a couple of jams and I often acted as a translator for conveying instructions or just anything to Devon, my practicum mate. It made me glad that I defied my parents' wishes in the seventh grade and took French instead of Spanish. Really I only took French because they wanted the opposite, but now I am thankful for that fit of teenage rebellion.

Saying goodbye was difficult because the farewells had an air of permanence about them. Devon and I want to return and are planning to go on some weekend to get in some more holes and get our blisters back. One day I planted 151 trees, my most productive day. My hands were really black and soil covered after that. Total, we may have planted only around 200 trees, but we accomplished most of our work digging trenches, terraces and tree holes. We also helped JB by entering workers' payment information into an excel spreadsheet, tedious work that had to get done and JB certainly did not know how. I hated it at first but towards the end I did not mind helping him out. He was totally clueless when it came to computers. He also speaks mostly French, which meant that I did a lot of the communicating, particularly when he needed to convey something important. We learned some kinyarwanda from him and we also helped him out with his English. All in all, he grew on me. He annoyed me at first, but then I grew to recognize his quirkiness and idiosyncrasies. Devon and I shared many a good laughs over JB's oddities. I might even miss that fellow.

Alright, I have done my best to give a fair synopsis of the past four weeks of my life. I do not want to edit this epic, so please forgive any grammatical errors. I am glad for the experience of tree planting and am better off because of it. I learned some patience in the process, considering the sheer amount of time we spent waiting around. Indeed, one day JB did not even show up so we just hung around and then walked around town out of boredom. I am proud to have planted trees and I would love to do it again in the future. It is good to work with one's hands, especially amoung friends in the abundant greenery of Nature.

Practicuum

In these past few weeks, I have learned that my dreams and expectations for tree planting were wholly unrealistic. The truth of the matter is that I have planted fifteen trees total (a ridiculously small amount) and I have dug over 50 holes, four trenches, and done my fair share of weeding with a machete. My hands show the marks of a digger and a digger I have become. Usually my days consist of travel, which lately has been on the exciting bota botas, motorcycle taxis, and then hours spent digging and labouring alongside the tough Rwandans of the hills. I like my practicum best when I am working, although it has been good to get to know the local football pickup games every day after work. My internet time here at the cafe is running out, I will post more next week when I am done with my internship.

Acacias And Eucalyptus

For some reason, I am back in Kigali. I was not expecting to return for a month. But events transpired (namely, Paul Kagame visiting Gisenyi, my practicum home-base, which threw everything into security chaos) so that it became evident that I needed my passport or some form of identification. I did not bring anything. Usually, you do not need that kind of thing for in-country travel here. But anyways, I am back for a day or two from my brief adventures with the Rwandan soil. Tomorrow I head back to Gisenyi on another four-hour bus ride. On the way here, my entire left leg fell asleep, completely numb, and the woman two seats to my left started burping like she was about to vomit. It was not entirely pleasant. 

My favorite part about working as a tree planter so far has been just getting to know my coworkers, my crew mates who have been teaching me the ropes although most do not speak English. I am improving daily in my Kinyarwanda communicative skills (I learned the future tense!) but talking to a rural Rwandan is still difficult, especially understanding them. We have not done that much work so far, just studying and learning, but I have fifteen trees under my belt and ten various trenches/terraces I have dug to help the hills catch the falling rain and prevent erosion. Hopefully, we will be much more involved in the physical labor next week, when we receive our own tools. 

Two things I do not like: planting foreign, non-native trees that replace the native forests, and planting trees only for them to be chopped down in four short years. However, those things are out of my control at the moment.

We plant on hills, slopes of varying inclines/declines/whatever. Some of the steeper ones are impossible to scale without using the hoe as leverage. Skipping and jumping down the hills, from terrace to terrace, is one of the more thrilling activities I have experienced yet. The Rwandans like it too; they hoop and holler as they throw themselves down the hills, sure-footed and confident. I know they like having us around (my friend Devon and I), to laugh at us when we work, to distract them, and to teach us the skills they know almost intuitively. They applauded us after we flung ourselves down a particularly steep hillside and made the final fifteen-foot drop. 

We live in paradise, on the shores of Lake Kivu. On my sole run so far, I stopped at a point on the lake, called it a midpoint, went for a swim and then ran home to our guesthouse. There are two volcanoes in the distance and we live three minutes from the DRC border. I am prohibited from crossing over. 

We work in a couple of different locations, all of which require a substantial commute. One of them is near a town in the hills called Gishwati, populated mostly by the Batwa, or the pygmies. It is surrounded by green, so much green. Green pastured hills and green hillsides covered in newly planted trees. We are so high up in the hills that we are almost in the clouds. Another site, around Mukondo near the town centre Mahoko, is located near a valley completely covered in tea bushes. I mean green tea bushes as far as the eye can see and beyond. The hills around the valley are populated with trees my fellow planters have labored to set in the earth. 

I love trees.

A Weekend Excursion Across the Northern Border

Life has been good. I directly witnessed its goodness this past weekend during my experiences staying in Kampala, Uganda. Not only did I raft the Nile, see a whole bunch of colorful birds I had never seen before and pray in a mosque after responding to the local muezzin's call to prayer (the sheik also tried to convert me, I held my ground), but I hung out with Caitlin T. and navigated Uganda's crazy streets with her help. She even helped me bargain with a shopkeeper around Owino Market in downtown Kampala. That market place literally smelled like shit and as we walked down the never ending pathways, the aggressive businesspeople grabbed at our arms and clothes. Crazy. It is good to be among friends; it is even better to be reunited with one you have not seen in a while.

Right now I am in Kigali, but that will not be for long. Tomorrow, my mate Devon and I head out to the North of Rwanda to Ruhengeri where we will be doing our practicum. Hopefully we will be planting trees, at least that is what we signed up to do. We do not really know much about what we have gotten ourselves into, but at the very minimum, we are guaranteed an adventure. I am looking forward to spending my time in the dirt and doing some restorative physical labour. I will not be taking my computer, although I might be able to find an internet cafe somewhere. Most likely, we will live in a rural area without internet access, so do not expect too much from me during this upcoming month. We return on March 25th or sometime around then.

Kigali now feels like home. I returned from Kampala with a joyous heart and got off the bus at our Remera/Chez Lando stop feeling so comfortable and pleased to return home, if only for a few days. Nothing solidifies the feeling of 'home-ness' like going away and coming back. I love Rwanda and seeing Uganda only made me realize how much I love life here. I love cramming into packed buses and traveling down familiar streets. I love speaking to locals in their language (though it is quite the challenge) and I even love only being able to comprehend three or four words out of every sentence. The trash filled streets of Kampala made me pine for Kigali, oddly enough. Suffice to say, Rwanda n'ziza.

I wish you all the best, whoever and wherever you are. May Imana bless you with grace and peace.

Muramoce,
Joshua

An Abbreviated Recapitulation Of A Busy Past Two Weeks

My blog has become like an Egyptian slave driver, whipping me with guilt every time I remember that I have not blogged in the recent past. So here it is, get ready folks. I am just going to go through the past couple weeks in a summary-esque format.

Two weekends ago I went to Kibuye, a town on Lake Kivu, for vacation where we swam (us guys skinny dipped for a while which was awesome), hiked, climbed Bat Island where many bats crowded the sky, got caught in a torrential lake storm that froze us to the bone on our boat ride back to the hotel, and danced in this haunted house looking night club in our hotel’s basement. That last part was rather creepy. For some reason us three guys ended up there both nights, dancing to funky African beats and a funny remix of Who Let The Dogs Out? I had not heard that song since maybe 5^th grade, so that was a trip. We also attended a local Free Methodist service that involved much singing and even some dancing accompanied by a traditional drum. So that was that and it was awesome. Saturday morning I helped some local Rwandan workers chop up a felled tree. Although I felt sorry for the tree, I wanted to give it a shot since I enjoy splitting wood. It took me twice as long as the wiry Rwandan man to finally slice through that tree trunk and my hands were worse off because of it, but it was totally worth it.

We arrived back in Kigali only to leave the next day for a research project in the Eastern Province. It is dry there, except for the two nights it rained like hell. We spent the week camping on a farm site in the midst of planting and clearing the land. During the days, we went into town and asked random families or individuals questions that concerned our qualitative research subject. Mine was the environment. Camping delighted me, even the night I spent cramped in a steamy van due to rain and a flooded tent. We also had translators to aid our interviewing process, students from Kigali Institute of Science and Technology who were quite personable and funny. We are now friends; tomorrow a group of us are going to visit them at their school and then have them over for dinner. Anyways, the interviewing went well and the people with whom we talked were quite receptive to our questions and thankful for our presence. But therein laid the problem. They thought we had solutions for them. They confided in us; they told us their lives, their lack of daily bread, how their children got chased away from school because they could not afford to buy them the proper school supplies or uniforms. Crops cannot grow without rain and they have been in a ‘drought’ (probably more of an unprecedented rain shortage) for two years. How can we make it rain? Am I even qualified to ask people questions, much less play like I have any sort of answers to their very real questions? I felt like a fraud, a masquerading liar. It got worse when we had to make our presentations to the community and its leaders, outlining our findings and proposed solutions. It is at this point that our fraudulent masks were removed and they saw our revealed inexperience and immaturity in the broad daylight. How shameful; they trusted us in the expectation of something, anything to help. We delivered them half-baked ideas; our ideas were shit, loads of bullshit. And they saw it clearly for what it truly was, for their questions to us penetrated our shallow façade and exposed our naïve ideas to the harsh realities of the Mpanga sector. Needless to say, I felt like I had betrayed the people I talked with, like all the smiles and cheery hand waves I had given people were all just a cover up for my own impotence, ineptitude and inability to help their situation. And they so desperately need help. Oh God help us.

On the way home, I saw a dead man. As we drove through a town in between the East and Kigali, we slowed down to find a figure lying motionless in the middle of the road. To the side of him was a crushed bicycle and up the road a bit was a parked semi. All around him, local people just stood and stared as if they were stunned. The reason became instantly clear. The man, with blood streaming from a gash on the back of his head, had been biking across the road when a semi plowed into him, demolishing his now contorted body and his bicycle. I felt as though I had become instantly sober, stoic and yet simultaneously vulnerable, confused, and desperate for something, maybe inner peace. Please God, help that man. His family too. Oh God help us.

So that has been my life recently, along with writing a paper (that I really do not enjoy) for the past few days. I still do not know how to deal with the reality of death I witnessed. We leave for Uganda on Thursday where we will go white water rafting down the Nile and go shopping at an awesome Ugandan market. I also get to hang out with Caitlin Torrence, a friend from Greenville! She has been in Uganda this semester and is coming down to see Erica and I. It will be so good to see a familiar face, especially one so lively as Caitlin’s. After that, I am off to Ruhengeri until March 25. I will be planting trees with my friend Devon; we also are doing some oral history interviews with locals to find out traditional Rwandan tongue twisters, origin stories, jokes and so on. I am looking forward to doing something productive, getting out into the rural country, and having some time away from our group. It can be too much sometimes living and doing everything in a big group like ours. So here is to life.

Christ’s Peace to y’all,

Joshua

PS I miss you Rachel

C'est bonne la vie

This past weekend was probably the best two days of my time here so far. Some friends and I travelled to Gatagara on Saturday morning, a small town past Gitarama which is the second largest city in Rwanda, I think. We walked through town, drawing attention and receiving random hugs from cute little children, down the dirt road to a pottery store. I bought a sweet plate with a fish image on it and also a mug. I also got to feed a cow; I plucked some grass from the ground and offered it to the bovine and he obligingly gobbled it up by snatching it with his super long tongue. On second thought, it could have been a female cow, I do not know. On the way back to town, I walked and talked with a fellow named Jean-Pierre in a trilingual conversation. We spoke mostly in French and English, but he also helped me a little on some nuances of kinyarwanda.
Sunday we attended an evangelical church on an invitation from a relative of one our Go-ED teammates (Princesse). The church had dirt floors and a swinging choir. According to custom, they asked us visitors to sing them a song, so we sang a swahili/english song for them, with the aid of their choir. It goes "there's no god, there's no god like Jesus; There's no god, there's no god like Him..." I won't even try to spell out the swahili part. Our performance turned into a dance party because the Rwandan churchgoers were not shy about expressing their spiritual delight in their rhythmic movements. Three sermons were delivered, which took a while especially since they had to be translated into English by Justin, Princesse's cousin. But it was a joyous and active service. Afterwards, we headed to Princesse's relative's house for lunch. At the house, we waited for two and a half hours for the food, but punctuality is not really important here and anyways the waiting was spent in good company. The Rwandan males of the host families got up and sang three songs for us in harmonious parts, all the while clapping and dancing and smiling up a storm. When they asked us to perform a ditty for them, we balked at first. Then the two other guys and I worked up a rendition of "I'll Fly Away", which went over pretty well considering our preparation. They also taught us some Rwandan dances, which we practiced gleefully.
The lunch turned into an all afternoon affair. Justin and two his brothers walked us home, being the amazing hosts they were, at around 4:30pm. Justin and I held hands for probably half the walk home. Then I switched to talking to his brother Felix, which necessitated more hand-holding. It is very common here to see men walking around the streets with intertwined hands or fingers. It took a little getting used since that is frowned upon back in the States and my hands became so sweaty that I felt self-conscious and sorry for Justin. However, it became something quite natural and it makes for a funny tale to relay. All in all, it was a fantastic and active weekend.
This morning, like every morning nowadays, I taught English at PHARP, a local organization started by one of our teachers Pastor Anastase that is dedicated to achieving peace, healing and reconciliation through common work programs. The women we tutor are learning how to sew in order to ameliorate their economic situation. Today, I went over the alphabet with the four women (Yvette, Alphonsine, Valerie, and Claire) I teach. I am learning how to teach as I go, and I would probably give myself a failing grade in terms of my pedagogical abilities. However, the women seem to enjoy and actually retain some of the information we study and I certainly benefit in learning more kinyarwanda. It is also heart-warming to interact personally with Rwandans and get out of both the classroom and our Go-ED house. That is it for now. Sorry if some of you are having trouble commenting on my blog, you might have to be an official follower if you want to do that. I am not well versed in blogging so I probably will not be of much help in those matters.
I miss you all very much. It is a joy to reflect on the past and all the memories I have shared with all you friends and family.

Did you know?

Yesterday night was quiz night at Sola Luna, the local Italian pizzeria, where a bunch of expats and UN workers get together, chat, drink from huge bottles of beer, and test each other's knowledge on obscure factoids. My team decided to dress up in our fancy duds in order to present ourselves as an intimidating force to be reckoned with. I looked pretty smart besides the fact that I sported my hiking boots as I do not have any dress shoes. Anyways, one of the questions was about an anagram for a famous woman's name that goes "nigel fetch an iron leg" or something to that effect. Our group was stumped utterly by this question and we were scrambling to fill in the blank before they collected our paper. I had been thinking to myself "what are dead women with really long names?" and suddenly I knew the answer: Florence Nightingale. I do not know how I came to that conclusion, I attribute it to God, maybe a theophany through speech.

I really enjoy those trivia nights and they are but one aspect of the wacky experiences I have an opportunity to take part in here in bustling Kigali. For example, last night was aerobics night at Amahoro Stadium. There was loud music (a dance mix of ABBA and Elton John) and a bunch of old Rwandans usually show up to the gymnasium for the aerobics, but they are dressed in the most ridiculous outfits, reminiscent of the '80s, and it is a comical affair. Not only was it hard work, but it was ridiculously fun. I probably got the same amount of a workout laughing up a storm than doing the dancercises.

Grace and Peace to you all (whoever actually reads this besides my parents) from Kigali,

Yesua

Regimen

     This feels odd to write but I have established a routine here in Kigali; my life is basically patterned instead of just a crazy roller coaster ride on an African expedition. I usually run in the morning, sometimes around Amahoro National Stadium, sometimes down into the nearby valley on the dirt roads. The kids I pass always beam their beautiful smiles at me and laugh as they greet me, as though they share a funny secret from the awkward, goofy looking muzungu that I am. It probably does not help that I have a funny accent when pronouncing kinyarwanda words. I find the whole situation quite funny. Then comes a nice outdoor shower and breakfast, which usually involves a decadent array of carbs and starches (like most every meal). They have this odd version of peanut butter here; they call it G-nut, it stands for ground nut. I prefer regular peanut butter because G-nut tastes really bland to me, unless you load the bread product with an ungodly amount of honey.
     We then hop onto a mutatu, the local buses which are usually packed to the brim, to get to our classes, which are held at PROCOM's headquarters in a residential area near the prison (gareza). I cannot believe how many people they manage to arrange in those vans. We have class for about four or five hours with a two hour lunch break and then head back towards our house in Remera, sometimes by way of Kimironko Market. Everytime I go in there the vendors accost me with offers for whatever they are selling, whether it be a pile of beans, flour, yards of fabric, or knock-off shirts and shoes. The afternoons and evenings are usually free. Tonight I trekked downtown for a little while. Tomorrow is reggae night at the Hotel des Milles Collines and the night after that will probably be taken up by an outdoor movie. Saturday is Umuganda, which is a public working day that happens towards the end of every month where everyone does some public service for the morning. I am hoping to get onto a ditch digging crew, just for the experience.
Also, Deuteronomy is a crazy and disturbing book of the Bible. We have been reading it for a class and I have had a hard reconciling my theistic conception (admittedly elementary) with the one presented in Deuteronomy. Help?

Stalking a Baboon and Chasing Zebras

Today is our one week anniversary of arriving in Rwanda and we just got back from safari in the Eastern Province. As the title suggests, I stalked a baboon and took a photo of him eating out of a pan, although he knew I was there the whole time; also, Devon, Blake and I spent a good half hour walking around the hills of Akagera National Park looking at animals and even chasing some zebras. We never got even close to them and it felt more like we were running WITH them as opposed to running AT them. The whole safari experience blew my mind, it felt quite surreal. Besides seeing the animals (like crocs, hippos, zebras, giraffes, baboons, etc.), the best part was just driving around the huge safari park because we were allowed to sit on the windows and have our torsos hanging out the sides of the cars. I got pretty sunburned but I consider it totally worth the slight pain. We also camped on the highest hill last night. Even though the ground was bumpy, I slept like a madman.
It is weird how leaving and coming back can make a place seem like home, even when we have only been living here for a short time. Also, this does not feel like school as of yet. I think we have had a total of four class sessions, and most of our days are spent exploring the city and getting to know each other. Two days ago, the two other guys (already mentioned) and I walked a ways away down to Kimironko Market, a local market that bustled with activity and was stocked full of random goods. I ended up buying a Ugandan watermelon. I gave it to Alphonse, one of guards here at the Go-ED house. We cannot communicate very well since he speaks kinyarwanda and swahili and I speak english and french, but we are friends. We have run together, which was great since we ran at the same fast pace. We have also kicked the soccer ball around a fair amount and a couple nights ago he taught us guys how to dance as they do in the Congo and as well as traditional Rwandan dance. Anyways, I have decided that when I blog I will try to focus on one aspect what we do here instead of trying encompass everything into a single blog post. After all, this is my life. I cannot convey it all to my family and friends and allow you to see the world through my eyes, as much as I wish I could. I have been posting pictures on facebook and will continue to do that as long as it works because our internet is too slow to allow pictures on this blog. Tura subira!

Nous sommes arrivés

Mwiriwe, this is just a note to say that I am in Rwanda, Kigali specifically. We have been here around four and a half days and it already feels like forever. The city is bustling and the language is tough, but graspable. I think I speak English now with a kinyarwanda accent, oddly enough. We have not had access to internet because our house's internet thingy is down. Right now, I am at Bourbon Coffee shop; I ordered a grilled vegetable sandwich. The internet will probably be working well tomorrow though. I like it here and ni meza (I am fine). Today we went to a genocide memorial; tomorrow we will go to another. Friday, we leave on safari for a couple of days. Yesterday, we went to a futbol match at the National Stadium, which is near our house (we walk everywhere around here, it is great!) and saw the semi-final of the U-17 African Cup of Nations match between Burkina Faso and Congo. The game was fun and went to penalty kicks, but the atmosphere provided the most lively entertainment. 

We live off a dirt road in the Remera neighborhood, an area teeming with the activity of botas and mutatus (crappy motorcycles taxis and public buses). I run every morning, which entails an early rising, usually before the roosters start sounding off. We have a porch out front where is quite nice to sit on, journal, and eat any meal of the day. We have two Rwandan women who cook for us, Aida and Shadia. Alphonse and Celestin are the house security guards and they run with us occasionally. Neither of them speak much English, and none of us are good with conversational kinyarwanda. That makes communication a joyful struggle that involves a lot of laughter and repetition of the word "Yego" which means yes. 

My teacher for my Peace and Reconciliation class is a Free Methodist pastor named Pastor Anastase. He knows the Seattle area quite well, and so the first day we chatted about Warm Beach, Tacoma, Mark Abbott, and Phyllis Sortor. He is quite connected in the Free Methodist world, but also is an expert of reconciliation and peace studies. It is amazing the forgiveness the Rwandan people have enacted and the resulting reconciliation that has been allowed to occur. So far, our classes have been at the Pastor's work, he heads an NGO named PHARP (Peace, Healing and Reconciliation Program). The first day we went there, we were introduced to the women who are learning sewing there at the center and then they sang for us a traditional African song of welcome. It was a call and response song, and the soloist not only could wail like a pro, but she danced as well. We experienced a similar sing-songy environment at the church we attended last Sunday, the Christian Life Assembly. We witnessed a baptismal program that was unlike any I had ever seen before. I wish my baptism had been like this. People who stayed to watch joyously joined their voices together welcoming those who experienced post-submersion renewal in the community of Christ. I felt privileged to behold the ceremony.  

On a random note, I drank my first and second sodas in like four years. I caved and decided to try a Coke since I remembered that coca-cola in foreign countries usually tastes way better. It was not worth it, but oh well. The place where I ordered the Coke is an Italian pizzeria called Sola Luna where every Monday night they hold a quiz night. A whole bunch of expats, embassy workers, and foreigners show up to socialize and test their knowledge of random political facts. If your team wins, the house pays for all of your table's food. So we went last Monday and got schooled. My team answered 8 out of 25 questions right. But, on the plus side, I did learn that George Bush was a cheerleader in high school, that the president of Libya, Gaddafi, has a bodyguard corps made up entirely of female virgins, and that US soldiers who landed on Normandy in WWII wrapped their gun barrels in condoms to waterproof them. Oh the things you can learn at an Italian pizzeria populated by expats. 

I will try to blog when I can, but frankly there are so many other things that appeal to me more than sitting on this computer and staring at the screen. I will probably have to force myself to do the whole blogging thing. Here are some pictures. Actually, it will not let me upload any photos now, so that will have to wait. Tura Subira.

Hmmm

My blog does not seem to be working. This is a test.

Imminence

I have had many things on my mind lately, especially getting some decent sleep, but for some reason all I can think about right now is that I will be putting on my chaco sandals within the next two days, without freezing my toes off. The thought of sandals makes me giddy.

Too Much Tea

I cannot sleep. I have tossed and turned in bed for four hours, failing to fall asleep. I blame it on the massive quantities of thai tea I drank as part of dinner tonight. One girl told me it had a lot of caffeine, but I offhandedly disregarded her claim. It turns out that she was utterly right. So I thought I might as well blog if I am awake and not really doing anything.
     Earlier today, actually yesterday since I am writing in the wee hours of the morning, cousins Jon and Levi dropped me off here at the Comfort Inn in Washington DC where I connected with my Go-ED group mates, most of whom are going to Rwanda with me. I think our Rwanda group has 17 students going on it. However, there is a smaller group of seven or eight girls going to Mekong, Thailand and they are here with us as we all get orientated together. So far, things are looking up, very much so. The people I have met are great and friendly, and I have even heard tell of an opportunity to go bungee-jumping sometime during the semester. Also, the first weekend we get to Rwanda we take off on safari
     I am tired of the cold and the snow, it wears on my bones especially since I only brought clothes suitable for warmer climates. I cannot wait to touch down in tropical Rwanda, although the long flights will certainly be harrowing. I had hoped that blogging and reading would make me tired. Unfortunately, that highly caffeinated tea must still be coursing through my system. An all-nighter it is.

Countdown (sick for the big sun)

 Although I had much time to prepare, both mentally and packing-wise, I feel as though the future has caught with me. I flew from Seattle to Baltimore, constituting the first leg of my epic which is to include a semester studying, living, breathing and walking around in Rwanda followed by a month traveling around Europe with my cousin Daniel Overholt, or Dan-O as I sometimes like to call him. As of now, we are planning on stopping and staying in Budapest, Istanbul, Greece, and parts of Italy, using the European trains like nobody's business. Pretty much the stuff of my dreams.

a sweet gigantic mobile

Currently, I am residing in the suburbs of Baltimore, staying with my cousin Jon, his wife Jackie, their son Levi, and our cousin Erin Gaughan who lives with them. Today, Jon and I visited two museums on the National Mall, the National Gallery of Art and the Natural History Museum. I left Seattle bright and early on the morning of monday the 11th to hang out here in Maryland until the 13th (tomorrow) when I will trek again, this time to Washington DC to finally meet up with my study abroad mates. We leave on Friday, after a day and a half of orientation, for Kigali! I find it odd that it is snowing right now here on the eastern seaboard, knowing that in my near future I will be harbored in the opposite climatic extreme, Rwandan heat.

Napolean

Though technically I have not left on my study abroad adventure, I already feel the sad reality of separation from both family and friends. However, that did not stop me from dancing like a maniac against Levi in a dance off, officiated by Jon and Jackie. Although I have trained with the best of the best of the best dance instructors like the right-honorable Michael Trapp, Levi pulled out some crazy moves and made it an intense competition. The judges said we tied. I know I was lucky to escape with a draw.

in the club

I recently joined a club, or maybe a (not-so) secret society. Polar bears are crazy in the head, especially human ones. I hope to continue and make this an icy, yet invigorating, New Year's tradition. It was almost like baptism, without the religious significance readily on hand. I was giddy for the next half an hour after the lakefront communal baptism service. (This has nothing to do with studying abroad with Go-ED, it is just the most interesting thing I have experienced in the last week). 

(Pre-submersion), nervous anticipation 

A mad and chilly dash

Post-Submersion, dry and alive