Abe "Lincorn," Evil Mastermind?

I want to start off by sharing one of the most ridonk things I have seen in this country (aside from a poster of American rap moguls wherein a photo of 50 Cent was labeled 50%. This is basically a horror movie DVD cover called “Illuminati 4: The Antichrist,” and it features photos of Justin Bieber, Hitler, the Pope, and Abraham “Lincorn,” which I’d like to point out is actually George Washington. Or maybe GW's evil twin? Aside from Hitler, I’m not sure who the good and bad guys are in this scenario. 

Strange DVD covers aside, I've made a bit of progress recently. First off, I attended an event in Kamembe last month (a bigger town about 90 minutes away) led by some other Peace Corps Volunteers. I pretty much just observed since they planned this activity prior to my arrival here. Local high school students presented pre-prepared skits about HIV/AIDS and heard lessons about prevention/stigmas etc. Many of the skits involved songs and I realized just how many young aspiring hip hop stars there are in Rwanda. lol Another volunteer who is working for an NGO in my district has a supervisor living in Kamembe and we stayed with his family during our visit. These folks had a huge home with indoor plumbing, satellite television, and even a lawn—just goes to show how different Rwandan circumstances are (though on the other hand they don’t have hot water and cook on a wood stove). This family was so great—we got a tour of the city, delicious home-cooked meals, interesting conversation, and a chance to watch the Style Network. On that note, I did not know that Tia and Tamara Mowry have their own reality show, but watching it in a developing country made me realize why some foreigners hate America.

From Kamembe I took a 7-hour bus ride to Kigali to run errands with another PCV. This was a great excuse to visit a random hole-in-the-wall restaurant called Lil’ Vegas where you can play slot machines and indulge in American-style chicken fingers and onion rings while watching Beyoncé music videos. The return trip to my site featured more music videos, but this time they were Rwandan, and playing on a bus TV screen. Yes, I was on a ginormous bus with a TV screen! Not sure when they bad boys were rolled out, but I am hoping I’m lucky enough to hop on one again the next time I have to travel to the city. Visiting Kigali is a strange experience because it’s like a vacation from village life, but everything is crazy expensive when you’re on a Peace Corps budget. I felt spoiled to stay in a hotel room with running water, but then ended up with about a dozen mysterious insect bites in my sleep. And in some ways Kigali feels safer than the village because you can walk around at night (which I never do at site), but I was also hyper on-guard in crowded areas like the bus station due to recent grenade attacks. So it’s definitely a place to visit once in a while when you need a dose of semi-anonymity and western food, but it’s not going to be a frequent occurrence for me. That being said, I did purchase a new hot plate which I am pretty excited about, so it was a worthwhile trip overall.

When I got back, I toured Kibogura Hospital, which is located about a 20-minute drive from me, and was surprised to find out that it’s a really large, well-equipped facility with foreigners passing through pretty frequently. I even met an American woman who will be living in Nyamasheke for at least the next year and had some really good insights to share about her experience so far. 

I then met a Ugandan woman who is mentoring teachers at the local school on how to instruct in English and adopt a student-centered vs. teacher-centered teaching approach. This mentoring program was implemented by the Rwandan government after they switched from a French-speaking to English-speaking education system back in 2009. Rwanda is moving forward pretty ambitiously with a program called Vision 2020 and education seems to be a big part of making this country an international player. The teacher I met is a great resource and it looks like we’re going to pair up to start some student clubs in January. She then introduced me to a woman from Zimbabwe working with Volunteers Serving Abroad who, prior to my arrival, partnered with EDC (the company I worked at prior to Peace Corps, which also has an office in Rwanda) to start a library nearby. The library is supposed to become mobile and visit neighboring communities including my town, so I'm planning to get on board with that project and see how I can help. 

In other news, last weekend I assisted with a malaria prevention event at another PCV's secondary school. The activity I was assigned to help with involved students making a "dream banner" with words and photos describing their goals—then placing the banner under a mosquito net to demonstrate how protecting yourself from malaria can protect your dreams. I’m happy to have some activities like this on the agenda because I've been doing a lot of watching and not a lot of doing recently. Feeling guilty about having too much down time to play Candy Crush and watch Always Sunny in Philadelphia, I've made a concerted effort to try to explore the area more and work on the Peace Corps Community Needs Report I'm required to complete. Part of this assessment included checking on the current status of an animal husbandry project started by the previous volunteer at my site. It looks to be doing well at the moment, and I am trying to get a meeting set up to discuss how to start breeding the pigs she distributed.

And finally, just a completely unrelated big-picture note, there was recently a parliamentary election which resulted in the number of seats held by women increasing from 56 to 64%. Way to go ladies—exciting times for Rwanda!