We Were Built for This....

A quick warning – this post could be disturbing, so please skip on down if you are at all uncomfortable. And, I really do have a point in this excessively long post, so if you can hang in there, do.

 

Goma, for those who don’t know its dark recent history, is a pretty grim place. You wouldn’t know for the loud music and bustling markets that thousands of people have died and are dying within a few mile radius of the border-town. Between becoming an encampment for refugees and fugitives of the 1994 Rwandan genocide and a starting point for the DRC’s current civil conflict, Goma became a truly forgotten (and totally misunderstood) hell.  I admit it now that I had a morbid curiosity with the place. How could it be so close and yet so different?

 

My friend Nick, the British med student with whom I went to Akagera, had some contacts with an aid hospital just over the border from the Rwandan town of Gisenyi, and had been to Goma twice before. He let me know he was going, and I joined in for the day. At least I could satisfy my curiosity in a productive way.

Goma is about 45 miles from my town of Ruhengeri and sits on the north shores of Lake Kivu. Gisenyi, Goma’s Rwandan sister, is a resort town for the rich and famous one of the most expensive hotels in the country is situated with lakefront property. Admittedly, the cloudy day Nick and I road into Gisenyi was the first time I had set foot in the place, but it was easy to see why Rwandese vacation there… the rolling green hills spill over into Lake Kivu and the view is spectacular. Walking towards the border, the red roofs of Goma looked more like the Grand Floridian at Disney World than it did a city with a civil conflict on its doorstep.

Getting through the border with Nick’s know-how was easy, and I got a quick tour of downtown. My first impression of Goma was how busy and exciting it was – in Rwanda, I have become accustomed to quiet order. No one shouts, people bump into you without saying anything, and cleanliness is almost a nervous tick. Goma was what I expected of Africa; small shops blasting beats, vendors shouting over each other, and color everywhere. I almost got run over twice and someone tried to pickpocket Nick. It was oddly comforting to have such disorder.

With a benign case of the Goma-lung between the volcanic dust and exhaust fumes, we ducked inside the hospital gates of HEAL Africa. Although I missed how long HEAL Africa had been in existence, the need for its services was immediately apparent. The entirely separate ward just for women suffering from genital mutilation and awaiting genital reconstruction stood out most as we walked around. The hospital also runs a half-way house for survivors of sexual assault, in addition to handling basic broken bones and cases of malaria.

Our morning was spent with Pastor Samuel, the counselor of the hospital. Pastor Samuel allowed us to sit on a few consultations, including a young woman who explained she had come from more than 200 miles away and now hadn’t the money to bring food to her family members in the hospital. (Of the three hospitals I’ve visited in Rwanda, this case was the same – although medical services are provided, food and often even bedding for the patient are not.) After praying with the woman, Pastor Samuel explained he would check with the cooks for the half-way house to see if they couldn’t provide her a few meals each week. He then went to speak with a woman healing from a motorbike accident, and with a family who needed medication that couldn’t be found within Goma. With each patient, Pastor Samuel calmly and intently listened, laid a gentle hand on an arm, and said a prayer. Walking between consultations, I asked Pastor Samuel if he wasn’t the problem-solver of the hospital. “As a pastor, I don’t solve their problems,” he gently corrected, “I help them to find their own solutions.”

After a lunch of a can of Coke (as you do when you don’t want to change money!), Nick was going in to see an Australian surgeon. I had a plan to roam about and discover which other aid organizations were at work in Goma while Nick went in for surgery. If I didn’t belong in the Chemistry lab with my students, I certainly had no business being in a real operating room. Not certain he’d scrub in, Nick invited me to wait outside the recovery room while he checked in with Dr. Paul. Within a few minutes, I was standing face-to-face with a very tall, very kind Australian plastic surgeon. “Well Jennifer! If you can teach Chemistry, you can come in the operating room! Felix, get some scrubs for these two. We’ll get you in a minute.”

Needless to say, not being a med student myself, I only made it near the end of my first surgery before I locked my knees and felt woozy. Back in the break room with Dr. Paul, I felt more at home, though, and was able to ask about his work in Congo. Dr. Paul explained that he comes to HEAL Africa for a few weeks every six months or so, taking a break from what I can only assume is a very successful practice in Melbourne to live and work in Goma. Dr. Paul made the safety and quiet of my hometown here sound like heaven. “I don’t leave the hospital compound when I’m here, but I can tell on my drive from Kigali each time that you live in a wonderful place.” When I asked why Goma, somewhere in the answer was a “someone’s got to. These people deserve good care.”

 

My one day in Goma was over a month ago now, and only now am I beginning to understand what my lesson from that day really was. It’s something that I picked up from Pastor Samuel, and it’s something I thought I understood with Dr. Paul. It’s something that I thought about when Nick first told me he was going to Congo. And looking back, it’s something I felt in a particular moment on that day. 

Between our visits with Pastor Samuel and Dr. Paul, I had stopped to shake hands with two little girls outside a children’s ward. The little girls were identical twins, and they both had both legs in plaster casts after battling polio. While it’s not unusual for me to stop for little ones, something about these two struck me, and still gives me good goosebumps to think of them. I don’t know how to explain it, but the first little girl had the kindest, sweetest smile I have ever seen. She didn’t bother to try to say anything to me, but instead, craning her neck to look in my eyes, she took my outstretched hand and cradled it to her cheek. Then she just chuckled, my hand next to her sweet little face. I went home thinking about her, and when I got up to teach the next day, things just seemed lighter.

 

What I see now, is that whatever we have and whatever we are, we were built for this. We were built for these moments when we can give who we are for someone else. We don’t have to have grand plans or great answers. Instead, we were built with our own special talents and we were built to use them in ways that help and encourage others. It’s the way Pastor Samuel uses his faith to help people to help themselves. It’s how Dr. Paul uses his learned hands to heal half a world away from home. It’s how Nick’s curiosity and enthusiasm brought me over to Goma and it’s how this one little girl’s beautiful smile gave me strength to continue working.

 

I don’t know yet what my real talent is, but I know I’m going to keep looking until I find it. My frustration in teaching science I blame on my own inadequacy in the subject matter, spending so much of my time away from my students in my room studying. That, of course, doesn’t mean that the work I’ve done thus far is worthless. On the contrary, it’s incredibly important if only to have helped me to understand that whatever our talents, using them in the best way we know how is a step towards helping others. Think about it. You don’t have to be a pastor or a doctor or a teacher or a ‘humanitarian’ to do something amazing. You only have use who you are, just the way you were built, to touch those around you. And that’s pretty powerful, if you ask me.

 

Much love and courage,
jen

 

The Moments of Quiet…

At our first meeting in Washington D.C., our program manager asked each of us to fill out a sheet about our expectations. It was meant to be a bonding exercise. I remember trying to fight back the panic as I was sitting in the Breakfast Room of that Holiday Inn and looked around thinking, “Here we go. Here’s to a year in Africa. Here’s to a year in a country, let alone a continent, I’ve never visited before, and here’s to diving into a job I’ve never done.” On our sheets, we were asked about our goals and fears for the year, the latter being easiest to answer. I was terrified of that first moment when all the hustle and bustle of orientation, moving, and meeting new people quieted down, and I would be left alone in my room. More than the exotic diseases or the teaching teenagers, the idea of that first moment of quiet made me feel sick.

Perhaps a self-fulfilling prophesy, I had that moment of panic when I was left alone in the guesthouse my first day at my placement. I’ve also had similar moments of panic since; moments when the many to-do’s and must-do’s are set aside and I’m reminded of the sheer ridiculousness of the tasks before me. There’s been moments of panic-causing quiet right after I hang up the phone with someone from home, and there’s been moments of panic-causing quiet when I come back from Kigali after a weekend with friends. “You’re here… alone.” I’d hear. “Now what are you going to do?”

I’ve always loved the quotation from Adlai Stevenson that “in quiet places, reason abounds.” Yet I’ve found that for much of my time in Rwanda, fear usually fights reason in my quiet moments, and fear usually wins. I won’t say that I’m ashamed or regretful of this, simply because each feeling I’ve had on this adventure I’ve wanted to treat as completely legitimate, no matter how silly it seems in retrospect. (It’s been my belief each feeling has been a steppingstone to something else, something more important, and some just take longer to understand than others.) It’s only now, though, ten months in that I recognize what a waste that fear could be.

Coming back into my room this afternoon, I found I had a different moment of quiet. After eating lunch with my neighbors, I found that in the quiet of my room I could hear the laughter of the six-year-old next door. Bits of Radio Musanze drifted through my curtains as our houseboy carried his Walkman out to wash dishes.  Birds outside flew back and forth across the yard and men walking home from Mass were speaking in Kinyarwanda. It was comforting and it felt like home.

I’m going to have pictures and souvenirs and letters from my time in Rwanda, but I won’t have these moments of quiet again, not unless I return. In the past ten months, no matter how brave I was trying to be, my moments of quiet have been filled with the voice in my head asking, “What are you doing here? Are you sure you should be here? Do you really know how to do these things? Wouldn’t you rather be doing something else?” My moments of quiet really have been moments of tumult, moments in which I was anticipating what was to come or missing what had been. What a waste, I realize now, what a total waste.

With less than thirty days to go before my year at school ends, my goal now is to enjoy these moments of quiet, to savor them and to save them. They’re the closest thing to ‘living in the moment’ I know how to appreciate, and they’re things I won’t be able to get back when they’re gone. It’s taken me ten long months, but the things that were my biggest fear when I left home, are now the some of the things I appreciate most, and perhaps my greatest gift. And I hope to enjoy them to the fullest.

Here’s to finding something beautiful in something you fear.

Much love,
jen

On My Absence from Posting…

A lot has certainly happened in the intervening months since I’ve regularly written my blog, and I’m so sorry that I haven’t kept up. What I’m posting now are two rather heavy posts, and with less than a month left to teach, I’ll let these suffice until the end of October and post a bunch from these last days of school. I promise there’s a lot that will be worth reading, and I appreciate your continued support, encouragement, and love. J It’s not long to go, and I’m so excited to see everyone when I get home for the holidays!

 

You'd Never Imagine It'd Get This Good...

One of the unexpected joys of what often feels like a nomadic lifestyle is that people who are living the same way hit it off pretty quickly – which is good because everyone else tends to think we’re crazy. We tend to form a small, ever-changing, community of people who steal toilet paper, wear patched clothes, and aren’t shy about asking if we can split a meal to save money at a restaurant. It’s comforting to be in groups where you don’t have to explain yourself.

 Two weeks before my birthday, I met a British med-student who was staying in the same Catholic guesthouse we call ‘home’ in Kigali. Nick was here for about 8 weeks volunteering and visiting medical facilities in and around Rwanda. Nick’s friend Sarah was coming to visit for a week and the two had graciously driven me back to Ruhengeri as they set out for their holiday. On the day before Sarah flew home, I got a call from Nick around 10 am. “We’re thinking about spending the day in Akagera, do you care to come?” I didn’t have to think twice – Akagera is the game reserve in the southeast of Rwanda and I’d wanted to go for eight months. The plan was to do it on the cheap – take a public bus down to the town before the road turns to dirt, take a moto down the dirt road to the entrance of the park, and hitchhike onto a pre-arranged tour. We'd see some pretty amazing animals, take a couple of facebook photos, and get home to Kigali before Sarah had to fly out that night. It turned out to be so much more, I'm not sure I'll really do the day justice. 

Getting to the town before the dirt road was fairly simple. We lathered up in sunscreen, grabbed liters of water, and boarded our minibus with ipods at the ready. Despite slightly overshooting our destination, by 1 in the afternoon, we had reached the dirt road to the park. My minimal Kinyarwanda successfully landed a senior 4 student to help us get three motos and after about fifteen minutes of haggling over the price, we suited up in greasy helmets and took off down the hill for the approximately 20km to the park.

While I've spent a good amount of time on the back of a motorcycle to get around these last eight months, I've never had a ride quite like this. The sky was absolutely clear, the day was warm, and rounding the slight curve at top of the hill, we suddenly found ourselves looking out over a postcard of Africa. Rwanda is remarkable for many things, its varied topography being one. When we came around the curve, we were looking out onto a vast savanna, surrounded the rolling hills that epitomize the country. Because I live in the mountains, I don't remember the last time I saw land that flat for more than a few miles. It was beautiful. Just what you'd picture Africa to be, complete with grasses swaying in the gentle breeze. 

On the back of our motos, I was more than tempted to stick my arms out and fly. I knew I'd look ridiculous, but the nice thing about being a complete foreigner is you already look ridiculous most of the time. Pretty soon, all three of us had our arms out, flapping wildly and insanely as we sped past small crossroads and chuckling villagers. Somewhere along the road, Nick's moto broke down and Sarah and I stopped at the next town to wait for him. It was clear that most of the muzungus who pass through this crossroads came in speeding 4x4 vehicles. Sarah and I were instantly swallowed by a crowd of school children practicing their English greetings and asking for bon-bons. When Nick arrived, you could hardly see the two of us for the number of "Good mornings!" we were receiving. It was glorious. 

Getting back to the task at hand, we had to get our story straight. When the driver (a friend of Sarah and Nick) arrived, we'd have to let the other tourists know we had no guide and ask (read: beg) if we could tag along for their tour of the park. We were covered in dust from the moto rides (you could see the line of dirt on my face, I later found out by looking at photos...), so looking pitiful wasn't a problem. Thankfully, the kind American woman who had pre-arranged her tour agreed to take us on. We were off.

After paying our entrance fee to the park, we set off on our safari. Our guide was the jolliest woman I've ever met, Claudette, punctuating every fact in her African English with a joke that, despite often not understanding the punch-line, sent me into giggles from the way her whole body shook as she laughed. We were told we should look for zebras, monkeys, and small deer, and we'd spend a good amount of time with her favorite animals, the giraffes. "If we see anything else, it'll be icing on the cake," Claudette said. I don't think I've ever seen animals like these in the wild before, so I was right along side her when we paused first by the giraffes and she gasped, saying in a whisper, "I see these animals every day and they still thrill me each time."

Our driver Robert opened up the top so we could stand to take it all in, and soon we were riding around the park with the sun setting, marveling at how lucky we were. In total, we saw the zebras, monkeys, small deer, and giraffe that Claudette promised, as well as chimpanzees, hippos, a dozen or so types of birds. As we were leaving the hippos, we were basking in the wonder that was the day. Robert noted that soon the park would open for night safaris "and then people will really get to see things. All of the predators come out at night." The sun was almost gone now, and I was fiddling with my phone to try to get our moto-drivers back to get us to the nearest town before all the buses left for Kigali. Robert slammed on the breaks. Something caught his eye.

With the windows wide open, and all of us hanging out the top, Robert slowly backed up. He whispered to us not to move. In the brush, he had spotted a leopard. None of us could believe our luck. We spent 5 or 10 minutes, no telling how long, just staring, whispering to each other. When the cat finally ran off, Robert exclaimed, "In all of my years in doing these tours, I've never seen a leopard. You all must have brought the luck."

After thanking Robert, Claudette, and our American host profusely, it dawned on me that it was already approaching 8, and we'd missed the last bus back. "Don't worry," I told Nick and Sarah, "we'll totally get back in time." I tried to sound convincing, but a combination of the long day and the cold I picked up the week before was getting to my optimism. Sarah's flight left at 3 am, but we'd have to get her back long before so she could pack and make it to the airport on time. 

Robert had helped me arrange our motos to return shortly after we finished our safari, but it hadn't occurred to me that they would have to drive through the game reserve - at night - to get to us. It took the men longer than I expected to get to us, and I was antsy to get us to the nearest town. After all, despite the fact I didn't need to, I felt like I should play the hostess as I'd been in country the longest. After getting on the road out of the park, I realized that now we were in the middle of a game reserve, on motorcycles, at night, and my driver didn't have a headlight. Great, I thought, I've had the best day yet in Rwanda and now I'm going to get us killed. 

Sarah and I looked like it was winter as we sped past each other, clutching our scarves over our faces from the dirt and shivering in the night air. Nick, for the most part, was up ahead. That is, until his driver slowed, stopped, and turned out his lights.

Earlier in the day, Claudette caught a local woman walking through the reserve. Robert shook his head. "She's going to be killed out there," he said, as Claudette radioed for someone to help. "Why? Are there lions in the park?" one of us had asked. "Yes, there are lions, but the water buffalo are much more likely to get her." In my naivete, I hadn't thought of water buffalo as the biggest threat to this woman's life, but Claudette agreed. 

As we neared Nick and his moto-driver, Sarah's moto-driver flashed his light. A quick succession of Kinyarwanda whispers passed between the three men before I saw why we were stopped. Crossing the road, no more than ten feet in front of us, was a herd of water buffalo. No one breathed. As the last water buffalo made it across and moved further away, Nick's driver started the bike. Sarah's driver started her bike. My driver attempted a start, and swore in Kinyarwanda. We weren't moving. 

Nick started to pull away, and Sarah's driver moved ahead. Mine tried to start the blasted bike again and, nothing. I knew it wasn't wise, but I was half-cursing, half-praying in a rather loud whisper, when on the third try, our bike sputtered forward. In a heartbeat, we were back with Nick and Sarah and on our way. When we reached the nearest town, word had gotten out that the silly muzungus were coming back in the dark from Akagera. A crowd had assembled and cheering broke out when we rounded the hill. I've never been happier to get off a moto in my life. 

The rest of the night wasn't as action-packed as earlier, but it made for some good stories in itself, stories I'll omit because, as my own father suggested, the most important thing is that we made it home safely and there's no point worrying anyone unnecessarily. All I will say is that Rwanda is the safest country in East Africa, and some very nice people made sure we made it back to Kigali safely, and with an hour to spare before Sarah had to leave for the airport. :)

While I came here to teach (and teaching provides amazing experiences everyday), it's important to have a few days away from work where I just marvel at how incredibly lucky I am to be here. Days like that one come along once in a blue moon, and when they do, they're worth savoring for years to come. I pray everyone has days like that from time to time.

Much love, and watch out for water buffalo...

Jen

Birthdays Out-of-Town...

I can’t tell the joy I felt when the secretary of our school handed me the 12 envelopes that had come for my birthday from the States. “Uh, Jennifer, these are for you…” I remember him saying to me, struggling with the other mail from the school P.O. box. “You have many letters!” The pink, blue, green, and yellow envelopes stood in stark contrast to the pay stubs for the other teachers. When my birthday came around, I opened each one as carefully as I opened Christmas presents when I was five; it took me about thirty minutes to open the lot. Thank you so much for so much love from home – it truly made my birthday special!!

We're Not Saving the World...

The life of a volunteer can be utterly miserable. It can be frustrating, uncomfortable, and completely exhausting. And the truth of the matter is, most days we just get by. 

Over our summer (or winter... we're south of the equator) holiday, a number of the volunteers in our group have shared stories of our Rwandese hometowns. We've talked about how things are run, how we don't understand about 75% of what is going on around us daily, who in the group has contracted worms (yum), and about how much we have to do before we leave the country. The last is probably most daunting. With the first term to adjust to living in Rwanda and the second term to fine-tune our teaching skills, it leaves just one term - three months - to tie together all the loose ends and finish all of the projects we began. 

Everyone goes into a venture like this, no matter how realistic or grounded, thinking that we're here to "make a difference." Our dear friends and family have congratulated us on our dedication, our motivation, or our bravery. I don't pretend that it doesn't do my self-esteem good to hear these things, and I won't lie that such encouragement is sometimes the only thing that keeps me going. 

But often, and probably more often than not, there's nothing brave about my day-to-day life. There are days that I get up and delay going to class as long as humanly (and professionally) possible. There are afternoons when I go to "La Palme," one of the nicer hotels in town, and get on the internet only to feel totally overwhelmed with everything I'm missing at home. There are weekends that I board a bus to Kigali to be with other volunteers because planning my lessons, working with my students, or looking at the piles of work that I have to do makes me want to collapse. I've been jealous of friends leaving for home, and I've been childishly angry when I'm not understood the first or second time I ask for something. And I'll admit, I've wanted to throw the towel in more than once. 

With all of this said, though, I remember hearing once that if you get up in the morning thinking today's the day you'll save the world, you'll be perpetually disappointed. Likewise, if you get up every morning thinking that what you'll do today won't make the slightest change in that pile of work, or the crooked system, or the long-term lives of the hundreds of students I work with, then you'll never actually get out of bed. No one can live with that pressure. 

Instead, I remember hearing that you have to be just naive, or conceited, enough to know that in some small way, you'll make a difference. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or even this year. Maybe not in the next ten years, or even twenty. You have to be comfortable with not seeing the results of your work, and content with the knowledge that if you weren't doing it, who would be? And you have to be OK knowing that today, you won't save the world,  but maybe, just maybe, the work you do today, with the work that your colleagues and friends are doing today, will amount to even the slightest positive change. 

I was talking last night to a good friend who isn't a volunteer but is positioned in Kigali only temporarily and we likened working outside of your comfort zone and in a developing country as taking two steps forward, one step back. Or rather, twenty steps forward and nineteen steps back. But in the aggregate, the net movement is still going forward. And that's the whole idea, after all.

No. Most of my life is about getting by: getting to class, getting through the day, crossing one more thing off my list. And I've had to learn to be OK with that, because everyday I get through, I've done just a little more than was done the day before. And although I never believed we were here to save the world, I've lost the illusion that what we're here to do is to make a concrete change. No, rather we're here to plant hundreds of seeds, and hope one or two sprout one day. And to learn that's the most you can do, and to know that's OK. 

 

Have courage, 

Jen

 

That's No Excuse, You're Smarter Than You Think...

In the past two terms, I’ve had students do things in our laboratory that would make my laboratory safety professional father faint. The most memorable, perhaps, was the day I was teaching my Senior 4 students about solubility using water, ethanol, and benzene. All you really need to know about the experiment is that ethanol and benzene are extremely flammable, and that there was to be no use of fire whatsoever. Leave it to 15 year-old boys to find out a way to start something, however, and suddenly you see a 4-foot flame on the sleeve of a bright blue sweater. Although the crowd of boys frantically beating the melting material thought they might put out the fire before their teacher smelled trouble, my nose and my eyes caught every bit of the fiasco.

I was livid. I marched straight over to the students, smothered the burning sweater, and sent the entire class back to the classroom. “What part of “this will burn” do you not understand?!” I scolded, using as many science-teacher-sign-language gestures I could think create. I got a number of puppy-dog eyes as the students left the classroom, and spent the next hour convincing myself that the big picture of flames I drew on the board had served as adequate warning for my francophone students.

The same afternoon, it was the girls’ turn. Same age, different class, but I caught out of the corner of my eye my girls playing with the pellets of a very strong acid from the chemical closet… with their bare hands. “Why do you take that?!” I shouted in my special English so as to be understood. “We want to see it.” The girls replied. “It can hurt you.” I angrily responded, “put it down now.” When I realized the students had passed the acid pellets all over the classroom, I made each student thoroughly wash their hands in front of me before I sent them back to their homeroom. “We are finished! You cannot listen, you cannot work.” I told them. “I will see you next week.”

The students look astonished. When they left, I put my head in my hands. Twice, in one day. Just as I was pulling myself together, two of my boys came back. “Forgive us Teacher,” one boy said, “it’s in our nature. We’re African.” I shook my head with more sadness than anger when I heard what he had said. “It’s not your nature to be careless.” I responded more quietly this time. “Return to your classroom.”

Perhaps the most frustrating and saddest part of teaching here is the fact that my students and colleagues insist that no one can make mistakes, and that when they do, they blame their mistakes on something as irrelevant as their continental identity. How long have you been told that you can’t learn or can’t progress because you’re African? And how are you supposed to overcome that stereotype if you don’t allow yourselves to learn and to make mistakes?

            Don’t get me wrong; I’ve long labored under the delusion that my own mistakes somehow prove me to be unintelligent or incompetent, so I fully understand the flawed logic. But never have I been somewhere where this delusion is so rampant. My students use it to the point where when I ask them to write hypotheses in science class, they cross them out and correct them when they find their results disprove their hypotheses. They use it when my friend Rachael asks her girls in their “Creative Performance” class to draw self-portraits, and nine out of ten of them copy the example she drew on the board. And when I ask why my colleagues didn’t follow instructions and complete their class reports correctly, my teachers use it to tell me that because they are African, they can’t be expected to be on time or be computer-literate. 

            As a History student, I could take a stab at why this feeling is endemic to this part of the world. But as a teacher, it’s my biggest challenge. How, in nine short months of school, do you empower the people you work with with the confidence to believe they can do things, even if they might fail, and how in these short months do you get them to take responsibility for their mistakes, and to learn from them, without passing off blame to who they are or where they come from?

            Everyday, I’m reminded several times about growing up and asking my parents to find my glasses or open my can of soda. “You can do it, Jenny, just try,” I used to hear on repeat, much to my consternation. But it stuck. The only thing, I’ve therefore concluded, I can do each day is to repeat, over and over, “you’re smarter than you think” and “you can do it.” “Jennifer, come and correct this report.” “No, Bosco, you can do it.” “Teacher, I can’t complete this chart.” “Marie Claire, you’re smarter than you think.”

If I do it enough, I pray, it might just stick.

Have Courage, 

Jen

Nighttime Hyperventilation/What Oprah’s Teaching Me...

I went to Kigali, yet again, and stayed at the house of one of our married couples, Paul and Linda. Being at their house is so comforting – they have a beautiful sunlit living room, a real dining table, and all sorts of magazines I haven’t seen in ages. (I never thought I’d actually miss magazines until we saw some at a restaurant in Jinja, Uganda and I stole them… I literally had to stuff them in a bag… and all they were was an airline magazine from November 2008 and some Australian style magazine from summer of 2005.) When I woke up on Sunday morning, Linda had pulled out several magazines she said she didn’t want any more and asked if I’d like to take them. “Absolutely!” I thought. We talked about it in Uganda, but to see a magazine from home with its visual feast of colors is incredibly exciting. (Kind of odd, right?!) I never actually read anything from those magazines I stole, instead, I ripped out the most colorful things I could find and I pasted them on my walls. I intended to the do the very same thing with the Oprah magazine I took with me.
            On the bus home, though, we had to pull off to the side of the road for about thirty minutes to let a bike race pass. So to pass the time, I pulled out the magazine with an exuberant Oprah on the front and tried to find just what she was so excited about. It didn’t take long. This Oprah magazine was the Christmas 2008 edition, and who doesn’t get excited about Christmas?! There are the holiday parties, the gift-giving, the shopping! I thumbed through a few pages, and then a few more. I tried to read an article on “Surviving the Holidays Without the Pounds” and one on what one should wear to an office party – flats or heels. I just couldn’t get into it. I ripped out one or two pictures before I put the magazine in the trash. I just couldn’t take it.
            July 1 is our deadline to book our return trip to the U.S. and in balancing when our Rwandese visas actually kick us out and when our last day of school is, we’ve all been playing the guessing game as to when we’ll actually reach Washington D.C. again. On Monday night of last week, I couldn’t sleep because I was thinking of all the things I had to do at school before I leave. On Thursday night of last week, I couldn’t sleep because I was thinking about coming home for the holidays. Seeing family and friends, eating turkey and cookies… those things sound fantastic. But then there is this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that is accompanied by a little voice that keeps saying, “But then this experience will be over. When will you get to see your students again? Will you ever get to see, face-to-face, your colleagues again, go to Kigali for the weekend, ride through Musanze with small children running to greet you?” It’s thrilling and devastating at the same time to already be putting a date to the day we return to the U.S..

            I struggled with the magazine in the same way I’m struggling to prepare myself that this is my one year to volunteer like this. The health-insurance, plane-tickets, and out-of-pocket expenses make continuing to teach in this situation cost-prohibitive, never mind paying off the exorbitant credit card debt I built up buying the bits of “survival gear” I needed in case my placement had no access to healthcare or running water. No, this is my chance, this year, to live in this way and to glean everything I can out of it. While I spent much of my first term missing things, and much of my second term traveling, I realize I have one more term to really get down to the nitty-gritty, to do everything I really want to do with my students and my school. And I realized flipping through the Oprah magazine that I’m ready for home and I’m not. I’ve always said that I looked forward to being that twenty-something with a dingy little apartment that was all mine… and I have it. I’ve said throughout the course of this experience that I will never be so happy with the things I have than when I return to the States. And I totally will be. And I’ve been told countless times that this experience will change me in ways I’ve never imagined. And it has.
            It scares me to think about coming home in the middle of the holidays, a time when life is moving at the speed of light and money and presents are flying here there and everywhere. But it’s also a time for visiting family and friends, for taking those two days where everything is closed (save perhaps the movie theatre and Chinese restaurants) to be still, and for getting down to what’s important in our lives, if we’re willing to do it. It’s going to take a lot of determination not to let myself be overwhelmed by the hype of being home, and being in the middle of the “holiday parties, gift-giving, and shopping!” just like it took a lot of determination to remind myself I had come here for a reason and it will all be OK. I’m not, and I’m saying this now, going to be able to handle a lot of what life is like at home for a long while, just as I couldn’t get into the articles in the magazine that I’d gladly read if I were in a different situation. But I will take out the two or three things I really want from all of the commotion that comes with the American holiday season, and can leave the rest.
            I’ve made up my mind not to think about my return home much more until it’s a month within sight. The more I think about it, the easier it will be to come home, but the harder it will be to get the most out of my time here. Although we still have one month until our second term is over, it is going to fly by with exams and marking reports and the like. And if this is my year, my one chance for this experience, then the five months I have until I touch down in Washington D.C. doesn’t feel like nearly enough.

A Disclaimer...

The following blog posts are ramblings I’ve written over the past two months. Between teaching organic chemistry and trying to stay sane, I’ve gotten caught up in life here and haven’t been able to explain it in terms of life back home. After finishing the second term, we’re now on holiday until August 4^th, when I’ll return back to Musanze for the final three months of my teaching tenure in Rwanda. Some of these entries are totally outdated. Thank you for your patience (and your emails that read in the subject line “Are you still alive?!”) and sorry for the wait! 

It's Gonna Take a Lot to Drag Me Away from You...

Ok. It was bound to happen. If you've ever heard the song, you knew it was coming. And it's not because I didn't have something else to write about, it's because it just felt right. So here it is, the lyrics to Toto's Africa. :)

I hear the drums echoing tonight 

But she hears only whispers of some quiet conversation 

Shes coming in 12:30 flight 

The moonlit wings reflect the stars that guide me towards salvation 

I stopped an old man along the way 

Hoping to find some long forgotten words or ancient melodies 

He turned to me as if to say, hurry boy, its waiting there for you

Its gonna take a lot to drag me away from you 

Theres nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do 

I bless the rains down in africa 

Gonna take some time to do the things we never have  

The wild dogs cry out in the night 

As they grow restless longing for some solitary company 

I know that I must do whats right 

Sure as kilimanjaro rises like olympus above the serengeti 

I seek to cure whats deep inside, frightened of this thing that Ive become 

Its gonna take a lot to drag me away from you 

Theres nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do 

I bless the rains down in africa, 

I bless the rains down in africa 

I bless the rains down in africa, 

I bless the rains down in africa 

I bless the rains down in africa 

Gonna take some time to do the things we never have

It's the rainy season in Rwanda, something I dreaded because EVERY season seems like the rainy season in Ruhengeri. But it hasn't got me down -this term has gotten off to a fantastic start. 

I left school in April feeling exhausted, not exhausted and fulfilled. I was teaching four rather advanced classes in subjects I haven't studied since high school. I tried to be both teacher and mentor, both laboratory instructor and camp counselor. Each week, I prepared seven different experiments and taught 24 hours of class. And somehow I fooled myself into thinking I could take on pet projects to boot. I remember writing in my journal while proctoring an exam (just before I got terribly ill and missed 5 days of the exam period...) "I'm really doing nothing here but hurting myself. By only teaching in the laboratory, I'm neither showing the teachers how to manipulate the equipment, nor practicing conversational English with the students, nor am I using my talents to the best of my abilities. At best, each week I'm just getting by." 

During our holiday, though, I made some second term resolutions: I will spend more time with the students outside of the classroom. I will teach fewer subjects. I will spend more time on things I know. I will find a way to make my work sustainable... Oh. And I will start to cook for myself. 

It's a tall order to live up to those resolutions, and three weeks in, I'm not terribly sure I'll reach them in this term. But I've been making a start and that has made all the difference. I tend to look at the two terms like this: the first term, I was the passenger enjoying (and sometimes pulling all-nighters to appreciate) the scenery. This term, I'm driving... sort of.

This term, in addition to cooking for myself (how I've missed vegetables!), I've learned to put my foot down. After a talk with our very understanding Academic Master, I'm still teaching 24 hours, but this term, I only prepare three lessons a week, plus a English course for our teachers. I'm working on starting our school's first science fair (any suggestions?) and am helping to produce our student's very first school newspaper. I'm compiling a list of tested experiments for the teachers to use next year, and for the first time in these almost five months, I'm working on things that I know more about than organic chemistry. And let's face it, there is no end to the things I know more about than organic chemistry.

I was told that after my month-three slump would be the month-four love-affair, and it's true. I can't imagine leaving now. I rearranged my room. I finally put up my mosquito net and have put away all traces of my temporary residence - my suitcase is now serving as a table under some beautiful wax cloth, my $1.50 travel alarm clock is replaced on my kitchen table with my radio. I'm shopping in the market and negotiating in broken, but passable, Kinyarwanda. And I've stopped counting daily the number of days until Term Two ends. When I was making the schedule for the science fair I kept thinking, "What?! That's it?! Only 2 and 1/2 months til August?!"

I know, thanks to the "Cultural Adjustment Timeline" we were given in our orientation, that this euphoria is not likely to last. But when it fades, I think I'll be in a stronger, better position than I was before. Every one wants to feel like their making a difference, particularly when you've come so far from home, but I've realized that the best way to actually do so, is to do what I know. And while I'm doing it, I'm, in a way, "doing things I never have", asserting who I am and being confident enough to know that that is all I need. 

Be yourself :) 

Much Love, 

jen

Blog Delay...

I'll be posting on Saturday this week! Sorry for the delay and much love! :)

Jen

Student Needs

Hello All!

So many of you have asked about things I and my students can use. While I'll email you about things I'd like, I'll post here things that my students definitely could use. A word of warning, a friend of mine says that a package from Pennsylvania costs about $9-15 without insurance through USPS to ship, so please don't spend any more than that. Also, if you are sending books, it's actually better that they are used. I've found that people are less likely to use things if they are new, because they want to keep them new... so if you send something that's a little beat up, it's just fine. And thank you again for everything.

Much love,
jen


My address:

Jennifer Keene

L'Ecole des Sciences de Musanze
B.P. 92
Ruhengeri
RWANDA

Needs:

Pen-pals

English kids books, particularly lower level chapter books or teen literature

French-English dictionaries (used)

English dictionaries and English Thesauri (used)

English Bibles (used)

Easy puzzle books (with word finds, easy English crossword puzzles, soduku, or travel games… those that you can get at the dollar store – partially used is fine!)

Newspapers (any)

Magazines (any)

Markers (any brand)

Decks of cards or old board games

Frisbees (used is fine!)

Remembrance Day...

It’s humbling to accept that some days, your presence, your simple being, is the most powerful thing you can do. Trained in political science and a junkie of rhetorical flourishes, it is often difficult to imagine, but also strangely comforting, that my presence trumps any words I could put together. April in Rwanda is Genocide Remembrance Month and 2009 marks the 15^th anniversary of the terrible 100 days of 1994. I've visited the memorials and I've read the books, and I still cannot grasp the enormity of the civil war and slaughter. This is why, when we left for our school vacation, I was positive I did not want to participate actively in the events on April 7, Remembrance Day. How could I possibly grieve for a tragedy that is not my own? And if I could not grieve, how could I have the right to stand next to those who lost their entire families? It felt voyeuristic. It felt wrong.

My friend Rachael didn’t see it this way, however. “I want to go,” she said, “I don’t know, I just want to be there.” I understood that Rachael wanted to pay respect but I still felt uncomfortable. Part of it, I realize now, was fear; fear that my presence would be misinterpreted as morbid curiosity, or worse, grotesque tourism, fear that we would witness the violent outbreaks or intense flashbacks that from time to time disrupt proceedings at this time of year. We agreed on a compromise, to go together to the National Stadium the night before Remembrance Day to take part in a few hours of the all-night vigil leading up to the official ceremonies.

When we arrived at the Stadium Monday night however, the vigil had been moved (or canceled or never existed… it’s hard to tell how planning works here sometimes) and we found volunteers completing the set-up for the next day. Kids were playing on the field, adults were chatting while they arranged gas lamps, pop music was playing in the background. I looked at Rachael. I don’t know about her, but I was incredibly relieved. This didn't look like the dark and somber services I was told to expect. I can do this, I thought.

We got word that the memorial at the stadium had been moved to the evening of Remembrance Day and another ceremony would be held at the mass graves across the city in the morning. Still slightly reluctantly, Rachael and I started out from our friend Gina's the next morning for the first of the ceremonies. We left Gina's house pretty late, and I couldn't tell if it was because we both were actually tired, or still a little uncomfortable. It didn't matter though, because after the two hours it took for us to wind our way through the closed streets, the President had finished speaking and the ceremony was over. We stood at the memorial, as everyone began filing away from the site, two late muzungus in a crowd moving the opposite direction. It didn't feel much like paying respects, but at least we had made the effort.

As the crowd dissipated, we walked away from the site. A few people were exiting to the right, a mass was exiting to the left. Lost, Rachael and I followed the crowd to the left. What we figured out after about 30 minutes of walking was that we were going the wrong way. I took a chance and walked up to two smartly dressed gentlemen in their parked car. "Excuse me sir, can you tell me how to get back to town?"

The driver laughed. "Town? It's the other way. Right now, you're half way to Burundi!" I must have looked like I was about to collapse. He added, "Get in. If you don't mind us stopping shortly, we can take you back. We're just waiting on my wife and a friend. Come on in, feel free."

Rachael and I got in the car. While in most countries this is an absolute no-go, Rwandese hospitality is not something to turn down. The men introduced themselves as Egide and Innocent, and soon Egide's wife, Francoise, and their friend Jacqui joined us in the car. The short stop Egide noted turned out to be an excursion for beer and soda at a nearby restaurant. Although most businesses were closed for the day, Egide told us that the restaurant was owned by a family friend and was near the site where most of their family was killed. In Kinyarwanda, over his drink, Egide and the restaurant owner discussed the memorial they wanted to create in the next few years. When business was done, he added, "What do you have to eat?" "We do not have food today, sir," the restaurant owner said. "No food?! Well we must go elsewhere! Come on girls, back in the car!"

Rachael and I spent six hours with Egide, Innocent, Francoise, and Jacqui. When our late lunch was finished, I worked up the courage to say how thankful I was that we were invited to share in what was such a difficult and important day. "It's hard for us, as outsiders, to understand and to share," I said, "and I'm very thankful and humbled that you took us in today." Egide sighed. "We are thankful to have you, Jennifer. It's ok that you don't understand. We don't understand either. But you're here. And you show that others know what happened here."

Rachael and I went to the Stadium after our time with Egide and his family to share in the candlelight vigil. Although much of the night was calm, a survivor spoke just as the lights went out, and the traumatic episodes began. Wailing broke out from one corner of the stadium and screams began from the other. Clusters of people could be seen running to surround those screaming. People were being carried out right and left. It was one of the difficult moments of my life. I wanted to run away. We waited until the last candle on the center field was lit and we left.

Going home, I was angry that more wasn't being done to relieve these people of these nightmarish situations. I was saddened that all I could do was be a bystander. And I was silenced because I didn't know how to talk to Rachael about what we experienced and I didn't know if it even needed to be talked about. But on the way home, I thought about what Egide said. "It's ok if you don't understand... but you're here."

In the two weeks since Remembrance Day, I've had a difficult time writing, let alone thinking, about the day. And I don't really have any closing remarks or fancy way of closing this entry. But I do know that if I'm ever in a situation where I'm faced with the decision of showing up or staying home, I'm going to show up. Some days, all you can do is "be." And some days, that's all that's needed.

much love,
jen

On Materialism and Martyrdom...

So, I went to Uganda during our spring break and two things completely blew me away: Ugandans speak English and the everything was half price. Forget the cultural immersion I'm usually looking for when I travel to another country, hanging out in a city with a movie theatre, Mexican restaurant, and signs that I can read was my idea of heaven. More salsa with my chips? Yes please.

I didn't realize how utterly exhausted I was from the past four months until Rachael and I boarded the bus for Kampala, Uganda's capital city. We watched the beautiful Rwandan countryside flatten out, and reaching the checkpoint, we left the bus to get our passports stamped and walk across the Ugandan boarder. Rachael and I looked at each other; although all we did was physically cross a bridge, it felt more like we had crossed into another world. Here was a new country without the tremendous responsibilities we were leaving behind for a few days. We were ecstatic.

Although we had planned take a number of "cultural excursions" out of Kampala, the idea was quickly scrapped when we reached the city. We needed some time to relax, to do whatever we wanted to with our time. We needed to shop.

The prices of everything in Rwanda is comparable to the United States: Coke is a dollar, pasta is two dollars, going out to dinner, if you do it right, is about five dollars. The prices of everything in Uganda was half to a quarter of that: Coke is 25 cents, a nice dinner out was about three dollars, and if you bargained, everything could be less. We couldn't believe it.

I spent my first term in Rwanda trying my best to live like my students. I didn't buy any cooking utensils. I kept my room simple, with only the things I brought with me. I didn't decorate except with some pictures my best friend was kind enough to give me for Christmas (thank you Sara!) I didn't go out to dinner. I didn't buy shampoo when I was running out and instead used bar soap. I didn't travel often, and I didn't treat myself to anything more than Coca-cola (which explains why I'm intimately acquainted with the price of Coke here, there, and everywhere!) And in all of this, I thought I was doing my job. I'm here to teach, to be a part of the community. I'm not here to live like I fortunately do in the United States. I have so much. I can do without it.

What I thought I was doing by denying myself many of these things I'm so used to, was fully experiencing my time in Rwanda. In some sort of twisted logic, I felt like I was giving of myself even more if I didn't give in to the material things. What I realized in Kampala was that I was actually just making myself miserable. Living without a radio, just because a radio cost 10 dollars, meant I had no connection with the outside world when I wasn't able to reach the internet. Living without a hot plate and pan meant that I was completely dependent on the people I live with to provide my food, and meant that I had no control over what I ate or when (or, as you'll see when I finally post pictures, how much I ate! Let's just say I've gained some weight...) It was in this twisted logic that I felt guilty asking for things from home and have told many of you that I didn't need care packages (which I'll be writing about shortly!).

While there are many things one can live without, I realized with our time in Kampala that taking care of myself is a integral part of the job I came here to do. The less stress I have at home when I return to my little room, the less stress I carry into the classroom. The more time I spend taking care of myself daily, the more time I can spend doing extra things for my students and colleagues more efficiently.

When I returned to school Monday, it felt like a new life. In Kampala, I bit the bullet and purchased a hot plate, cooking utensils, a radio, two baskets, new washcloths, and various things to clean my apartment. I stole two magazines from a restaurant and put up pictures on the wall. I disinfected the walls of my room (it's the rainy season, so mold grows pretty regularly...) and I lay down on my bed, listening to BBC. It was heaven.

Surrounded by things that make my life easier, I realized, may be a little selfish. It certainly is a little materialistic - to think these things make me happier. But I'm ok with it. Because I certainly cannot take care of anyone else, if I'm not taking care of myself as well.

Much love, take care, and buy yourself a Coke today. :)

Jen

Apologies and Catch Up...

Hello All!

About time, eh?! I know, I know... it's been waaay too long since I updated my blog. I never intended to stay away this long.

To catch you up with the last few weeks, I'll summarize and spare you the gory details! I:

*battled food poisoning
*survived the flu with a fever of 102 (after an eventful trip to the doctor, which consisted of him sticking a thermometer under my arm-literally, that’s the full extent of my medical evaluation)
*made it through two weeks of intense exams and close to 800 exams to grade (FWEW! :) )
*left on vacation to Kigali (thank goodness!!)
*visited Uganda (including Jinja, the site of the source of the River Nile, on which we took a boat ride on Easter!)
*traveled to Kibuye, Rwanda on Lake Kivu (into which we dove, and perhaps now have schistosomaisis... I'll look out for a rash soon...)

and started Term 2 back at school.

In being so remiss with my posting, I'm adding two other postings today, plus a list of things I could use for my students. Thank you so much for your patience and support again, and happy late Easter!!!

Love,
jen

Stuck in the Middle...

Well, that was a little longer than intended! I'm sorry it's been three weeks since my last post, and particularly since that last post was rather whiney. I am very thankful for your well-wishes though, and, as predicted, I'm back to wondering how I'll ever be able to leave this place. 

And on that note, I think I'll write my blog this week. So much has happened in the last few weeks that having intermittent internet access was more of a blessing than it was an inconvenience. We are in our last week of classes, and all papers, midterm grades, and drafts of exams have come due the last few days. I haven't slept much, much less had time to think. But as we finish our first term and plan for our two week holiday, I've been thinking a lot about how strange it will be to allow myself to be a tourist. Without a stipend from the Ministry of Education since January, I've been careful with every penny, which, as many of you know, is not my forte. I've invested a lot of time and energy to convince people that, although I'll never fit in, I belong here. I'm here for the long haul. Most of my students think that for our holiday, I'll travel home to the States. Don't be silly, I keep saying, I'm going to stay here, I want to stay here! Oh, and no... I'm not that rich. 

Two weeks ago, though, I went into Kigali with Rachael to meet a friend of hers who's here with another non-governmental organization. There are lots of NGOs in Rwanda - the West has poured money into the country to keep it stable since 1994. But I was reminded suddenly of why my students think I can travel back to the States when I want when we met up with this crew. We went out for a delicious dinner, the first I had in a restaurant that was not owned by the Catholic church since I moved to Musanze. Then we went to the home of some of the other kids working for a different organization. There wasn't anything out of the ordinary... you know, couches, curtains, gas stove, refrigerator. Ok, nothing out of the ordinary except couches, curtains, a gas stove, and a refrigerator. I spent about a half hour looking at these things as if I had never seen them before. Rachael passed me an hour or so into the evening and asked me to accompany her to the bathroom. "What are we doing here?!" she said, as we awkwardly locked ourselves into the bathroom, complete with a bathtub and purified water. "I don't know. But we just spent thirty minutes looking at kitchen appliances." I said. "Did you see the walnuts in the bowl? I grabbed a handful and put them in my bag," she said. "Good thinking," I said, "I'll take toilet paper for the road."

Looking back on it, it's pretty hilarious. At the time, though, it was serious business. We must have spent most of our time that night commenting on how strange it was to be in the middle of so many white people, and how crazy it was that people were spending 10 dollars on dinner. On my way back to Musanze, though, I realized however difficult I thought it was to adjust to being here, I can't imagine how difficult it will be to adjust to coming back to a place where 10 dollars on dinner out is the norm, if not pretty cheap. 

It's not just the money, but expressing the feeling in monetary terms in about the most concrete way to describe it. On our first night in Kigali, all of the volunteers introduced themselves and why we came. More than a few of the volunteers said that they had served in a developing country and went home trying to find the same fulfillment. That's why they're here, they said. In coming here and staying here, I'm slowly realizing, we each committed our lives to service in way that we can't reverse. For better or for worse, this experience is affecting the way I live, the way I eat, the way I think. 

I know I'll adjust when I come home. That's the way life works. But I think even more than being here, the real adventure starts when I decide what I'm going to do with what I did here. In that bathroom in some stranger's house in Kigali, Rachael and I realized that our life here puts us in a strange position. We're never going to stop being "muzungus" - but we're never going to be the people we were before we boarded the plane in D.C.. I don't think we're alone in feeling this way... We're always, in one way or another, going to be slightly stuck in the middle. 

Although I'm not quite sure what that means yet-and maybe I never will- I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing. It means that I feel like I have a responsibility to let people of both worlds to understand how the other people live, which some days can feel like a burden. But it's also a pretty big privilege.

So if you're even thinking about serving in any capacity, I say take into consideration that it's not only a responsibility for the week, month, or year you spend, but it's something that goes with you. But I'd make that choice again. Seriously. 

Just make sure you take some walnuts and toilet paper for the road...

Have courage and much love, 

Jen 

They're Building a Road, so the Power Goes Out...

Ok, so I wrote my blog entry this week, and then the power went out.and I lost my work... such is life :) I have to return to school now, but I will have the blog up again on Friday!

Much love,
Jen

One for me...

Tuesday, I have class with a student named Rachel (so many Rachel's in this blog, eh?). Rachel had been following me around for a few weeks, asking for my email. After class yesterday, I finally gave her the special "teacher" address I made for my students on gmail, but she hung around for a long while while I cleaned. "I think you will be my best friend," Rachel said. I smiled, but shuddered slightly. When I hear that, it's usually followed by a flurry of emails with questions ranging from my favorite singer to how I can get someone a visa to the United States. "I do not tell, but I only have my grandfather. Both of my parents died in the genocide and the government gives me money to be here. I like to talk to you. I will write you and we can be friends, ok?" "Absolutely," I said, for the first time being very open with one of my students, "I live right next to school. If you ever need someone, come and get me." "It is not a problem," Rachel said, "I do not feel alone, but I wanted to tell you. I try to remember my parents, but I cannot be sad or I cannot study. I take one day a week for me. I will write you on that day this week, ok?"

I try to stay upbeat in my posts, but I hope that in doing so I'm not also making life here sound just peachy. In fact, after this past week, I won't lie, I had a few hours where I was ready to pack my bags. A week of flu in a foreign country will tucker anyone out, but this week I was especially low. 

Friday night, my friend Rachael came to visit me. I was so happy that for most of Friday and Saturday I ignored the fact  I was perhaps still sick, and tried to do all of the things I hadn't done while convalescing. I also found myself unloading just about everything: how my colleagues insist I became sick because I don't wear a hat and not because very few people in this country find it crude to pick their noses and shake your hand; how tired I was of trying to eat all of the food on my plate rather than eating just what I wanted; how most of the time I was only guessing at what was going on, and how I felt like I had very little control over my everyday life. 

It all came pouring out over the weekend, and, as expected, once you identify a problem, you start to see it everywhere. Suddenly, everything was bothering me- even something as hilarious as our botched talent show act. Rachael and I had decided a week earlier that we would perform in my school's talent show Saturday, and had been incessantly rehearsing "Live Your Life" by T.I. and Rihanna (If you haven't heard it, look for it on YouTube - my students were already excited to see their teacher play a tall, handsome, black man...) After practicing for two hours straight, our student accompanist said, "Will you sing for talent night too?" "What?!" I said, "of course! We're singing tonight!" "But talent night is moved to March 7. The Mistress of Discipline moved it on Wednesday night. You can still sing tonight, though." "What IS tonight?" I asked, trying not to blame Patrick for my colleague's oversight. "Tonight is our ecumenical prayer service." Brilliant. Here I am, wearing a sideways baseball cap and sunglasses, rapping to a song about how I've been thuggin' all my life and I ain't a hater. I collapsed right there. (Incidentally, we decided at the last minute to teach the students "I'll Fly Away." Now as I walk down the hallway, I can hear little voices humming the song behind me... totally worth it in the end...)

I couldn't figure it out. I'm where I've planned to be, where I've wanted to be for a year now. I started saying how much I missed home - something I never dared do aloud before, afraid that if I started, I might not stop. I went back to counting the days until the end of our first term, and then the days until the end of school. I sat in my room alone and listened to my music instead of going to lunch. Why was it suddenly all so difficult again?

After talking to my student Rachel yesterday, I think I got the message. I can't let all the little things bother me - otherwise I wouldn't be able to make it the eight short months I have left in this country. But I also can't completely ignore all of the little things - otherwise, they begin to build up and come crashing down in one go. I have to admit, I absolutely hate it when adults ask me for money six or seven times. I hate being asked for visas, or books, or told that I must not be eating because I think I'm better than Rwandans. I wanted to get up and walk out when I explained to a colleague that I didn't have the money to fly back and forth from the United States and was told I was just making excuses not to live in here- all Americans have more money than they know what to do with. I want to scream when people tell me I don't eat enough, or that there must be something wrong with me because I'm not married- no one must want me. I am so unbelievably tired of explaining that yes, I am a female, and yes I am quite capable of learning new things and holding good jobs. I don't like eating when other people tell me to, or showing up for a meeting and being told by three different people that the meeting has been changed to three different times. And I HATE shaking hands with someone when I've just watched them pick his nose. 

So there. There are the things that are bothering me. Getting those things out, rather than holding them in, makes it easier to handle - to laugh at, to move on. Maybe getting those things out from time to time will mean I'll have fewer moments where I want to take the next flight home. Yes, I imagine I'll be a lot more positive next week :) but for now, this post was just for me...

Have Patience...

Bleh. "Have patience" is the last thing I wanted to hear yesterday morning. But having patience is sometimes the only thing you can do when you've lost your voice. This week, I finally got really sick for the first time in Rwanda. No, no tropical illness or intestinal worm (yet!), just a good, long, old-fashioned cold. I went away this weekend, which is probably why my sniffles quickly progressed into bronchitis, but I've been treating my symptoms with my medicine from home and LOTS of unbearably sweet (read: delicious) Rwandese black tea. Although it was terribly amusing to hear me squeak out "Mara mutze" or "good morning" in Kinyarwanda, I got "go home and rest" two or three times in the teacher's lounge. "I will be ready on Thursday," I said, sounding more like nails on a chalkboard than simple English. "We'll see you when you're well. Have patience," I was told.

Having patience isn't necessarily my strong suit. I want to be able to write emails now. I want to be at work and teaching, now. I knew good and well that I was getting run down this past week, and still couldn't get right with the idea that I could actually still be doing my job is if I didn't teach my scheduled classes and took a rest. After failing miserably several times on simple laboratory experiments after school each night, it never occurred to me that I might be making mistakes because I was tired and not because I haven't the foggiest idea what iodometry is (is that even an English word?!) No, instead of "taking a rest" as I was instructed to do by my colleagues (oh Lord, I've become my mother! :) ) I decided that the better solution would be to get away and visit my friend Rachael in Shyrongi.

Rachael is my wonderful roommate from our orientation in Kigali, and she now teaches in a small town called Shyrongi, about 1.5 hours away from my school. This past weekend, one of the other teachers from her all-girls Catholic boarding school was getting married, and Rachael, the token American with a digital camera, was elected the couple's wedding photographer. I was her date, as we soon found out, it is more of a faux pas than showing deference to the guest list if you don't bring your family, friends, and uncle's pet goat to a Rwandese wedding. The ceremony, a Catholic mass almost all in Kinyarwanda, lasted about 2 hours, complete with a period where the bride and groom received offerings from the 400 or so people gathered. After the ceremony, the reception was held in the school's great hall and guests were invited to take from a selection of Coke, Fanta Orange, Fanta Citron, and a few Primus' (a South African beer) while watching girls perform traditional Rwandese dance. The bride's father spoke in Kinyarwanda to the groom, presumably about giving his little girl away in exchange for whatever Athenese (the groom) was able to give for her, and the couple tasted their wedding cake, in a true example of globalization, by smashing it squarely into each other's faces. (Shortly thereafter, there was a mass exodus of faculty. Although the reception was still going on, Rachael and I took the hint and excused ourselves out the back door. As we peered around a dark side of the building, we could just make out the shapes of 10-12 faculty members of this very Catholic institution huddled around a crate of beer...)

When I arrived back in Musanze for church on Sunday, I was exhausted. You can get a bus going directly from Musanze to Kigali to drop you off in Shyrongi, but on the return journey, I had to take a minibus and a motorcycle into Kigali in order to board a coach back in the opposite direction. By Monday afternoon, I was obviously not well. "Jennifer!" my headmaster, a priest, said in a stern voice, "You did not tell me you were going away this weekend!" My tired mind raced to find a time when I was told I needed to inform him of my whereabouts. He smiled, "you are sick because you did not tell me. But next time you go away, let me know and you'll return in one piece. Now, turn around and go home." "I still have three hours of class today," I said, not sure if I was pleading to and teach or to be forced to rest. "Then finish your work today and rest," he said. "But know that the best work you can do today is have patience."

I hope you are well, know that I'm thinking of you, and that you have patience :)

Jen

Viewing the Third World as a First World Citizen...

Hello All!

I am so sorry I have not been able to respond to emails, but I must say before I start this week's post that I am so very thankful to be able to read notes from home. With the internet connection here, gmail doesn't stay open for long. I'm starting to write emails from school and send them off my flash drive, so in the next week, expect to hear from me. Otherwise, thank you so much for your patience and your encouragement. It's needed. :)

With that said, this past week I've wondered just what all the fuss was about "living in the third world." In my routine and comfortable with my friends and colleagues, I looked around last Sunday and thought just how lucky I am. On Friday nights, teams of our students participate in the Friday Quiz. Friday Quiz (and bear with me if I spoke about them before) is the time when five students in two classes debate. On Monday, they are assigned the topic, usually fairly developed and complex (in my three Friday Quizzes, the topics have been 1) should Rwanda integrate into the East Africa Union, 2) Is Barack Obama an answer to the problems of every American, or an answer just for Africa-American males, and 3) is the high percentage of women in Rwanda's Parliament a solution or an added burden to Rwandan woes). Friday night at 9 pm, the students debate in front of the school, with the headmaster as moderator and the audience as an extremely critical peanut gallery. Every so often, the language of the debate changes - last week's debate was conducted in English, this week's debate will be in French. "Third world?!" I thought as I took notes on student presentation, diction, and pronunciation.

I had the same thought sitting at our Talent Night on Saturday, when the students accompanied themselves, without any music lessons whatsoever, on an electric keyboard, singing pop and gospel songs to a crowd of 700 students. And on Sunday again, when I was invited to the Protestant student's worship, (and consequently, I missed mass and the priest/headmaster, aka my boss, thought I was lazy and had slept in...) I was blown away by the student's organization of their own choir, their own keyboard music, and their own sermon. Equipped with a translator and a Gideon's Bible in English, what more could I want?, I thought. What am I really missing out on?

I've thought about that since Wednesday, and how far personally I've come in the last few weeks. The first week I was in my town, I must admit, I counted the days on my calendar until the first term ended. Breaking months down into to segments somehow made my time shorter - something I desperately needed when I was not teaching and was sitting alone in my room at night thinking about the number of mosquitos that could come through my window's hole. I read the "Intestinal Worms" chapter in my Health in Africa book everytime I got a slight stomach ache. And just a week ago, I drank a whole liter of water because I ate cassava paste at dinner and remembered from my West African studies that cassava contained trace amounts of cyanide. I've done incredibly silly things because I feared what might happen in this strange new place called a developing country.

Instead, now I've come to appreciate the unique position I'm in to be a first world citizen living in the third world. I live on about $1 a day. I eat well - more healthily than I would in the United States - despite the odd pebble that finds it into my rice. I get my exercise walking to town, especially since I once estimated it was only a mile from school and after driving that distance find out it's actually more like four. I do things I've never done back home - take taxi-motorcycles home, sit in restaurants just for a coke and to listen to French news, haggle with the banana man to reduce the price. I save toilet paper rolls for test tube holders and bottle caps for pieces on a checker board. I travel when I want, use the internet when I want (well, if the connection is there!) and make phone calls when I've got enough spare change to buy a phone card. And all in the comfort of knowing that despite my $100 a month, my health insurance will cover me if I'm sick and I have a place back in the first world when I leave here. While I live on $1 a day, my shoes are made of leather and not of plastic. My comforter keeps me warm at night, and I have bug spray and antibiotics to ward away malaria. And while I still miss my family and friends, I've got everything I could ever need materially right here.

I would tell everyone that they must experience living in the third world at least once, but I'm not even sure if that's really what I'm doing. After all, I'm only here for a limited time, and even then, I hold an American passport and am surrounded by my American belongings. The best I can say, I guess, is that it is a curious feeling to recognize that my fears, while they may be founded, are not applicable to my situation, and that the people that should perhaps fear the things I did, still get up every day and practice debating in their third or fourth language.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself, eh? I can't help but count it a small victory to finally come that realization, and a blessing that I'm in a unique position to experience the joys of this country as a citizen of my own.

I'll probably still drink a liter of water after eating cassava though... :)

Take care, have courage and I'll write soon,

jen

Oya! Nitwa Mahoro...

Hello! I'm so sorry that this post is late. I can now use the internet right next to school, so in the next week or so I’ll actually be able to respond to emails! Thank you so much for your patience!!

The past week has been utterly exhausting. Classes were finally in full swing for our upperclassmen, and I found myself teaching periods I really shouldn't have been. On Monday, one of my colleagues caught me at a free moment to ask that I help him translate the digestive system. After my spectacularly ignorant performance, let's just say I won't be asked to do that again... Three more classes of my own and one of someone else's later, I passed out on my bed before dinner. I was lectured that evening that I should take a little more time for myself.. and maybe only show up 30 seconds before my class starts so no one can grab me to do anything else. Another week, another good lesson.

And with another week came an important change. Maybe because I now have a routine, maybe because I have a circle of friends, but this past week was the first week that I didn't desperately miss home. In fact, after visiting friends in Kigali on Friday, I was very happy to come back to my home away from home. I've just about accepted that I will never fit in- how could I being of Norwegian, Scottish, and English descent?!- but I've come to the conclusion that the best I can do is allow myself be absorbed as much as I possibly can.

I usually eat my meals with the Mistress and Master of Discipline, the school librarian, the nurse, and an administrative assistant, and they usually try (unsuccessfully) to teach me Kinyarwanda. This past Wednesday night, their job was to think of my Kinyarwanda name. "If you're part of our family now," Josette said as she heaped more food on my plate, "you must have a Rwandan name." (Just as an aside, when eating with the teachers the other day, I was told that no one would marry me if I didn't eat more.) After discussing it for approximately 15 minutes, they reached a decision. My name in Kinyarwanda is "Mahoro" meaning "peace." My students love it. The teachers have stopped using "Jennifer." And laughing children on the street stop in their tracks when they shout "muzungu, muzungu (white person!!)" and I respond, "Oya! Nitwa Mahoro. (No! My name is Mahoro.)

I was initiated into my new life as "Mahoro" on Sunday - Heroes Day - when I was dressed in traditional Rwandan dress and asked to sit on the front row of the celebration to remember all who have served and died for Rwanda. I don't think I've ever had more eyes on me than when I walked into the ceremony, and I don't think I've shook more hands. Part of it was because I'm the whitest person they've ever seen, but part of it, which came as a surprise to me, was how honored people were that I would wear their dress and attend their ceremony. I was invited to dance with the girls who performed to the national anthem, and walking home, the whole group of ceremony participants said thank you. "You're officially Mahoro," my friend Foucas said as I was putting on my sunglasses. He looked at my glasses and shook his head. "Well, almost."

Every day has its ups and downs, its moments to remember and moments, like misspelling esophagus and pipette, that I'd much rather forget. I'm just about getting used to expecting the unexpected... well, almost. I have a saying taped to my wall in my room that I look at every night before I go to bed, and I will leave you with this:

"finish each day and be done with it. you have done what you could. some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. tomorrow is a new day. you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense." - emerson

Take care and have courage,

jen

I Live Among Giants...

Good Sunday afternoon to you all!

When last I wrote, I had little idea of just exactly where I had come to live. Last Saturday morning at about 10:23 in the morning, I climbed into the minibus that was to take me to Musanze - my new home for the school year. We had packed up early on, and I had already visited the Economat, the tiny convenience store at our mission, three times to say goodbye. (The Economat became my Holy Grail over the last three weeks when I went looking for a caffeine [read:soda] alternative to instant coffee. As I quickly became a regular because of their bottled Cokes and sweet potato rolls, my friends at the Economat took it upon themselves to teach me Kinyarwanda. I owe my skills in numbers to them.) But when the Master of Studies and Mistress of Discipline, titles for members of school administration in Rwanda, arrived, I was quickly reminded of the job I had actually come to do. We all said our goodbyes and I set off for the two hour drive north to Musanze.

With Stratton and Josette on either side of me in the minibus, I was made very aware of the rapidly changing Rwandan topography. Outside of Kigali, one turn suddenly takes you straight up the side of a mountain, and the rest of the ride felt as though I was riding along the mountains' peaks, only to find there are mountains above mountains.

The first thing you notice about Musanze is the volcanoes. As soon as we arrived, I was introduced to each member of the Virunga chain - the volcanic line that forms the western boarder of Rwanda and the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. In the morning, the volcanoes are as clear as day, but by three in the afternoon when the clouds set in, I've since found it necessary to find other ways of orienting myself. The air is thinner, and in some ways clearer, up here, and it is very hard not to appreciate the beautiful surroundings every time I leave my little room.

My Headmaster, Director of Studies, and Mistress of Discipline are no less impressive than the view out my bedroom window. They each speak at least four languages and can command respect without saying a word. Josette has since become my closest friend here, and she translates word for word from Kinyarwanda the two hour long church services I attend as part of my duties at the school. (P.s. When I was asked to introduce myself last week in Mass, the priest asked me my confession in front of the congregation-Josette saved the day and whispered "just say that you are a Protestant." Fwew.)

Likewise, the brouhaha over the first "muzungu" teacher at Musanze has been pretty humbling. Although my students clamor around every time I walk onto the school grounds, I never forget that the questions they ask me are actually in their third, and sometimes fourth, language, and that despite the fact that I am a member of the faculty, I am in no way more intelligent or more capable than they. It's hard to think of activities to start when students organize and direct their own choirs, basketball teams, dance clubs, and cultural nights. If that's not enough, they get up at 5 am to run 2K together, and conduct their own 6:30 AM Wednesday worship service. When all of the students piled in to the multi-purpose room to watch the American inauguration on widescreen Tuesday, three students asked me what Obama's policy on Israel was and how he planned to restructure America's economy. (They also asked if Dianne Feinstein, white Senator from California, was Obama's wife. They breathed an audible sigh of relief when I said no, and pointed about Michelle...) Finally, outside of class the other day, one of my juniors asked, "Teacher, I have been trying to know, how is uranium enriched? I am not positive how the centrifuge works." Great.

I've had to remind myself in the past week that my purpose here is in no way diminished although my surroundings, my colleagues, and my students are so very impressive. This year is the first year that the Rwandan government has required all secondary students to learn in English, hoping that Rwanda can rise to the level of the industrial giants in Nairobi. Teachers are scrambling to find English books, and students are struggling to catch new concepts in a new language. In a country where even a used Danielle Steele paperback costs upwards of $50, children are yearning to learn and parents are eager to see their children improve upon the lives they've lived.

In addition to helping my students, I'm learning and experiencing things I've never even imagined. Last night, at the church service celebrating faiths of all sorts, I got up on stage twice to learn traditional Rwandan dance in front 750+ students. I was invited by a fellow teacher to visit his wife and newborn baby girl in the Musanze hospital. I bargained for bananas in the market, despite my meager knowledge of Kinyarwanda. And despite going through some low spots in these past five weeks, I'm living in a developing country hanging out with kids who will one day run this country. It may be very humbling living in the company of giants, but it sure is spectacular.

I hope you all are well, and can't wait to write again.

Love,
Jen