Travelogue

Images Heaped and Broken

2006-03-24T02:33:00.000-08:00

The following posts and photographs are remnants of a six month stay in Rwanda.

The Politics of Memory

2006-03-24T02:18:00.000-08:00

Genocide Memorials in Rwanda

"'...The people who did this,' he said, 'thought that whatever happened, nobody would know. It didn't matter, because they would kill everybody, and there would be nothing to see.'

I kept looking then, out of defiance."

--Philip Gourevitch

Tracking mountain gorillas is the most lucrative and popular Rwandan tourist attraction. After emerging from the quiet northern forests, however, tourists who remain a little longer confront a dry landscape teeming with human difficulties. The second most common tourist attraction in Rwanda is the genocide memorial.

Color Codes

No one can travel far in Rwanda without seeing purple and pink.

Purple drapes a slew of genocide memorials: purple banners, purple flags, purple signs, purple flowers. The Rwandan government has taken radical action to prevent genocide denial, and one of their most visible strategies has been establishing codified monuments to the hundreds of thousands of people slaughtered in 1994. Purple appears suddenly around a bend, or through a thick row of trees, to remind the ordinary traveler that this is no ordinary place. Purple is a linguistic signifier, voicing the unspeakable. It represents the hope that Rwandan history is no longer to be regarded only as a capsizable chronicle of finite events. Purple reminds us that endings are, generally, to be resisted.

Pink drapes the bodies of those who are accused of genocide crimes. Prison uniforms in Rwanda are a cheerful bubblegum color. Truckloads of men walk around in pink shirts and shorts, shaded with pink baseball caps, working tranquilly. The accused work on public service projects until their trials, which are always years away. They build houses, arrange greenery, till the soil, plant seedlings, and wave at passers-by, inexplicable bits of cotton candy in a careful landscape. Pink is the reverse of purple. It is the eraser, the clean up crew.

False Sanctuaries

The majority of memorials are plain old lumps of buildings dedicated to the memory of extraordinary events. The genocide turned logic on its head. The largest massacres took place in ordinary spaces - churches, schools, hospitals, and orphanages - where the victims had gathered for safety. Many of these structures still sit silently on their foundations, absorbed by trees.

The Kibuye memorial church is one of the many churches in Rwanda that has been restored to a functioning place of worship. The brooding stone edifice perches high on a cliff, overlooking the main road into town. The stained glass windows, once blown out by grenades, have been replaced by mosaics of lively colors. Boys have footraces in the front yard, and the church choir rehearses on weekends. In most scholarly accounts, Kibuye is mentioned as one of the most decimated provinces, and the Kibuye church massacre tops many a list of unthinkable acts - over eleven thousand Tutsis flocked to the church, and all were slaughtered within a matter of days.

Butare is another location that ranks high in offcial death tallies. When the genocide began, there were hopes that this province, the site of the National University of Rwanda and Rwanda's intellectual stronghold, would be exempt from the massive killings that were taking place in the rest of the country. For the first two weeks of the genocide, people flocked to the region, hoping to escape the worst of the madness. The reprieve didn't last long. After the initial quiet, Butare quickly became one of the worst hit regions as militias were trucked in from already stripped areas to finish their work.

The university's memorial is another extraordinary quiet place, nestled among rows of thin trees. Under a pavilion, photographs of murdered students and teachers stare down at visitors from glass cases. Most are smiling shyly for their yearbook photos, a reminder of the era that Rwandans occasionally refer to as Before.

Corporeal Displays

"The aesthetic assault of the macabre creates excitement and emotion, but does the spectacle really serve our understanding of the wrong?"

--Philip Gourevitch

Another type of genocide memorial in Rwanda is one that displays the physical evidence of the crime: bones, graves, clothing, or bodies. These memorials in particular bait all the huge questions -- how to prevent this from happening again, how to educate outsiders, how to grieve properly, even how to remember correctly. If they have been unnaturally taken, Elie Wiesel notes, the dead must rely on the living to defend them. But how do the living balance all of these issues?

In a whispered tribute to the European Catholic tradition, several Rwandan churches have skulls and bones displayed as a memorial, as in this example from the church in Kibuye. Some bones are gathered into tidy piles, and sometimes they are scattered chaotically, where they fell. Some memorial staff stack the skulls from their communities into careful pyramids, sockets arranged in billiard triangles.

One memorial does not stop with bones. During the genocide, fifty thousand people sought shelter at the school in Murambi and all were slaughtered in its classrooms. In 1995, fifty thousand mummified bodies were exhumed from nearby mass graves and placed on display.

Murambi is a controversial place. The debate rages over whether such a graphic display is an appropriate tribute, and whose consent was given to create it. Not everyone is convinced that the dead would want to be remembered in their state of vulnerability.

A guide led me around this endless labyrinth of rooms, chatting politely. The Murambi memorial was created only a few months after the war was over. It was a direct response to international denial that a genocide had taken place in Rwanda. Oh, in particular the Mitterand government. No, since the massacre, the school has never been finished. It looks just as it did during the killings. Yes, he was from the area. Yes, he had survived in hiding, but many of his family members had not. He did not know if his mother and brother were among the dead at Murambi because it is impossible to recognize the faces after eleven years of exposure to air. Yes, he chose this job. Why? People need to see who were not here.

The first door opened. The bodies were white with lime, twisted, mummified. The smell revisits me. I did not make it through all 64 rooms.

As moving, and much less contentious, is the display of the victims' clothes at Murambi. In a larger building, still on the school grounds, three clotheslines stretch across a unfinished space with the feel of an abandoned warehouse. The lines are heaped with all of the muddy, rotting clothes that were collected from the exhumed bodies. The display is simple, artistically presented, as stylized as a Soho gallery, and as shocking in volume as in starkness.

And Words?

Words are too often not enough. In Butare, they are:

Electric Green Lines

2006-03-03T07:37:00.000-08:00

Tea Growing in Rwanda

Tea is one of Rwanda's primary exports and most valuable cash crops. Outside Nyungwe Forest is the rolling Gisakura tea plantation. Acres of undulating farmland are billowy with electric green tea bushes, and fog lines the tops of hills. Every field is partially fallow, so the bushes form geometric patterns of green and brown.

"The Most Elusive of Primates"

2006-03-03T07:04:00.000-08:00

The Author Goes Chimpanzee Tracking in Nyungwe Forest

The most obvious reason to visit Rwanda is to see the world's most fascinating primates in their natural habitat - a quixotic quest if ever I've experienced one. For anyone with a few days to spare after tracking mountain gorillas, Nyungwe Forest offers a small primate B-side.

Monkeys are the most visible residents of the forest. Families of L'Hoest monkeys pick through vines in the roadside tangles of brush, and a troop of Colobus monkeys on the nearby tea estate has been habituated to refrain from fleeing when park visitors come crashing through the undergrowth.

But chimpanzees are the attraction that draws most primate-watchers to Nyungwe. For seventy US dollars, you can attempt to track them with the help of a guide, a handful of trackers, and a walkie-talkie. This experience is best suited for hikers who feel a twinge of excitement at the thought of waking up at 4:30 am, scrambling around a rainforest in pursuit of the most elusive of primates, and emerging from a green world, half a day later, crippled and completely covered with mud.

Chimp treks differ from normal Nyungwe hikes because there are no pre-cut trails that allow you to follow the chimps' erratic movements. The terrain is extremely steep; and because Nyungwe is a true rainforest, the ground cover is both exceptionally dense and sopping wet. The result is an experience that, when retold in later company, sounds like a journal entry of an early American pioneer: the journey was muddy, daunting, backbreaking, and occasionally meaningful.

A tracker with a machete begins the procession, hacking through the thickest vines and branches. The guide follows, indicating which entrances to small mammal burrows could potentially snap a leg if accidentally plunged into. Civilian hikers bring up the rear, wielding long, thin walking sticks. They plunge through thick curtains of ferns, ducking under vines, climbing over fallen tree trunks, ice-skating across the slippery sides of the hills, all the while trying to ignore the furry white caterpillars, black beetles, and other unnaturally large insects resting on the leaves that brush over their faces and necks.

Traveling with speed is, unfortunately, impossible. Therein lies the challenge. Chimps prefer to take their breakfast in the valleys that lie between hills. They will tolerate the presence of a tracker or two; but when the number of gawkers rises above comfort level, they swing over to the next valley, floating through the mountain treetops as effortlessly as butterflies.

Humans are a hopelessly grounded species. When the chimps disappear over the top of the next mountain, the only way to follow is to crawl up and down the hills in sluggish, groaning pursuit. The uphill slopes are steep enough that you can touch your nose to the trail without leaning forward more than a foot. Grabbing vines and pulling yourself up is the only way to steady your climb when the mud gives way.

Uphill may be slow and strenuous, but downhill makes people fall. Cover a wall in your house with vines and mud, and then walk down it. If you can do it without bruising the end of your spine when you slip, or overextending leg muscles when one foot gets hung up in the foliage and the other slides out from under you, then chimp tracking will come naturally to you.

After four hours of climbing, sliding, falling, and being scratched by thorns, all the while hearing the screams of chimps around every next bend, the front tracker informed our group for the tenth time that we had just missed them. We mutinied. How were six people hacking through brush ever going to sneak up on such quick animals? We wanted to turn back, we declared. Because park policy is to refund the tracking fee if no chimps are spotted, the guides huddled and began to whisper. After a few minutes, one of them assured us that if we did not see a chimp around the next bend, we would turn back. We were a group of strangers thrown together in the woods, and we did not have a unity of purpose. No one wanted to be the wimp who made everyone turn back twenty minutes too early. We set off again.

Another stretch down, more slipping, more thorns. The guide behind me fell and took me out. Like amateur skiers, we both tumbled down to the swampy creek at the bottom. Then another aching uphill. A vine I grabbed ripped out of the ground and sent me flailing backwards for a few yards.

Suddenly, the guides shushed us. We crept along with as few cracks and rustles as possible, not knowing what to expect. The line came to an abrupt halt. "Look!" the guide whispered, pointing up into a particularly tall tree ten meters away. "There!"

We peered up into the tree, quietly fanning out in a circle around him. We kept peering. Nothing.

"There! Keep looking!"

A branch moved. A brown hand reached out from the leaves and snatched a piece of fruit. Another minute passed. Then with a rustle, the full chimp emerged, glanced in our direction, dropped like lightning out of the tree, and scampered off through the brush.

No one said anything.

"Okay," said the guide. "It is time to go back."

On the way home, we stopped and saw another chimp hand reach out from a treetop perch on the other side of the valley to pick a piece of fruit. This was the moment when my legs, crushed beyond recognition after, among other things, cushioning the fall of a fully grown man, stopped working. I told the party to leave me behind and save themselves.

Somehow, after finding a paved road and landing a ride, miraculously in the correct cardinal direction (although also on the back of a flat bed truck, which would have given me a full blown anxiety disorder had I not been semi-conscious), I made it back to Park HQ. On the way home to Kigali, I dozed and stewed in a savage disappointment over the yield.

Until one week later, when I stopped limping, and when I learned that it took Jane Goodall three months before she saw her first chimp in the wild.

Primeval Playground

2006-03-01T07:52:00.000-08:00

Nyungwe Forest

Rwanda's Nyungwe Forest is like an old man. Every inch of its thousand square kilometers is hunched, twisted, and tangled.

Nyungwe is a true rainforest, so damp fog and overcast skies are the norm, apart from the moments when afternoon sun breaks through the cloud cover. A mountainous snarl of old trees and dense greenery carpets its gaspingly steep slopes.

Entering the park is startling. One second you are cruising between the usual crowded red-clay hills, and the next you are plunged into the cool thickness of trees. Suddenly, the laughter of children being let out of school is replaced by the piercing whine of insects. Thousands of trees - bare and broken, thick and leafy, young, ancient, all as green as emeralds - stand out against the gray of the sky.

It takes over an hour to drive through the park. For most of the trip, the road is deserted. (This is a novelty in an otherwise densely populated Rwanda.) The dripping silence is broken only by the appearance of black and white l'Hoest monkeys munching on the new shoots of roadside vine growth, and the presence of camouflaged soldiers patrolling the perimeter. The latter are more sociable than the former, and wave hasty greetings to travelers. The monkeys, on the other hand, happily endure the loud rush of cars and trucks zooming past, but they run off in terror the second a driver slows down to look at them.

My Dinosaur Swamp

Nyungwe boasts a color-coded network of easily navigable trails. Within walking distance are waterfalls, troops of semi-habituated monkeys, mountains, valleys, rivers, and a working tea plantation.

One trail leads to the Kamiranzovu swamps, an entirely unique ecosystem. The most shocking moment I experienced in Nyungwe was, after winding up and down claustrophobically tree-covered mountains for forty minutes, rounding a bend and watching a far off swampland open up in front of me. Every dinosaur-themed movie I saw as a child came back to me. Its appearance is so prehistoric that it is otherworldly in its foreignness, like a display in a natural history museum. If a pterodactyl had swooped down from the mountain crags overhead, I would not have been surprised. Instead, a family of l'Hoest monkeys ran across the road and scrambled up a huge mahogany tree, chattering warnings at me.

Spitting Hot Fire

2006-02-10T07:11:00.000-08:00

The Virunga Volcanoes

Seven volcanoes create natural borders between northern Rwanda, Uganda, and the DRC. Five out of the seven are sliced down the middle and shared between two countries. The exceptions are Sabyinyo - which is half Rwandan, a quarter Congolese, and a quarter Ugandan - and Mikeno, which sits entirely inside the DRC. In Rwanda, the land around the base of the peaks is called the Volcanoes National Park. These tall, stony cones are responsible for the majority of tourism in Rwanda: in their forests dwell half of the world's mountain gorillas.

A Post-conflict Palette

2006-02-03T05:33:00.000-08:00

The Colors of Gisenyi

Gisenyi is a town of flowers. Its buildings may be crumbly, but its landscaping is extravagant.

The northernmost town on Lake Kivu, Gisenyi has a climate that made the early European colonists rejoice - every breezy, sunny day is followed by a deliciously chilly evening - and an azure lake landscape that attracts Kigali tourists by the Land Cruiser load.

Blue is the primary color in Gisenyi's palette because the lake dominates the background, but the picture is also dotted with the pink, yellow, red, orange, and purple of flowers. Some blossoms quietly line the walks; some droop over barbed wire fences; and some perch high up in the trees. Irises greet you in the morning. Night-blooming jasmine sends you off to bed. Bougainvillea vines are cheerful afternoon companions.

Holding the flowerbeds in place are piles of black pebbles, fragments of the volcanic rock that lies beneath the northern region. Whenever a dirt road is worn down, jagged peaks of pumice stone peek through the taught red surface. Volcanic rock is frequently quarried, and it is the foundation of many homes and hotels.

The lakeside avenues of Gisenyi are tattered but beautiful. Nature has begun to reclaim the once wealthy parts of town. Palm trees sagging with fruit bats line the front walks of abandoned mansions. Broken windows are guarded by overgrown yucca plants. The avenue's potholes are filled with fallen blossoms from flowering trees. Apart from the bustle of a few hotels, the children swimming in the lake, and the odd soldier on patrol, the area is thick with vegetation and silence.

Roadsights

2006-02-03T05:26:00.000-08:00

While driving in Rwanda, I saw...

...two pure white rabbits in holes carved into the side of a mountain.
...bundles of eggs wrapped in banana leaves.
...orange t-shirts being sold underneath orange trees.
...women carrying baskets on their heads.
...women carrying chairs on their heads.
...men carrying bundles of cattails on their heads.
...men carrying church pews on their heads.
...men tilling the fields wearing flapper hats that West Village swingers would kill to find in a thrift shop.
...men dressed like English aristocrats -- tweed hats, rubber Welly boots, navy blazers, and walking canes.
...people of all ages walking for miles with yellow jerry cans full of water.
...bicycles decorated with sparkles, spangles, and stickers.
...a black and white brindled duck.
...a goat that had been killed by a car.
...distressed, lowing cattle being led to market.
...a cow squeezing through a gate into the yard of a nice house.
...chickens tied to stakes to prevent wandering.
...children playing soccer with balls made from plastic bags and string.
...a child standing on a table and being switched by his mother.
...children tossing rocks into the road as cars approached.
...children sitting on the shoulder of the road.
...children sitting on the road.
...children pushing each other into oncoming traffic.
...a group of children beating up a boy.

Supa Good Product: A Carnival of Commerce

2006-01-17T06:37:00.001-08:00

'Lost in Translation' Brand Names

Witnessing international trade in action is an amusing experience in Africa. Because Rwanda produces few consumer goods on its own, its economy is dependent on imports from all over the world. Grocery shopping, then, becomes a globalized process. Labels are crowded with translations in as many as five languages. Canned corn imported from a Saudi Arabian distributor sits on the shelf next to canned corn that was grown in the United States but distributed through a Jordanian company. Four steps can take you to four continents: tinned ham from India, powdered milk from Kenya, Chinese soy sauce with a French label, and biscuits from Germany.

Names and slogans are often lost in translation, morphing into the pedestrian (if a company wants to be safe), the bizarre (if the company wants to show some personality), or the blatantly incorrect (if the company did not do any research).
Most commonly, product names are remarkable for being so unremarkable. Fresh Product Tissues and Taste Pasta are prime examples of when companies want to express their dedication to building consumer confidence but end up with labels that sound like primary school projects. Tissues do not necessarily need to be fresh. In fact, the trees have been dead for quite some time before the boxes reach the store. Taste is not the most exciting name for a pasta brand. To make matters worse, its catchy slogan is "Just Taste It!" This strikes me as an oddly aggressive command for peaceful food shoppers.

Supa toilet paper mystifies me. I am not sure yet if the name deliberately plays on super, insinuating that the quality of the paper is high, or if it is an honest misspelling.

Some product names use associations erroneously. Spot is a brand of bleach-based bathroom cleaner. Clearly, the company means that their product removes spots; but the name suggests their presence more than their absence.

Ultimately, these examples have ESL problems at their roots. Developing businesses often have a limited English vocabulary. Like many desperate students, they fall back on what they already know: the familiar lingo of English marketing, the universal language of money. But to those who already bridle at the forced saturation of advertising in the West, it comes off as childish imitation.

And for those of us who are delighted by the surreal: it's pure entertainment, courtesy of the free market.

Of Juice and Hooch

2006-01-15T06:46:00.000-08:00

A Survey of Rwandan Beverages

Passion fruits make a bad first impression. They are nasty little wrinkled brown balls that barely contain anything except seeds. Instead of becoming more beautiful and voluptuous as they ripen, like bananas or pineapples, they shrivel. Upon further acquaintance, however, I have learned to overlook its bedraggled appearance and high maintenance personality because it is such a nice breakfast companion.

Jus de maracuja, the local name for passion fruit juice, is sold in most grocery stores in big bottles of concentrate. Because the label did not say 'concentrated,' I did not know it needed to be mixed with water and consequently thought it a bit overpowering the first time I drank it. Blended in proper proportions, though, it is nothing short of charming.

The best way to drink maracuja juice is to spike it with Ugandan Waragi, the local hooch. Waragi makes a bad first impression as well. The very word waragi sounds like it causes blindness. Empty bottles litter the streets on Monday mornings, propped up on windowsills or clutched by men sleeping in the alleys between shops. I always thought it was either too strong or too local hooch-y for my taste. In reality, it is a fragrant, gin-like liquor that is especially agreeable when blended with juice and reasonably cheap at around 10 US dollars per liter.

Banana beer is another unique regional offering. Bananas are sun-warmed, buried in leaves, reheated, and liquefied into a yeasty brew. The presentation of banana beer is a little quirky. Almost no one in Kigali calls it 'banana beer.' I got confused looks when I asked for it at a local grocery. After some searching, I discovered that banana beer is called 'banana wine' in the city. The drink is definitely closer to beer than wine; but who am I to raise a fuss over semantics? There are two categories of banana beer that you can choose from. The first is banana beer in professional plastic bottles with uniform labels. The second is mystery banana beer, which comes in all different shapes of secondhand bottles (mostly Old Jack's Whiskey bottles) with semi-attached homemade labels bearing a pencil sketch of banana leaves. If you go for the latter, make sure the cap is properly sealed before you buy it. Someone grabbed a swig out of my bottle before it reached the shelf.

Depending on shipments from Kenya and Tanzania, an assortment of fruit ales is sometimes available in groceries. Happiness tasted a little too much like dirt, but strawberry wine (which may or may not be wine) is pink, sweet, and exciting if you are nostalgic for the days when wine coolers were fashionable to drink in public.

Mutzig and Primus, the two local brands of Rwandan beer, are present in every restaurant, bar, and corner shop. Both are decent light brews, but most drinkers cultivate an unspoken brand loyalty. Primus is the more pleasant of the two to sip. Mutzig is cheaper, slightly stronger, and is therefore the brand most men can be seen grasping in bars.

The wine situation is dire. In the US, one can find a good bottle of wine from South Africa, South American, or Australia for under ten dollars. In Rwanda, the starting price for a bottle is usually ten dollars. This princely sum buys you offensive table wine rejects from Italy and France. The most pervasive of these is Regina, an Italian vino da tavola with a tartness that burns your tongue. Letting it breathe does not help: with a little air, the bottle goes straight to cooking grade. Slightly nicer wines from France and South Africa can be found for 15 dollars, but they are not fifteen-dollar quality. In restaurants, drinking red wine is a desperate act. The pricey offerings usually taste like either port or vinegar.

European church wines are exported to Rwanda for recreational purchase. Predictably, these wines are chunky and will not dazzle the connoisseur. Cyprus Altar Wine is the most common offering: it has a menacing black label with a gold cross radiating God's light.

Finally, locally grown, roasted, and distributed Maraba coffee is a genuine triumph. In fact, the quality of a Kigali hotel should be judged by whether or not it offers Maraba for breakfast. Most of them serve Nescafe or other pathetic, watery brews; serving Maraba coffee indicates that the hotel has a higher level of class. Cafe de Maraba is available in stores and has the advantage of being sold in an attractively Bohemian fresh-pak.

Baboons on the Roof and a Lonely Elephant

2006-01-04T23:31:00.000-08:00

Akagera National Park

Rwanda is a tiny country, but it offers great variety in its landscape. Western Rwanda, like the neighboring Congo, is famous for its volcanoes, deep forests, and mountain gorilla populations. Akagera National Park is entirely different.
Located in the east on the Tanzanian border, the park is the only place in the country where a visitor can experience the classic African safari: savannah bush land, giraffes, zebra, crocodiles, and hippos. Going on safari in Akagera, however, is not as much of a vacation as it is in other countries (see BLOG). Seeing the park itself is absolutely worth the trip, but arranging transportation and accommodation was more stressful than it should have been.

To be fair, Internet research is a dangerous thing. Naively, I believed that a random blogger's picture of Akagera Game Lodge was in fact depicting the Akagera Game Lodge, and I expected rustic comfort. After our bouncy, dusty journey to the park, however, I was not greeted by the sight of cozy thatched chalets in the bush. Nor was I welcomed by the sound of cooing doves or laughing hippos. Instead, brick walls and metal staircases loomed in front of me as I jumped out of the car. In place of a watering hole, an artificially blue swimming pool peeked out from the back garden.

The lodge is, in fact, a pleasant enough place. It has tasty food, decent wine, comfortable rooms, and a trilingual staff. But it practically bustles with activity until dark - I am beginning to understand that Rwandan hotels always seem crowded until dinnertime, when everyone who came to sip Coke beside the swimming pool goes home - and it is far too people-centric to be truly relaxing. One does not leave with the impression that man and beast coexist peacefully, which is a shame because the park itself is so scenic and tranquil.

When Animals Ruled the Earth

The best hour I spent at the lodge was from 5:30 to 6:30 am before everyone else was awake. Urged by an earnest travel companion, I rose early, layered on several sweaters, shuffled out to the poolside deck, plunked obediently into a chair, and waited for the orange sun to pull itself above the clouds.

Gradually, I became aware that the neatly shingled hotel roof was covered with large bumps. My ears registered scratching, and the shapes began to move. One shrieked. A troop of twenty baboons had parked themselves on the roof. All of them, like monks, faced the sunrise; and as the sun's light crawled across the roof, some of them began to play. As my companion poetically noted, the entire lodge suddenly became their jungle gym. They swung from balconies, climbed columns, perched on tables, and slid down railings. On the upper patio, a waiter suddenly appeared from the restaurant carrying a large room service tray. Several baboons watched him go by as they ripped flowers out of the planters, chewed off the roots, and then tossed them into the courtyard below. Three more tailed him down the hall.

As the light increased, the baboons were gradually shown the door by the hotel staff, who circled the grounds waving their arms and yelling. By eight, the whole troop had galloped huffily back into the bush.

We weren't the only ones enjoying a stunning buffet that morning. On my way to breakfast I learned that baboons are omnivores. As I approached the restaurant, I saw a man quietly sweeping up the bloody sparrows' wings that were scattered among the debris of potting soil, chewed up plants, and feathers. My delight at the thought of the lodge's assortment of freshly made omelets was somewhat diminished as I picked my way around the mutilated birds.

Mutual Fascination

Our first game drive was a short tour near the lodge, and it was wildly successful. I expected neither volume nor variety of animals, as Akagera has been called an evaporating park. Not only have war and poaching severely deplete the number of animals living in the park, but 65 percent of the land has been confiscated and redistributed to returned refugees. In our first two hours, though, we were pleasantly surprised by both the beauty of the land and its variety of wildlife.

Despite the human turmoil that they have witnessed, the Akagera animals are not shy. After thirty minutes of weaving up and down the red rocky slopes, our vehicle emerged into a thorny clearing dotted with acacia trees. We growled along for a minute and then shuddered to a stop. The guide told us to climb onto the top of the car. Soon we spotted a pair of giraffes, a mother and baby, approaching across the clearing. The thorn bushes were four feet tall, so all we could see were two spindly necks bobbing towards us. Suddenly the huge animals burst into the path right in front of our car. Both of them paused, earnestly studying us. The baby was especially curious about the funny creatures in front of him and stared for a long time. Then his mother rustled back into the brush, ambling off into the distance, and he followed.

Later on, we passed by a herd of sleeping buffalo. I only mention this encounter because our guide suggested that we try to wake them up by driving into them. To his disappointment, all of us (especially the driver) voted down this scheme; but when I spotted a baby bush bunny camouflaged in the tall grass, he excitedly jumped out of the car to try and catch it. All the buffalo jumped up and snorted in alarm at his sudden movement. We begged him to get back in the car, and he grinned triumphantly as we drove off.

The Misunderstood Elephant

One Akagera elephant has made a splash on the international news scene. Last year, he overturned a French embassy vehicle full of picnickers and rummaged around in their baggage through the broken windows. While they stood and watched in terror, he made off with all their baguettes and sweets. Last month, the BBC online reported that he attacked a US embassy car when it got too close to him. The suspicion is that neither of these vehicles had a park guide with them, though; and the elephant seems more famous than he is notorious.

The elephant is called Mutwale, which is equivalent to 'chief' in Kinyarwanda. He is around forty years old, and has lived most of his life in the park. When Akagera reopened in 1960, after Rwanda declared its independence from Belgium, the directors transported an elephant herd from southern Rwanda to Akagera in order to establish a large population in the park. Mutwale was a baby in the herd when they were transported to their new home, and according to our guide he was the biggest and strongest young male for many years.

In the BBC article, a scientist claimed that the elephant was attacking people because he was lonely and grief-stricken. Our guide agreed and explained Mutwale's sad history. After years of fighting to maintain his dominance, Mutwale lost his tusks in a particularly bad row. Immediately he lost his social status and was exiled from the herd. In his subsequent wanderings through the park, he eventually became acquainted with a man who was kind to him and fed him sugarcane. The man lived in a small fishing camp on Lake Ihema, the southernmost lake in the park. The rest of the elephants lived in the northern region of the park, so Mutwale made his home near the man's house. Supposedly he was less lonely in his exile because he had someone to keep him company. During the war, though, the man disappeared and Mutwale was shot by a soldier. He did not die, but now he is very wary of intruders.

Elephants have incredible memories, as the saying goes, and Mutwale is no exception. In my amateur opinion, he is as conflicted about humanity as any other victim of violence. He remembers both kindness and pain, and a new encounter with people can trigger either comfort or fear and anger.

Mutwale still lives at the fishing camp, which is now a haunted looking place. The only time he ever leaves is when the other elephants pass through the area - then he disappears until they are gone. When we saw him on our first drive, he was contentedly eating sugar out of the hand of a guard at the camp; but the buildings in the camp are wrecked from his fits of anger. The tin roofs are mostly torn off and thrown about, walls knocked down, windows broken, boats from the lake littering the yard. It is as though he is searching for his friend.

The Uglies

Two animals vie for the distinction of Weirdest Looking. In Kinyarwanda, the word for hippopotamus is appropriately chunky: imvubu. All you can see of these awkward, shuffling animals as they float in the water is their whiskery noses, tiny ears, and massive round backs, like a bunch of overfilled balloons ready to pop. As if looking odd is not enough, hippos occasionally let out deep, rolling Vincent Price chuckles to communicate with each other.

The marabou stork is as spindly as the hippo is roly-poly. These huge birds lurch around the lakeshores as precariously as old men in nursing homes. True to their rotten corpse-like looks, these birds are among the largest scavengers in the park. The feathers on their heads are fuzzy in a chemotherapy recovery style, and they look like they are wearing blouse that is unbuttoned one hole too many. In the early mornings they can be found in groups along the lakeshores, cleaning up after the previous night's kills.

The Domestics

The most common animal in Akagera is, anticlimactically, the cow. Local landowners in the province commonly measure their wealth in cows, and having a herd numbering over fifty is not unusual for many of the local herders who have had cows in their families for generations. Because the park contains twelve lakes, herdsmen tend to water their cattle inside its boundaries, a practice which has stirred conflict between local advocates and conservationists. Until the debate is resolved, cows will continue to be a part of the wildlife viewing experience at Akagera.

Rwandan cows are more interesting than you might imagine because they have spectacular weapons attached to their heads. The Ankole is a longhorn variety that, unless you live in rural Texas, is quite a head turner. Despite their fierce appearance, the breed is peaceful and obedient, filing one at a time out of the way of traffic.

The Verdict

As far as African safaris go, Akagera provides a unique opportunity: one can spot an animal, turn off the engine, and observe it peacefully without having five other Land Rovers converge on the scene. If you have access to private transportation and can tolerate a mediocre hotel's monopoly, Akagera is a worthwhile trip to an isolated - and possibly endangered - wilderness.

Leisurely Flutterings

2005-12-21T07:24:00.000-08:00

A Jaunt to Lake Mahuzi

Bird life is the dominant feature at Jambo Beach on Lake Muhazi. This small lake is a pleasant hour's drive east from Kigali, and the landscape is radically different from the west side of the capital. As you approach Tanzania, the hills are pulled much flatter and the landscape morphs into savannah scrublands. I must emphasize once more how beautiful Rwanda is from the window of car when one has a reliable driver and uncrowded roads.

After Sunday morning services in Kigali, we had just enough time to venture out, lunch on the lake, and make it home before dark. Jambo Beach is a restaurant and bar on the north shore of Lake Muhazi. It is known for its idyllic location, creative concrete sculptures, and the two Ugandan cranes that wander around while you eat. The huge birds strut slowly and deliberately until one of them spots an insect in the grass; then both of them flap their wings, open their beaks, and jump up and down until one manages to pounce on their prey. The impression they give wavers between mighty hunters and hysterical women.
While the cranes were flapping around the yard, a colony of yellow weaver birds squawked overhead. Their beautifully woven grass nests decorated a nearby oak tree like holiday ornaments. The male weaver has a rough job: he builds as many as ten nests, and his female mate chooses the one she likes best. During our visit, the males were weaving like crazy. All of them, perhaps thirty or forty birds, would fly away at the same time to find building materials, leaving behind an eerie silence. Then after a few minutes all of them would return at once, swamping our conversation with boisterous cheeping as they fluttered upside down and wove the new grass into the walls of their nests. At one point during the fuss, one nest fell to the ground behind my chair. It must have been recently built because the thickly woven walls of grasses and wildflowers were still green and fragrant. Unfortunately, that weaver didn't spend as much time fastening it to the branch as he did on its impeccable construction.

As we were leaving, the cranes injected a bit of action when, after being fed the last of our chips by a member of my party, they decided to attack her. They started pecking at her in protest when the food ran out, wings flapping in their melodramatic style. We all made it safely to the car, though, and returned to Kigali with a cautionary tale against feeding large, stupid birds.

Soccer, Waterbirds, and Mortal Men

2005-12-19T02:08:00.000-08:00

Attending the 2005 CECAFA Soccer Finals in Kigali

Last weekend, the Rwandan soccer team - the Amavubi (Wasps) - advanced to the final round of the East African soccer championship.

For anyone who doesn't know, soccer is tremendously popular throughout Africa. During the week leading up to the finals, Rwanda's team enjoyed a winning streak in Kigali, their home city, by crushing Somalia, Tanzania, and Uganda all in a row. By the time Saturday evening rolled around, spirits were running high city and countrywide.

I was entirely unaware of the tournament until the preceding Tuesday night, when a sudden roar of people yelling and horns honking sent me running to a neighbor to enquire whether or not I should be concerned. Rwanda had just defeated Tanzania, I was informed, and had secured a place in the semi-final round of this tournament. Two days later, I was an old pro. When the entire city erupted into screams and babies started crying, I knew the Wasps had defeated the Uganda Cranes and faced a weekend battle with Ethiopia. Because I had never been to a soccer game before, I decided that this was the match to see.

Decorum at Amahoro Stadium

My catalogue of expectations included - but was not limited to - seething crowds, criminal behavior, and drunken riots. I am pleasantly shocked to report that no such madness was tolerated on this occasion. We arrived twenty minutes after the game had started - so much for "games never start on time in Africa" - and were speedily directed to front row seats with unobstructed views of the Ethiopian goal. The crowds were anything but unruly. I even saw several fans with loud horns chastised when they blew them too close to someone else's ears. No alcohol was served, so drunkenness was limited to pre-partiers and anyone with hip flasks. People cheered enthusiastically for their team and waved flags in a well mannered fashion. Good vibes in all directions.

Kigali's Amahoro Football Stadium struck me as clean, freshly painted, and organized. Contrary to other reports, the stadium has both a working scoreboard and decent PA system. The halftime marching band was excellent - except for the fact that they wore no microphones. I wish I could have heard the entire performance, but the powers that be decided to play a rave-beated dance track on the PA system as the band circled the field, so I only heard the live music when they were marching near my seat. In the center of the field, a troupe of acrobats dressed in fluttering orange robes tumbled, juggled, and made human pyramids.

A brief warning about the ticketing process from a person raised in a capitalist country. Security told us to purchase tickets from men outside the stadium who held bunches of two, five, and ten-dollar slips. Once we got in, however, it seemed like there were only two types of seats: seats on the plain concrete steps, and seats with yellow plastic cushions screwed into the concrete. I grew to suspect that the ten-dollar seats and the five-dollar seats were essentially the same, so I will clarify the issue before my next game.

The Confused Omens

Both teams were skilled, and both sides coordinated some impressive passing sequences in the first half. The ball, being chased furiously by a colorful cluster of men, rolled back and forth from goal to goal. The players on both teams were polite to each other, few yellow cards were handed out, and rivals helped each other up if anyone took a dive on the turf. No one scored in the first half, as all efforts to score were thwarted by skillful blocks.

Just after sunset, during the halftime show, two large herons flew over the stadium. Disoriented by the florescent lights, they flapped softly back and forth, completely illuminated. The crowds of people below them inhaled collectively at their presence and began to applaud. Eventually, the birds found their bearings again and disappeared back into the night. It was an omen. Everyone was excited for what the second half would bring.

Not luck for the Amavubi, as it turned out. The only goal of the game was scored very early in the second half. People were still trickling back to their seats, and the Rwandan trainers hadn't even reached their seats yet. I myself had been distracted by some children sitting next to me who had tired of waving a large Rwandan flag and slung it over the railing in a crumpled heap. Suddenly a concerned murmur rose and heads began to turn toward the Rwandan goal. The goalie looked defeated, and an Ethiopian player was running in a triumphant circle, having his back slapped by various teammates. The scoreboard flipped to 1-0 in favor of Ethiopia and remained that way until the very end.

Professional Children

I am (obviously) new to the world of professional soccer, so it was my first time seeing grown men act like babies in front of thousands of people. It was extremely entertaining, and still I am left with a desire to write satire.

Most memorably, I have never seen so many athletes collapse in agonizing pain, rolling around on the ground, only to get back up again and enthusiastically rejoin the game. This happened twice in the first half; but towards the end of the game, the Ethiopian players began collapsing more frequently and, mysteriously, without anything happening near them. One solitary player near us dropped to the ground despite the fact that the ball had been carried off down the field a good ten seconds previously. I thought he was having a heart attack. He flailed about as though he were drowning, arms wrapped around his torso in agony. The Ethiopian trainer, who did not stand over four feet tall, came flying across the field, little legs churning, with an overstuffed piece of hand luggage in his hand. Six men in red jackets carrying a red stretcher followed him. The player was placed on the stretcher, and all seven upright men tore back to the sidelines with the victim jolting along over their heads. After a ten second medical assessment wherein the trainer opened his medical kit and then closed it, the player stood up, limped twice, and then ran back out to rejoin the game. As soon as he had disappeared into the seething mass of players, though, another Ethiopian player on the other side of the field went down with what appeared to be the same affliction. The trainer and the stretcher men picked up their gear and dashed over to the new player. This cycle was repeated several times.

The good humor from the first half disappeared, almost physically; and when the clock began to run out, immaturity reigned. Every time Rwanda got a corner kick, the Ethiopian player who was supposed to be guarding the kicker suddenly transformed into a teenage bully. Instead of remaining ten paces away until the ball is kicked, as the rules delineate, he dashed forward toward the Rwandan kicker before contact with the ball was made. This happened several times; but every time the referee warned him, he just shrugged his shoulders. Finally the kicker got exasperated and pretended to rush the ball, so the Ethiopian player looked stupid for charging forward when he wasn't supposed to. The referee, however, ignored the misconduct and mildly started the play over again, without ever reprimanding the guard.

The conduct of the Wasps did not rise above the antics of the Ethiopian team. In my opinion, it was a Rwandan player who was responsible for the rock bottom moment of the game. At one point, Rwanda gained control of the ball about twenty yards away from the Ethiopian goal. The referee placed the ball on the ground on the precise spot where the designated Rwandan player was supposed to begin play. Then he turned his back and walked closer to the goal, where the other players had gathered. While he was striding away, the Rwandan player picked up the ball and tip-toed forward with it. He had time to move the ball forward several yards before he dropped it and straightened back up. When the referee turned around, he was greeted with the sight of the Rwandan - a goofy grin on his face - ten feet closer than he should have been. It reminded me of watching cartoons. The referee yelled a bit and put the ball back in its original position. No yellow cards. No red cards. No player substitutions. Just the ref chiding a little boy for his mischief. (All the while, the clock was running.)

This Rwandan player did not cheat when no one was looking - a stadium full of home team supporters witnessed his act. As he snuck forward with the ball in his hands, thousands of people collectively gasped in disbelief.

Did I mention that the President of Rwanda was attending the game? Oh, he cheated in front of his president.

Post-Game Exit Strategy

Once the match was over, 1-0 Ethiopia, and the Ethiopian team began spraying each other with fizzy liquids, the audience began shuffling towards the exit. On the stadium's outer rim, however, security guards blocked the stairs and prevented everyone from leaving. Some people complained, and we were told that we all had to wait for the president to leave.

Uncomfortably but successfully, we managed to swim against the stream back to the seating area. We waited for another fifteen minutes, watching the Ethiopians celebrate in the middle of the field. The trophy was bigger than a toddler and was unfortunately flanked with big gauzy bows, one per handle. The players passed it around and sang, presumably about Ethiopia. One player lit a red emergency flare, waved it gleefully, realized that no one was really watching him, set it down on the ground, and trotted off in search of another attention-getting device. After a pause, another player doused the flame with the remainder of his water bottle. Eventually we began the trek to the exit again, and this time we made it outside successfully.

A First Sketch of Kibuye

2005-12-14T23:06:00.000-08:00

The Kibuye Genocide Memorials

There are two genocide memorials in Kibuye. The first, a mass grave squeezed between the Pentecostal church and the soccer stadium, holds the remains of 40,000 victims. It is a simple plot - a walled in rectangle of grass - only distinguished from the neighboring stretches of green by a sign that explains its existence. Children play in the adjacent church playground; their laughter prevents too solemn a reflection on the significance of the site. The street is bustling with vendors, goats, sweepers, and hospital patients, so it is possible to walk by the grave without even noticing it.

The Kibuye church, on the other hand, is hard to miss. It was the site of a substantial massacre in 1994 but has since been restored into a functioning place of worship. The brooding stone structure perches high on a cliff that overlooks the main road into town. Circles of stained glass, blown out by grenades and later replaced, depict abstract designs of yellow, red, and blue that contrast severely with the dark brown stones of the walls. The church can be busy; but if you can time it so that you have a moment alone, the quiet will give you a moment to reflect on what this sanctuary has witnessed.

The road up to the church carves into the side of a small mountain, and one side plummets down to the lake. Gravestones line the steep hill close to the church, balanced perpendicularly to the slope. Some of the bodies rest in low crypts, but others must have been inserted into the hill from the side because I don't know how else it is possible to dig into such a steep grade. Very long last names, like Nyarmitaranka and Murikawegata, are painted on the stones in tall white letters.

There was a flurry of activity as I approached the church. In the front lot, children had set up slalom courses of empty USA Vegetable Oil cans for young men on motorcycles to navigate. The loud motor revving was periodically followed by metallic crunches as cans crumpled under the tires of an imprecise driver. Dodging the swerving vehicles, I scampered across the dusty gravel and up the front steps. Because it was Saturday evening, men and women were gathered for a choral rehearsal on the porch. They all stared at me for a moment without saying anything, so I heaved open the large wooden door and continued inside.

The sanctuary was absolutely silent. Light spilled through the stained glass and splashed across the dark stone walls in a colored chiaroscuro. Strings of plastic flags stretched across the ceiling, like someone had decorated for a party. Rows of short benches lined the floor, and a mural of the stages of the crucifixion was painted onto the wall behind the altar. Thousands of people, believing that a church would be protected, had sought shelter in this room.

The chorus outside began to sing. Although this was not a big church, the stone and concrete amplified the sound of the voices. Female sopranos weaved in and out of the men's low humming.

I have delayed this posting because I still cannot figure out how to describe what it felt like to hear that singing. My trip to Kibuye was ripe with hassle, but it is impossible to explain how beautiful, and alarming, this moment was.

Transport Keeps Getting Crazier

2005-12-01T06:28:00.000-08:00

Touring the Lakeside Town of Kibuye

Two posts ago, I described the bus ride to Butare - compared to riding mini-taxis in Kigali - as hair-raising. I had the foresight (or perhaps the pessimism) to qualify my fear by finishing the paragraph with this sentence:

But I haven't even been to the north at this time, so I'm sure driving on the sides of volcanoes will rearrange my perspective yet again.

I still haven't been to the north, but I have now been out west. As prophesied, the rides on public transport just get crazier as the elevation increases.

The town of Kibuye is on Lake Kivu, the large body of water that separates Rwanda from the DRC. The entire country of Rwanda gets higher as you move west, so the elevation of Kibuye is about 1000 feet higher than Kigali. That means a trip through the mountains to get there.

There is no such thing as a straight line on the Kibuye road. It follows the most curvaceous route possible, winding up and down through the mountains. The road was built by Chinese laborers in the 1990s and is described in our guidebook as "a marvel of engineering." There are positive aspects, I agree: the road is evenly paved tarmac; there are some rock walls to protect against rockslides; and it is complete. But it is only two lanes, which encourages the practice of overtaking around blind curves. Also, the drainage ditches are really deep, which is great in theory - except that they run right next to the road for the duration, so there is rarely more than six inches of shoulder.

In the US, mountain roads have metal guardrails running beside cliff edges. Whether or not they will prevent a car from rolling over the edge is debatable, but they definitely have a degree of protective value. Some Rwandan roads have similar metal rails beside the high stretches, and some have rows of concrete blocks around extremely tight curves. The Kibuye road has neither. A line of skinny white poles, each about 8 feet away from its neighbor, occasionally appears to point out severe bends. A few were ripped in half, which suggests they are plastic. These poles have a warning function only. If they were more tightly packed, they would do more good, but a car could run right between them if it lost control.

The Kibuye road is absolutely adequate for conscientious drivers. We didn't have one on our first trip.

Enough To Make a Nun Pray

Budget travelers in Africa are often confronted with the internal conflict that comes with taking public transport. On one hand, it is dirt-cheap, usually 1 to 3 dollars. On the other, the ride can range from uncomfortable to dangerous if the driver is not reliable. We chose to take an Okapi Tours and Travel mini-taxi from Kigali to Kibuye and have no desire to repeat the experience (see BLOG). The driver drove much too fast for the conditions, especially when it began to rain. He drove on the wrong side of the road around blind curves, overtook when it was too risky, and generally disregarded all passenger comfort in his quest to get us there in two hours.

I was not the only nervous person this time. Some of the Rwandan passengers were nervous, too. The first hour was comfortable, but about 30 km past Gitarama it started to rain. The temperature dropped ten degrees, and the road began to snake upwards into the clouds. On Rwandan roads, mini-vans always struggle to the top of hills, and then coast down to the bottom in order to build speed for the next uphill stretch. I expect these bursts of speed because they make it easier on the vans to crawl up to the peaks. But our driver hit the accelerator as soon as the downhill sprints started, and the vehicle began to take the curves at breakneck speed. Remember that there are no straight lines on this road, so we were tossed back and forth relentlessly.

Several women stopped their conversations, leaned forward, and closed their eyes. The nun sitting in front of me began to pray. I removed my headphones and sat up. The whole vibe in the bus had changed from jovial to tense. The volcanoes loomed in the distance, and a chilled wind whipped in through the open windows. One woman had to ask to pull over so she could be sick.

After 20 more kilometers of being thrown around, we finally decided to speak up since no one else was. We yelled over the hum of the rain for the driver to slow down, startling many people out of their private reveries. After much confusion, one passenger decided that we were worried about getting a speeding ticket. "I believe you are afraid of the police!" he giggled. Suddenly, the ice was broken. The whole bus erupted in conversation about us, and our request was forgotten as we zoomed along. My only solace came when the nun stopped praying and took a cell phone call.

Alighting in Kibuye was pure joy. I muttered maledictions under my breath, hauled my pack onto my back, and trounced off down the muddy road to find a hotel.

The Buzz on the Bethanie

The budget Catholic guesthouse was full that night because of a conference. On foot, tired, and stressed from the ride, we hiked for another rainy hour until we found a room at the secluded Bethanie Episcopal Centre. Luckily, Kibuye is beautiful:

dripping pine forests and blue-green lake on all sides. The hills all slid right down into the water, and the only sounds came from bleating goats and cheeping birds. As evening crept in, we settled into the solitude of the forest - the budget rooms were set down the drive from the rest of the hotel - ate dinner, and went to bed.

As I sleepily fumbled with my toothbrush, I noticed the dull throb of buzzing insects somewhere over my head. A large swarm of insects, from the sound of it. I knew there was a fluorescent lamp right outside the front door, and I figured the sound was coming from noisy beetles it must be attracting. There were screens on the windows, so I was not concerned.

At five the next morning the call to prayer from a nearby mosque jarred us awake, so we decided to get an early start on exploring. The same humming noise continued as we got ready, but when we opened the door to leave, there were no bugs flying around. I shined my headlamp on the outside light. It was crawling with honeybees. Dead bees littered the concrete porch, and more were drunkenly attached to the door. Hastily, I locked it and made a mad dash to the drive. They must have been up all night, which struck me as highly unnatural. The reception attendant sounded defeated when we told her that the rooms in the budget wing of the hotel were infested with crazy bees. "You cannot make them leave," she sighed, and offered us a choice of several other rooms that had smaller hives in their ceilings. We checked out.

Walking Around Kibuye

Early morning was my favorite time in Kibuye. A new hiking trail has been cleared around the Bethanie Centre peninsula, and it is perfect for watching all the fishermen return from a long night of fishing out on the lake. As they row across the still water in their wooden canoes, their songs carry for miles. The singing is beautiful; it reminded me of the kind of crying that results from genuine relief.

Most visitors to Kibuye attend conferences or church gatherings, and the town does not really cater to the casual visitor. There is no taxi service except for motorcycle and bicycle rides, and each of the three hotels is a substantial walk away from each other. We walked for hours each day, and we soon discovered that the rain on the first afternoon afforded us a privacy that we never had again. Kibuye is a small town, and small towns everywhere have quirky attitudes towards outsiders. Westerners are not nearly as common there as they are in Kigali, and they do not normally walk around on foot. The local people were definitely surprised to see us as we wandered around. We were not unwelcome, but we did attract a lot of attention. This did not always make for the most relaxing of strolls.

The children of Kibuye provided an x-factor worth mentioning. There are always unsupervised kids wandering around in Rwanda, but I noticed many more of them in Kibuye than in other places. Some exhibited a sweet, friendly curiosity. More than one performed an impromptu song and dissolved into shy giggles as we walked by. But some - usually gathered into groups of six or eight - were poorly behaved around strangers. We were occasionally mobbed by these diminutive gangs, and when that happened one child always felt emboldened enough by the hubbub to show off by touching the white woman. One even grabbed my arm and shoved a half-eaten apple into my face, yelling at me to eat it. I soon found myself tensing up whenever I spotted children beside the road, as their reactions varied from politely wishing me a "bonjour" to physically accosting me.

The Home St. Jean

After the Bethanie bee incident, we walked all the way back up through town to the budget Home St. Jean to see if they had any vacancies. This guesthouse has a split personality. It is the cheapest place to stay in Kibuye, boasts wonderful views, and is convenient to town, sitting up on a wooded hill adjacent to the Genocide Memorial Church. It also has what a guidebook would call 'local flavor.' As we approached, we watched men repairing cars in side lots and boys herding goats down the back driveway. A large troupe of schoolchildren paraded by, singing.

But the Home is also very shabby and has inadequate service. The water heaters were all unplugged, so there was no hot water. The shared bathrooms were grim, and the rooms were on the musty side. Most importantly, though, there was rarely any staff to be found; a child always had to go run and find the receptionist if you needed anything. There is no restaurant, and kitchen staff was scarce. Ironically, the place is always bustling with people, but very few of them are actual guests. I think church officials live in a rear building, and that might be why the staff never manned their front posts. I definitely got the impression that local people were catered to more than customers.

The first sight that greets you upon arrival is a burned out Toyota Land Cruiser.

The story we heard from Catholic Relief Services employees in Kigali is that this truck belonged to one of their employees who was staying at the guesthouse. Supposedly, one of the watchmen carefully siphoned the vehicle's gasoline out into a plastic bag in the middle of the night. Because it was so dark, though, he dropped the bag and spilled the gas everywhere. Without thinking, he lit a match and held it underneath the body so he could see what happened. The truck promptly blew up.

In the evening, we were told that the kitchen was open for business but that we would have to wait to be served. After some sleuthing, I spied a group of church people dining in the rear, so I surmised they were being served first. That would have been a tolerable arrangement, except that the dinner guests turned their children loose to run around the hotel while they enjoyed their meal. Naturally, the herd of little barbarians made a show of provoking the mzungu who were waiting on the patio to eat. They would creep around the corner, sidle up to our table, yell all kinds of greetings, touch my arm, and then run away. This routine was repeated every ten minutes. As service is not top priority at St. Jean, we endured their attentions for over an hour. The only way to make them leave was to completely ignore them; and, needless to say, it is difficult to ignore a group of ten kids all yelling "Good Morning!!" in your ear at eight in the evening. After what seemed like an eternity, the adults began to emerge from the back house after their supper, and the aggravating scamps magically transformed back into angels as soon as the authorities appeared.

Dinner was delicious when it finally arrived: rice, beans, celery soup, plantains, and lots of peace and quiet.

Riding Home

We got a ride in a private car back to Kigali. Compared to riding with Okapi, it was night and day. Now I understand why so many authors have written about the pleasures of driving in Rwanda: they were not taking public transportation. Having a patient driver makes all the difference in the world. When you secure a stress-free ride, it is impossible not to marvel at the Rwandan countryside.

Using T-Shirts to Communicate

2005-12-01T06:27:00.000-08:00

In Africa, divine forces use t-shirts to participate in earthly dialogues.

If you mention Ohio in casual conversation, you may find yourself sitting next to a girl wearing a "University of Cincinnati" t-shirt on your next mini-taxi ride. And it is likely that you will pass a child wearing a "Dallas, Texas" t-shirt following a discussion about the myth of the American cowboy.

A morbid but common expatriate nickname for t-shirts is 'dead white men's clothes.' They are donated in bulk to Africa by Western charities, shipped overseas, bundled into huge cubes bound by thick cable, and trucked out of ports to local markets all over the continent. They are a common sight in both cities and rural areas and may be the most ubiquitous article of clothing in Africa.

What is written on them is not important. Literal meaning takes a backseat to color, design appeal, and the status of possession. Most of the shirts I see refer to obscure facets of local American culture: local high school track teams, local art festivals, local concerts, local colleges, local cheerleading conferences. Such grass roots fashion commemorations have little significance in neighboring states, much less other continents. By the time these donations reach their new homes, they are nothing more than an ornate collection of threads, devoid of reference and meaning.

Very few of the proud new owners know what kind of statement they are displaying as they walk around town; but for expatriates, random glimpses of home pop out at oddly appropriate moments. Many of these coincidences seem engineered by a larger intelligence.

One afternoon, for example, I felt suddenly homesick. I was jammed onto a crowded central street, wading my way through honking traffic, rowdy vendors, and clouds of diesel fumes. Suddenly a child flashed by, draped in a shirt bearing the logo of a community college in the town where I grew up. It was a genuine shock to see something so specific, so familiar, and over 7000 miles away from its origin. Many travelers tell stories about the sudden appearance of logos, town names, and other reminders of a past life. An Occidental College t-shirt appears on a child in a remote village. A student parades the t-shirt of a rival Maine high school sports team. A Pearl Jam t-shirt is worn by the driver of a passing pick-up truck.

The majority of American t-shirts are printed up to display clannish pride, worn to the point of boredom, tossed in a bag, and delivered to the Salvation Army - most likely during a major holiday when people feel extremely generous and/or ready for a wardrobe change. It's reassuring to know that they have a useful second life: not only do they clothe needy Africans, but they also provide omens for needy Westerners.

The Intellectual Heart of Rwanda

2005-12-01T06:22:00.000-08:00

A Visit to the National Museum in Butare

Driving in Kigali was wild and exciting until I took my first bus ride out of town. Add elevation and subtract guardrails: no competition. (And I haven't even been to the north at this time, so I'm sure driving on the sides of volcanoes will rearrange my perspective yet again.)

It was time to get out and see some countryside, so we began with a visit to Butare, the intellectual heart of Rwanda. Both the National Museum and the National University of Rwanda are situated in this southern city. We booked a round trip ticket with the Volcano Express, an inexpensive private bus service (see BLOG).

The Hills Never End...and Neither Does the Dance Beat

Every row of hills was followed by another, and the drive resembled a three-hour roller coaster ride. I was the only one with white knuckles, of course; everyone else dozed off or chatted happily on cell phones. The young man sitting next to me was dressed in a snappy three-piece suit with a pink shirt, and he text-messaged the entire ride. I couldn't believe I was the only one gripping the safety bars around each curve: the other passengers just slid back and forth, squeezing against each other, as unconcerned as waves in an ocean.

Inch by inch upward progress, suspenseful and achingly slow, suddenly gave way to swift downhill slaloms around cargo trucks and decrepit mini-buses. A new obstacle waited around every bend: a goat, a tree, a stopped car, a broken down semi labeled PETROL, DANGER, and/or FLAMMABLE. The driver laughed nervously and glanced back at me after swerving around the latter. It was very nearly a satisfying gesture, except that he almost ran off the road when he did it.

The Butare road is high quality, with narry a bump to be found. Its serpentine of black tarmac winds around the green waves of hills, rising to impressive heights before every inevitable dive back down into the next valley. Banana trees explode on the slopes in clusters of leafy fireworks.

The first glance from the top of a guardrail-less cliff distracted me enough to tune out the Kinyarwanda talk radio station that was blaring at 100 decibels in the background. One hour later, when for the hundredth time the bus did not free fall off the edge of a hill, worrying had fatigued me to the brink of boredom. Gradually, I began to realize with surprise that the droning radio conversation was set to a tinny dance beat. The speculation about its purpose kept me occupied for some time: was the drabness of talk radio being jazzed up by a DJ for a wider, or a younger, audience? Were the men discussing music? Did the beat signal a change of broadcast? Another thirty minutes passed, however, and the rattle of cymbals was unrelenting. I returned to assessing the likelihood of a plunge into the abyss, struggling in vain to tune out again; but some things cannot be unnoticed. I don't know which was more uncomfortable: contemplating a fiery end, or enduring that half-rave, half-news show racket for the remainder of the ride.

Rwanda From the Window

Watching a developing country through the window of a moving vehicle is a true joy. It is a luxury to absorb foreign scenery without being interrupted by solicitations or conversations. There is comfort in temporarily replacing the awkwardness of stilted language barriers with the universality of gestures. Everyone understands the smile, the nod, and the wave.

In some ways, rural East Africa resembles the countryside of the southern African regions. Red clay is pocked with spots of savannah scrub; groups of people sit watch buses flash by like they are watching TV; gleeful children run around in torn t-shirts; babies wrapped in elaborate fabric slings droop from their mothers' backs. But every country can be distinguished from the generic. One can tell Rwanda from its neighbors

most obviously by the checkerboard terracing, the mountainous terrain, and the beautiful longhorn cattle that dot the landscape. Some of the animals munch the cropped roadside grass contentedly, while others are fortunate enough to graze in the shade of the banana groves. They have an aristocratic appearance, stately and wrinkled, and place each hoof deliberately when they decide to move. Their silver and copper coats glow softly in the sunlight.

En route to Butare, it is common to see pigs shuffling along the shoulders of the road, directed by little boys who chase them with what appears to be no more than grass flyswatters. The pigs' ears flop violently with the bobbing of their heads as they try to outrun the incessant tapping of the flimsy instrument.

In any region of Rwanda, you will see groups of men dressed in bright pink jumpsuits bent double tilling the soil, planting baby banana trees in tight rows, or hanging from construction site scaffolding. These are genocide prisoners who have been sentenced to community service along with their prison time. There are also genocide memorials: clusters of flower-strewn headstones, mass gravesites, lists of names, and large signs proclaiming "The Genocide - Never Forget!" in large white letters.

Inside the Museum

We were dropped off at the National Museum, just north of Butare proper. The building is wooden with lots of windows, a stark contrast to the predominantly concrete towns. It is a pleasant place for a day trip. Not only does it have a light, airy design, the flow of its content is well structured and easy to follow. The collection was begun in 1945, which demonstrates an unusual degree of forward thinking by both the colonial and local powers. The exhibits range from climate and geography to family structure and divination.

The only problem for us Yanks was that the information is displayed in Kinyarwanda and French. We would have lost 75 percent of the information, i.e. all of the non-cognate words, had we not asked for an English-speaking guide. He turned out to be a valuable resource, patiently plodding through our barrage of questions and giving us elaborate insights that captions alone would not have yielded. He also had one eye.

Two whole rooms were devoted to objects made from weaving grass, like hobbles to prevent animals from wandering off, stretchers for carrying royalty, and wall hangings. The second room brimmed with baskets of all sizes. Some towered over my head, and some were tiny enough to sit in a teacup. All bore the same shape, rounded bottoms and

conical tops, a silhouette that has a lot of personality. The baskets sat in orderly rows on the shelves, ready for action. The tiny ones were mischievous, ready to scamper away like the dancing Chinese mushrooms in Fantasia. The big ones seemed gangly and adolescent, too big for their bodies, and leaned weakly to one side.

An assortment of curiosities was on display. A huge replica of a native grass hut brooded in one room, filling the museum with a sweet meadow smell. Broken pottery was piled
into a nearby glass case, and we were informed that only one in twenty pots survives the firing process practiced by the Twa, Rwanda's smallest tribe. We read through a step-by-step guide to brewing banana beer and marveled at bright wooden tiles that are colored using red, white, and black paint and cow dung.

Photographs taken by European colonists during the 1940s and 1950s dotted each room, capturing high jumping competitions, herds of wild animals, and the fat children of the mwamis, Rwanda's kings. The latter were obese compared to the rest of the population because they drank prodigious amounts of milk, according to the guide.

The Exchange

While we were learning about divination amulets and witchcraft, I recognized the young man who sat next to me on the bus, the one in the fancy suit. He was strolling down the opposite side of the room with an equally dressy girl. She was wearing high heels and a summery blue dress. A few minutes later, they made their way around to where we were standing, and we all nodded at each other in recognition. As we turned to enter the next room, he suddenly broke from his partner.

"Wait!" he cried, walking quickly toward us as we halted and turned around. He reached into his pocket and handed us a small pin in the shape of the Rwandan flag. We accepted, tentatively pleased at the gesture, and thanked him for the gift. "Maybe we will meet again back in Kigali," he replied, and then he returned to his date. They both waved and continued ahead of us into the next room.

The guide smiled at us. "Do you want to be Rwandan?" he asked me.

"Well, okay..." I broke into one of those smiles that attempts to compensate for complete confusion and paused to see if he would explain the situation any further. He didn't. We pinned the flag onto our bag and continued the tour, mystified.

I turned the hypothetical over in my head on the bus ride back to Kigali. Should we have accepted the offer of symbolic citizenship? Two radically different cultures can't really walk around in those proverbial shoes for long, can they? But then, as we careened around trucks and over mountains, I found myself dozing off.

Swerves and Curves, Shoulder to Shoulder

2005-11-17T01:45:00.000-08:00

Zooming Around Kigali in a Mini-Taxi

Blessed with courage instead of cash? Kigali's public transportation provides plenty of thrills for the budget-minded.

One of the first things you'll notice in Kigali is a stream of white mini-vans on every road, all jammed with passengers. These are the mini-taxis -- also called minibuses, matutus, or matolas in other African countries.

Private hire taxis are widely available, but mini-taxis are absolutely the cheapest way to travel. A ride during daylight hours is 100 RWF (Rwandan francs), or about 20 cents; at night, the price goes up to 150. The rainy season's sudden storms also tend to trigger temporary inflation, as space becomes premium.

The bottom line: a good bargain involves work. Minibus riding comes with complex challenges and requires a learned set of skills. The first step is to ask, in whatever tongue you can manage, where the van is going, and if it stops where you need it to stop. Public transportation is in some aspects universal. In New York City, there were times that a 2 train would mysteriously appear on the 4/5/6 track, or an R train would randomly find itself in the East Village. In Kigali, the various lines (lignes, in French) are painted on the doors of the vans; but they do not necessarily correspond to their actual routes.

Each van has a driver and a conductor who plays host (his duties include advertising, rearranging seating order, and collecting money). If you cannot understand where a mini-taxi is going from its operators, wait for the next one or ask another passenger.

A side note: vans don't usually depart until they are filled. If you are the first one on, don't congratulate yourself too fast. You may have a good seat, but you'll occupy it longer. A fuller mini-taxi will leave sooner.

Maneuvering in the Galley

You've finally found a van going your way? Well, the challenge has just begun.

Finding a seat requires good luck and/or quick judgment. Each van has four rows of four seats each as well as two seats beside the driver. Most of the time, you will be in the back. This is what guidebooks euphemistically call a 'colorful' experience. The two seats furthest from the sliding door form a solid bench, then there is a 6-inch gap, and closest to the door is a much smaller seat that folds up to let people in rear rows out. You are almost guaranteed to be cramped because a mini-van does not usually carry a cargo four adults wide.

The worst seats to get are the 6-inch gaps as by definition they lack seats. I usually get stuck in them because I don't have that competitive public transportation edge. And like public vehicles everywhere, the rear zone generally operates on Darwinian principles: tiny people get shoved into the cracks left between larger people. I also suggest avoiding the seats closest to the sliding side door. The conductor does not pay to ride and is not allocated a seat. He therefore stands hovering over the laps of the people in the second row so he can open the door and hop out at each stop.

Unless you were one of those kids who enjoyed riding roller coasters right after lunch, you may be sweaty-palmed in the front seat. This is because you can actually see where you are going. Some people prefer the more spacious quarters near the captain, though, and enjoy witnessing an assortment of thrillingly narrow escapes. If you always wanted to star in an action movie, this may be as close as you will ever get.

Finally, you must know the password to stop the ride. When you need to get out, knock on the wall or ceiling when approaching the desired stop. The conductor will then knock to signal that the driver should pull over. Pay the conductor after you get out.

A mini-taxi is human jam, a pay-per-ride clown car. Advice can do little to alter the facts, and you won't always be excited about being so close to unfamiliar people. If possible, try to get a window seat so you can control your airflow. Give babies space -- sometimes they do not come equipped with diapers. Be polite at all costs and keep your tension to yourself.

Don't Be a Stat -- Safety and Mini-Buses

As you may have gathered by now, greenhorn Westerners may grapple with mini-taxi safety issues. (Well, you might not; but I am of a nervous, sheltered constitution.) Driving anywhere involves risk, and more so in many places in Africa.

Kigali is relatively safe because there is a sense of order and reason in the planning of main roads. Smoothly paved roads are also common here. Because the terrain is hilly, however, decent speeds can be reached on uninterrupted downhill stretches. Sometimes these are more than I can comfortably tune out, but I am beginning to be able to tell a reckless binge apart from a mere exhilarating sprint. Try to size up the condition of the van before you get on, although it is difficult to spot a good ride. Even the most battered of vans can actually growl to life and miraculously carry 20 people up the hilly streets.

Above all, a van needs brakes and a good driver. Don’t hesitate to change vans at the next stop if you feel either is lacking.

Pimp My Ride

Some mini-buses are completely tricked out: tassels, fringe, paisley velvet seats, rear speakers and subwoofers. Operators also define their vans' images with written tint on the windows. Honoring rap music is popular, and I have ridden in vans that announce our presence by declaring JAY-Z, USHER, KANYE, or the generic GANGSTA from the windshield. Back windshields also display horses and other animals that represent fleet-footedness.

Individual vans do have distinctive personalities. Sometimes the decorative style can reflect the type of ride you can expect. The SHANIA TWAIN van seemed gentler in spirit, the turns less careening. The HELLO van was welcoming.

A personal note: I have made a habit of avoiding the PUT YOUR TRUST IN GOD vans, or ones bearing any other message to that effect. One can make arguments that the driver may be more likely to be moralistic, or that the passengers attracted may provide well-mannered company, or even that these mini-buses may be protected by a higher power. I concede these points. Yet I cannot shake the impression that these operators' attitudes towards danger could be too laissez faire. Faith in your god and faith in your driver are equal preoccupations when riding in a mini-taxi.

Pizza and (Banana) Beer

2005-11-14T01:42:00.000-08:00

A Brief First Impression

In Kigali, Rwanda, kebabs are bar food, avocado trees line the streets, and gorgeous hillside vistas appear around every bend.

And it gets better: sidewalks, paved roads, gregarious people, buses that leave on time, turquoise-headed iguanas that scurry across your path. Banana wine - actually a beer - is a local delicacy. Internet access is relatively inexpensive. The temperature hovers between 60 and 75. Not just one, but several pizzerias exist.

The small details are the most intriguing reflections of culture, and Kigali often displays a sunny, polite disposition. An example: Mr. Clean is called by his French nom here. The local market's back shelf is lined with big yellow bottles of MR. PROPRE to disinfect your floors.

Checkered Hills and Silent Hawks

2005-11-12T01:37:00.000-08:00

Wheels Down in Kigali

Shortly after departure, the sun rose for the third time in two days.

The flight from Entebbe to Kigali, our final leg, left at five in the morning. I had left home on Sunday; and, after two days of plane rides, it was now technically Wednesday.

Many people have seen the sun rise: pilots, prom night sweethearts, soldiers, night-shift employees. It is an experience often promoted as pleasant, even thrilling. On that flight, I was not in the kind of mood that is easily roused to admiration; and therefore when I say that the immensity of sky lit up, I mean that even in my state I noticed it. I am used to tri-colored sunrises, pink, orange, purple, stretched thin by the distance of the horizon line. This one was miles higher and included, in addition to the usual colors, indigo, yellow, and green stripes at the very top of the sky, almost beyond my sight.

The cloud cover loosened to reveal, at first in patches and then completely, why Rwanda is nicknamed the 'Land of a Thousand Hills.' I have never been anywhere that looks like here, was my first thought. These are not exactly hills, was my second. They were much bigger, more like small mountains, and they never stopped coming. Red soil peeked out from under green vegetation cover like other places in Africa, but a unique landscape became apparent. Squares of various shades of green cascaded down the sides of the hills, separating all the plots of earth devoted to cultivating a variety of crops. It was dizzying to swoop in and out of the tops of these hills in a plane. Below, the rolling countryside was tightly regulated and controlled, parceled out to farmers in tiny bits.

Rwanda's Hawks Lay Out the Red Carpet

The plane touched down. I heard a massive flapping and turned once more to the window. Hundreds of hawks had been flushed from their rest by the plane's landing, and they now swarmed around it in a huge flock. As we taxied over to the terminal, they soared by, flapping, diving, swerving. They really didn't settle down again, even as we stepped down the stairs and onto the runway. Every few seconds, you'd hear a flutter behind you, and if you turned quickly enough, a large brown bird would glide by at eye level and give you a hard look. It was a feeling of air; there was no noise. A nearness, and then far again, as the birds made bold to approach you and then, with a turn of the wing, depart again.

Night Flights and Night Life

2005-11-10T01:31:00.000-08:00

Flying with Ethiopian Airlines

You must have stamina to find an obscure airline's ticket counter in Washington Dulles' departures terminal. The ceilings are impossibly tall, and the rows of counters stretch beyond sight. Glancing down the length from domestic ticketing, even the few souls checking luggage at Alaska Airlines are no taller than matchsticks.

I didn't know there were so many airlines. Weaving my rolling bag crazily around luggage carts, security checkpoints, and small children, I caught glimpses of an incredible variety. Thai, Mexican, Irish, Malaysian, Kenyan, German, and Peruvian counters, each manned by a different looking woman wearing a different length of skirt, were all shuffled together.

I asked directions from an assortment of bored (and imprecise) employees and passed an airline servicing every other member of the United Nations. Many minutes later, transit to most inhabited continents behind us, we reached the end of the line. Windows had long ceased to figure into the architecture down here. Birds chirped from nests in the rafters high above. A small banner reading 'Ethiopian Airlines' peeked out from behind yet another counter. It hung unevenly, stretched out awkwardly with white twine. Nearby, a family sat together eating samosas out of Ziploc bags and chatting with the baggage handlers. Slight apprehension at informal state of affairs.

Earplugs and Eye Masks for All

Luckily, first impressions are not always accurate. The plane, in contrast, was clean, new, and as technologically advanced as any other airline can claim. The only outstanding feature of this particular journey was that a surprisingly large number of children were on board for a 20-plus hour flight. Of course, they were all seated near us. Before departure, we endured 10 minutes of an adjacent two-year-old boy's tantrum. A patient Rastafarian sitting in front of me tried to distract the child with a game that involved a dollar bill. The rules were manipulative but simple: be quiet, and keep the dollar. Cry, and it gets taken away. The arrangement worked for approximately 30 seconds before the boy learned to scream at the man for taking the dollar out of his hands. With speed, we moved to a vacant row in the back of the cabin and remained ignorant of future sobs for the rest of the flight. All else was pleasant and comfortable.

Marble Madness

Addis Ababa boasts a stately airport. It is constructed mostly of marble, and the resulting aura registers somewhere between a museum's knowing authority and a tomb's peacefulness. The first floor's massive halls are divided into endless unmarked cubicles, and every doorway looks like it leads somewhere off limits. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was going to barge into an important confidential meeting at any second and single-handedly instigate a breakdown of a random international relationship. By some miracle, though, the sight of a proper place was always waiting when a door swung open: a baggage claim, or passport control counter, or snack bar.

We had a scheduled layover of 6 hours, beginning at 9 pm and lasting until 3 am, and decided to reject the fuss of using a hotel voucher for such a short period of time. A meal of very dry red wine, rice, and spicy Ethiopian beef was a satisfying substitute. We ate silently, the only two people in a balcony cafe dwarfed by 30-foot ceilings. For the second time in 24 hours, I noticed small birds nesting high above me. Two waitresses giggled softly at the buffet line. A cart rattled down a distant hallway. A horn honked in the parking lot outside. All else was still.

For about thirty minutes. It started as a slow trickle. The cafe had around fifty empty tables. First, two Nigerians made themselves plates from the buffet and sat down at one of them. Then three ladies in traditional Muslim garb sat and ordered beverages from another. An Indian family took over the back corner, the children laughing and eating spaghetti with their hands. Within the time it took for me to drink a glass of wine, every table had filled. Conversations in countless languages ricocheted off the marble walls.

A dance beat started from the bar down the hall, and the lounge opposite sprouted a bouncer and red ropes. I suddenly became aware of the presence of tall, made-up women strolling up and down the concourse. Soon after, I became aware of the presence of young men, dressed in silk shirts, following them. The gleam of gold jewelry was everywhere. A brief fresh air outing to the curb outside baggage claim revealed a packed parking lot, crowded with cars and people. Watch check: midnight. The Addis airport was absolutely jumpin'.

When we finally boarded our connection to Entebbe at 2 am, the airport was still filling up. Not a seat in the house remained unoccupied. Every hallway, every duty-free store, every cafe was brimming with people.

The True Meaning of Peanuts

2005-10-14T20:09:00.000-07:00

Village Food, Anti-Lice Cermonies, and Real Gratitude.

My nerves jangled as I approached the large hut.

A mother in the village had prepared lunch for us. Maybe I'd make a mistake, like insult my hosts accidentally, or get sick later from eating something I should have passed up. I ducked under the cloth in the front doorway and was plunged from the bright sunshine into a room lit by a candle. A small table, quite low to the ground, was set for two. Two small wooden chairs, decorated with carved scenes of lions and giraffe, sat squat on either end.

"These chairs look hand-carved," I said to H--. "Did you make them?"

He grinned. "Yes, I spent many days making them for our guests today. Otherwise you would have had to sit on buckets. I did not know whether you liked giraffes or lions, so I made both."

"I like them both. Thank you."

After thanking him, I realized it was a drop in the gratitude bucket. It was the first time I had met H--, but he had already been carving my chair for a month.

Veggie Delight

Mama served lunch. I rejoiced as the platters were laid down: greens, eggs, tomatoes, squash, potatoes. I recognized everything. There was no meat. The grave thoughts of salmonella that had plagued me for the day swiftly departed. I was introduced to nsima, a Malawian starch staple made from corn flour and water that resembles white play-doh. Nsima is a tasteless filler, meant to accompany meat and vegetable dishes. Proper etiquette dictates that you eat with your hands, balling up a small amount of nsima and using it to scoop up the other dishes served. I ate with delight, comfortable with anything vegetarian. I even remembered to leave a small amount of food on my plate at the end of the meal, which I was told is a polite way for a guest to show that she is satisfied and has been treated well.

Of Lice and Little Sisters

The climax of the visit was the post-lunch dance. A group of boys had planned a dance routine in our honor. Nine boys dressed completely in banana leaves and performed a choreographed number around a tenth drummer who positioned himself in the center of their circle. The lyrics were translated to me as giving thanks for the rain, but not for the lice that came with the rain. At that point, the boys mimed picking pretend lice out of his clothes and giving them to the dancer on his right.

A much younger girl spontaneously joined the ceremony, despite the boys' protests, after hearing the drums start. She would not take no for an answer. Everything they did, she mimicked perfectly - and with a huge smile on her face. Mama and several aunts laughed hysterically as the girl wiggled her way around the circle of dancers. The boys themselves were less amused and tried their best to ignore her.

The True Meaning of Peanuts

When it was time to leave, a funny thing happened. Each member of the household suddenly produced something to give us. I'm not talking about normal party favors. My friend and I received enough food to feed us for a week: a dozen tomatoes, bowls of peanuts, bags of onions, and lots of greens. H--'s family probably earned ten dollars a month, and they were feeding us. I began to protest. "Don't," my friend hissed. "Just take it." I knew better than to disobey, but I was mostly speechless on the drive home. I managed to ask why this incredibly hard working but very poor family felt they had to give me food.

"Because they don't want you to think they don't have enough."

"But do they have enough?"

"No."

Celebrity Fever in the Veld

2005-10-14T19:52:00.000-07:00

Teenagers are the same everywhere, six hours of TV a day or not.

After I spent several days in the city, it was time for me to venture into Malawi's rural areas. I was invited to stay at my friend's site, a mission in the valley below the Zomba plateau. The mission reminded me of a tiny town. It consisted of a main house, a primary school, a secondary school, a maize mill, a youth center, a small vegetable market, a church, and scattered housing for the mission staff.

The schools were the heart of the mission. Seven villages within a 50 mile radius fed into them, so plenty of youth were always running about, doing mission chores, grinding their maize into uffa, or flour, playing soccer, and hanging out waiting for the American visitor to show.

There were two boys in particular who were very curious about what America was like. The tall one, Alex, walked around with a cane although I noticed no limp. I believe it was for style, as he liked to read fashion magazines that mission guests left behind. The second boy said he had three names but mostly went by Arnold because he liked Terminator 2. They asked me lots of questions, most of them about American celebrities.

"Madame from America, do you know Arnold Schwarzenegger? We hear he is a political leader now."

"Yes, he was just elected to be California's governor. And no, I don't know him."

The boys exchanged an incredulous glance. They tried again.

"Well, then, Madame, do you know Jennifer Lopez?"

"No."

They looked at each other again, dismayed.

"Well, then, Madame from America, who do you know?"

I explained that there were lots of other people in America that I knew, like family and friends. They nodded politely, chatted with me some more, and eventually wandered off to find their friends, probably disappointed that I wasn't more socially connected.

On Strip Malls and Straight Rows

2005-10-14T19:49:00.000-07:00

Commercial development in Malawi is spotty, but neatness is universal.

On the way from the airport to the commercial part of town, I noticed a huge billboard by the side of the road. The face of an African man in a blue suit towered over me. "President Muluzi warns you about the AIDS virus! Let Us Save Our Country!" the sign screamed. This puzzled me. I thought AIDS was spreading so rapidly because of a lack of education, or a refusal to confront the problem; but this billboard seemed to contradict all those Economist articles I'd read. I was later to understand that the AIDS situation in Malawi was much more complicated than I had thought from my Western perch.

There is one strip mall in Malawi, and it happened to be my first local sight. We had pizza and beer for lunch at Ali Baba's Pizzeria, and then we went grocery shopping at the adjacent Shop-Rite, Malawi's only grocery chain. The grocery store was cool, organized, and offered impressive variety. The cans on the shelves were stacked impeccably straight. When I took one down, a man ran up behind me to reshuffle the rest back into a perfectly smooth facade. Next lesson: Malawians like things to be neat.

Thus far, Malawi didn't seem so unfamiliar. In fact, if I had left that day, I would have returned home thinking that Blantyre was a lot like a Western suburb. As it turns out, Blantyre is unique. Malawi has other cities, of course, like Lilongwe and Mzuzu; but no other area in the country is as commercially developed. Most grocery shopping is done at roadside markets; most food is cooked over open fires; pizza is altogether absent from the local diet. My first impression of Malawi was, looking back, highly abnormal. But it did give me enough confidence to be hopeful. A lot is possible there, even though much of the country struggles to get by.

Goats With Death Wishes

2005-10-14T19:45:00.000-07:00

Driving in Malawi comes with a unique set of challenges and yummy fried chippies.

"Distances between [Malawi's] major centers are short and the roads are good."
--Lonely Planet's Getting Around

'Short' and 'good' are relative terms, as places can be physically close together but feel far away in reality. Roads can be paved, but that doesn't mean you can drive on them with ease. The stress of driving is one factor that makes Malawian car journeys feel much longer for a visitor. Driving four hours between Lilongwe and Mzuzu, for example, can feel more like eight hours. There are several variables that make driving in Malawi a nail-biting experience for the uninitiated.

Your ASPCA Don't Work Here

Animals are a big part of the driving experience. Goats and chickens are constant nuisances, but they are also an important source of food here so you need to watch out for them. Goats -- those ornery four legged fiends! -- have a bizarre death wish and almost always dart into the road right in front of an approaching car. Miraculously, many goats manage to escape; but often that's because Malawian drivers make extraordinary efforts to avoid hitting them because they know how important these creatures are to their owners. Local drivers are as in tune with the sudden movements of a roadside goat as a New York driver is with a jay-walking pedestrian: the local driver can better gauge the likelihood that the goat or pedestrian is going to step into their path than the visitor.

It doesn't sound too politically correct, but you should keep on driving if you hit one of these animals. Remember, accidents happen. If you stop your vehicle to explain or offer remuneration, there is great chance that you will be the target of severe verbal abuse or worse. If you are in a populated area, crowds will quickly form and things will escalate rapidly due to the spectacle of it all. Remember what you may look like to others: i.e. a callous foreigner with plenty of money who has little regard for other people's property. Keep driving. The goat or chicken will still get eaten, just sooner than planned.

The Road Walkers

Road walking is the act of traveling by foot or by bicycle on the nicely paved road, as opposed to using the dirt footpaths that run beside the tarmac. This is a common practice in Malawi and can give visitors stomachaches as they drive, narrowly missing the pedestrians walking on the road. It is a normal occurrence to see men riding bicycles piled high, sometimes over five feet, with chopped firewood, or women carrying large cloth-wrapped bundles on their heads. The number of road walkers exponentially increases as you near the outskirts of a city, town, or trading center. Some paved roads are as crowded as a city sidewalk at rush hour, and the average driver may cry out in frustration about having to drive through such a thick sea of people when roads are supposed to be for cars in the first place.

To accommodate road walkers, it is a good idea to choose your path, use your horn sparingly -- and most importantly, to slow way down. The bike or pedestrian will adjust their path to make way for the vehicle. Usually when the driver attempts to choose a new path at the last second, the bike or pedestrian moves in the same direction. (You know that feeling.) This will inevitably lead to another massive over-correction by the driver to narrowly avoid a tragedy.

If tragedy occurs and you hit a person, you should NOT get out of your car if you pick up an angry vibe from bystanders. It seems horrible, but if a visitor senses growing anger, s/he should drive to the next police station and return with a police officer. Reason: an angry mob is always a bad thing. Malawians are, in general, a peaceful bunch. One thing that ticks them off, though, is foreigners who drive too fast on their roads. If you are driving carefully and slowly, and a crazy person jumps in front of your car, the crowds may come to the consensus that you aren't at fault. (This is rare, even for volunteers who are fluent in the local language.) If you are speeding and hit someone, especially a child, you may be in danger if you get out to help. Keep driving to the next town and ask where a police station is.

Roads of Licorice... or Swiss Cheese

The roads in Malawi range from shiny, licorice black tarmac to axle-busting, Swiss cheese-like mudholes. Roads in many nations are set up to transport large items and the military to all parts of the country. To maintain roads takes money, usually from taxes. Malawi is not very wealthy and does not have a large military; but it does
get help from international donor agencies that allows it to maintain the roads. However, if an agency leaves or the money is spent on something else, the roads do decline in certain areas. The deterioration is further caused by overloading semi trucks, especially during the tobacco season, so that they exceed the weight limits of the roads. Naturally, the pavement splits from such stress. The cracks are not repaired often so the flux of heat and cold causes larger cracks, leading to treacherous potholes that are famous for eating car tires. Ask around before you go speeding on any Malawian roads, as it is better to go slow and not break your axle. Also, bridges are treacherous in low-lying areas where rivers flash flood. Unfortunately, many of the bridges are rebuilt in the same spot over and over again instead of in a better position.

Bribery and Hard Boiled Eggs

A final obstacle, literally, is the roadblock. This is a way for police or military to stop vehicles and check them out. At the more serious stops, there is an actual gate manned by a contingent of military personnel. At smaller roadblocks, a long wooden pole is supported up by two oil barrels. These are staffed by a three or four man contingent. Some roadblock guards have guns which can make visitors nervous. Don't be intimidated, as many of these guards are friendly. Of course, some are not, so just play it by ear but err on the side of politeness.

The vast majority of Malawian roadblocks are safe and corruption is minor...not absent, however. There is a reason that traffic policemen positions are sought after: because of the bribes that are paid to speed things up or smooth things over. But for the most part, if you are respectful and avoid expressing frustration or nervousness, the roadblock should be a painless experience. There is a chance that the police will ask to look in the back of your car, under the hood, or at your ID. Cooperate and things will be fine. Don't get angry if some vehicles sail through while you wait; these are usually aid organizations, government workers, or someone else with official clearance. The more irritable you become, the longer you will wait.

Roadblocks are rarely set up in unpopulated areas, by the way. The larger the roadblock, the more people are set up to sell their wares. In Malawi, these range from old hard-boiled eggs (avoid!) to fried potato chippies with roasted tomatoes (yum!). You can also do a bit of grocery shopping at some roadblocks, as many of them have vendors that sell cheap vegetables, bread rolls, nuts, cookies, drinks, matchbooks, and cigarettes. A roadblock can actually be a welcome stress release after tough driving conditions.

Notes on Arriving

2005-10-14T19:40:00.000-07:00

One Experience Packing, Flying, and Touching Down in a Tiny African Country

Once the developing world gets in your blood, I'm told, it is likely to remain.

Arranging and Rearranging

I planned my first trip to southern Africa with an irrational amount of care. I knew continental weather patterns. I bought batteries. I printed out map after map. I bought my ticket 10 months in advance. I packed for a month long trip in one little black rolling suitcase that I could pick up and carry if I had to, and a small backpack. Hours were spent rearranging. Items were tossed aside when priorities changed, often due to burgeoning knowledge of weather patterns: my flashlight was replaced by a bottle of sunscreen. A sweater took the place of three T-shirts. Socks were mostly abandoned. Film became a priority, and thus the Tylenol supply was reduced. I was vaccinated completely, and when a power outage compromised my refrigerated oral typhoid vaccine, I repeated the entire course just in case. My medicine chest was a triumph: prophylactics, antibiotics, pain killers, sleep aids, large tubes of steroid creams, gauze, medical tape, the works.

The friend whom I was visiting, a Peace Corps volunteer stationed at a mission in Malawi, emailed me the day before I left. I paused between re-rolling pairs of underwear to read the short message: BRING CHOCOLATE AND A BOTTLE OF NICE SCOTCH. I ran to the drug store, bought three boxes of Hershey bars and a box of Ziploc freezer bags to pack them in. At the closest liquor store, I discovered that their bottles of nice scotch only came in large portions. No problem. I'd just have to make room. Back home, two skirts, three notebooks, a fistful of pens, a small photo album, my jar of Aveda pomade, and a swimsuit were all removed to make room for the new booty. It was zipper-pop tight, so I reduced the size of the towel I was told to bring from bath to dish. Finally everything fit comfortably, and I could carry it all at once without groaning.

My flight left JFK at a comfortable 10:00 AM. I was at the airport by 7:30, so I checked in, got an emergency row window seat, had both bags swabbed for plastic explosives, and still had 2 hours to kill. I called my mother, my brother, a cousin, and three friends to say goodbye. I was starting to get nervous and also slightly weepy. What if this was to be the final time I set foot on my home soil? What would I remember? Who would remember me? Fifteen minutes of similarly paranoid thoughts. I watched airport CNN and stared at my fellow passengers. Who were they? Why were they going to Africa? One man was dressed as though his safari vehicle would be meeting the plane: khaki cargo shorts, khaki vest with numerous pockets, belt with some kind of teeth on it, Crocodile Dundee hat, accent. I was intrigued. Do all white people dress like that in Africa? How did the English ever manage down there? More silly thoughts, then the first boarding call.

I wish I could tell you more about what it feels like to fly 20 hours straight, but I don't remember much of it. I had great hopes of beginning my first novel. Instead, I read the fifth Harry Potter book for several hours and then slept the rest of the time, thanks to my superior planning and advanced medicine supply. It was better that way. If I had had more time to form preconceived notions about what the world would look like when I finally deplaned, I might have turned around in Johannesburg and flown right back home.

Sometimes 'Customs' is Just a Doorway

Blantyre was a three-hour flight from Joburg, and the entire trip was very sunny. I think it was a morning flight, but I can't be sure. After 28 hours of traveling, I had no idea what day it was, much less an accurate sense of time. When the flight attendant told us to prepare for landing, I glued myself to the window for my first glimpses of Malawian soil. I had an image in my mind from online photos: tall, golden grasses, elephants moving in herds, rivers filled with hippos, huts.

It's not that I didn't see any of that. I did, after a week or two. But my first impression of Blantyre was that it looked just like the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. Red clay as far as the eye could see, scrubby brush, paved roads, stores.

The plane parked parallel to the terminal. I didn't get a clear view of the airport until I stepped outside and climbed down the wobbly stairs to solid ground. The building was white stucco, paint peeling. Grass in the cracks on the runway. I saw motion and looked up. On the roof of the airport, hundreds of people (Africans!) were waving to us. A row of little girls in front all had on pink dresses. I did a quick calculation. Maybe...fifty people on the plane? And they were mostly white people, which in my struggling, weary mind made family connections seem illogical. What were all those people doing up there? OK, I was definitely not in Georgia.

I went through customs, which turned out to be a doorway with a sign saying "Customs" hanging over it, and went over to the baggage claim area. There were ten thousand bags everywhere, of every color, shape, size, and brand. We had to climb over and pick our way around them. I will never know why they were all there, because immediately a man was directing us to another doorway. "Go get your bags," he said, pointing out to the doorway. We crossed through and found ourselves back on the runway beside the plane. We trudged over to its open belly and waited for the men unloading it to drop our bags out onto the concrete below. Good thing I bubble-wrapped that scotch.