A wonderful Rwandan-Irish wedding

Today was another great weekend because a got to see a friend and fellow vso volunteer, Brigid, get married to her partner Patrick in two wonderful ceremonies in Kigali. Now before I begin, a little about weddings in Rwanda. So there are usually three parts: 1) The civil or ‘legal’ ceremony; 2) The dowry giving ceremony known as a ‘Gusaba’ and lastly 3) A religious or church ceremony. For Brigid’s wedding I got to see parts 1 and 2 because the religious ceremony will take place in Ireland at a later date. 

So the civil ceremony took place at the sector office in Kigali, known as an umurenge. Brigid and Patrick had to make their formal vows here and sign the marriage register. Interestingly, it is also done with other couples at the same time and they take it in turns to take the ‘stand’ and make their vows. The bride of the other couple was wearing the most fantastically eccentric clothing to her wedding, we did try to subtly find out if this was ‘normal’...but it was hard! I think the conclusion was that it was unusual. This part of the day was actually quite quick once it started.  

Ruth, our programme manager at vso came and as she was sat with us she very kindly translated what was happening. Basically this quite stern looking lady tells the congregation and couples about the institution of marriage, about what they should and shouldn’t do and about the promises they make to each other. I would not want to cross her! The congregation is asked whether they know any reason why any of the couples should not get married and the bride is given an opportunity to change her mind. They actually explain that there are other people out there if the marriage isn’t right...which to me is quite late in the day to be floating this thought! Nevertheless there was of course nothing to worry about with Brigid and Patrick. 

In the afternoon we attended the Dowry giving ceremony or ‘Gusaba’. Lots of us vso volunteers got dressed up in traditional Rwandan ceremonial clothing called a ‘mushanana’ for the occasion. This is also what is worn by the bridesmaids and the bride for this ceremony. The men wore a plain piece of cloth and carried sticks like shepherd’s sticks. The mushanana is basically a skirt with a drawstring waist that you wear quite high up, a strappy vest top and a piece of material sewn or knotted over one shoulder and draped across the body. Brigid looked totally breathtaking in her bright pink mushanana with gold embellishment. She looked like a kind of Rwandan-Indian-Irish princess, just lovely! 

So the Gusaba ceremony is basically role play or theatre that is a very traditional part of Rwandan culture. The groom’s family and the bride’s family argue about the suitability of the marriage and the dowry to be given, in a very jokey, friendly way. In the olden times if a deal could not be struck, if the groom’s family did not argue well, the family did not get the bride. However nowadays its just for show and they do always get the girl. This goes on for about an hour. During this time the bride is hidden out of sight. Towards the end of the ceremony, when a deal has been decided and the bride’s family have accepted to give their daughter to the groom’s family, the bride is brought out with an entourage of bridemaids. A gift is presented to both the bride and the groom’s parents.  

Then there was some dancing and singing and celebration. The main wedding party ate some melange or ‘mixed plate’, traditional Rwandan food, then all of us got a chance to eat. The wedding party line up to give gifts to the bride and groom of food, household items, money etc and ceremony was officially concluded. I have to say it was one of my favourite days in Rwanda and it was totally fascinating to experience the dowry giving service. I wish Brigid and Patrick lots of luck in their new life together and I hope they will be very happy together.

Brigid and Patrick

Guest queing up to give gifts

Brigid and Patrick signing the register at the civil service

 VSO girls in mushananas!

 Me getting hot!

 The bridsmaids and male version

 Brigid looking lovely

 Patrick in traditional wedding clothes

The student goat

Today was a first for me in my teaching career. Just as I was getting into describing why ‘give me paper’ is an impolite way of asking in the English language with a class of over 50 unconvinced looking students, this other enthusiastic bearded black goat hopped into my class. I suppose I should be flattered really, at least someone was interested in what I had to say. He just kept coming back for more...perhaps politeness is important to goats. But soon it became hard to remain polite to him. He hopped in and out of my class no fewer than 3 times and he was very casual about it, with some half eaten grass sloppily hanging from his jaw. Definitely not shy, I had to chase him out with a meter stick in the end. Still he was not as persistent as the birds (see prior entry: revenge of the birds for details on the latest me vs the birds situation).

Talking of goats, recently I’ve become morbidly curious about a particular goat issue - just how many goat brochettes can be made from just one average sized Rwandan goat? I first thought about 20, but a friend of mine thinks closer to 100. It’s just so hard to judge just by looking at them, but I do want to know...and just how does one find out? I’m far too much of a pansy to actually buy a goat, kill it, cut it into small chunks and see how many brochettes can be made. So unless I become friends with an English speaking goat butcherer and brochette maker I guess I’ll never know. Even though I am curious, all rationality tells me some things probably are best left to the imagination.

Beautiful Burundi

It has to be said that Burundi is not generally considered to be a popular holiday destination. Recent civil conflict has ruled out visiting most of the country, but the capital city, Bujumbura, is considered relatively safe by the British foreign office as long as you fly there. So on Friday night, I flew there with vso friends Tammy, Mark, Lindsey, Tricia and Geri. It was dark when we arrived by taxi and we wondered how close our bungalows were to the beach...that is until we pulled back the curtains the next morning...and wow! There it was. One of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen, and I have seen many.

 Bujumbura is located on the shores of Lake Tanganyika, a really beautiful inland lake which borders the Burundi and the DRC. The white sand was dotted with palm trees and the sea was warm and blue. Lake Kivu in Rwanda is lovely, but it lacks the raw beauty of Lake Tanganyika in my opinion. There is not so much beach and it is not framed on three sides by green mountains like Lake Tanganyika. And what’s even more wonderful is that so few foreigners have discovered it yet! Yes there were a few expat type people around, but not the European winter sun crowd like there was in Zanzibar. And the beach was blissfully free of touts trying to sell you things and smart alecs trying to chat you up. There were a few security guards complete with their guns, but they seemed to spend most of the time playing cards with each other or studying so the atmosphere was relaxed.

So the first day of our weekend away was spent walking along the beach, drinking cocktails at Hotel Du Lac, probably the only posh hotel in the whole of Burundi, and swimming. What a hard life. In the evening we saw some Burundian drummers on the beach. Burundi is rightfully famous for its drummers and they were brilliant. We could feel the pulse of their beat through our feet and I never knew that drumming involved such acrobatics! The lead guy literally performed back flips around his drum. 

The next day we convinced Eric, the guy who had picked us up from the airport, to give us a little taxi tour of the sights of downtown Bujumbura.  Eric spoke very good English, which is unusual is almost exclusively francophone Burundi and he was fiercely proud of his country. He claimed that people in Rwanda speak ‘Kirundi’ (while interestingly those in Rwanda say Burundians speak Kinyarwanda!). In reality both languages are almost the same just with some pronunciation differences, a bit like the difference between British and American English. He said that things had been slowly getting better for Burundians from 2005 when the war ended. There definitely has been some development by all accounts as my edition of lonely planet said that there were no souvenir t-shirts available in Burundi. Yet Eric took us to a small handicrafts place where there was indeed a solitary ‘I love Burundi’ souvenir t-shirt for sale.

Bujumbura town itself seemed quite different from Kigali. It may have been because it was a Sunday, but the town did appear to be quiet and ghost like. It might have been because of the security situation, or perhaps because everyone was at church. People didn’t appear to live so much by the road as they do in Rwanda. There were a lot of big walls everywhere which I think people lived behind. Bujumbura doesn’t have the cobbled streets and neatly manicured lawns of Kigali, but just like Kigali, it is built on a heart attack inducing hill. There is also a general feeling that you have to watch your back here a bit more than in Kigali. While Eric was convinced that Bujumbura was mostly safe, when me and Tricia were sat on the beach watching the sunset, the moment it got dark a security guy came to move us back inside. However as long as you are sensible, keep abreast of the current security situation and follow the advice of local people here, you shouldn’t be put off coming here. In fact far from it. The people in Burundi, like in Rwanda have suffered a lot and it’s good to support them in rebuilding their economy and seeing all the good stuff their country has to offer.

View from the hotel window

The Bujumbura crew

Burundian drummers on the beach

Downtown Bujumbura

Trisha with the Local brew (which we also love in Rwanda) Primus                                       

Me on top of a concrete jetty thing with lake Tanganyika in the background

 I love Burundi!

Palm trees at sunset

The lake at sunset

The case of the disappearing bus park

A strange thing about Rwanda is the speed at which big things can disappear. For example in Kigali the one and only post office had been relocated and the old building pulled down within a space of two weeks. I remember walking to it one day, swinging my letters in my hand and staring at the blue sky which should have been obscured by a big building. My first thought was, as usual, ‘have I gone mad?’ ‘Am I on the right street? Has it really gone? Fortunately it had been relocated to the centre of town along with all of the letters inside, but it was a bit unnerving to say the least.

Well a similar thing has happened with Kabuga bus park. I got my bus from Kigali as usual and when we arrived in Kabuga all I could see was a gaping hole where it should have been. It’s so weird that a bustling busy bus park can literally disappear overnight, only to be replaced by...well...nothing as yet. So now all the matatus have to stop on this horrendously steep slope to pick up their passengers. The overladen things literally creak up the hill, narrowly avoiding the chilled out people of Kabuga who don’t seem to run out of the way even when a matatu is revving its way towards them. Then you hear a lurch as the tired old handbrake is put on as hard as is humanly possible, yet the buses still look like they are about to roll down the hill again. Goodness knows what will happen in the wet season. I have a vision of matatus sliding down the hill into old ladies and sacks of potatoes, running into a couple of moto drivers before reaching the main road and crashing into more matatus trying to get up the hill, but hopefully this will only happen in my overactive imagination.  Like the post office, the disappearing bus park will reappear in another place...like Rwandan reincarnation...ah tis the cycle of life here.

A muddle of muzungus

Life has gone full circle and I have just finished welcoming all of the new January volunteers for vso. I can hardly believe that a year ago I was the one trying to process the massive stream of information and make sense of the seemingly senseless buses, banks and bureaucracy. Now I wonder why I ever found it so hard. Of course that second unmarked white bus will be the next one to go to Kimironko market and not the identical one ahead of it in the line, and of course the last chair on the right hand side is where to queue starts in the bank. Although having said that the mtn phone centre in Remera still baffles me, there is no obvious queuing system there...or perhaps it is simply that I have not been there enough times to pick up on all of the subtle clues about how things work.

Talking of Kimironko market, I took the new volunteers there in a moto convoy and we didn’t half turn some heads. Streams of white light streaking past, all clutching nervously to the back of the motorbike on the rough cobbled track...like beginners hells angels. I have finally after a year got to confidence to ride a moto the Rwandan way. You casually slouch your back, let your hands go loose or rest on your knee, and occasionally you get your mobile out of your pocket to answer a call or send a text.  Ok so I’m mostly joking about that last bit!

So 14 more volunteers and 5 accompanying partners have been let loose on Rwanda and I’m sure they will do very well and like it here. We did have some dramas including no less than 3 lost (and subsequently found) bags, a suspected death (not a vso volunteer!) on the Dutch volunteers’ KLM flight and a good few trips to the polyclinic, but all’s well that ends well I say. So its back to the job of teaching for me. I have had a big increase in my hours this year so it will be interesting to see how it all goes. So here’s to another week. I must admit even after a whole year I still have to take this experience of being out here one week at a time, and sometimes one day at a time, although I do have a sense that time is speeding up since I returned from the UK...

Applause on the dirt track

Today was a first for me. It was the first time (and probably the only time!) where I received a round of applause from a group of students simply for returning back to work. And its all the more surprising because sometimes I am horrible to the students. I wake them up if they dare to sleep in my class, I send them out if they are either rude or lazy and I give them low marks if they do sloppy coursework. So I am surprised they were glad to see me! You see in Rwanda it is quite normal for people to move on to other jobs during the holidays without anything being said at the end of term and several of the other tutors have done just that, which seems weird to me considering all the parties and fuss and speeches one gets when they leave work back in the UK. Here people go and just don’t come back.

I honestly don’t think anyone ever expected me to return.  I remember nearly a year ago when I said I was going to be here for two years there were a few raised eyebrows around the staffroom! So I feel delighted to have proved them wrong. In fact a few of the villagers stopped me on my way to work to say they were so glad to see me again which was so heart-warming especially as I was a bit nervous of returning to the village. I was worried I would be back to square one with the excessive muzungu calling but today I only heard the word once all day.

It was nice to come back already knowing people’s names, being familiar with the TTC and knowing my job. I think (I hope) I’ll be able to really move things forward over the next couple of terms...well I’ll do my best at least.

Back to Nzige

I’m typing this from my humble bedroom in Nzige which apart from some more damp on the walls and bits of debris from the ceiling on my bed, is as I left it. It’s so lovely to be back in the warm, wearing a t-shirt and having exposure to sunlight. Tomorrow is supposedly the first day of term, so it will be interesting to see if anyone is back, I do hope so! In any case I have some preparation to do as there will be a workshop in my TRC on Tuesday run by another volunteer for head teachers, and everything is lying in heaps under rice sacks as I packed it all up for the holidays.
 

Strangely, as soon as I arrived in Kigali everything seemed totally normal. There was no culture shock (well apart from the power cut at the airport!) and everything felt very familiar. The warmth did take me by surprise a bit, but other than that within a day it was like my trip home to the UK was like a dream. Even though the first week back in the UK was a tough adjustment I’m glad I did go back for a bit. It was so lovely to catch up with family and friends and my colleagues from my old school and being back forced me to start to think about life after vso, which I have a feeling will creep up on me very quickly.

So I will be up nice and early tomorrow to see what awaits me at the TTC. The first week back is always a bit of a surprise, you never really know what will happen...