In many ways this is not the Peace Corps experience I originally envisioned. I must admit, part of me applied to Peace Corps with idealistic and grand visions of life in a rural African village, cut off from the world. There would be no electricity, I would wake with the sun, and write letters to my family by candlelight until I fell asleep, usually by 8pm. Running water would be non-existent, and every day I would find myself clustering around the village well with my neighbors, gathering water to drink, wash with and cook with. I would have a simple house (though I wasn’t naïve enough to picture a mud hut with a thatched roof) with a grass fence and no gate, welcoming neighbors, children and all sorts of animals to cross in and out freely. I would toil for hours over a wood fire, concocting spicy stews and carb-filled porridges. I would walk everywhere, to work, to the market, to visit friends, to do anything; or maybe if I was lucky I’d have a bike! My days would be filled with interacting in the community, dreaming up projects, attempting to get funding for them, attending weddings and baptisms and most likely even seeing babies delivered constantly. I would speak fluently with my neighbors and be basically adopted into the community, know everyone, know everything. But every day would still be a challenge as I dealt with language barriers and cultural barriers, adjusting to a solitary Peace Corps life.
So here I am, in Peace Corps, in Rwanda. I live in the 4th largest city in the country, where foreigners are rather abundant (everything from NGO workers to tourists off to visit the gorillas). I live in a rather beautiful four room house, with tall brick walls on all sides and an imposing brown and green metal gate. I have electricity (most days) and running water in my house (most days) with an indoor toilet and shower. I write blog posts, type emails to friends and family back home, listen to music, watch movies and do most of my work all on my laptop. There are more hotels in my town than I can count on one hand, offering yummy Western food, Fanta’s and beer, and fast wireless internet. I cook over a kerosene stove, concocting spicy stews just as much as grilled cheese sandwiches. I can buy wine, olive oil, peanut butter and jelly, Pringles, mustard and so many more “Muzungu” things at numerous stores in my town. I ride in a truck more often than I ever imagined, either for work or getting rides home from some American friends. I can easily go to a bar quite similar to one you would find in America, order a pizza and a glass of wine, and watch a soccer game on a flat screen television. I have an office in the district hospital and travel around to 17 health centers in two districts getting my bearings working for a large project founded and funded by Americans. I get outside and walk around every day, but considering the size of my town have an incredibly difficult time identifying even what my “community” is, let alone integrating into it. My Kinyarwanda is coming along, but conversation is limited when I can really only talk at the level of a five year old. I have yet to be invited to a wedding, though have attended a baptism; and despite seeing women about to give birth and several newborn babies, I haven’t witnessed one single baby being delivered so far. But every day is still a challenge, as I deal with language barriers and cultural barriers, adjusting to a solitary Posh Corps life.
So, there we go: Peace Corps vs. Posh Corps. Yes, it’s different, yes it’s not exactly what I expected, yes it presents its own unique set of challenges that I never even contemplated before coming here. But every day I’m still very much aware of who I am, where I find myself and what an amazing experience this will still be, hopefully even better than what I envisioned. Every day is new. Every day I learn a new word. Every day I explore a new part of town. Every day I talk to someone new. Every day I notice something new. Every day I hear a new animal sound. Every day I find a new solution to a problem.
And yet, I am constantly struggling with how to balance my desire to absorb and embrace Rwandan culture, integrate into my neighborhood and build relationships with Rwandans, with my need to remain sane as an American living in a foreign country. This manifests itself in a variety of ways. I spend the entire day in a room with two dozen Rwandans receiving Quickbooks training entirely in Kinyarwanda (two things still very foreign to me), and then retreat into my house in the evening to eat mac and cheese and M&Ms and watch The Hurt Locker. Or I spend a few hours gardening with my Rwandan neighbor and her three children, attempting to discuss everything from my job, to religion, to my family in America, and by the afternoon am at Americaland (or rather the home of my American friends) using their wireless internet, eating hotdogs and pickles, and watching a movie on their projector screen. But which of these is my life? Which one is “right”? When does support become a crutch? While attempting to be Rwandan, I often feel awkward and uncomfortable and long to be back in America. But while being “American”, I often feel guilty and awkward and long to be speaking kinyarwanda with my neighbors and colleagues. It’s the epitome of split personalities. My name is Amy and my name is Umugwaneza. I’m an expat working in Rwanda, but I’m also a Peace Corps Volunteer working and living amongst Rwandans. I like pizza and hamburgers, and I like cassava and dodo. But this contradiction is inevitable, right? And maybe it’s even necessary. Maybe it will be my ability to balance these two “personalities” that will allow me to not only survive, but thrive, here. Maybe by embracing these two sides I’ll be able to endure the successes and challenges of the next two years; learn, teach, give, take, adapt, grow.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
A day in the life...sorta.
I’ve gotten many requests from friends, family and blog readers, asking what a typical day is like here in Rwanda. And I’ve struggled to figure out how to even answer this question, let alone attempt to write a blog post about it. The problem is, no two days are the same. One day I’m insanely busy with work and health center visits, with little time to eat or relax; the following day I may have little actual work or housework and spend my day reading, writing, watching movies and perusing the internet. So…condensing this into a “day in the life” would be difficult to say the least. But as I’ve recently made a life decision to not only embrace challenges, but overcome them, I’ll do my best.
A somewhat ordinary, somewhat un-ordinary Friday:
5:36am – I’m awoken (as usual) by the sounds of my neighbors beginning their days: Babies crying; pots banging; bicycles, trucks and motos passing on the street outside my house; a ball bouncing against a wall. Rolling over, I do everything in my power to fall back to sleep.
6:22am- Awake again. I glance at my clock, instantly excited that I still have 40 minutes to doze and lay in bed. (insert more of “the world is awake and starting their day, you should too” sounds).
7:00am- My alarm goes off, I hit snooze.
7:04am- I remember that I keep meaning to change the snooze time on my alarm to something other than a ridiculous mere 4 minutes.
7:08am- I decide that snoozing for 4 minutes is really unnecessary, turn off my alarm and text my boss to see what time I should meet him at the office
7:10am- I attempt to quietly un-tuck my mosquito net and get out of bed, but she can’t be fooled.
7:10:30am- PiliPili cat begins her loud, obnoxious, “feed me or I’ll die, woman” cry/meow from the living room.
7:11am- I get an egg and a granola bar out of my storage closet and peel the egg while attempting to ignore Pili’s meowing and caressing of my ankles.
7:14am- Back in my room, I switch on music, eat my breakfast and get ready for my day (insert mundane activities such as getting dressed, brushing my hair and teeth, washing my face, taking my anti-malaria pill, putting on deodorant, sunscreen and makeup, etc)
7:40am- Almost ready to leave my house, I get a text from my boss saying he’s at the bank and won’t get to the office until 8:30. I settle into more music and playing with the cat, then get my bag ready for the day.
8:25am- I refill Pili’s water dish, open up a window (Pili’s version of a “cat-door”), lock my house, and emerge from my gate.
8:26am- “Amy, Amy, Amy! Bite? Tuzagusura ryari?!” I receive my usual morning greeting from the neighborhood children (Amy, Amy, Amy! What’s up? When will we visit you?) Three of my favorite girls, Sifa, Deniz and Marvee, run up to me for morning hugs and high fives. I tell them “ngiye ku kazi” (I’m going to work) and wave goodbye.
8:28am- I get to the end of my road, where the waiting moto drivers rush to me saying “Sister, twagiye?” (Sister, we go?) “Oya, murakoze” (No, thank you), I respond, (fighting the urge to say, “But if I am your sister, how is our mother?”) and begin my trek to work.
8:34am- I pass the oogling bicycle taxi boys and make my usual turn onto my shortcut to the hospital. A group of market ladies fall in step beside me, muttering something about the muzungu and if she knows Kinyarwanda. “Buhoro, buhoro” (slowly, slowly), I respond, only mildly hoping that they actually hear me. “AAAAHHH, azi Kinyarwanda!” (Ahhhh, she knows Kinyarwanda!), they exclaim. We exchange the normal greetings and questions (where are you going, where do you work, etc). As we near the hospital the one question I’m hoping they don’t ask is finally uttered: can you give me one hundred francs? Followed of course by my usual response:“Ndi umukorerabushake, simfite amafaranga, sorry” (I’m a volunteer, I don’t have money, sorry).
8:40am- I’m on the hospital grounds now, and pass my favorite cleaning lady, exchanging a smiley “Mwaramutse!” (Good morning)
8:42am- Bertin, my counterpart, is cheerily sitting at his desk when I enter our office. As we haven’t seen each other in a couple of weeks (Bertin’s been on vacation and then I was in Kigali for a couple of days) we exchange hugs and handshakes. I inquire about his wife and daughters (and cows of course), then we get down to business, planning our activities for the next few weeks, bearing in mind my training schedule and the arrival of the Books for Africa shipment.
10:19am- While I’m working on a memo to the Executive Secretary regarding further requirements for the library, Bertin suddenly tells me that he’s going to go see if the internet is working. Huh? Excuse me? Can you repeat that? I must not have heard you correctly. Apparently the hospital finally got wireless, but the signal doesn’t quite reach our office. I go back to my music and memo writing, anxiously awaiting his return.
10:56am- And Bertin’s back, with excellent news! The wireless does work; he was able to get a very fast signal while sitting in the hospital parking lot, under a grove of trees.
11:04am- Yep, he wasn’t lying about the grove of trees, the internet signal is quite impressive. I check my email, I check facebook, I check the news and download a few documents I need.
11:52am- Freezing from sitting in the shade with the cold Musanze wind whipping around me, I retreat back to our office to finish my memo and see what the plan is for the rest of the day.
12:10pm- Lunch time! I head home (fairly uneventfully actually) and get started on some lunch (totally gourmet pb&j) and chores (insert mundane activities such as bleaching water, washing dishes, sweeping, watering my plants and gathering my dirty clothes to wash)
1:51pm- Lunch is finished, chores are finished and I’m waiting for Jessica and her parents to finish their gorilla trek so that they can stop by and see the house, cat and babies; I switch on Harry Potter 4 and lie down for some relaxation time with the cat.
2:46pm- Bored with movie watching, I decide to rearrange my room, something I’ve been meaning to do ever since Mosquito Invasion 2k10. Of course, rearranging my room turns into sweeping and mopping the entire house, in anticipation of Jessica and her parent’s arrival.
3:35pm- Jessica calls, they’re on their way!! I return to my movie and start texting with Jenny, relishing in the fact that with Tigo each text is a fraction of the amount it used to be when I used MTN.
4:37pm- I hear commotion outside my gate, and then a quiet knock. Upon opening it, I see Jessica and her parents, with at least 20 neighborhood children swarming around them talking and laughing. “Jessica ari hano!!!” (Jessica is here!) Yes, kids, I see that.
4:38-5:28pm- Pandemonium. Children in the avocado tree, children in the garden, children in the trash, children in the latrine, children talking to Jessica, children babbling to her parents, children asking for photos, children looking at photos, children dancing, children screaming, children singing, children piling avocadoes into two warring piles much like they would snowballs before a snowball fight, children reading magazines, children speaking incoherent Kinyarwanda to me about the pictures in the magazine.
5:29pm- Silence. The children have departed and Jessica, her parents and I settle into the living room to talk about their visit and allow Pili to come out of her usual hiding place to be fawned over and told that not only is she a teenager, but she’s also a princess. On cue, Pili jumps into “her chair” and assumes her “princess pose”.
6:03pm- Jessica and her parents depart, leaving me with a hungry cat and a strong desire to wash off the kid germs from my hands.
6:24pm- Princess Pili has an egg in her bowl and a new flea collar around her neck. I press play on Harry Potter 5 and receive a text from my next visitors of the night, Jessi and her friends, who will be arriving from Gisenyi a little after 7 for dinner and a (free) sleepover. I lose myself in the world of Hogwarts.
7:25pm- Jessi texts, they’re at the post office, a mere 4 minute walk to my house!
7:29pm- There’s a knock on my gate and I open it to three smiling Americans, backpacks on their back and hunger on their faces.
7:45pm- After a quick costume change we’re out the door, heading to Volcana for pizza (Yes, my town has a pizza place! For $8 I can get a personal pizza with salami that in no way reminds me of Red Rocks in DC, but still satisfies my occasional pizza craving)
8:09pm- Pizza’s ordered, fantas are on the table and conversation moves from my December vacation with my parents and brother, to my 2012 European adventure with my brother, to the differences between Uganda and Rwanda)
8:53pm- Pizza arrives, commence eating.
9:22pm- There isn’t a crumb left on our plates, as we pay the bill and head home, not before being stopped by a random Rwandan saying “Amy!” in the parking lot who I must have met at some point (not that knowing my name in my town automatically means that we’ve actually met). Yes, Kevin, I’ll be sure to return to Volcana to hear you spin music one day…maybe.
9:34pm- Back at my house, we all get ready for bed, tuck in our mosquito nets and turn off the lights
Sometime before 10pm- I am passssssssssed out, exhausted from another wonderful day in Rwanda.
A somewhat ordinary, somewhat un-ordinary Friday:
5:36am – I’m awoken (as usual) by the sounds of my neighbors beginning their days: Babies crying; pots banging; bicycles, trucks and motos passing on the street outside my house; a ball bouncing against a wall. Rolling over, I do everything in my power to fall back to sleep.
6:22am- Awake again. I glance at my clock, instantly excited that I still have 40 minutes to doze and lay in bed. (insert more of “the world is awake and starting their day, you should too” sounds).
7:00am- My alarm goes off, I hit snooze.
7:04am- I remember that I keep meaning to change the snooze time on my alarm to something other than a ridiculous mere 4 minutes.
7:08am- I decide that snoozing for 4 minutes is really unnecessary, turn off my alarm and text my boss to see what time I should meet him at the office
7:10am- I attempt to quietly un-tuck my mosquito net and get out of bed, but she can’t be fooled.
7:10:30am- PiliPili cat begins her loud, obnoxious, “feed me or I’ll die, woman” cry/meow from the living room.
7:11am- I get an egg and a granola bar out of my storage closet and peel the egg while attempting to ignore Pili’s meowing and caressing of my ankles.
7:14am- Back in my room, I switch on music, eat my breakfast and get ready for my day (insert mundane activities such as getting dressed, brushing my hair and teeth, washing my face, taking my anti-malaria pill, putting on deodorant, sunscreen and makeup, etc)
7:40am- Almost ready to leave my house, I get a text from my boss saying he’s at the bank and won’t get to the office until 8:30. I settle into more music and playing with the cat, then get my bag ready for the day.
8:25am- I refill Pili’s water dish, open up a window (Pili’s version of a “cat-door”), lock my house, and emerge from my gate.
8:26am- “Amy, Amy, Amy! Bite? Tuzagusura ryari?!” I receive my usual morning greeting from the neighborhood children (Amy, Amy, Amy! What’s up? When will we visit you?) Three of my favorite girls, Sifa, Deniz and Marvee, run up to me for morning hugs and high fives. I tell them “ngiye ku kazi” (I’m going to work) and wave goodbye.
8:28am- I get to the end of my road, where the waiting moto drivers rush to me saying “Sister, twagiye?” (Sister, we go?) “Oya, murakoze” (No, thank you), I respond, (fighting the urge to say, “But if I am your sister, how is our mother?”) and begin my trek to work.
8:34am- I pass the oogling bicycle taxi boys and make my usual turn onto my shortcut to the hospital. A group of market ladies fall in step beside me, muttering something about the muzungu and if she knows Kinyarwanda. “Buhoro, buhoro” (slowly, slowly), I respond, only mildly hoping that they actually hear me. “AAAAHHH, azi Kinyarwanda!” (Ahhhh, she knows Kinyarwanda!), they exclaim. We exchange the normal greetings and questions (where are you going, where do you work, etc). As we near the hospital the one question I’m hoping they don’t ask is finally uttered: can you give me one hundred francs? Followed of course by my usual response:“Ndi umukorerabushake, simfite amafaranga, sorry” (I’m a volunteer, I don’t have money, sorry).
8:40am- I’m on the hospital grounds now, and pass my favorite cleaning lady, exchanging a smiley “Mwaramutse!” (Good morning)
8:42am- Bertin, my counterpart, is cheerily sitting at his desk when I enter our office. As we haven’t seen each other in a couple of weeks (Bertin’s been on vacation and then I was in Kigali for a couple of days) we exchange hugs and handshakes. I inquire about his wife and daughters (and cows of course), then we get down to business, planning our activities for the next few weeks, bearing in mind my training schedule and the arrival of the Books for Africa shipment.
10:19am- While I’m working on a memo to the Executive Secretary regarding further requirements for the library, Bertin suddenly tells me that he’s going to go see if the internet is working. Huh? Excuse me? Can you repeat that? I must not have heard you correctly. Apparently the hospital finally got wireless, but the signal doesn’t quite reach our office. I go back to my music and memo writing, anxiously awaiting his return.
10:56am- And Bertin’s back, with excellent news! The wireless does work; he was able to get a very fast signal while sitting in the hospital parking lot, under a grove of trees.
11:04am- Yep, he wasn’t lying about the grove of trees, the internet signal is quite impressive. I check my email, I check facebook, I check the news and download a few documents I need.
11:52am- Freezing from sitting in the shade with the cold Musanze wind whipping around me, I retreat back to our office to finish my memo and see what the plan is for the rest of the day.
12:10pm- Lunch time! I head home (fairly uneventfully actually) and get started on some lunch (totally gourmet pb&j) and chores (insert mundane activities such as bleaching water, washing dishes, sweeping, watering my plants and gathering my dirty clothes to wash)
1:51pm- Lunch is finished, chores are finished and I’m waiting for Jessica and her parents to finish their gorilla trek so that they can stop by and see the house, cat and babies; I switch on Harry Potter 4 and lie down for some relaxation time with the cat.
2:46pm- Bored with movie watching, I decide to rearrange my room, something I’ve been meaning to do ever since Mosquito Invasion 2k10. Of course, rearranging my room turns into sweeping and mopping the entire house, in anticipation of Jessica and her parent’s arrival.
3:35pm- Jessica calls, they’re on their way!! I return to my movie and start texting with Jenny, relishing in the fact that with Tigo each text is a fraction of the amount it used to be when I used MTN.
4:37pm- I hear commotion outside my gate, and then a quiet knock. Upon opening it, I see Jessica and her parents, with at least 20 neighborhood children swarming around them talking and laughing. “Jessica ari hano!!!” (Jessica is here!) Yes, kids, I see that.
4:38-5:28pm- Pandemonium. Children in the avocado tree, children in the garden, children in the trash, children in the latrine, children talking to Jessica, children babbling to her parents, children asking for photos, children looking at photos, children dancing, children screaming, children singing, children piling avocadoes into two warring piles much like they would snowballs before a snowball fight, children reading magazines, children speaking incoherent Kinyarwanda to me about the pictures in the magazine.
5:29pm- Silence. The children have departed and Jessica, her parents and I settle into the living room to talk about their visit and allow Pili to come out of her usual hiding place to be fawned over and told that not only is she a teenager, but she’s also a princess. On cue, Pili jumps into “her chair” and assumes her “princess pose”.
6:03pm- Jessica and her parents depart, leaving me with a hungry cat and a strong desire to wash off the kid germs from my hands.
6:24pm- Princess Pili has an egg in her bowl and a new flea collar around her neck. I press play on Harry Potter 5 and receive a text from my next visitors of the night, Jessi and her friends, who will be arriving from Gisenyi a little after 7 for dinner and a (free) sleepover. I lose myself in the world of Hogwarts.
7:25pm- Jessi texts, they’re at the post office, a mere 4 minute walk to my house!
7:29pm- There’s a knock on my gate and I open it to three smiling Americans, backpacks on their back and hunger on their faces.
7:45pm- After a quick costume change we’re out the door, heading to Volcana for pizza (Yes, my town has a pizza place! For $8 I can get a personal pizza with salami that in no way reminds me of Red Rocks in DC, but still satisfies my occasional pizza craving)
8:09pm- Pizza’s ordered, fantas are on the table and conversation moves from my December vacation with my parents and brother, to my 2012 European adventure with my brother, to the differences between Uganda and Rwanda)
8:53pm- Pizza arrives, commence eating.
9:22pm- There isn’t a crumb left on our plates, as we pay the bill and head home, not before being stopped by a random Rwandan saying “Amy!” in the parking lot who I must have met at some point (not that knowing my name in my town automatically means that we’ve actually met). Yes, Kevin, I’ll be sure to return to Volcana to hear you spin music one day…maybe.
9:34pm- Back at my house, we all get ready for bed, tuck in our mosquito nets and turn off the lights
Sometime before 10pm- I am passssssssssed out, exhausted from another wonderful day in Rwanda.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Remember that time.
Remember that time you were thoroughly impressed that the restaurant staff were actually cleaning the tables, until you noticed that they were cleaning them with insecticide.
Remember that time you saw the moto driver chug a beer, place the bottle back on the bar, put his helmet on and go to work. (Eeek.)
Remember that time Zackhshowed what his director’s cut of Troy would look like on the projector screen, cutting down almost 3 hours into a 25 minute highlight reel.
Remember that time you came home late from watching a World Cup game and your cat was nowhere to be seen, but after searching your entire property you finally found her high up on a branch of your avocado tree crying and meowing, unable to get down; and it only took 45 minutes, a lot of coaxing with cat food and you finally scurrying up the tree branch at midnight to get her safely back on the ground.
Remember that time you came home again to a missing cat and found her either fighting or frolicking with a stray cat amongst your vegetable garden; and that you woke up at 3am to find the stray cat meowing outside your window, hoping Pili could come out to play again.
Remember that time you bucket bathed and washed your hair on the same day (and for the first time in too many days to even mention here) and you jumped into the CCHIPs car and Lauren exclaimed “oh my goodness, you smell like marzipan”. Maybe you should bathe more often?
Remember that time you wished you hadn’t walked into town and weighed yourself down with three bags of food for the long trek home, but then suddenly looked up and saw Mbonesa, your driver, who stopped, pointed to the front seat, and gave you and all of your bags a much needed ride home.
Remember that time you caught your 4 year old neighbor wearing a plastic bag on her head like a chef’s hat and using sugarcane to “conduct” the cornstalks in front of her.
Remember that time you went to Gorillas hotel on a very cold day for internet and mentioned to your waitress how cold you were, and within 10 minutes had yummy hot chocolate, mini waffles to snack on and a blanket over your lap, all courtesy of your lovely hotel friends.
Remember that time you discovered that your garden was in fact producing yummy but mutant carrots the size of your forearm.
Remember that time your favorite bank teller was wearing a pin stripe suit with matching bright pink shirt and tie, and you got to use your favorite Kinyarwanda compliment: Wambaye neza! (which means, “you put on clothes well!”)
Remember that time you realized you live just off of Umuhanda w’Amahoro, which means Street of Peace.
Remember that time you were putting on the lotion that your grandma sent, once again saying “geez, this lotion is the weirdest lotion ever” and then looked at the bottle and realized that it was in fact body wash, not lotion at all.
Remember that time you went into the bathroom at the bar and realized there was (as usual) no toilet paper, but then remembered that you actually had two rolls of toilet paper in your bag that you’d just bought at the store. Good timing!
Remember that time Mama Providence brought you an entire bag of ibigori (corn) so the next day you decided to return the favor by giving her a bunch of ibitoki (plantains), and what started as Providence and three children in your yard turned into every child from your neighborhood invading your compound talking, laughing and singing. If only you’d been able to capture on video the hilarity of Providence whacking at a tree with a machete while two dozen children hung from the branches of your avocado tree.
Remember that time you were walking to work and noticed that all the corn had been cut down and maybe you needed to think of a new name for the Children of the Corn.
Remember that time you were about to tell the middle-aged man in the full suit, tie and shiny shoes that he looked smart, but then he turned around and you noticed his messenger bag was plastered with pictures from High School Musical.
Remember that time the sewing kit your mom sent you actually came in handy, as you and three of your friends went to work putting new wicks into your kerosene stove and your foyer began to resemble something more like an operating room with people calling out “thread, scissors, pliers!” much like they would “suture, scalpel, forceps!”. That grilled cheese sure was worth it though!
Remember that time your shoes, hairbrush, stove and bed all broke in the same week. Yeah, that sucked.
Remember that time you had some friends in town for a training and they were staying at a super nice hotel, so you borrowed one of their keys and had what was probably the best hot shower of your entire life. And don’t forget later that night when you ended up actually sleeping at the hotel in her king size bed and watching CNN on the television.
Remember that time you woke up from a nap curled up with the cat and realized you may not be only a dog person after all.
Remember that time you walked out of your gate and three separate groups of children yelled “Amy” while grinning and waving like crazy, and you fell in love with your life just a little bit more.
Remember that time you reached the final page of your journal and decided to re-read what you had written from cover to cover, once again experiencing the ups and the downs, the good times and bad, from the mundane to the extreme, and everything in between. And remember when you got to one of the most difficult entries and a butterfly fluttered through your window into your room. Remember, you’re never alone.
Remember that time you saw the moto driver chug a beer, place the bottle back on the bar, put his helmet on and go to work. (Eeek.)
Remember that time Zackhshowed what his director’s cut of Troy would look like on the projector screen, cutting down almost 3 hours into a 25 minute highlight reel.
Remember that time you came home late from watching a World Cup game and your cat was nowhere to be seen, but after searching your entire property you finally found her high up on a branch of your avocado tree crying and meowing, unable to get down; and it only took 45 minutes, a lot of coaxing with cat food and you finally scurrying up the tree branch at midnight to get her safely back on the ground.
Remember that time you came home again to a missing cat and found her either fighting or frolicking with a stray cat amongst your vegetable garden; and that you woke up at 3am to find the stray cat meowing outside your window, hoping Pili could come out to play again.
Remember that time you bucket bathed and washed your hair on the same day (and for the first time in too many days to even mention here) and you jumped into the CCHIPs car and Lauren exclaimed “oh my goodness, you smell like marzipan”. Maybe you should bathe more often?
Remember that time you wished you hadn’t walked into town and weighed yourself down with three bags of food for the long trek home, but then suddenly looked up and saw Mbonesa, your driver, who stopped, pointed to the front seat, and gave you and all of your bags a much needed ride home.
Remember that time you caught your 4 year old neighbor wearing a plastic bag on her head like a chef’s hat and using sugarcane to “conduct” the cornstalks in front of her.
Remember that time you went to Gorillas hotel on a very cold day for internet and mentioned to your waitress how cold you were, and within 10 minutes had yummy hot chocolate, mini waffles to snack on and a blanket over your lap, all courtesy of your lovely hotel friends.
Remember that time you discovered that your garden was in fact producing yummy but mutant carrots the size of your forearm.
Remember that time your favorite bank teller was wearing a pin stripe suit with matching bright pink shirt and tie, and you got to use your favorite Kinyarwanda compliment: Wambaye neza! (which means, “you put on clothes well!”)
Remember that time you realized you live just off of Umuhanda w’Amahoro, which means Street of Peace.
Remember that time you were putting on the lotion that your grandma sent, once again saying “geez, this lotion is the weirdest lotion ever” and then looked at the bottle and realized that it was in fact body wash, not lotion at all.
Remember that time you went into the bathroom at the bar and realized there was (as usual) no toilet paper, but then remembered that you actually had two rolls of toilet paper in your bag that you’d just bought at the store. Good timing!
Remember that time Mama Providence brought you an entire bag of ibigori (corn) so the next day you decided to return the favor by giving her a bunch of ibitoki (plantains), and what started as Providence and three children in your yard turned into every child from your neighborhood invading your compound talking, laughing and singing. If only you’d been able to capture on video the hilarity of Providence whacking at a tree with a machete while two dozen children hung from the branches of your avocado tree.
Remember that time you were walking to work and noticed that all the corn had been cut down and maybe you needed to think of a new name for the Children of the Corn.
Remember that time you were about to tell the middle-aged man in the full suit, tie and shiny shoes that he looked smart, but then he turned around and you noticed his messenger bag was plastered with pictures from High School Musical.
Remember that time the sewing kit your mom sent you actually came in handy, as you and three of your friends went to work putting new wicks into your kerosene stove and your foyer began to resemble something more like an operating room with people calling out “thread, scissors, pliers!” much like they would “suture, scalpel, forceps!”. That grilled cheese sure was worth it though!
Remember that time your shoes, hairbrush, stove and bed all broke in the same week. Yeah, that sucked.
Remember that time you had some friends in town for a training and they were staying at a super nice hotel, so you borrowed one of their keys and had what was probably the best hot shower of your entire life. And don’t forget later that night when you ended up actually sleeping at the hotel in her king size bed and watching CNN on the television.
Remember that time you woke up from a nap curled up with the cat and realized you may not be only a dog person after all.
Remember that time you walked out of your gate and three separate groups of children yelled “Amy” while grinning and waving like crazy, and you fell in love with your life just a little bit more.
Remember that time you reached the final page of your journal and decided to re-read what you had written from cover to cover, once again experiencing the ups and the downs, the good times and bad, from the mundane to the extreme, and everything in between. And remember when you got to one of the most difficult entries and a butterfly fluttered through your window into your room. Remember, you’re never alone.
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