Site Visit: Rulindo Living.

I am currently writing you all from a beautiful sector called Masoro in the District of Rulindo. It is located about an hour north from Kigali up a monstrous hill that showcases why Rwanda is called the land of 1,000 hills. After a Harry Potter style site placement announcement, I was ecstatic to learn that my permanent site will be in a cooler, rainier district about 2 hours away from the volcanoes, gorillas, and Lake Kivu. This makes beach weekend getaways not only possible, but mandatory since I will be heading to Gisenyi for a regional meeting this Friday. Do yourself a favor and Google Gisenyi, or follow me on Instagram, it is absolutely stunning. Being from Minnesota, and especially after living in Duluth for 6 years, God definitely blessed me with a climate I can deal with for 2 years. Though I won't be living in Masoro until December, every volunteer goes to their new community for a week to visit, introduce themselves, and begin to develop an action plan with the Headmistress/Headmaster of their school. My assignment will be working with primary school students, this is equivalent to elementary school in America, and training teachers to increase their English communication skills. This assignment is a pilot program as it is the first year Peace Corps will be working in primary schools and focusing on teacher training as requested by the Rwandan Education Board (REB).

A main reason I appreciate Peace Corps, is that it only goes to countries it has been invited to by the respective government. As I talked about in my last post, I am more on the cynical side of International Development because so far it has shown to do more harm then actually repair. A critical reason is because too many times NGO's, nonprofits, and other organizations with good intentions (I assume) go into over-exploited countries and assume they have the answers to all their problems. This is not how Peace Corps approaches development. Peace Corps understands that we do not have the answers but the people do and we come (only when invited) to exchange skills and facilitate learning on both sides.

Enough about the serious stuff, I do want to tell you how much I am enjoying my site visit! I have an extraordinary Headmistress who has made every effort to make me feel welcome in the school and community. In the community there is a Catholic Church, a priests' house, an orphanage (run by  nuns), and the school I will be working at called G.S. Masoro. G.S Masoro is a well equipped school with computers, an art room, and a music room all donated by Kate Spade, random right?  My Headmistress arranged for me to stay with the Priests and they have fed me things I was starting to miss like cheese and peanut butter. So, I am one happy American right now :-)

SYesterday I went to the District Office of Rulindo to introduce myself to the Mayor and other officials and talk about my anticipated projects. Going to the District Office, waiting to speak to the officials and traveling back to site literally took me all day. By the time I got back to site all I could do was stuff my face with umuceri (rice), ibishimbo (beans), ni fritti (fried potato wedges), avoca, and isoupu (broth based soup) and lay around in bed. Traveling in this country is definitely something I will need to get use to, which I have no problem because I get to take a motorcycle some of the way. My village/town is about 15 mins from the main road so I get to take a moto ride wearing the badass helmet that Peace Corps gave to me. My moto ride is pretty incredible since it down/up a giant hill that gives me a gorgeous view of the hills and I Snapchat while the umushoferi (driver) wonders what the hell is this muzungu (foreigner) doing.

Today I went to school, which was a delightful 5 minute walk and introduced myself to the teachers and students. Everyone is so excited to have me and learn English it is a bit daunting. Being new in the community I got a ton of stares and personal questions. In Rwandan culture it is perfectly acceptable to ask, “Are you married? How old are you? Do you have children? Why is your haircut like a black man? If you are from America, why is your skin Black like mine?” All questions I was asked right after, “What is your name?” LOL. I smile and answer which follows with another series of questions.

Since my last post was so long and heavy I wanted to make this a bit lighter but next post I plan on writing more on my personal experience as a Black volunteer, **spoiler alert** it is not easy but I can say living in Duluth has prepared me for this situation... until next time folks! 

xo Dedekated

P.S. Add me on Snapchat to follow my experience --> Mare_Bizzle