All in all, things are going well here. I am really enjoying Kigali and am constantly surprised by the people and the city. As many of you know, when you live in Africa or Asia, there is a certain mystery to being white. Something that is so intriguing that people will stare, yell, touch, or generally make a scene. Its not the most comfortable feeling by any means, but you get used to it. But here, there is really very little of that. It seems that most Rwandans just go on about their daily lives, and though there is some small notice taken of us (we do stick out), we just arent interesting enough to really point out. I even went running with one of my roommates, Leigh, yesterday and hardly anyone made fun of us or even took notice. Granted, most people do speak Kinyarwanda and could have been saying things I dont understand, but running certainly wasnt the show that it was in Uganda. And the city is nice! I mean really nice. The three main streets are lined with trees with medians in the middle, also lined with trees. There are streetlights and sidewalks, and although the street is crowded it isnt an overwhelming push of people by any means. Despite its size, 700,000, for the most part, the city feels like a large town. There are no huge buildings, few concrete walls, and you can usually look across the hills and see another part of the city or just deep green trees. And... AND... there is regular garbage pickup. Every Friday! Thats pretty amazing.
Activities have been pretty slow around here. I have gone to the project the past two days and been introduced to dozens of people I have already confused or forgotten. Carey, my friend from Emory, is great and knows everyone and everything. Our first attempt at a tour ended up with us drinking coffee on her couch and catching up and then her showing me off to the study. Yesterday, we had a series of management meetings (yep Im management) which was both interesting and tedious. The meetings seemed to primarily consistent of people avoiding blame for small problems that really could have been solved in two seconds. But these were my first meetings and I had very little knowledge of what was going on, so perhaps these impressions will change as I become more involved in the project. Yesterday I also signed up for French classes, two hours a day, three days a week. Yikes. There is another girl, Marta, who also just arrived for one year who will be taking them with me. Marta is here to help produce a movie about the project as well as do law and advocacy work regarding the extradition and trial of the people responsible for the genocide who continue to have political asylum in the states. Marta's job is cool.
Im still dealing with jet-lag and continue to wake up at 4 in the morning. Last night I passed out at around 9 and woke up at 230. Hopefully I will adjust soon. Oh and I got a phone. My number is
011 250 037 53835. If that doesnt work try taking the 0 out after the 25. But I think thats right.
Finally, the plagarism bit. I wanted to take a bit out of Carey's blog and from wikipedia regarding the history, culture, and because it is unavoidable the genocide.
Brief history via Carey Spear
"It is the one place I have lived in Africa where the colonialism thing just didn't stick, like they just laughed at it and kept moving forward. Their government is and has been stable (ok, bar the genocide planned by the govt), this country lacks beggars, theives, squatters, shanty towns (they actually don't exist here), has policy in place and is actually enforced. All the backwards things i fully enjoy about Africa just don't exist here. Turns out that since time immemorial Rwanda has had hierarchical organization that has been respected. Of course, one cannot ignore its small size and the fact that there has always only been two or three tribes (as opposed to South Africa's twenty something tribes, 11 official and as many unofficial languages, beliefs and "political systems").......anyway, I am still trying to suss this one out but it is amazing to me how clean, organized and "westernized" Rwanda is.
It has a fairly simple history compared to even some of its neighbors (i.e. the DRC), the "hills" (aka: 5,000-10,000 foot hills) really kept people out! the Germans tried to colonize it for a while but the Belgians kicked them out. The only lasting memory of the Belgians is their french language - even that is being overtaken by English (now one of the official languages along with French and Kinyarwanda); Rwanda "gained" independence in July of 1962 and has carried on just fine without their colonizers ever since. They export loads of coffee, tea and bananas and import nearly everything else (thus the prices); petrol is $7.50 a gallon which is reflected in the cost of taking a taxi, but not in the number of vehicles on the road in the city! Crazy.".
Finally a bit on the genocide. Many of the people that worked for the study were killed and many that work for it now where opponents of the genocide, many suffering heavily for that. Almost everyone had a family member or all of their family killed. It is impossible to be here without feeling the effects of the tragedy. However, Rwanda and its people are committed to avoiding anything similar in the future. Here is a little bit on the history of the genocide courtesy of wikipedia.
"
The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass killing of hundreds of thousands of Rwanda's minority Tutsis and the moderates of its Hutu majority. Over the course of approximately 100 days, from April 6 through to mid July, at least 500,000 people were killed.[1] Most estimates are of a death toll between 800,000 and 1,000,000.[2]
The genocide was primarily perpetrated by two Hutu militias, the Interahamwe, the militant wing of the MRND, and the Impuzamugambi, the militant wing of the CDR. It was an eruption of the ethnic and economic pressures ultimately consequential after Rwanda's colonial era and the fractious culture of Hutu power. The Rwandan Civil War, fought between the Hutu regime with support from Francophone nations of Africa, as well as France itself, and rebel Tutsi exiles with support from Uganda, after their invasion in 1990, was its catalyst. With outside assistance, in 1993, the Hutu regime and Tutsi rebels were able to agree to a cease-fire, and the preliminary implementation of the Arusha Accords. The diplomatic efforts to end the conflict were at first thought to be successful, yet even with the RPF, the political wing of the RPA, and the government in talks, elites among the Akazu were against any agreement for cooperation between the regime and the rebels to solve the ethnic and economic problems of Rwanda and progress towards a stable nationhood.
A resurgence in the civil war and the French government's support for the Hutu regime against the Tutsi rebels compounded the genocide. The situation proved too difficult and volatile for the United Nations to handle. The invaders successfully brought the country under their sway, although their efforts towards a conclusion to the conflict were brought to a contravention after the French, under Operation Turquoise, established and maintained a "safe zone" for Hutu refugees to flee to in the southwest. Eventually, after the UN Mandate of the French mission was at an end, millions of refugees left Rwanda, mainly headed to Zaire. The presence among the refugees of the genocidaires (see Great Lakes refugee crisis) on the border with Rwanda was the cause for the First and Second Congo Wars with clashes between these groups and the Rwandan government continuing.[1]
The UN's mandate forbids intervening in the internal politics of any country unless the crime of genocide is being committed. The United States government did not recognize the genocide. The governments of Belgium, the People's Republic of China, and France in particular still receive negative attention for their perceived complacency towards the Hutu regime's activities and the potential for UNAMIR to save Rwandan lives. Canada, Ghana, and the Netherlands provided consistent support for the UN mission under the command of Roméo Dallaire although it was left without an appropriate mandate for the capacity to intervene from the U.N. Security Council. Despite emphatic demands from UNAMIR's commanders in Rwanda, before and throughout the genocide, its requests for authorization to end it were refused and its intervention-capacity was even reduced." The full link is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide. Please read it
This weekend I think that I will be going to two of the memorials to the genocide. I am sure that I will more impressions and photos to share as a result. In the meantime, I hope that everyone is healthy and happy and I miss you all!
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