Thursday, May 14

Thursday was a pretty busy day, but compared to our first three days here in Rwanda it was almost like a holiday. In the morning, we went to another secondary school, College St. Andre, and I sat in on an S4 Chemistry class. I was once again really impressed by the discipline of the students and their dedication to their education, especially to learning in English. Everyone here tries so hard in school – as Dr. Keino says, maybe they try too hard. Everyone is so focused on succeeding in school and going to that prestigious American university that they don't take any time to just enjoy being young (compared to Americans at least). Of course on the other hand, they end up making American students look lazy and unappreciative by comparison, so I guess it's a trade-off.

After St. Andre we went to a market in Kigali, which was pretty much an exercise in keeping myself from looking like I was in a group of 15 Americans. Pretty difficult, seeing as we were probably the only muzungus in the place, but I did fairly well. The market is pretty much what I expected – vendors selling everything from freshly slaughtered meat to clothing to crafts to kitchenware to haircuts. I bought a couple things from the market, sometimes for as much as 1/3 the price other people in my group paid. There's probably a few reasons for that... knowing a little bit of local languages, being a guy, and probably not walking around in a group (practically a bulls' eye for vendors). Amazingly, I was done shopping well before any of the girls were, so after I convinced one guy selling crafts that I had no more money I was able to talk to him for about a half hour using a mix of my limited Kinyarwanda and French and his limited English. Probably pretty entertaining to listen to.

After lunch we went to Gisimba for the whole afternoon; it was nice to finally be able to spend a solid amount of time there. We brought them American footballs and frisbees, so it was really fun to play some American games with them. I spent a lot of time sitting and talking with the older kids since the little ones all seem to rush to the girls in our group. It was really fun but at times very frustrating – it's really easy to interact with a child even if you don't share a language but with older kids it can be really hard because you feel like you should be able to communicate more. Luckily some of the kids there speak English very well, so I was able to spend some time chatting with them and playing with the occasional child who would run by.

Once we left the orphanage we headed to an Italian restaurant for dinner, and the view was awesome. The hills of Kigali rolled out in front of us as night set in and the lights flicked on. Kigali is a different city from anywhere else I have ever seen. There were lights everywhere, climbing up and down the hills as far we could see, but they're different from other cities. There are no skyscrapers, and the lights aren't nearly as densely jammed together as a typical Western city.

We walked home from the restaurant, and even though it was only a 10 minute walk or less, it really made me realize how much I wish I was walking places instead of riding in a car. Kigali is a really safe city, and you miss out on so much of what a place is really like when you sit in a car the whole time. We're more than just physically separated from the people of Kigali when we ride around in our mobile bubble, and it can be a little frustrating. Luckily I've been able to make meaningful connections with people at some of the different places we've been.