Getting settled at St-Joseph’s

It’s definitely the rainy season in Kibungo! We just arrived at our permanent residence in Kibungo, Rwanda—we’ll be staying at a motel style guest house called St-Joseph’s. I’ll attach pictures, it’s really beautiful! Kibungo is about a 2 hour drive from Kigali so we took a station wagon taxi loaded up with all of our bags. It was a struggle for the driver to fit all of our suitcases in the back :S maybe I shouldn’t have brought so much? I think my back pack full of rain boots, 2 kg of quick oats and a costco bag of almonds might have been a bit much. But I’m here now and I’m sure I’ll be happy for the porridge in the mornings. We had our first lunch at the restaurant here and it was really good! It’s a buffet style so there was rice, beans, fried bananas, cassava, potatoes, cabbage and carrots, and some meat. No French fries yet! But I am to understand that they will be a staple here so I’ll have to be careful.        

Gurjeet took Kathy and I on a quick tour around St-Joseph’s.  We are right across from the university campus and right beside an elementary school and an orphanage. We’ve already had lots of kids waving at us and calling out greetings in English. We’re planning to visit the orphanage later. It’s beautiful here! I’ll have to post some pictures. You’ve probably heard that Rwanda is called the land of a thousand hills and it’s true! I think we’re on the top of a hill because we can look out across the street from St-Joseph’s and there’s a beautiful valley with more hills in the background.  After our tour we decided to rest a bit in our separate rooms and unpack. I was part way through when it started to rain REALLY HARD, so I was inspired to sit down and blog. It didn’t rain like this in Kigali. Apparently the rains are late in Kigali, but came early in Kibungo. Someone also told us that in the places that the rains have been late in the recent past, when they do come it is so strong that it washes out the crops. Climate change... To give an idea of how hard it’s raining right now, I’m listening to music on my computer at its loudest and I can only just make out the lyrics! I had opened the door of my room to look out into the courtyard and watch the rain come down, but I had to close it because it was splashing in even though it’s covered for about 4 feet outside of my door.  And now there’s thunder! I’m sure this won’t be as exciting in a few days but it’s great right now!

I’m not sure how people back home are picturing Rwanda so I’ll try to describe it throughout my blog as best I can. I’ve already mentioned the hills—from wherever you are it seems like you can see probably 5 hills when you look in any direction. Kigali city itself is spread out over several hills. It’s pretty big! We definitely didn’t see all of it, and I wouldn’t say that I know my way around at all. But I’m sure by the end of the 3 months, after staying in Kigali a few more times, I will know it pretty well. I had thought that on our drive from Kigali to Kibungo we would go through some forested areas similar to what I had experienced driving through Costa Rica. Not the case! As far as I can tell there are no forests or jungles that I could get lost in. Most of the land is being farmed. There are trees on the peaks of some hills, but over the years they have been cut down to be used as fuel and to make more agricultural land. Along the roads there will be houses lined up, and behind them all of the farms. It’s very fertile so everything is extremely green, and the soil is red. There are lots of trees, big and small, as well as plants along the roads but nothing very dense.

The power just came on! I think that they must turn it off for most of the day at the guest house. Same with the running water so I have a jerry can of water in the bathroom for washing my hands. Gurjeet said that the water might only be on for a certain amount of time in both the morning and evening. The showers will take some getting used to! There’s no curtain or anything, just a shower sized indent in the ground with a drain. I’ve ended up making quite a mess each time I’ve showered so I’ll have to work on that. The room is very nice though! I have my own bathroom and a double bed, two chairs and a closet with shelves in it. There are two big windows and a mosquito net of course!

It’s hard to believe that we’re finally here. After unpacking everything it feels more real than it did before. 3 months! Tomorrow we’re going to start some project planning and probably get more acquainted with Kibungo.