The week in brief

Sunday – In church, an announcement is made asking the congregation NOT to take change from the offering basket.
One family brings their new baby to give thanks for her surviving 5 days in intensive care shortly after birth. It’s a reminder of the difference health care can make, but the infant mortality figures here are still frightening.

Monday – our normally reliable MTN internet connection, via the mobile phone fails.
It’s goat day at the refugee camp at Bugarama, 50 goats to give out from our Christmas appeal. Chantal, the Social Worker, has it well organised, but inevitably there are some unhappy people who feel hard done by. In the end, though, we manage to get the job done. For the people living here, this is a drop in the ocean, but the local official with us says that the government will complete the house-building we and other churches have started. A very encouraging sign of how churches can lead the way despite very limited resources.

Tuesday – we usually meet with a group of Rwandan friends after work for a Fanta : the English club, as we reluctantly call it. Tonight we invited a new acquaintance, the friend of a friend, but the atmosphere changed noticeably when he arrived. One of our friends explained that they needed to get to know him first before they would feel comfortable in a group like that (we meet in a pub). This society is still very divided and distrustful.

Wednesday – the ufucu (mole) lives! The mole traps in our garden were dismantled (empty) ages ago, but today there were 4 large molehills on the grass. I’m quite glad – Wikipedia confirms my suspicions that moles are carnivores, but our neighbours stick to their convictions that the moles will eat the sweet potatoes and other plants.

Thursday – I gain a new respect for Rwandan wildlife when we see a 2-metre snake on the road while we are on our way to Nyarusange. It’s only the second one we have seen here and it’s 5 times as long as the first, which was dead. The live one is quite a scary sight. Instinctively, I drive round it – it’s only afterwards that I remember an episode story from the “Lady Detective Agency” series where a snake gets caught in the engine of a car.

Friday – an email from MTN suggests the oldest IT trick – turn the phone off and then back on. The internet connection is duly restored.
Dinner at the “pork restaurant” with a friend – the menu consists of pork and matoke (savoury banana), but at £5 for the three of us, including 1 kg of fresh pork to take home, we can put up with the lack of choice every so often.

Saturday – I’m cooking dinner for the first time since Sheena came back from Scotland and attempt stovies using matoke. Unfortunately the matoke has ripened since we were given it on Tuesday and the stovies turn out really quite sweet and not very pleasant. Next time I’ll use a recipe.