Murabeho! (Goodbye!)

It is time to end this blog : I have now been back in Scotland and have reflected on my time on Rwanda. There are some still unpublished stories and more than 1000 photos, but they will have to wait. If I continue to blog, it will be somewhere else and about something else. This title has served its purpose and the reflections on re-entry are mostly too personal for me to put on the internet.
Having set out to Rwanda expecting “new eyes”, I will be finding these in Scotland, too. I am returning to a new role as grandfather in November, a new job (soon, I hope!), probably a new home in a new location and a spiritual home in a new Christian community. My experience in Rwanda will, it seems prove to be a watershed in my life in many ways.

Rwanda reflection : last words, first words

As we waited for take off from Entebbe airport the pilot made an announcement apologising for a further delay. “The gas bottle which was brought to inflate the tyre was empty, so we are waiting for another one. This will arrive shortly.” We couldn’t help laughing at this, which epitomised so much of our travelling in Africa.
In the morning I watched CNN while we waited at our hotel. The first news item was reported that Apple has just launched a new iPhone and in several countries round the world people had queued for more than 24 hours in order to make sure of getting one. This perhaps epitomises the society we are returning to, where the madness of materialism can sometimes be rampant.

Rwanda reflection : "Anna Karenina"

I read “Anna Karenina” while in Tanzania : it is likely to be a while before I again get such a chunk of time for reading. I expected a sharp contrast between the snows of Russia and the heat of East Africa, but I was surprised by some of the parallels between Russia in the 1870s and modern-day Rwanda.
There is considerable discussion in the book about how conservative the Russian peasants are and how hard it is to get them to adopt modern (foreign) farming methods and technology. This conservatism certainly also exists in Rwanda. Modern technology (especially computers and mobile phones) are accepted and coveted, but what might be described as “intermediate” or appropriate” farming technology and techniques is quite hard to implement.
The building of schools and hospitals is another topic of some importance. On one occasion a visitor to a hospital construction site asks about an adjacent building. “That is accommodation for the staff”, he is told. “It was built as an afterthought, without plans and is not quite in the right location”. I know of several Rwandan examples….
There are parallels, too, in the social pressures which are changing long-standing traditions. In the Russian situation, there is discussion about young women wanting to choose their own marriage partners and one of the central themes of the book is what happens when marriages fail and how that is different for men and women. In Rwanda, much of traditional life is already under threat and will continue to be under increasing pressure from western influences. This goes from the relatively trivial (carrying things on the head is almost universal in rural areas but rare in Kigali) to the much more important, where western time-driven values are being strongly promoted by the government.

This is not to say that Rwanda is more than 100 years “behind”. It is to say, however, that the required and indeed actual speed of development is not just rapid but supersonic.

Rwanda reflection : wrestling with Africa

In the Old Testament there is the story of Jacob wrestling all night with a “man”. Neither is able to overcome the other and they continue till dawn. This will be my lasting picture of our time in Africa – it has often felt like intimate hand-to-hand, body-to-body wrestling. We could never hope to “overcome”, but equally, have been determined not to be overcome. We feel that we, like Jacob, have managed to leave with a blessing, but with some of the marks of the wrestling still on us.

Rwanda reflection : “a man at the end of his strength, exhausted by his work in Africa”

In his speech at our farewell dinner, the bishop said many kind words, but also used this phrase to describe me. The reason is simple : I lost about 20kg in the 2 years and in particular I am thinner about the face. I was neither overweight to start with, nor underweight at the end – I simply moved from near the top recommended end of the Body Mass Index to the bottom end. I am leaving Rwanda feeling fit (in training for a half marathon in September), energetic and in good shape mentally, physically, spiritually and emotionally.
It’s an interesting demonstration of how culture affects perceptions. The African concept of a “big man” is not just about power or influence : one is expected to be physically big in order to qualify fully for the title! Putting on weight is almost invariably perceived as a good thing, losing it as bad. More money means less walking, less physical work and better food, hence more weight. It is an idea which still has a lot of power. The corollary is that as I have lost some weight (due, I believe to some loss of appetite, less rich food and an end to “snacking”), I must be wearing myself out with work.

Rwanda reflection : a rare privilege

I need to record as part of this blog that it has been a remarkable privilege for us to work and live for 2 years in Rwanda. We are deeply grateful to God for it; we are grateful to CMS and the staff who trained and supported us; we are grateful to everyone in the Diocese of Cyangugu for allowing us to work with them; we are grateful to our fellow-missionaries and ex-pats for their fellowship and support and we are grateful to the many remarkable people we met in Rwanda for sharing their lives and their struggles with us.
The longer we have been in Rwanda, the more we realised how much cross-cultural development work is well-intentioned, but clumsily and poorly executed. Ours was no exception and we appreciate how tolerant people have been.
Before we left the UK several people said we were brave to got to Rwanda : as we return, we feel that “privileged” is a much better adjective.

Rwanda reflection : deliver us from cynicism

The struggle with negativity has my most intense spiritual battle, one shared by many ex-pats in development work. “Do not lead us into testing, but deliver us from cynicism” is a frequently-used version of the Lord’s prayer.

A little story will illustrate how temptation can come. A school pupil, Eugene, came into my office. He is an orphan and his older brother got out of prison a few months ago, but unfortunately died just before Christmas. We have helped him before, but on the last occasion as he was leaving the office I saw him give money to 2 people. When he came back I challenged him about this, suspecting some scam. He claimed that both had asked him for money and as he had some from me he could not keep it all to himself.
I still don’t know if he is genuine or not. People here often are extremely generous and are also often unable to manage money well, so it is entirely possible that he did not think about how the money would last but immediately gave some of it away. Equally, our experience is that many people in need of money will hold the truth very lightly and some will quickly concoct and hold to a very plausible story. Such is sometimes the fruit of desperation, or of a life which completely depends on others for finance.
It sometimes appears to be a rule of thumb that when you think the worst of someone they will surprise and shame you, but the people you think are the most trustworthy can let you down the most badly. It’s an emotional rollercoaster that you just cannot avoid.
This not just at a personal level, of course : organisations always provide plenty of scope for cynicism and this is particularly true of those whose supposed aim is to help others. The lofty aims and high ideals are often worked out through incompetence, petty politics, prejudice and inflexible bureaucracy.
It is incredibly easy to slip into thinking the worst of people and groups, but in trying to avoid cynicism, other temptations arise : drifting into hardening of heart or its opposite, naivete. Neither really fits well with our work here nor being disciples of Jesus. It is indeed a battle fought in the heart, mind and spirit; a battle which every day provides more opportunities to yield to temptation. “Lord, save us”.

Rwanda reflection : from one small country to another

In all the same ways as Scotland, Rwanda is a small country, but living in a different one has taught me a lot about how outsiders must see Scotland.
Everywhere we went in Rwanda we met people who knew people from our diocese. We climbed Bisoke, a volcano in the north and our guide knew the sons of our bishop in Cyangugu. We visited a diocese in the north and the administrator had studied in Uganda with his opposite number in Cyangugu. The examples were endless. There is a sense of community here, of the interconnectedness of relationships. There is also a sense of claustrophobia, of how difficult it must be to make a new start, to be different from what others expect or to break out of assigned roles.
It’s easy to see, too, how the Rwandan government can have such tight control over the country : from Kigali you can get to the border in any direction in 3 hours, with the exception of our corner in the south-west. The network of roads and the “cellular” system of local government mean that little can go unnoticed. This, of course, was also a contributory factor in the “success” of the genocidaires – in a small country like Rwanda there are few places to hide.

Rwanda reflection : sustainable cross-cultural mission

We came to Rwanda with CMS, as employees and under the responsibility of the Anglican church here. Our role was to serve the mission of the church in Africa. That is the basis on which CMS works and it seems on reflection to be a good one, especially for short-term missionaries like us. It never seemed to us to be fair or reasonable to do things which we would not have to see through nor to live with the consequences.
However, we also reflect that our first experience of Anglicanism, although we have appreciated many aspects, has left us feeling that in the longer term we could not give ourselves whole-heartedly to its mission. The shape and nature of the Anglican church in Rwanda is such that it clashes with several things which we hold to very deeply, things which we believe that God has put into our hearts and built into our lives. It has been a privilege and a wonderful opportunity for us to be part of the Eglise Anglicane au Rwanda, but we know that what we believe about leadership, authority and accountability; about community and about diversity could never be expressed as part of it. In that respect our time as cross-cultural missionaries has come to a natural end and we understand that the next Christian community we belong to needs to be one which better expresses these core values.

Rwanda reflection : new eyes?

I am absolutely convinced that my time in Rwanda has changed my perspective. I am equally convinced that I can never analyse for myself what that means. I chose the quotation from Proust as the title for this blog because I both expected and hoped for new eyes on the world. The process has been unexpectedly physical. My perspective has been changed not so much through observation, listening, reflection, contemplation and analysis (these seem to me now very European processes), but much more through physical means. I have been changed by -

living under the intensity of the equatorial sun and equatorial rain;
waiting in queues or for meetings which start hours late;
driving for hours along seemingly endless dirt roads;
struggling by car or on foot through the clinging orange mud of the 9-month rainy season;
standing in the homes of those living on the edge of starvation in desperate housing conditions;
listening to long hours of incomprehensible Kinyarwanda with only limited translation;
coping 3 times with skin infections which required minor surgery;
hearing other ex-pats recount their inner and outer struggles;

None of this is by way of complaint and I don’t at all regard this as a list of suffering. It’s simply that if I have been changed at all is by experiencing these things directly and also that it is in the struggles rather than the many good times that the changing has happened. Having said that, I still need to wait to be completely at home in Scotland before I will know whether there has been any permanent change and perhaps in any case that is only for others to judge.

Zanzibar : calm before the storm

Our time in Rwanda is now over and we are spending our last few days in Africa in Zanzibar, relaxing on the beautiful white beaches before the flight to Scotland. It’s a time for reflection. We know that when we arrive home there will be a lot of things to do, all demanding simultaneous attention – seeing our family, seeing friends, gathering our belongings and setting up house again, looking for a job, buying clothes (I’m a size smaller now in waist and collar size) and sorting out our financial affairs. It’s an eagerly-awaited tornado of activity and relationship : we have missed our family and friends very much, but we know that these first few weeks back in Scotland will not be easy, either.

A tropical wind-storm has just passed us on the east coast of the island. For a while it stirred up the sand and drove everyone off the beach, but an hour later everything is back to normal. We are expecting that this short settling-in period will be similar : unlike our time in Rwanda it will not leave any permanent impression.

Baby does headstand

I didn't expect grandfatherly instincts to kick in quite so quickly, but I was really excited when my daughter told me on the phone that she had seen the baby move during the 16-week scan. The end of November (the due date) is becoming as important a landmark as the middle of july (our arrival back in Scotland).

Do you know that man, the black one?

A couple of times in the last weeks friends have used this approach to try to describe someone to us. Of course we find it incredibly funny and a very ineffective way of identifying someone. There are undoubtedly very different shades of skin colour, so "black" is used as opposed to brown, not white. It is also quite possible to identify different ethnic groups (I'm not referring to H and T in Rwanda, but "Congolese", "Munyamulange", "Twa", etc.). However, it still seems a strange starting point as a description of an inhabitant of Central Africa.

Too many milestones

I came to Rwanda in my forties, with our oldest daughter working and her younger brother and sister still students. Only 2 years later, I am leaving in my fifties, with all 3 working and Clare married. The latest milestone, a very exciting one, is that we are to be grandparents later this year. Nevertheless, for all kinds of reasons, these milestones among them, this spell in Rwanda has and will continue to be such a landmark for us. One of the things to ponder in the last weeks, during our planned holiday and on our return, is what shape our lives will take when we get back to Scotland. We are at least clear that this is our next step, but there are many other decisions still to be made and the way ahead is by no means clear.

Empty promises

Advertising slogans are thankfully few here : the big companies sell beer, mobile phones and banking services. I recently discovered that Primus beer is using the slogan “Let us share the good life!”. In a country like this, it is an offensive delusion, it seems to me, to say in an advert that drinking beer can . In any country it smacks of a horrible distortion of the promises of Jesus, who alone can genuinely offer the good life.
Meanwhile the other beer, Mutzig, is only a little better with its “The taste of success”. It is still advertising by image. As we leave Rwanda, one of my prayers is that the church here will be able to deal vigorously with the empty promises of advertising and marketing.

Reading

We were discussing reading with some Rwandan friends. Reading for pleasure is not popular here, by custom or opportunity.
“We know that white people like to read”, they told us. “When an African is sick and getting better we say that they are eating again. White people say that the patient is obviously recovering because they have started to read!”. And indeed, our doctor friend confirmed that in some British hospitals it is taken as a good post-operative sign when there is a newspaper on the bedside table!

Inflation

I don’t know what the official figures say, but inflation seems to be rampant here just now. Some of this is reflecting the world situation : fuel is now 900 Frw a litre, compared to 640 when we arrived in August 2006. At 90p, I know that it is still a lot cheaper than in the UK, bizarre when you consider that it is brought here to the centre of Africa by ship, pipeline and lorry. However, transport of materials is such an essential part of the economy that many other prices are rising as a result (I’m trying to resist a very obvious pun about fuelling inflation). Building supplies are a prime example of this and one which has affected my work considerably. It becomes very difficult to control costs when inflation is high, or even to know when price increases are justified or have some element of profiteering. I’m old enough to remember mortgage rates of 15% in the UK, so it’s not my first experience of this, however!

Rice prices have also risen sharply, although even before this it was relatively expensive and not really one of the staple carbohydrates. Sweet potatoes, savoury bananas, “Irish” potatoes and cassava are all cheaper. Cooking oil, essential in Rwandan households, has also shot up in price. As usual it is those who are poorest who will suffer most. Subsistence farming is not producing higher incomes and many people round Kamembe are earning the national minimum wage of 15,000 Frw ($30) a month, or the “famous” $1-a-day for casual labour. It’s not a happy picture, but as so often here, equally not a big enough crisis to attract much attention.

A double encouragement

A good day as we enter our last 3 weeks in Cyangugu.
We had a meeting at the nearby primary school, privately run by the diocese. There was a structured agenda, well-written report from the head teacher, punctual start and a discussion about wider issues, not just current crises (which are thankfully few). We left feeling that we had contributed in some small way to the development of this school through our training, encouragement and visits (Sheena is currently teaching there 2 mornings a week).
Finishing at 4pm, we headed to the local football stadium, where an “Expo” has been organised. There were a lot of exhibitors and a reasonable number of people visiting. The western-style DJs and dancers in the corner attracted a fair crowd of young people. There were quite a few interesting products, too, including some we wished we had come across sooner. Making furniture is an important business here and quite a lot of people around Kamembe are employed that way. The favourite material is wood, but it is heavy and expensive. One stall had bamboo furniture; sturdy, well-made, attractive and at a price where you could furnish a whole sitting room for the price of a wooden settee (about £150). Someone else had ceiling tiles made of papyrus. Cheaper than “triplex”, the local name for hardboard, they also look a lot nicer and don’t need painted. They are also, of course, a natural material grown locally.
There were tea and coffee exhibitors (Rwanda’s main exports) and a good number of foodstuffs, crafts and herbal medicines. Rusizi District was showing a promotional video. Overall, there was a very good feeling about this event. There was enterprise, creativity and an opportunity to relax and learn : a real sign of the progress the country is making and not so often seen in this remote corner.

As an aside on Rwanda’s application to join the Commonwealth and its push to become more Anglophone than French-speaking : while all the signs were in Kinyarwanda, we still found French a lot more useful than English when speaking to people at this event.

Strategic planning

We spent a lot of time in November and December working with many people in the diocese developing a 3-year strategic plan. It’s a different process from what would happen in the west. Certainly we gathered all the “wish lists” from each project and parish (about 24 managers / pastors involved in this) and we also did some filtering of them, dispensing with the less likely. We took an overview of the work of the diocese and did SWOT analyses.
However, the final part, where we would cost the plans, match against likely / possible funding and then select priorities was missing. In reality, it is not worth the effort to draw up very precise plans : things are just too unpredictable! A few weeks ago we had a long and vigorous discussion with a British friend about this : should we have refined the plan and selected priorities for each parish and project, producing a much clearer statement of intent with budgets and timescales? As I look back now over the first 5 months of the year and the plan, I feel that our approach has been vindicated. We have seen :
- a minor earthquake, with the corresponding diversion of time and effort and changing of plans
- an offer from an NGO to operate 2 of our projects on a subcontract basis
- funding for a school, which we had been told was approved, withdrawn indefinitely
- the likelihood of getting a donation of $50,000 for our dispensary
- the cancellation of our large teacher training programme at Easter
None of these were foreseen even in December, yet all requiring significant changes to our activities. It’s better to be prepared and flexible than to spend too much time in planning.
It’s noticeable that the government is putting a lot of effort into training various leaders in local government and in education in planning. While we live in an environment that is highly changeable and so full of need and opportunity, any plans need to be held lightly.

Pending good-byes

This is a strange and not very pleasant time, as we reach the point where we only have 1 month left in Cyangugu. It’s too early to start saying goodbye to people here in town, but it’s too late to start any major new projects. There are some loose ends we can tie up now, but it is even a bit premature for most of that.
I’m not ready to leave right now, but I am ready to start the process and this state of pending good-byes wil, I hope, pass quickly.

Sporo!

Not a miss-spelling, but the usual call which goes up from the guards’ house when I go running. It also applies to our walks : the idea of walking for pleasure or exercise is quite foreign and incomprehensible.
It’s not easy to run here, I tell myself as an excuse for only having started 3 months ago. The paths are rough, muddy when it rains, it is very hilly and people will stare. However, the decision to take part in the 20km Great Scottish Run in September provided the necessary incentive, as it has in previous years. I’m now running every 4-5 days, usually accompanied by Boss, the dog from next door. She is good company and at least solves one problem – people pay more attention to her than me, especially children. Most of them are petrified, although a more docile dog you could not find.
Meanwhile, I also tell myself that a 25-minute hill run, first thing in the morning with low blood sugar and at an altitude of 1700m above sea level, must be worth at least an hour in Scotland. We shall see.

Chasing the football

Rangers may have had difficulty in getting the ball during their failed attempt to win the UEFA Cup, but not as much trouble as we had in trying to see the match on TV here.
We arrived at the Peace Guest House 10 minutes before kick-off, only to find the diocesan AIDS conference still under way. As speeches were being given, we assumed that it could continue for an indefinite period.
Off to Hotel du Lac (10 minutes’ drive), where they could not get the appropriate satellite channel, only a game from the premier league in Ghana.
Hotel des Chutes is nearby, but there the antenna was giving problems and they had no channels at all.
In the centre of town, “Planete Foot”, a “cinema” was showing the game, with an entrance fee of 10p, but our Rwandan friend was not at all keen on the clientele (having later seen pictures of the crowds of shirtless Russians at the match in Manchester, I could only think it was as well that he was not in the stadium).
The neighbouring “10-to-10” had the match on TV, with no-one watching and much encouraged, we settled down to watch. The English commentator was complaining about the lack of excitement in the first 30 minutes, so we did not feel we had missed much. 10 minutes later the screen went blank. The hotel staff were able to get a different channel with French commentary, but when that failed just at half time we were left with Bukavu TV and some exotic and badly-acted adverts.
As a last resort, we returned to where we had started and sure enough the AIDS Conference had gone, allowing us to enjoy an excellent picture and sound. The only subsequent disappointment was the result, of course!
In a country obsessed by football, it was intriguing to see how little interest this final attracted. Our Rwandan friend put it down to the lack of a team from the English Premier League taking part.

Night driving

All the advice you can read about Africa says not to drive at night in the countryside. It is wise – I would say the same myself and avoid it wherever possible. Sometimes, however, given the approach to time (i.e. mostly ignoring it) and the insistent hospitality, it is just impossible to get away early enough to arrive home before dark. A double difficulty then arises : taxis seem to drive faster at night and early evening is the busiest time for pedestrians at the side of the road as people return home. In most parts of Rwanda you will find pedestrians at the side of the road for the whole duration of your journey. It is much easier to drive around 9pm, by which time things are a lot quieter.
There is the occasional reward, however. On our recent drive from Gisenyi back to Ruhengeri, we left as darkness fell, but had a wonderful view of the volcano Nyiragongo as the road climbed away from the lake. This is situated in the DRC, close to Goma and caused a lot of damage and several deaths when it last erupted in 2002. There is still a very noticeable red glow from the top, which is only visible at night. It’s an emphatic reminder of the beauty and power of nature.

The grand tour of Rwanda

I’ve just finished visiting 5 of the 9 dioceses in the Anglican Church in Rwanda (EAR), along with the administrator from our own diocese. We’ve been looking for things we could learn from, or more accurately which could inspire or educate our diocesan staff on our planned study tour / retreat. Unfortunately, it now looks as if this will take place after we return to Scotland, but we have had a good time in the last few days.
There is a huge variety of work going on, some “successful”, some struggling, some with the poor and disadvantaged, some which brings contact with some of the most the privileged families in Rwanda. Perhaps like our farewell to Banda, it has been a microcosm of our time in Rwanda – fascinating, frustrating, depressing, inspiring, always with surprises just around the corner. I’ll describe some of the high and low points over the next few days.

The first goodbye

We travelled to Banda today, really to say “goodbye” to our friends there. It will be 8 weeks until we leave Cyangugu, but we decided that we needed to be organised and to start early if we are to see everyone that we want to. There is still a lot to do! The day captured so much of what we will treasure as lasting memories of rural Rwanda :
1. An early start : we had to set the alarm for 0600 on a Sunday morning and leave 40 minutes later.
2. Car problems : the power steering belt broke after 30 minutes, not a major problem, but I felt as if I had done some physical work!
3. Unexpected travellers : our friend Chantal decided to bring her 2-year old with her.
4. Terrible roads : the potholes on the main road become ever worse, the rains have caused several minor landslides in Nyungwe Forest and the side road down to Banda is not difficult, but just bumpy all the way.
5. Broken-down lorries : we only passed 2 today, quite a low tally.
6. The beautiful Nyungwe Forest.
7. The unimportance of punctuality : church had started at 0900, we arrived about 40 minutes late, but by the time we were given breakfast it was 1020 before we all went in, with no sense of rush or stress.
8. Warm welcomes : everyone is so glad to see us, we are hugged by hundreds of people before and after church and there are words of appreciation and prayers for our protection several times during the day.
9. Enthusiastic faith : the congregation was about 1000 strong, with several daughter churches being represented by people who had walked for >2 hours to get there.
10. Long church : with many choirs singing, including the children’s’ choir about 120 strong, it was 1330 when we finished. We had only spoken for about 40 minutes : we are definitely taking longer!
11. Friendship across culture, race and language barriers. There is a mystery here, but unity and fellowship in Christ is also strong reality.
12. The unexpected : we left the pastor’s house after lunch later than we had hoped, but called in to see his daughter with new husband and baby. There we were served our second meal.
13. A late return : we minimised our stay in the second home, but it was getting dark just as we got out of the forest and 1900 by the time we got home.

From mud to dust

In the space of 2 weeks it seems that the dry season has arrived, much more suddenly than last year. We hope and pray that it this does not mean the complete end of the rain, because it is too early and there are still some very young plants around, but the dust on the roads is a sure sign that the dry season is here.
Coming from a very wet country like Scotland and having to do a lot of driving here, I definitely prefer the dust.

Blogging advice from the 1950s

“Just because your voice can reach half way round the world does not mean that you are any wiser than when it could only reach the other end of the bar”

Attributed in the film “Good Night and Good Luck” to a journalist called Murrow, a staunch opponent of Senator McCarthy in 1950s America. A cautionary note for all of us who blog and perhaps even more true today when it is easy for any voice to reach almost any part of the world (just look at the Clustermap!)

Blog taboo

It occurs to me that the one major taboo for blogs like this one is local danger. It doesn’t feel right to cause anxiety to family and friends by describing local hazards. Sometimes imagination can run wild and it is better not to know the details of events which can act as a starter’s gun for that imagination. I still remember receiving our first letter from our daughter Clare when she was on a gap-year in Malawi. Enclosed was a photo of a 4-foot snake which had been killed in the compound around her house.
In that spirit, here is the story of a crime which is the talk of Kamembe. A woman was found murdered and decapitated in her house at the week-end, with a 2-month old baby. Such a horrific murder of course caused a great deal of alarm. 2 days later, suspects have been arrested and it is alleged that the husband arranged for the murder of his wife, paying about £100 for this. The case is likely to come to trial very quickly.
It’s a window into a very dark part of Rwandan life. I must emphasise that this is not a dangerous or crime-ridden society and people do not get attacked at random. As at home, murders are most usually committed by family members. However, there are people around who hold human life very lightly and you can only wonder if that is a remaining product of the genocide.

Business update - dividend paid!

My young “business partner”, Eugene, visited yesterday with my dividend from our joint venture : 1,500 Frw (£1.50), as agreed. He has sold all of his flour and he was sporting a new pair of shoes. All very encouraging.
There was also a request, to help him buy soap. It seems that it is difficult to obtain in his village and that customers had asked him to sell it. I duly parted with 4,000 Frw, explaining that this had now freed Eugene from the need to come and ask me for money in the future. We shall see…..

Muesli & dependency

The main “treat” which we ask visitors to bring with them is muesli. Our usual breakfast diet of fruit salad and bread benefits from a little variety and it is certainly not possible to buy muesli in Kamembe. Mostly, we make it last by having small portions and by only eating it every second day.
The last packet we received was about 2 weeks ago and we realised that we have been eating it every morning. We wondered recently if it is a sign that we are adopting a more African approach – “use it today, let tomorrow take care of itself”. Sheena disagreed – we have another friend coming from the UK early in May and our supply can be refreshed then. This of course confirms our enculturation : now we have developed a dependency on the west for muesli-aid and are looking forward to the next consignment brought by a “mzungu”!

This is not simply a story about our breakfast diet, of course. It’s true that at one level we are dependent on western visitors, but only when you look at the material world. As far as I can recall, none of the visitors to the Diocese of Cyangugu in our time here have failed to be impressed with the welcome and hospitality they have received from everyone and many have commented on how much they have gained during their visit. There is indeed a 2-way exchange going on, not simply a 1-way flow of goods and at a personal level it is wrong to too quickly assume that there is dependency. What we have to offer here, however, are different cultural values, life experiences and wisdom gained by people who constantly live close to the edge and who have suffering as a frequent visitor.

CMS Conference

We had an inspiring and refreshing time last week-end at the Mid-Africa CMS Conference. The main part of the content was an explanation of the recent and planned changes in the organisation and ethos of CMS. Not so relevant for us – we have been quite isolated down in Cyangugu and so do not really understand too much of the history and obviously as our time in Africa is now quite limited the future will not affect us much, either. However, Dennis Tongoi, the new General secretary of the new CMS Africa was very perceptive and inspiring and Tim Dakin, who leads CMS UK did a good job of explaining the rationale behind what is happening and communicating vision for the future.
Most interesting for us was the mission work CMS is doing in the UK, with “fresh expressions” of church to meet a rapidly changing faith environment. The recent experience of our home church back in Scotland has shown how many parts of the church hierarchy are quite unable to understand or accept anything that is out of the ordinary. We were excited by our conversations with Chris Neal and look forward to finding out more about CMS in the UK when we get back there.
All this was in the setting of a retreat centre in a beautiful location at the side of Lake Muhazi. It’s a strangely-shaped lake in the middle/east of Rwanda – mostly less than 1km wide, but at least 40km long. Excellent food, friendly staff and a chance to meet regional CMS staff and others working in this part of Africa : the 15-km drive along a muddy road was worth it! Worship and prayers in English were a great blessing, too.

Church is cancelled

Last Sunday marked the end of the annual week of mourning for the genocide. It began with a public holiday on the Monday : there were meetings throughout the country with speeches and the interment of remains. Each day thereafter businesses closed at 2pm, although we were surprised to arrive in Kigali on Friday afternoon to find everything open.
On Sunday, all church services in the country were cancelled so that the population could attend ceremonies to mark the end of the week. As usual, this was announced at very short notice (Saturday night).
Even on Wednesday, the day we left Kigali, the “New Times” was full of stories about Genocide Memorial Week. There was also a full page of diatribe against Paul Rusesabagina, on whom the story of “Hotel Rwanda” is based, but who is decidedly persona non grata with the government here and therefore also with “New Times”.

Comment on these various aspects of the week can wait for another time, but it certainly leaves us in no doubt that the genocide and its repercussions are still very much shaping the consciousness and the public life of this country.

A strange conversation with the traffic police

Traffic police are very common on the main roads and it is not unusual to be stopped. Long conversations are unusual, however : the normal routine is to check documents and sometimes less than that. Last week, however, I got into a much longer and deeper conversation, rather against my will. The tone was friendly throughout and on reflection it was a very revealing insight into how an ordinary Rwandan sees the "big issues" in the wider Anglican church.

TP : Where are you going?
Me : Kigali
TP : What are you going to do in Kigali? (this was already more detail than anyone usually asks)
Me : We are going to a conference
TP : What kind of conference?
Me : It is a conference for missionaries (hoping this will mean an end to the conversation)
TP : Oh, are you a pastor? (the usual question which follows)
Me : No, I am a projects manager
TP : With the Pentecostal Church?
Me : No, with the Anglican church
TP : You have just changed your name, haven't you?
Me : Yes, we were the Episcopal church and now we are the Anglican church. (by this time I am regretting letting on I can speak French)
TP : That was because of problems with homosexuality.
Me : Oh, that is a matter for the bishops (this is very deep water now and I don't want to be in it!)
TP : That's what I heard on the radio
Me : Well, we must be going

I hope he does not really mean that

The underlined passage is quite chilling; much of the rest is just incomprehensible. Perhaps it is just a case of excessive enthusiasm for education and a naive and simplistic belief that it is the solution to the majority of the country's ills. As genocide memorial week begins here, it is not good see anyone being described as "not fully a person". Dehumanising others was, of course, one of the devices used in 1994.

From the “New Times” website : full link

“Modernization of education sector can boost the economic growth of the nation” - by Joseph kamugisha

The government of Rwanda is fully focused on human resource development through use of the education sector. Many schools, technical institutes and universities have been built to accommodate and educate high numbers of Rwandese people. Restructuring of the education system has seen the levels of illiteracy drop from 60 per cent to a smaller per cent and the country target to have at least over 80 percent of its citizens literate. Many teachers, doctors, Engineers, economists, agriculture experts and others to mention but a few has been produced ever since after the 1994.
…….

It can be noticed that the spread of literacy through schools stems from organization level and ideological processes used by implementers of the education system in the country. Also any economic output of school expansion should be effected and studied at an aggregate level. This is because economic effects may be more related to the changing social rules of trade and work within modernizing economies, which are increasingly oriented around markets and mass production and not village based subsistence.

It can also be observed that aggregate analysis of education avoids the ecological fallacy of estimating nation level productivity growth from individual level correlations between school attainment and wage levels. In countries where there are no modulators or active implementers of the education system, investments in the education sector have either small or inconsistent economic effects. The potential effect of educational quality that also includes literacy levels from the effect of the quantity of schools available and to disentangle possible effects among different economic sectors.

Education has an immense impact on the human society. One can safely assume that a person is not in the proper sense until he or she attains a certain level of education. Education trains the human mind to think and take the right decision. In other words, man becomes a rational animal when he is educated.

It is through education that knowledge and information is received and spread throughout the world. An uneducated person cannot read and write and hence he is closed to all the knowledge and wisdom he can gain through books and other mediums. In other, words he is also shut off from the outside world and on contrary an educated man lives in a room with all its windows open towards outside world.
(continues)

Synod

There was never much chance that Presbyterians like us would understand their first Anglican synod, especially in a foreign language. It started at 7pm, after dinner, with apparently only one purpose, to ratify the change of name from Eglise Episcopale to Eglise Anglicane (my favourite comment from the floor – “This is a good idea, I could never pronounce Episcopale anyway”!!). Since the archbishop, house of bishops and provincial synod had already approved the name, it was never going to produce a heated debate.
At 1020, the bishop started his closing speech. This got interrupted and we took the chance to leave assuming it was nearly over. We found out the next morning that it found a new lease of life and went on till midnight – it was 0130 before some people got to bed.
No more complaints about long church meetings when we go home!

Teacher training, government style

Two of the English teachers who were to lead the training course during these 2 weeks came to Rwanda anyway to understand the country better. Yesterday they went on a chimp trek, setting off at 0500. As they left Kamembe, they were horrified to pass the Rwandan teachers who were on the government training. In the half-light before dawn, they were in groups of about 10, each accompanied by an armed soldier and jogging to the pace of an army chant.

Holidays cancelled

Since last October, we have been preparing for a group of English teachers to come to Cyangugu and to hold a 10-day training course for over 100 of the teachers in diocesan schools. We have been hoping for many benefits from this – improvement in teaching methods, improved use of visual and practical aids, building relationships among our teachers. A very generous donor in the UK funded it : flights, £5000 of materials and the costs of accommodation and transport.
One of our concerns all along has been that something else would crop up, so even last year we went to the district education office to share our plans. They were enthusiastic. On Wednesday, 2 days before the end of term and 3 days before the arrival of the English teachers, we learned that the government is taking ALL teachers for a residential training course from 1-18 April. Many of the teachers learned this officially on Friday 28th March. The topic is genocide ideology and there are to be no exceptions – anyone missing it is to be punished. The government is taking this very seriously (see the earlier post on burning books). The previous education minister probably lost her job because it was felt that “genocide ideology” was not being tackled vigorously enough. A secondary school about 50km from here was closed for the last 2 weeks of term following an inspection of their performance in this.
The teachers do not have long to prepare and childcare will be a problem for several that we know. It is being accepted in the usual resigned way, although we know that many are very disappointed to be missing our course and feel that the topic of genocide ideology has already been more than thoroughly covered.
Of course our plans are in ruins. The flights are changeable, but the “advance party” has already arrived and we have spent a lot of time and money in preparation both here and in England. We also now have a large hole in our plans for our last 3 months here – follow-up of the training was to be a major part of Sheena’s role.

In some ways this whole episode epitomises one part of the African experience. The poor are at the mercy of forces completely beyond their control, which can suddenly and unexpectedly change their lives for the worse. In that respect, almost everyone here is poor. It is a salutary but bitter lesson. (I realise very well that it is also one with much less drastic effects than people suffer every day). It feels as if this was preventable and indeed it was, but the same is true of course of much of the disease, war, incompetence and corruption which plague this continent.

The building project

About once a month, we have been visiting a parish on the edge of Kamembe and speaking at the Sunday worship services. They call us their “parents”, a title which does not sit very easily with us, but which at least encourages us that we are appreciated.
Last Sunday we were told that there was a meeting after church and that we were invited. It turned out that it was to discuss the building project. The current church is house-size (7m x 5m), but can easily accommodate the 20-odd adults and a similar number of children who comprise the typical congregation.
The plan was presented by one of the congregation, a building technician who I work with sometimes. His plans were for a building with a floor area 5 times as big as the current one – total cost 4,800,000 Frw (£4800),excluding the roof, which would be donated from the UK in an agreement with the diocese. The current balance in the building fund is 90,000 Frw – a series of pledges taken at the meeting raised this at least in theory to 220,000 Frw.
This is where our theology and praxis diverge sharply. I can think of half a dozen reasons, practical and theological, why public pledging is a bad idea and I can think of another half a dozen reasons why a huge building project is a bad idea.
For most Christians here, however, a big project like this means a big vision, requiring big faith and big commitment. Their view is that God will reward this faith and commitment by miraculous provision. There is no doubting the willingness to give sacrificially, but there is also no doubting the impracticality of the project. Only a handful of the Christians have any kind of regular employment and that is mostly low-paid. Many others are struggling to survive, to feed and clothe their families, pay school fees and repair earthquake damage to their houses. There are numerous examples around of church buildings which have been started but not finished and we know from experience that over-ambitious building can dominate and drain the life of a small church. Of course, we are being expected to bring a significant amount of money from outside, but I got the feeling that even without that expectation the visionary project would be seen as the way forward.

I took the opportunity to speak, reminding them that Jesus warned would-be disciples about the need to consider carefully before following him. He reminds them that no-one starts a war nor starts to build a tower without being sure that the project can be successfully completed. They listened respectfully enough, but it was clear that I was not being “heard”. Perhaps it’s a sign of maturity when one is able to go against one’s parents’ wishes. In any case, it was at least agreed that nothing should be done until the pastor returns from a training course he is on in Indonesia (see “A sudden goodbye”, 31 Jan)

One question to myself as a postscript - if a rich donor was to read this blog and to send money to build the church, would that be an answer to the faith and prayers of the people? I’m not sure how I answer that!

Business partners

This week I signed an agreement with Eugene, the letter-writer and budding businessman. I have funded his request for a 25-kg bag of flour (I think it is cassava flour, wheat-flour is much more expensive than that) in exchange for a share of the profits, to be paid at the end of April. The plan is :

Purchase price : 6400 Frw
Expected income : 25kg x 400 Frw/kg = 10,000 Frw
Profit : 3600 Frw
My share : 1500 Frw

I am hoping that this may indeed help towards some self-sufficiency for Eugene. I’m not expecting it to be a smooth ride, however, nor to make either my fortune or his!

A letter

Good day, sir.
Firstly I want to thank you because you have given me 1000Frw [£1] to pay to the school for my photo.
Sir, I need between 6000 Frw and 8000 Frw to set up a little business, in order that I do not need to come and bother you every day.
Sir, choose – do you want to give me a little money or for me to come and bother you every day?
Sir, do you accept that I will be able to not bother you every day?
Sir, I await your answer.
It is Eugene, the pupil of Rusunyu School.
Thank you for your understanding
Eugene

This arrived in my office a couple of days ago. Eugene is an orphan pupil in p6 who we have helped a little – he is bright and speaks good French, is not always truthful but is certainly persistent. I’m still thinking about what to do, but it certainly won’t be long before he is back “pour me déranger chaque jour”.

Earthquake 9 : housing in Rwanda

Our welfare programme is currently working in 3 quite remote parishes and we visited a few days ago to see the progress being made with building houses. This is the main thrust of what we do in the programme and the visits reminded me why. Regardless of the earthquake (and there was little sign of damage where we were on the edge of Nyungwe Forest), many, many families in rural Rwanda live in terrible conditions. There is a desperate and huge need for decent housing.
We have been building simple mud and wattle houses, about 8m x 6m, with 3 bedrooms – 1 for the parents, 1 for boys, 1 for girls. There is a kitchen / store and a toilet at the back. The doors are very basic, the floors are mud and usually there is very little furniture : I have never seen a wooden bed in one of these. The families are overjoyed to have even this very simple accommodation and are overflowing with thanks to God. This week we met a family which had 8 children (2 others had died) in their new house and they were delighted to have it. The family have a small coffee plantation and otherwise depend on the father finding temporary work digging fields.

These visits are very humbling, because life is a real struggle in very basic conditions, for so many people. The visits also raise a lot of questions about earthquake aid and if there is any just or fair way to distribute in this country with such overwhelming needs.

A rare negotiating success

There are of course “mzungu” prices here, elevated specially for white people on the two assumptions that they are rich (usually correct) and that they will easily part with their money (sometimes incorrect). Generally expats become less tolerant of these prices the longer they live here, certainly true in our case. The practice of attempted price inflation varies enormously – food in the market just a little, in shops not at all, but others are quite outrageous in their attempts to make money.
Recently, I went to the market to buy a pair of trainers. These seem to come, along with many second-hand clothes, in bundles which are bought in bulk by stall-holders and then sorted out. Presumably the original sources are in the West somewhere. The sight of a mzungu buying something was of course enough to gather a small crowd of spectators in the market, but as usual it was good-natured curiosity. This is just an unavoidable part of life here.
So I was presented with a pair of trainers and asked for 40,000 Frw (£40). I laughed and said I was looking for a serious price.
“How much will you pay?” was the response.
“5,000 Frw” I replied. Knowing that people typically pay between 5,000 and 10,000 for shoes is a great advantage. Otherwise, it is hard to believe that the seller will come down so far from the first attempt.
Now it was the seller’s turn to be incredulous.
“You cannot find shoes at that price in the market” (actually, you cannot find shoes at 40,000 Frw in the market).
Sheena’s arrival was timely – she got hers for 6,000 Frw just a few weeks ago. “Those are ladies’ shoes” was the response. I made my final offer of 7,000 Frw.
We have found that the only way forward from this situation is to leave. If your offer is at all reasonable you will be followed so that the deal can be closed. It is much less emotionally satisfying than haggling towards a mutually agreed price, but it is the only thing which works, at least in Kamembe. Sure enough, the seller was soon after me to make sure that I took the shoes. They are a brand new pair of tennis shoes, so I am quite pleased and the seller also got a good price.
It’s all a bit more wearing than going to a shoe shop at home, but if you are in the mood it can be quite fun, especially if you get a good deal. That probably happens less often than not in my case, but the tennis shoes were a definite success.

Burning books

There has been a lot of discussion recently about “genocide ideology” and a fear that it is still around. As is often the case here, it is very hard to find out exactly what is meant by this phrase, but there has been a lot of attention given to schools. The education minister has been under severe pressure from MPs because it is alleged that her department has failed to ensure that all unsuitable textbooks have been removed from schools.
It now seems that a drastic solution has been found. At a school committee meeting this week, we were told that new text books would be supplied because pre-1994 books were to be burned. The deliberate and targeted burning of books always seems very uncomfortable, but it is another reminder that the fear produced by the genocide of 1994 is still very real and present.

Earthquake 8 : government policy

There was a local government meeting this week and rebuilding after the earthquake was among the subjects covered. There are fairly clear ideas about policy, although the practicality of them is still to be tested.

It is one of the features of Rwanda that houses are not gathered together in villages, but are spread across the countryside. People like to live on their land. Because of the population density, this means that outside the National Parks and the tea plantations, it is hard to get more than 100m away from a house. Recently, the government has been trying to gather people together and to live in “imidugadu”, groups of houses which have only a very little land around them. The expansion of our town, Kamembe, has been by the building of these villages at the outskirts. There are obvious advantages for the delivery of services such as electricity and water, although it must be said that this is still theory, as most of the houses are fairly basic and are without either of these.
So the government has decided that any rebuilding of houses will not be on the original sites, but in imidugadu. Furthermore, they have decided on a “standard” house, which will have a cement foundation and be to a standard design. I can see the sense in both ideas, but also the drawbacks. Firstly, the proposed sites have not yet been identified, so no rebuilding can be done; secondly it means that there will be a forced removal for those who have been affected by the quake and lastly it will significantly increase the costs. For the last few years, the Eglise Anglicane has been building “welfare” housing”, mostly for widows, for about £1000 for a house plus kitchen and WC. The government standard will cost at least twice as much and is therefore likely to create difficult choices, because it seems likely that the increased cost will limit number of houses available.
It still remains to be seen how this will work out in practice, of course : meanwhile the tremors have diminished, but not quite disappeared.

A poor man?

We watched the DVD of “Fiddler on the roof” recently with a Rwandan friend. Expecting a rather light evening’s entertainment, we found that it dealt with quite a number of serious issues – political upheaval in pre-revolution Russia, anti-Semitism and the decline of tradition as a force shaping society. It also had an interesting story-line and some good songs.

The setting of perhaps the most famous - “If I were a wealthy man” was very interesting, particularly as we sat and watched this in Rwanda. The man singing was in his huge barn, with his milk-delivery horse and several other animals. With all this round him, compared to most Rwandan subsistence farmers, he was already a very wealthy man.

Earthquake 7 : update

As I write this on Tuesday morning, we have had 3 minor tremors today already : worrying signs that the seismic activity is not yet over. They were nothing like the first ones, but enough to wake us up during the night and to noticeably shake the building this morning.

Meanwhile, there have been a few developments :
> A group of government ministers came down last week to inspect the damage. They refused to use the conference hall at our guest house because of signs of damage, although it has been used for weddings. The first lady also visited on Monday, so we have not been forgotten by Kigali, at least.
> Our bishop has returned and was told by local government leaders that the distribution of tarpaulins and blankets was complete. When you visit families affected, you find that this is not true - there seems to be a blockage somewhere. In particular, where the house has not completely fallen down, it appears to be difficult to get help.
> As a diocese, we have decided to focus on things within our capability. We have developed some expertise in building simple houses (wood, mud and wattle) for less than £1000 and we will be concentrating on that alongside repairing our own property.
> We have managed to find a temporary project manager who will come to manage the repairs. This is great news, because it will take a lot of time and could easily have meant us choosing between our "normal" work and earthquake relief. With 4 months to go before we leave Cyangugu, our programme is more clearly defined than at any time since we arrived here.
> There are appeals operating in both the US (via the AMIA website) and in the UK via Rwanda Aid (see link on the sidebar). Once the money gets transferred, we can start, subject of course to also finding the much-needed wisdom! (see the last earthquake report).

Goodbye in Bujumbura

We are just back from a week-end in Bujumbura. It’s an almost perfect location for swimming – our hotel was on the sandy beach, the water in Lake Tanganyika is warm, the mountains of Burundi and the Congo create a stunning setting and the weather was great. You have to swim in the morning, as the wind gets up in the afternoon and creates some quite large waves. The other drawbacks are the presence of teenage boys who are of course fascinated by us and there are also hippos, although they are usually about 3km away from where we were. It’s just a step too far to claim that we were “swimming with hippos”!!
It was also a week-end for saying good-bye to our Scottish friends who have been working in Uganda. There was a lot of reflecting on our time in Africa, on lessons learned, on experiences both good and bad, on problems unresolved and on the future. It was a very significant time as we prayed together – the support and encouragement of our regular but infrequent meetings has been a huge source of strength for us. Much of our reflection was on struggles with African culture, set in context by 2 short passages from The Message version of the New Testament. Perhaps more important for us than the work we have done in Africa is the work God has done in us :

Then Jesus told them what they could expect for themselves: "Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat—I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you? " (Luke 9)

"You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule." (Matthew 5).

Where's the coffee?

In Kigali a couple of weeks ago, we found it hard to find ground Rwandan coffee. Eventually we managed to buy a couple of small packets instead of the usual 500g. This week my mum reported that the new Marks and Spencer’s store in Berwick had just started selling – Rwandan coffee! I don’t know if the two are connected : perhaps the export strategy has been too successful. The government is certainly encouraging people to grow coffee. The only problem is that it takes about 4 years to get your first crop!

Earthquake 6 : wisdom needed

A metaphor for our current situation (providing assistance after the earthquake) might be serving school dinners. Unfortunately, we are doing this without 3 important pieces of knowledge :
We don’t know how much food there is (no money yet received from various appeals)
We don’t know how many people are in the queue (assessments not yet complete)
We don’t know how many other people are also serving dinners (no overall plan for relief yet)
If ever there was a need for all the wisdom and gifts God gives, it is now.

Earthquake 5 : mind your language

Nearly 2 weeks after the first earthquake, but only 6 hours after the latest tremor, there is a little more time to reflect on the experience. The use of language to describe it has been interesting. We have been reading reports on the news, writing reports ourselves and also written an appeal letter to raise funds to help with rebuilding.
There is a temptation to use extreme words, although in terms of global news this was a relatively unimportant, 1-day story : the death toll was under 40 and none of the essential services were affected. How do you generate interest in a “minor” earthquake in an obscure part of central Africa? By using language like “ripped”, “major”, “disaster”. These draw attention, even though the resulting descriptions cannot really said to be an accurate reflection of what has happened, what life is like or how it feels to be here for most of the population.
Of course, it is different for those who have been suddenly bereaved, or for those whose house is badly damaged, or even for those who are wondering how they will afford even the small repairs which are necessary.
So, on the whole this is not a “catastrophe”, but it is certainly a big setback for many families and for the communities. While we can hope for a response which is appropriate and considered, we are also hoping for one which is generous and loving.
Postscript - there is also a temptation to show the most dramatic pictures and I freely confess to succumbing to this. The photos I published recently showed the worst damage we have seen. My excuse is that there simply is no point in taking pictures of hairline cracks in a wall. I watched a whole minute of these on Congolese television and it was excruciating.

Earthquake 4 : still going strong

Just before going to bed last night, I sent an email to friends who plan to visit in April. The theme was that the tremors have been diminishing in both frequency and force. How wrong I was! Having apparently slept through a minor tremor around midnight, we were rudely awoken about 0400 by another, violent enough to shake the house and dislodge Sheena's birthday cards, although there was no other damage. Being awoken like that with an immediate adrenaline rush and heart pounding, precludes further sleep for quite a while and many people spent the remaining hours of darkness outside.

In fact the quakes seem to become more difficult to deal with emotionally as time goes on. This may be related to the last one being during the night, but there is also something Pavlovian about it. For me, it is the roaring noise which produces a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I'm sure, too, that the background of having experienced a dozen or so significant tremors, having talked about them, having listened to others' stories, having witnessed a lot of damage and having visited scenes of death have also taken their toll. In any case, there is a lot of fear around and last night was a setback in overcoming that.

It has been reported that there were several injuries and 1 death in this part of Rwanda as a result of last night's tremors.

Earthquake 3 : photos

It takes ages to upload photos, but sometimes words are not enough....


Rusunyu School near Kamembe : typically older buildings like this were worst damaged, the newer ones around were nearly intact, with only a few loose bricks.


The nurses' quarters on Nkombo Island, just offshore in Lake Kivu. This took the biggest impact from the quake.


Nkanka church, where 13 people died as the belltower fell right at the main entrance.

Earthquake 2 : Nkanka

The Catholic Church at Nkanka, about 10km from where we live, was the scene of the single biggest loss of life in the earthquake. We went there on Monday as part of our visits to the area. As we arrived, the funeral service was under way : a huge crowd of about 2000 people in the open air. Catholic singing here is quite different from that of Protestant churches : the tunes have much more of a European influence in them. The overcast sky, the humid early evening atmosphere, the liturgy broadcast through a very poor PA system and the haunting music made it quite an unforgettable experience.
There was a sudden flurry of activity in the middle of the crowd. It soon emerged that the burials were taking place. No solemn or demure or slow activity here - these men were working very hard and fast with hoes. As the crowd began to disperse, we were able to see that all 13 bodies had been buried beside each other. 13 mounds of earth covered with flowers and marked with simple wooden crosses carrying the names and birth years of those killed. A very sobering sight and yet there was little outward sign of grief among the people gathered.
We moved on to look at the church. Like many Catholic places of worship here, it’s a beautiful building to an original design - quite old and made of stone with large windows made of stained glass - not in small sections as in Britain, but huge panes. The atmosphere inside was lovely and there was little sign of damage, simply a thin coating of dust and small pieces of debris. This is one of the ironies of this particular incident. The instinct to leave buildings when an earthquake strikes is, believe me, very strong, but if people had stayed inside they would have been safe. It was the collapsing bell-tower at the main entrance and the stampede of people leaving which caused the deaths. Those inside or leaving by the side entrances would have been OK.

Earthquake 1 : Sunday 3 Feb

On Sunday 3 Feb an earthquake hit our region of Rwanda, epicentre about 20km from us, force 6.0. The death toll is about 35 in Rwanda and 6 in DRC.

We were getting ready to go to church when there was a low rumble, followed very quickly by the house starting to shake. It was our first experience of an earthquake, so it took a little while to realise what was happening, but the first thought was to get out of the house. It is a truly frightening experience to have the earth move beneath you, even if it only is for a few seconds. Standing on the grass, we could hear the eerie sound of human shouting and wailing from across the water. Normally the city of Bukavu is almost completely quiet.
The quake was strong enough to shake things off shelves, but tidying the house did not take too long. The smell of vinegar from the broken bottle lingered for quite a while. The rest of the day went something like this :
Morning : We went to church, but Sheena took home a group of schoolchildren who were parked outside spreading fear to each other and I spent some time ferrying people with injuries to the diocesan clinic and to the local hospital. There were not too many of these and the injuries were mostly minor : it was soon apparent that a lot of the damage was relatively slight. The rumour mills were working overtime of course : 200 dead in Bukavu, a landslide in Bweyeye and a family in Kamembe killed while watching TV were all reported but later found to be false.
Afternoon : in coordination with other diocesan staff, we visited some of the projects It is amazing how quickly fear spreads and perhaps especially so in a country like Rwanda where so much trauma is hidden under but close to the surface. Several medical centres reported that a substantial proportion of patients were physically uninjured, but suffering from various kinds of hysteria.
By the afternoon, things had settled down considerably and as we visited and spoke to people on the phone a clearer picture started to emerge. The death toll was lower than first feared. Helicopters from Kigali were at the airport, taking some injured to Kigali. A couple of government ministers had arrived. The government was advising that people slept outside. As dark approached, we put up the tent which was fortunately in the storeroom of our house and had dinner with a doctor friend who was going to spend the night with us.
Evening : sleeping in a tent in an earthquake zone, being woken by occasional aftershocks, is an experience in vulnerability and a very small insight into the life of the poor. It is also a bonding experience when no-one around is sleeping indoors. Fortunately the night was dry and even for those not fortunate to have cover it passed uneventfully.

A sudden goodbye

One of the pastors came into our office last week. He’s one of our closest friends, speaks good English and often accompanies us when we visit churches, introducing us and translating.

“I’m here to say goodbye”, he said.
“Where are you going?” we asked.
“ To Indonesia, for 3 months” came the answer. To say that we were surprised is an understatement. We had been in his house 3 days before to celebrate his 10th wedding anniversary and he had not mentioned this.

It turns out that he was on his way Jakarta on a course in some sort of pastoral care. It is sponsored by some German mission organisation and he is representing 4 dioceses. There had been some advance warning before Christmas (I had taken his photo and given him a digital image one day), but there was no confirmation. On the Tuesday he was told that he would perhaps be going and on the Thursday he was phoned to ask why he was not at the airport! He left Kamembe the same day, leaving his wife, 5 children, 3 jobs and a church behind.
It’s one of those stories which encapsulates the African approach so well. It’s also a setback for us, losing a good friend and colleague for most of the remainder of our time here.

Titles

Rwandans love to use titles instead of names, even outside of work. Sheena’s worst experience in a meeting was to be called “Madam Missionary Education Officer”, but fortunately the translator, on seeing her face, changed this to “Madam Sheena”.
Meanwhile I get called “Padre” by strangers a couple of times a week (usually when I am without Sheena, of course!). I’m not exactly sure why people assume I am a priest.
Even in small groups, people will be referred to by title (“the secretary will pray now”) and spouses often do the same instead of using their partner’s name. The corollary of this is that sometimes people do not KNOW the names of people they work beside. In one extreme case, someone tried to introduce me to his wife’s cousin who had been staying in his house for a few days, but then discovered that he did not know the man’s name!

This is the word of the Lord

Marcel is a young man with little education and he makes his living riding a bike-taxi around Kamembe. Until recently, he was living behind someone’s uninhabited house, in accommodation resembling a stable. This was rent-free(!) in exchange for him providing a basic security service by being there at night.
Thanks to the generosity of Milford Church in the UK, we were able to buy a simple house for Marcel and a few others in his community - these cost less than £500 each. We visited the church last week and they had a surprise party for us afterwards to say “thank you”. In the speeches which always follow food on such occasions, Marcel spoke very simply but powerfully. “Thank you for being the hands God used to help me and others”, he said.
This encapsulates what we hope to be the spirit of our work here and indeed the calling of Christians everywhere – we are simply to be God’s hands in the communities where we live. Too often here we are regarded simply as a source of money : last Sunday, Marcel gave us a different view – this is indeed the word of the Lord.

Statistics

While Andy (our son) was visiting at Christmas, a few questions came up about Rwanda and the surrounding area. We spent an hour on Wikipedia browsing tables of data about countries and it was a revealing and depressing experience concerning the state of Africa. In almost all the tables we looked at (“suicide rate” being the main exception), the “wrong end” of the table was dominated by countries in sub-Saharan Africa - poverty, child mortality, HIV/AIDS rates, etc.
Of course I knew at the back of my mind that this was the case, but seeing it shown in so many ways somehow brought it home again.

The rabbit in church

We were at church for 4 hours recently, in the parish of Nyarusange, where we have already done a lot of work with the school, in both education and construction projects. It now feels like being among friends and the time passed quickly, perhaps partly because we were, of course, the ones who were the main speakers. (I still don’t like the word sermon, it somehow sounds much grander than what we usually do).
There was one particular moment of real spiritual power and reality. A young man got up to speak about his return to faith. That is not so uncommon, but his aunt followed him to tell more of the story. He is an orphan living with her and in his worst days had been stealing from her. We were able to pray with him and there was a palpable sense of God’s presence in that loving community which so wanted this young man to succeed and to stick with his decision to follow Jesus. It was lovely, too, that attention was focussed on one person for a while. One of our difficulties is the sheer scale of need here and individuals often seem to go unnoticed and are not well cared for even in Christian circles, simply because there are too many people.

And the rabbit? The aunt had brought a special offering to thank God – vegetables, fruit and a live rabbit. I was wondering what would happen to them, but I found out at the end when the auction was announced! It was handled very competently by Ephraim, a student at the Anglican College in Kigali. Perhaps it was part of his training….
We contented ourselves with buying a couple of pineapples, the local speciality.

Why I love Africa

Some time ago the BBC Africa website ran a comment section where people were invited to email and say why they loved Africa. Among my reasons would definitely be garage bills. Two recent examples :
A repair to the exhaust, taking 1 hour and completely replacing a section with a huge hole – 15,000 Ush (less than £5). It would definitely have meant a new pipe in the UK.
A puncture repair – 500 Frw (less than 50p).

How to eat an elephant

It’s an old joke for a new year, but with a lot of wisdom. The answer is, of course, one bite at a time. I thought about it while we were in Uganda, perhaps because of the many we saw in Queen Elizabeth National Park.
However, the specific trigger for my thoughts was the sight of two men demolishing a large two-storey building, equipped with nothing more than a large hammer each. It looked like such a huge enterprise, but it was being tackled with just the patience and perseverance required.

Umwaka mwiza? (2)

Although we have had a good start to the new year, there is trouble of various kinds on every side. Life in this part of Africa is lived against the background of instability and uncertainty about the future.
To the west, there is continuing unrest in the DRC as the government army and the militia of General Nkunda meet to discuss peace terms. This is what gets reported on the BBBC website, but of course locally there are all the issues of refugees, fear, inter-tribal suspicions and rumours.
The Kenyan political situation has also hit the world news and there is a particular Rwandan twist as the 2 sides have accused each other of “genocide”. It’s a bit of political hyperbole which is very painful in this country. The impact on Rwanda is potentially very serious, because we are landlocked and completely dependent for fuel and other necessities on a supply line which starts at Mombasa and passes through Kenya and Uganda. Already fuel is rationed here and things may get worse before they get better.
As we left Uganda we were asked abut our travel there and given a leaflet about Ebola. Fortunately, contrary to earlier reports, the recent outbreak of this deadly fever was limited to Bundibugyo, one district very near to the Congo border in the north-west of Uganda. It still cost 40 lives, however and Rwandan caution remains.
This is not to paint a bleak picture : at this time of year most people here are much more concerned about finding school fees for the new year than they are about wider issues. There is such fortitude, too, in the face of very serious problems, personal, national and international.
And we do genuinely wish each other a happy new year with the greeting “Umwaka mwiza!”.

Umwaka mwiza! (1)

The “Happy new year!” greeting is used almost as much in Rwanda in Scotland and even 5 days into January it is a common greeting. Our son has been visiting for the holidays and we spent both Christmas and new year in Uganda with Scottish friends and visited Queen Elizabeth National Park in between. We had a great time with Andrew and catching up with our friends, the animals and scenery were fantastic and we have had a short dry spell, but it required spending a lot of time on very bumpy Ugandan roads to get there and back.
All this has brought our departure from Rwanda into focus : it is still 6 months away, but there has been so much in the last few weeks to remind us that this new year is one with a fairly definite first half and an almost completely unknown second half.