The City

I'm often asked what Kigali is like.  Well it's a modern, developing city with lots of new high rise buildings going up - banks and hotels mainly.  Decided to walk into the city from where I'm staying and thought I'd take a short cut but discovered there wasn't one.  Kigali, like most of Rwanda, is made up of hills and the city sprawls over quite a number of them making walking challenging as one minute you're going up a hill and next minute you're coming down!

In the city centre, there is a shopping mall with a large supermarket selling nearly everything you need but targeting the large community of westerners in the city. There is also a growing coffee shop culture with wi-fi access as there is now in most places across the country.

There's a lot of traffic with vehicles definitely taking precedence over the pedestrian so you have to run to get across the road when there is a suitable gap.  The city is full of motorbike taxis (MoTos) and every time one went past me they asked if I wanted a lift.  Decided to wait until I get to Cyangugu to try one out as think it may be a bit safer there.

They take pride in their roundabouts planted with ornamental gardens and you often see wedding parties having their photographs taken on them although it must be a challenge crossing the road to get there.

There's a huge clean-up of the city taking place.  Rwanda is an incredibly clean country as they have banned plastic bags and there is no rubbish anywhere.  They are moving some of the poorer communities out of the city into the outer areas and are, I understand, paying good money to buy the land and families can buy much cheaper land elsewhere and continue to be part of a community.  Industry is also being moved out of the city to new industrial parks and the plan is to fill the city centre with lakes and greenery.

There is a new airport being planned and a railway will come through the eastern part of the country linking up Rwanda with Uganda and Tanzania.

The day starts early in the city, as it does in the countryside, and from where I am staying you are woken by a wonderful dawn chorus at around 5.30am followed by cockerels, dogs barking, the sound of traffic and people starting work.  Being just south of the equator means the sun comes up at around 6am and then goes down at 6pm so you have to make use of the daylight hours so early to get up and early to go to bed so I am having to adjust to a different pattern to my day.