Back to the city

Rwandese dancers - no relevance to post but like to start with a picture!

Here I am back in Kigali, sooner than I’d planned. Decided it would be a good idea, or so I thought, to come up to the city to process my visa/permit application following my unsatisfactory attempt at trying to do it in Kamembe. Well, I am going back to Kamembe not having had much success in getting it done here either but now have a useful contact through my Rwandese brother, Charles Semwaga, who came to my rescue when I met him in Kigali following my visit to the Immigration Office.

When Charles starts off by saying “My brother, let me tell you something…”, I know some words of wisdom and advice are coming and they do.  Charles really understands how things work here and, perhaps more importantly, how the Rwandese and Muzungus relate to one another.  So it is a lesson for me, maybe a humbling one but just another thing I need to understand and learn as part of my journey here in Rwanda.

Having come back to this blog post to review and edit it, I have decided to change it as when I wrote it, yesterday in Kigali, it seemed to be a good excuse to have a rant about the frustrations I am going through to get my visa/permit sorted. Decided it makes rather boring reading and I am coming to accept, rather than just understand, there are reasons for why things are done here in the way they are so I really just have to stay patient, don’t get so indignant and don’t think things are going to change because I don’t like the fact that it could all be easier if they did things in a different way.

On a more positive note, coming to Kigali again I still marvel at the developments in the city.  Sitting in a new shopping centre on Friday afternoon, I just people watched and strolled around some of the new ‘designer’ stores – there’s even an Apple reseller now (the technology and not the fruit type!) and a number of fashion outlets selling very expensive clothes but without any shoppers and quite a few bored looking shop assistants. 

Christmas comes early to Kigali

Saturday was ‘Umuganda’ or community workday that takes place across the country on the last Saturday of each month. The public are required to do some practical work in their Umudugudu (not easy to say), a community sub-division of around 10 houses. Rwanda is made up of five provinces, with each province split into districts, then sectors (like Kamembe) and then cells, each run by either a governor, mayor, community leader, all the way down to an Umudugudu. The government has decentralised a lot of control to encourage people to take responsibility for their community and to work alongside one another.

Staff at Peace Guest House were busy working together on clearing and improving a small plot of land at the entrance. Some staff, who live outside the Guest House, have to be given letters to give to their community leaders to explain why they are not available to take part in Umuganda in their community so there are very strict rules and regulations.

Kigali, as a result, was deserted on Saturday with very little traffic on the roads and with security patrols checking cars and buses to see, I assume, why people were not doing Umuganda.

Saturday morning rush hour in Kigali!

Stopping & checking buses in Kigali

This week I will say goodbye to Tony, Daniele, Rob, Jan, Ian and Mary as they head back to the UK. Have just met a lovely young couple, Julie and Tim, from the UK – Tim is related to a couple in my church and Julie is here, in Rwanda, for a few months whilst Tim has come to visit.  They are just up the lake and came down for lunch at the Guest House – realise it is a small world.

I come across many interesting people who come to Rwanda to work in some form or another. It’s always interesting to find out what they are up to – I met one chap in Kigali who is going research into the SME (Small, Medium Enterprise) market here in Rwanda and why more SME businesses are not developing; sat next to a young Chinese man at the Immigration Office who is working here in the construction business whilst on my other side was a Chinese woman involved in solar panels.

Guest House annexe being built

I take the occasional look, over the wall of the Guest House, to see how work is progressing on the annexe being built.  The basement, or cave as they call it, has been built and I noticed, the other day, an army of casual workers (men and women) had arrived to help out. All the work on the annexe is done by hand, the slope of land was dug by hand which in itself is an amazing feat; the rocks, cement and sand were all brought onto the site by hand and there is no sight or sound or any mechanical digger or machinery of any kind. As usual, heads come in very useful!

Army of workers