Kigali

Surprisingly, the arrival of our 25 friends in Kigali has consumed most of our past week and has not allowed us access to a computer. For the first week of our African journey Dan and I spent our days exploring Kigali. Kigali is clean, beautiful and constantly bustling. The city is spread out over at least a dozen rolling lush green hills dotted with banana trees and corn fields. Brick houses line the dusty red roads.

Dan and I spent our days on crowded fifteen passenger city buses and slow moving motos and have enjoyed a constant diet of beans, rice, potato, banana and brechette(basically goat on a stick- the local favorite). We have met a dear friend Chistopher who has given us a incredibly warm welcome to Rwanda which has included several Rwandan lunches and tours around downtown. Chistopher has even been kind enough to invite us to his house where we enjoyed an evening of Rwandan beans and rice and of course rap music videos. What unites us always comes in surprising forms!

On May 15th Dan, Lama, Chistopher and myself spent the day meeting our host partners. At the Nelson Mandela center, just outside Kigali, we met the greenhelmets team from Germany who will be the architects on the Covaga center. Currently the team is working with the community to build a school for vocational training. We enjoyed a french cup of Rwandan coffee with the group then headed to Gashora to meet the Covaga women.


Jen and Dan
Student Team Leaders
Rwanda May 2010