We had an interesting drive from the city. Many of the locals we walking along the road side in their Sunday best. We believe they must have been returning home from church. Three quarters of the drive was on a two lane paved road. This road was put in 4 years ago. We then turned on a road called "African Message Road" by our guide. It was a dirt road with pot holes. Compared to the dirt roads some of us have travelled on in other African countries it was pretty smooth.
Even though Rwanda is the poorest country in Africa, we had such an encouraging drive. We saw many houses be build. Many of high quality construction with doors, windows, columns out front as well as porches. We saw factories being built in these remote village which will bring jobs to these communities and improve the quality of the locals lives.
Even though we have accommodations with walls and doors, many of us were reminiscing about our accommodations we had in Tanzania. Actually missing the opportunity to sleep with just a mosquitoes net between us and nature. We now have a mosquitoes around our beds in our rooms with 4 walls, electricity and running water.
Our first team dinner! We had a fabulous authenic Africa meal on African time. (Long service! Nothing is fast in Africa.)
Sandy taking a picture of our special guest Raymond and his bride to be Maria! Raymond was our tour guide in previous builds in Tanzania and came to visit us during our short stay in Kigali! It was so great to see them!
Our fearless leader Rick addressing the team of our exciting build!
Lama from Building Bridges with Rwanda and Julio from Calgary
Our guide Steven with me!
We did not get a chance to visit the job site and the locals after we arrived. We are all so excited to get there tomorrow morning to inspect the site, set the plan and get hard at work. We expect tomorrow to be low 30's in temperature and the humidity does not seem as high here as Tanzania. Fingers crossed it's not too hot for our first day!
The Internet is not working where we are staying so we will do our best to keep you updated and have pictures posted.
Wish us luck for our first day....
Marianne Thompson
DWC Participant
Rwanda, October 2013
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