A quick round up

First half of the week was spent with my schools. I’m really enjoying getting to know all the children and in most of the classes, I’m even managing to remember names which is nice. Another thing which I was really happy to see was many of the teachers using ideas we’d talked about. I saw a brilliant exploration of ‘some/any’ through dialogue. The best thing was the teacher really seeing how much easier the grammar teaching was when there was some context to the lesson. Given meaning, the lesson content was far easier for the children to grasp and as an observer this was great to see. I’ve been giving lots of lessons too. In Muganza last week some teachers were out taking part in a training so classes had been amalgamated but with fewer teachers classes, normal lessons were abandoned and everyone piled into my lesson and began taking notes. I think I did ok :0).

American Embassy

Had a cheeky midweek trip to Kigali on Tuesday. Me and Charlotte fancied trying out the ‘ladies night’ at the American embassy where rumour had it, there would be half price drinks for the ladeees..And indeed at 1000 rwf (£1) for red wine it didn’t disappoint. There were lots of VSOers there although we spent most of the evening table surfing and chatting to everyone from the Peace corps to Basketball players from the national team. Was much fun.

Meeting new vols

On Wednesday, I was down to do a couple of sessions for the new vols. It was all pretty informal, me and Amy took a group each of the primary methodology trainers and answered their questions as best we could then we ran through some health & safety points, demonstrating how to set up the water filter and how to use the kerosene stoves etc. In the evening, feeling a little delicate from last night’s cheap drinks I went for one beer (to be social) with the newbies then fell in to bed at the Amani guest house where I was staying.

A quick trip home for work then it was back up to Kigali early Saturday morning. I was meeting the girls for lunch at the Ethiopian then we were off for more fun and games c/o VSO at the traditional ‘family dinner’. Now personally, VSO have been pretty good in terms of organisation/communication etc but today they would really test my patience! It’s usual for them to organise accommodation when there is a function going on in Kigali so as requested I emailed my requirements over two weeks ago and assumed that a room had been organised. Anyway, as I made my way to Kig, Charlotte texts to say that vols who had been helping with this week’s ICT (in-country triaining) were being moved to another guesthouse and perhaps we’d better check where we were staying. I then sent 3 texts to the girl responsible for booking the rooms and then called but still got no confirmation. By this time I’d met up with Charlotte and it was approaching lunch time and we really needed a room. In the end though my programme manger agreed that we could book into a nearby guest house and just charge VSO later. It turned out though that we had been booked into somewhere but no-one had bothered letting us know- what a palaver! Anyway, in the end it was fine. We dropped our stuff off and headed to Lalibela, the Ethiopian restaurant just across from Amahoro football stadium and a stone’s throw from Sarah’s. There we had an amazing veggie dish complete with injira (traditional bread which I still maintain looks a bit like bandages) and lentil dishes which we ate in the traditional way, with hands and out of a giant dish. During lunch we finalised arrangements for next week’s trek. We’re off to climb Karisimbi, not only that but we’ve decided to tag on the end of it a little trip to Gisenyi…Am very excited!

Reggae and eh Randy moto drivers...

It’s Monday and though I have been to the office writing up some lesson notes and trying to get a summary report off to VSO, I have retreated back home… Ostensibly because there is no electricity at the office but really I’m still suffering from a pretty heavy weekend in Kigali…

After the Ethiopian, me and Charlotte were all set to get back to the guest house. We needed to be ready at 5pm for the VSO team-building (oh joy!) before dinner. In the end though, there was such an amazing atmosphere outside the stadium that we decided to grab tickets for the game and root on Rwanda in a match against Egypt. We were chuffed at our seats. Having bought the cheapest tickets, we weren’t quite sure where to go in so just joined any queue. Predictably we were in the wrong one but no matter, a flash of a smile and we were waved into the expensive shaded area of the stand complete with seats and the best view of the game. Nice.

After 40 mins, we’d picked our favourite players watched them kick the ball so there was nothing more to see (yeh I’m not the biggest fan) but the atmosphere was amazing and we were glad we went…Think the score stayed 0-0 anyway so nothing missed. Suddenly though we had to rush back and get ready for the evening. An hour later, we took motos up to Luna d’or and Chris did his usual repertoire of team-building games for the whole of the VSO Rwanda contingent which is brave of him to say the least.

Dinner was amazing as was the traditional Intore dancing. I was gutted I’d left my camera at the guest house…

Around 9pm we made our way to the bar where Steve was playing with his reggae band. He was off back to Canada, as was Nidhi, the next day so it was a really lovely way to say goodbye. The band itself was fantastic and I’m gutted I hadn’t got to see them before…It was a really good crowd and it was great to see lots of the new vols come down too. Cadillac was next on the schedule. It’s a pretty cheesy club just out of town. Red wine had been flowing all night so by the time we arrived here, I was feeling pretty merry. Being Kigali, it’s a very small world so saw lots of people we’d met earlier that week including the Basketball team again. By around 2am, I began to flag a little so although there was some talk of heading to KBC (another bad night club), me and Charlotte decided to take motos back to the guest house. What we didn’t realise though is that KBC is on the way so in fact instead of heading staright home we had a little pit-stop here for some more dancing…On the dancefloor, we got chatting to Shakira who was determined one of us get it on with her ‘brother’. Their familial connection was dubious though, while she must have been about 5 ft, he was over 6ft and facially they looked nothing like each other. Anyway, despite us telling her we just wanted a good old boogey she decided to show us how we should dance with her brother and proceeded to gyrate against him. I guess they’re a close family. It was hilarious. We all sat chatting for a bit she showed us pics of her two children…and then of their fathers, one aussie the other rawndan. We’re not quite sure what she does for a living but she seemed quite comfortable and was genuinely offended when we refused her offer of drinks.

We eventually got in at 5am no thanks to Charlotte’s frisky moto driver who it seemed wanted to carry on the party…while he was driving! As my moto overtook Charlotte’s, I waved cheerfully. As I do Charlotte is tapping her driver and saying something to him. Just then she shouts that her driver isn’t exactly keeping his hands on the throttle. When we arrive back, we realise the driver is high as a kite. He is still trying to kiss himself in the mirror as he had done throughout the ride and is wondering why we don’t love him. Aaahh well, no harm done I guess…

Sunday morning is a blur. Lots of us meet for lunch before going our separate ways back to ‘the sticks’. After some welcome calls from back home it’s straight to bed for me.