Adrift in a Sea of Rolling Hills
My time in the Pays des Mille Collines
Archive for Uncategorized
October 30, 2008 at 12:16 am · Filed under Uncategorized
If you’ve been following the news today, you’ll know that the situation in Northeast Congo, on the border with Rwanda, has been escalating. Yesterday rebels pushed back UN troops and moved into area in the Northeast; today they’ve surrounded the provincial capital, Goma, threatening to take it and shots were exchanged across the Rwanda border. At day’s end, the rebels were calling for a ceasefire,and the UN warned that Congo is on the verge of a catastrophic refugee and humanitarian crisis, as thousands of refugees are already fleeing Goma and other parts of Congo.
While Rwanda has been able to attain stability and peace since the genocide, it has been at the expense of instability throughout Eastern Congo. The RPF, the rebel force which liberated Rwanda, literally chased their war into the Congo. After the war, Hutu militia sought refuge in Congo and established camps, all with Congolese support. They continued their terror on the small Tutsi population in Congo, originally refugees themselves from Hutu pogroms in Rwanda. Since the genocide, for reasons of Congo’s own making and the overflow and leftovers of the war from Rwanda, Congo has been locked in civil war and instability all sparked from Northeast Congo.
Now the rebels, claiming to be protecting the small Tutsi population from the Hutu militia have taken much of Northeast Congo in a muddy battleground that includes the world’s largest UN peacekeeping force, inept Congolese forces, and, surely, Ugandan and Rwandan forces operating covertly in the area. It’s a mess.
For an excellent overview of the current crisis and “How’s Congo’s Heaven became Hell,” check out this article from the BBC.
October 24, 2008 at 7:10 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
I’ve a lot of time telling you about Rwanda already, but not much talking about genocide. It’s remarkable how easy it is to go along here without thinking about it - even forgetting about it - , notwithstanding working for an organization which directly engages the genocide. But it’s there.
Read the rest of this entry »
October 18, 2008 at 3:34 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
This post isn’t about Africa, but it was on the radio in Africa, which is close enough. While driving back from our village site yesterday, BBC Radio replayed a 1993 radio documentary called “Ghetto Life 101.” It features 13 year old Lee Allen Jones and his friend, 14 year old Lloyd Newman, narrating their life in the ghetto of South Side Chicago. They are at once soberingly innocent and all too aware of the hopeless world they live in. It’s startling and one of the most powerful pieces I’ve ever heard. Here I was driving through the countryside of a poor, African country who just one year after this piece aired, was victimized by civil war and genocide. And I was most horrified by the state of these parts of our own, “advanced” and “developed” country. In 14 years, Rwanda has come so far and in the same time, America’s ghettos have remain unchanged, marked by drugs, senseless violence, and overwhelming hopelessness.
Take 25 minutes and listen: BBC Radio.
October 17, 2008 at 2:57 am · Filed under Uncategorized
So apparently the some streets have names here (but try telling the Rwandese that) and mine is called Umuganda Boulevard. For the most part though, street names and addresses are more the stuff of Western legend than practical reality. When I registered with the US Embassy, under address I put Prima 2000, the name of my building (2000 as in the millenium, not a street number). Apparently this is how addresses work here.
Anyways, I find the street quite quiet and boring. We’re in a diplomatic part of the city (American Embassy, British Embassy, EU, President’s Office, Ministry of Education and other embassies all have their “addresses” on my street) and about 10 minutes away from the downtown (just one hill over). But my neighbor apparently (that’s the third time I’ve use that word in this post, I know) gets up early enough to see a much more interesting street than I do.
So for a good description of where I’m living, check it out at her blog.
October 10, 2008 at 3:44 pm · Filed under Travel, Uncategorized
Rwanda is no bigger than the state of Maryland in size, but with all due respect to the Chesapeake, it’s staggering how much this tiny place has to offer. There are, of course, its world famous mountain gorillas. The volcanic mountains it shares with Uganda and Congo are one of the only places in the world to find the mountain gorilla. Venture west to Akagera Game Park and you’ll find zebras, hippos, giraffes, antelope, crocodiles, elephants, and even the occasional lion. At it’s eastern end is Lake Kivu, a stunning view that is one of the 20 largest freshwater bodies in the world. And to the South you’ll find Africa’s largest montane rainforest, home to chimpanzees and a score of other monkey species, and, for a couple days, me and my trekking buddies.
We began our adventure with a 430am appointment with the chimps of Nyungwe rainforest. After a one and one half hour drive along a muddied, barley passable dirt road, past rolling hills of breathtaking tea plantations, deep into the rainforest, we set out on foot to trek a family of chimps. An hour or so into the forest, we found our first chimp, resting high in the trees, and soon the chorus of hoots and calls filled our ears. We trekked deeper and found a young chimp and its mother and trees shook back and forth as several more swung through the tree tops.
We went to see the chimps, but it was the sounds and smells of the rainforest that most fascinated me. The rain dropping, the insects creeking, the trees rustling, the birds chirping, it’s a soothing and blissful orchestra that hits its crescendo with the calls of the chimps. It’s easy to see why they put these sounds on alarm clocks. Your senses come alive with the crisp mountain air and the flowing scents of green, dewey life. How extraordinary it is to close your eyes, pique your ears, and breathe deeply in. We share 95% of our genetic code with the chimps, but, standing there, you have to wonder where in that other 5% it made sense to leave this tropical paradise.
We followed our trek with a drive to Rwanda’s Eastern edge and sweeping views of beautiful Lake Kivu, Rwanda’s border with Congo. The drive took us along sweeping valleys and steep hillsides of tea plantations where the trees grow almost horizontally at points. I was awed by the poetic sightlines of the plantations of tea trees that share the hills with rainforest in this corner of this country. We finally ventured to the very edge of Rwanda, before turning back at the Congo border crossing.
The next morning we set out before the park office opened to take a trail to a waterfall 5km into the forest. As the trail opened up into a vast tea plantation, we found ourselves hopelessly lost trying to find the entrance to the forest. Up and down the hills of tea we trekked, but the waterfall proved elusive. We returned to find the park rangers upset and angry that we had entered the park with paying and without a guide. When we told them we never passed the tea trees, we laughed it off and all was okay.
I guess I’ll have to save the waterfall for next time.
September 30, 2008 at 6:03 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Round challah with raisins? Check.
There may be no Jewish bakers in Kigali, but here’s evidence that there are bakers who can be taught to bake Jewish.
Shana Tovah from Rwanda.
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