Getting My Hands Dirty

I had never lived alone until the past month of my life and I had certainly never lived alone in a foreign and developing country so I was terrified at the prospect of starting my life at site. Probably shockingly to anyone who knows me and knows how much of an extrovert I am, I am ecstatic to have the house to myself. It means that I can do all of the weird American things I want on a daily basis. I can do workout videos in my living room, I can listen to music, and, most importantly, I can eat....things that I can taste. My first ventures into the world of cooking in Rwanda have been more than satisfactory. I stocked up on pasta and learned to make a mean marinara and Thai peanut sauce almost from scratch. I even made my first few batches of french-fries! On top of all my, less-than-healthy comfort food, I've finally been able to make myself a fresh salad with homemade vinaigrette, which has become a staple with almost every meal to make up for not being able to eat a single fresh vegetable during my three months of training. Last weekend, I even learned how to make yogurt, which means that I can have either strawberry or honey-cinnamon (or honey-cinnamon-peanut butter) in the morning instead of my normal eggs with veggies. And tonight, it's time for cheese sauce. I know that to my readers at home, my culinary adventures are probably somewhat less stimulating than my cultural ones, and we'll get to those, but I feel that, to truly convey my experience here I have to be honest about the things that take a priority in my life and quality cuisine is definitely one of them.

But I'll get on to the good stuff since I've done much more than sit around locked up in my house cooking. I do, after all, have to go to the market to buy ingredients and I spend a great deal of each day on foot, greeting people. Rwandans love greetings and nothing seems to make my village people happier than seeing me walk (or run, depending on the time of day) down the street saying “Mwaramutse!” (Good Morning) or “Mwiriwe!” (Good Afternoon) to everyone I see. As another a way to get integrated in my community, I've taken up farming. The nuns down the street from me help to run a farming cooperative, which has turned out to be a great place to make friends in the community. On the first day that I picked up a hoe, is was a huge shock. My friend Marigo was beyond incredulous that I was actually capable of doing the work. She kept on asking, “Azi gukora?!?” (she knows how to work?!?) and I don't think she believed it until she saw me with her own eyes. So farming has gone a long way towards changing my community's initial perceptions of me as an American, as well as providing me with something I like doing to fill what would probably otherwise be painfully dull days. One of my happiest days here was spent just sitting in the dirt, cutting the roots and shoots off of onions with a couple of breastfeeding mothers. I had already cut on one of my fingers (ironically, from chopping an onion the night before) and the juice was making it sting and we were there for so long that I got a sunburn and a callouses on my hands, but the sense of togetherness that comes from making sure that everyone has food on the table when they go home is insurmountable.

Sadly, the same mindset that seems to make people so ecstatic to see me farm has had some negative repercussions in my community. People seem to think that white people don't know how to work, not because they are incompetent, but rather because they never have to do it at home. I am definitely humbling myself by being willing to get my hands dirty. I found that some of the villagers are under the impression that there is a hierarchy of race in which white people don't need to work because they are, by far, the best. I had a particularly heartbreaking conversation with a young man who was convinced of the fact that white people were the best “class of race” and that they were followed by brown and then by black people, who were lowest and least promising of the races because God had created them last (He then asked me for books on the apocalypse). This is, of course, precisely the opposite of any scientifically-based telling of the origins of humans. It might just be me, but I find it ironic that the same people that are convinced of my inherent superiority are also shocked that I can somehow manage to lift a hoe and simultaneously infuriating that someone found it acceptable to brainwash the people of Rwanda into a framework that makes them feel inferior.

Whether I like them or not, these are the perceptions I'm up against and I'm working hard to change them. It's not enough that to that I told that boy about the discovery of the world's oldest human bones in Ethiopia or the multitude of accounts of a brown or black historical Jesus. Everyday, no matter how much of a hurry I'm in, I have to take the time to stop people on the streets that call me Muzungu and tell them my name, explaining that I don't like the word Muzungu because it means the same things as different, but I'm a person, just like everybody else. I only wish I had the Kinyarwanda skills to explain that skin color is determined by one, singular gene in the entirety of a person's DNA. Normally my explanations go a long way, but there are definitely days that I have my setbacks. For instance, days on which missionaries have come to visit the church. Now don't get me wrong, I have friends who are missionaries and I truly believe that their work can be good and the church visibly benefits the members of my community, but it's rather frustrating when I realize that a new congregation is in town only when everybody in my market place starts asking me for cookies and candy because the bandi (other) abazungu had just given them some. I explained the differences between myself and the missionaries by pointing out that they didn't speak Kinyarwanda, live in the village, or work with any of the people there. I said it was nice that they gave out candy, but that I can't afford to do that since I am only a volunteer. What I can afford to do is to give the people of my village two years of my time and hard work in the hopes that, someday, if they want candy, they can buy it for themselves.

However much I disagree with my village's missionary visitors, I still maintain a strong relationship with my church by farming, spending social time with the nuns and priests, and attending holiday and Sunday Mass. It's fairly obvious that these efforts are paying off. Father Vincent had me for drinks to introduce me to some of the teachers at my neighboring primary school and gloated about my Kinyarwanda and farming abilities.

He was so ecstatic that I came and introduced myself to him in Kinyarwanda on my first day here that he made a point of introducing me to the church congregation of thousands on New Years by asking me to make a speech. The service itself was actually so much fun that it wasn't even nerve-wracking to have to introduce myself. It was so large that it had to be held outside because not everyone could fit in the church. There was a sermon-making in Kinyarwanda (some of which I could actually follow, but spent a fair portion of playing with children) followed by several other components than I am assuming come pretty standard at Mass anywhere.....waving around frankincense and praying etc. Father Vincent and the sisters then proceeded to give the sacrament to the entire crowd as they lined up in an impressive and tedious feet of crowd management. But then came the dancing. It was headed off by the same sleepy girls that normally perform at rather solemn Sunday Mass, but it really started to pick up from there with dancers in brilliant costumes jumping all over the place and, eventually, get the crowd to join them. Sister Rukundo, who I am coming to love, got up a shook it with the rest of them.

However, not every day in paradise is so perfect. There are days that I am too tired to play with the kids outside of my house and wish they would stop calling my name. There are also days that I wish they understood dogs the same way Americans do so the kids wouldn't incite Beans to play with them and then run away screaming bloody-murder when she actually does. Granted, her training is going fairly well and I can stop her before she gets too riled up most of the time now. And then there's Alphonse, the town umusazi (crazy man). It's hard to say what's happened in his past, but he's clearly of an age that he would have witnessed the crimes of 1994 and there are no psychological services to speak of in Rwanda to help people to deal with trauma. As a result, he stumbles around each day, rambling into a telephone that may or may not even have someone else on the other end, yelling at people. I'm pretty sure that he's harmless, but that the village people are afraid of him because he's different and being treated differently is something I can emphasize with quite well. I want to reach out to him, but it doesn't help that he's obviously a bit scared of me because of my skin. I actually think he would really appreciate it if I would leave so things could go back to normal, as evident by the fact that he normally follows me around the marketplace trying to scare me when he sees me there. Thankfully, my village people are very protective of me so I rarely need to tolerate this for very long.

For the most part, my village has been extremely welcoming and easy to move in to. I'm excited now that classes have officially started (which I will have to write about later) and I have a distinct purpose, but I am also looking forward to working on my own projects in the village. The priests and nuns want to learn English in exchange for French and my farming friends want to learn yoga after I told them I was more worried about their backs than my own. So much to do and so little time. Two years is already starting to feel like nothing at all.