Home for the holidays

As much as I thought I was prepared to spend Christmas and New Year’s in Africa, I’ve realized over the past few days that there really is no place like home for the holidays. Al Stillman certainly had it right when he wrote those lyrics over fifty years ago – “Oh, there’s no place like home for the holidays, ’cause no matter how far away you roam, if you want to be happy in a million ways, for the holidays you can’t beat home sweet home.” There really is nothing that can compare to taking time to celebrate the holidays at home with family and friends. I hope everyone else feels as wonderfully happy (in a million ways) and truly thankful as I do this holiday season. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Unexpected plans

When I woke up this morning, I never thought that seven hours later I’d be sitting at a tropical resort in the middle of the Tanzanian savannah. And yet here I am, sitting in a breezy, open restaurant, surrounded by beautiful purple, orange and pink flowers and cacti, sipping on “passion juice” (which I can only assume is made from passion fruit), listening to exotic birds that occasionally land on the patio next to me, gazing at Mount Kilimanjaro in the not-so-far distance. The scene is a little different than the uncomfortable, stuffy, dirty airport terminal where I thought I would spend my day. But when I was forced out of the Kilimanjaro airport upon arrival and given the option of walking back in by a different door or finding somewhere else to pass the time, I decided to explore. And so here I am at the Kia Lodge, just one kilometer and a world away from the airport, actually enjoying the ten hours that I'm having to wait before catching my next flight to Dar es Salaam.

Turkey dinner

Last night we celebrated Christmas one more time before everyone left for the holidays.

This time, though, we had a more traditional Christmas dinner – turkey (imported from South Africa), stuffing (with mix imported from the U.S.), mashed potatoes, gravy (imported from the U.S.), cranberry sauce (also imported from the U.S.), green beans, salad, apple crisp, chocolate cake (from a box imported from the U.S.) and oatmeal cookies (with mix imported from the U.S.). I don’t think I realized until just now how much of that meal was imported from elsewhere in the world. It may seem ridiculous, but none of those items could have been made (except, maybe, the gravy and oatmeal cookies) without importing certain items via a friend at the U.S. embassy.

Certainly some imported items can be found in Rwanda without having connections to the embassy, but most often they’re incredibly expensive. For example, a small bottle of Listerine mouthwash sells for almost $30 and a can of tuna is around $4. However, even shopping for items that are locally produced or imported for more reasonable costs is an experience. Fresh fruit and produce are certainly the easiest; there’s always someone walking down the road with a basket full of mangos or bananas or pineapples on their head, and the market is full of people selling all kinds of vegetables. Shopping for other food items, though, is something of a game. There are certain items that you can only find at BCK, certain ones that should be bought at City Market, and certain things that are best from La Galette. Still there are other items that require even more creative shopping. For example, the orphanage in Kimihurura takes orders for bagels on Thursday afternoons, one of the supermarkets receives shipments of Philadelphia cream cheese every few weeks, and numerous smaller shops occasionally have other specialty items. So a shopping trip for groceries is more like a game of hide and seek around the city.

I feel like I should also comment on the fact that it seems like I’ve been writing about food a lot lately, with Thanksgiving dinner, my Christmas dinner and this turkey dinner. I’ve been writing a lot about the food itself, which is certainly exciting as a change from the usual Rwandan cuisine, but the significance of these dinners is more related to the gathering of friends and the feeling of home. In a country where the weather is constantly sunny and over eighty degrees and where many holiday traditions are absent, it would be easy to miss the comfort and excitement of the Christmas season, but thankfully gathering and celebrating with good friends make the holiday season much more real.

Lunch with Ben Affleck

At lunch today, I ran into Ben Affleck. Yes, the actor Ben Affleck, from ‘Good Will Hunting’ and ‘Dogma’ and whatever other movies. According to the ever-reliable ‘New Times’, he was in town “explore investment opportunities for future business engagements.” Supposedly he’s interested in investing in “entertainment, value addition in agriculture and education,” so he was at Bourbon Café, where I was having lunch with friends, for a meeting with one of the government ministers. Life in Kigali is so random sometimes.

Trouble in the DRC

Most of the time, I pay little attention to email from the U.S. Embassy, but I received one today that caught my attention:

The U.S. Embassy hereby informs American citizens in Rwanda that all non-essential travel to the province of North Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) should be deferred until further notice. The Travel Warning issued by Embassy Kinshasa dated April 24, 2007 remains in effect for the DRC.

According to media reports, as well as information provided by the UN Mission in Congo (MONUC) and the U.S. Embassy representative in Goma, the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC) stepped up military action against General Laurent Nkunda and his forces, using helicopter gunships and heavy artillery in the area of Mushake on December 4. Nkunda loyalists are moving from Kabati and Kilolirwe towards Kichanda and further north. Movements of forces on both sides, build-up of government troops, and continued clashes are expected. Numerous civilians are fleeing the region."

AFN football

Thanks to the fact that someone must have forgotten to disconnect the Armed Forces Network (AFN) from the house some of my friends just moved into, I just watched a real, live, American football game. I may not be a big fan of the Cowboys or the Lions (or, really, professional football in general, for that matter), but I was thrilled to have the chance to watch a game. Since the games will be on every week, I think we might have a new Sunday night tradition.

Puppy

After dinner last night, we had plans to go out to a new club in Kigali. We drove out to the area of town where we had been told it was and found out that the opening had been postponed until the next weekend. Just as we were about to turn back onto the main road to head back home, we saw a little puppy dodging cars in the middle of the road. Terrified that she’d be hit by a car (and knowing that even if she wasn’t hit by a car, she didn’t have much of a future on the streets of Kigali), we decided to pick her up and take her home. We brought her back to the house, where we gave her some leftover fried chicken, bathed her and then spent quite a while picking ticks and fleas off of her. Apparently it was all a little much for her, because as soon as we finished, she fell fast asleep and slept through the entire night. So now we (that's a collective "we" since the puppy isn't living at my house and it's still not clear where she'll be living when) have a sweet puppy to play with and take care of.

Christmas dinner

Yesterday afternoon, I went to the supermarket to shop for groceries to cook a Southern dinner for about a dozen of my good friends who were coming over to celebrate Christmas in Kigali. Most of what I planned to make was easy and familiar recipes, but trying to find the right ingredients in Kigali is always a little bit of a challenge. (For example, it’s impossible to find cheddar cheese, brown sugar, sour cream, vanilla extract and who knows what else.) Thankfully I was able to find most of what I needed for dinner – including four whole chickens imported from Burundi.

Now, as many times as I’ve eaten fried chicken, I have to confess that I’ve never actually fixed it, so I was a little nervous. I didn't want to disappoint, but somehow, before long, we had stoves and ovens full of food, including more than enough flour-coated chicken and a big pot of oil. I forgot to take a picture before everyone started filling their plates, but I think everything still looks pretty good.With a decorated Christmas tree, Santa hats, Christmas music, and mistletoe, not to mention lots of good company, it really felt like Christmas.After dinner we exchanged gifts and finished up the night with a "family portrait" of all of us in our hats. It was really a perfect celebration of the holidays together.

Thunderstorm

This morning, something incredible happened. I woke up to the sound of a thunderstorm. Of course the sound of rain is nothing new since it’s been raining almost daily since September, but until recently, it only rained in the afternoons. Even now that it's started raining some mornings, I realized today that as often and as hard as it rains, there's never any thunder. It's just the opposite of home, where it seems that any time it pours rain, there's thunder to go with it. I never thought that waking up to a thunderstorm would be such a comfort. Plus, it was much easier to be lazy and sleep in with a thunderstorm outside than if it were sunny with the birds, chickens and dogs making noise in the street.

Des Mille Collines Rally

This weekend, one of my friends participated in Des Mille Collines Rally, one of the largest rally races in Rwanda. The race covers approximately 350 kilometers over two days time, and the cars race at speeds as high as 140 to 150 kilometers per hour on the roads in rural Rwanda. Four of us followed the race around Rwanda to take pictures and give moral support. We left early in the morning from the Hôtel des Mille Collines.
On Saturday, we headed east from Kigali to the Akagera region of the country, and on Sunday, the race went west into the Ruhengeri region. The race went through some really rural areas of Rwanda, so we were able to see a lot of towns and villages and a lot of the countryside that we would never see otherwise. The ride was bumpy, but beautiful.
Since the race is divided into sections, we were only able to see about half of it. We would skip a section in order to drive to the next one and set up, watch that section, skip the next one to drive to a new location, watch that section, etc. My "official" role of the weekend was photographer, so at every stop, I had to find the best place to set up the camera and take pictures of my friend's car.

Watching the race was pretty interesting, but what was probably more fun was watching the crowds that came out to see the race. Since the race was literally on roads, it passed right through villages like this one, so it was easy for people to gather and watch.
As you can imagine, rally racing in Rwanda isn't the safest of sports, but thankfully, there were no serious accidents this weekend and we had a great time.