Rwanda is a truly amazing country. On Saturday we all woke up early to go to the monthly event called umuganda. This happens on the 4th Saturday of every month. Shops close and everyone works together on this national community service day. We went to go help one particular umudugodo (village) with cultivating land for Cassava plants. The mayor recommended we help them. It was an hour and a half hike through woods and over mountains and down hills, it was beautiful but of course I forgot my camera. Anyway we get there and we see over 2 hundred people hoeing the ground, the old fashioned way to turn the soil. We all had to take turns with the hoes because they were many more people than there where tools which seems to be a common problem. Anyway we worked for a few hours on this large area of land, then everyone sat down for some sort of meeting and role check I think,(it was all in Kinyarwanda). Umuganda is a mandatory event in the country and some community’s even fine people who do not attend. After the meeting the Rwandans all start chanting and then dancing and I realized that in Rwanda everything turns into a dance party. There is never down time because anytime people are waiting to do something they just start singing and dancing. Maybe if we all did the world would be a happier place. For lunch we got to eat umugati, which is a roll of bread dough that you dip into a sauce. I really like it but it takes some getting used to. The way one person refers to it here is the most earthy taste you can imagine, but in a good way.
Sunday it was off to Kigali. We are staying in a hotel with huts as rooms. Its really nice, we have hot water showers and flushing toilets and amazing food. We had French toast for breakfast which made me amazingly happy. Today we met our supervisors of the organizations we will be working with. And we also have free wireless internet, what more could a PCV ask for!
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