The Rwandan Episodes: 2
Subject: In which I realize this is not a vacation
Captain's log,
Not a vacation
Two weeks marks the maximum length of time that I've spent in a place where I did not live. Not sure if that makes me boring or ADD. Regardless, it seems Kigali and I have hit a milestone together.
The beauty of moving abroad is that you learn a great deal about yourself. For example, you come to realize that it isn't beyond you to regularly say a variety of moronic things like "can I get a tour?" in a gym the size of your childhood bedroom. You also become accustomed to seeming crazy or dull-witted in public when, perhaps, you stare blankly at perfectly normal things like milk sold in plastic bags and what looks like lizard eggs (???).
So so many questions....I made it out of there with some fruit, tea, mango juice, and my customary 100 year old Snickers bar. I'm so winning at this living in Rwanda business.
The beauty of moving abroad is that you learn a great deal about yourself. For example, you come to realize that it isn't beyond you to regularly say a variety of moronic things like "can I get a tour?" in a gym the size of your childhood bedroom. You also become accustomed to seeming crazy or dull-witted in public when, perhaps, you stare blankly at perfectly normal things like milk sold in plastic bags and what looks like lizard eggs (???).
So so many questions....I made it out of there with some fruit, tea, mango juice, and my customary 100 year old Snickers bar. I'm so winning at this living in Rwanda business.
"Mozungo"
The most common definition of the Kinyarwandan word "mozungo" is white person. Someone tried to make me feel better by saying it meant something more like "foreigner," but yea, whatever. All of these expats, who contrary to my last communique, I am starting to see as people and not the rejects of their respective countries (no hypocrisy here shhhh), are resigned or don't care or whatever. I'm doing my best not to sound like a petulant child and continuously argue the injustice of being lumped in with Africa's colonizers every time I'm referred to as a mozungo, which is all the damn time.
Africa is a loaded concept, in addition to being a huge geographical region. Lot of embarrassing ugly shit for the West went down here. OF WHICH I DO NOT WANT TO BE ASSOCIATED.
End of tirade.
Quick shift to momentary laying aside of post-colonial complexities and focusing entirely on my love of exploration, thusly: I've been reading Heart of Darkness in preparation for what I will be for Halloween. Which is......* drum roll *........ a badass. Famous explorer of the Congolese jungles. Crystal Ramos, the female Dr. Livingstone, who shall trek up Nyiragongo, an active volcano, to summit in a little hut in freezing temperatures to witness the glowing lava pitch blackness and be the.coolest.person.EVAR.
Serious stuff, aka: the "g-word"
Unfortunately, most people can't hear about Rwanda and not think about the genocide, which took place in our very recent lifetimes. I haven't heard of it spoken about much directly and if so, its usually in quiet tones and to give me, the newbie, a quick explanation. I asked on my first day why Rwandan people's noses are so perfect (its like Beverly Hills up in here yo) and was gently told that I should avoid said commentary. There's some history where the colonialists gave preferential treatment to one ethnic group over the other due to their supposedly more aryan features, which led to socioeconomic differences, which led to tensions...etc. The country has done a pretty great job of moving past what happened, but the scars run deep. For the government, in the following years, integration between the Hutu and Tutsi groups was achieved through Gacaca courts and policies focused on building a cohesive Rwandan society. I've heard the words "Hutu" or "Tutsi" mentioned once and that was from a PhD student who was outlining theories on how the "two" (some theories argue that there is no difference ethnically even, but that it was always socioeconomic) groups came to arrive in east Africa.
Rwanda is doing great in the few decades since the genocide, but human nature is immeasurably fucked up so its highly unlikely that you heard that there was a genocide in Burundi only last year. Burundi is a country about the same size as Rwanda and borders it on the south side. All information on the genocide was suppressed, except for what was communicated via text and facebook to friends outside of Burundi-- read an eloquent account here.
An Australian guy yesterday randomly and rather somberly mentioned the genocide of Aborigines in his country. Chip on my shoulder, I bring up the native american genocide spiel up a few times a day (see: "Mozungo" above). And you know the Israelis always gotta be bringin up the Holocaust. I'm half kidding. But seriously, Rwanda, for us foreigners, is helping to serve as a reminder of how we keep fucking this "never again" shit up.
Mike drop.
-CR
PS-- I'm making friends. I don't have malaria yet. But I did fall... again... in a ditch.... again. Sigh.
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