Ruhengeri

Slept a solid 11.5 hours last night. Toally wiped out from going 48+ without any sleep.

We left the ghuesthouse at around 10 this morning for Ruhengeri. Lucky for us, the road between Kigali and Ruhengeri is one of the few paved roads in Rwanda outside the capital. It was quite a trip. Rwanda is called the land of 1,000 hills, but it should really be called land of 1,000 mountains. The topography is ver similar to that of Colorado. The travel experience was similar to the mountain passes in Colorado was well, excepting the fact that there was two-way traffic on the roads, along withj people walking on the side. The whole country is filled with farms: sorgum, bannanas, soybeans, regular beans, potatoes, corn, cows, goats. We stopped at some sort of fuel depot on top of one of the mountains to take photos and the like and we explored some of the farms there...very interesting.

We saw some of the members of the Rwandan cycling team (Jake's friend leads an organization that raises funds for them). We also saw a project rwanda coffee bike outside a mall in Kigali last night.

The reminds me of something I forgot ot mention last night, and this is the police presence. It's not so much here in Ruhengeri, but in Kigali it was strange. Lots of cops riding around in military dress with rifles in the back of large trucks. We saw that a few times. The mall we were at last night had two officers, each with a shotgun, at every entrance. Kinda creepy.

Anyways, Ruhengeri is much different than Kigali was. there are less paved streets, no hi-rises, the houses arten't as nice, and there is marginally less traffic. The atmosphere is considerably more relaxed as well.

We went ot view the Intore dancers at Ruhengeri Stadium this afternoon, an easy walk from our hotel. It was pretty cool. Some of us, including myself, got up and danced with them. The crowd of 200+ Rwandans found that to be hilarious. You'll have to see the video when I get home.

We spent the rest of the day exploring Ruhengeri on our own. It was pretty cool. We talked to a lot of people, some more extensively than others. They all want to know what we think of the country, and are very pleased to see that we are impressed. We're getting a hang of the Kinyirwandan phrases, and even learning an itsy-bitsy bit of Swahili. It's strange how people talk here, mixing Kinyirwandan, Swahili, French, and Enghlish together to varying degrees. Most people in Kigali spoke all four. Here, everyone speaks Kinyrwandan and Swahili, and most know either English or French. French is somewhat more common.

Well, gotta go back to the guesthouse, everyone's waiting.

Until next time,
Drew