Goodbye Cyangugu, Goodbye Kigali

So this is it - We are in the finally in week 10 - literally the end of our placement. The week has consisted of thoughts and reflections. We spent three days concentrating own finishing our paperwork.

On Wednesday, we went to the feeding clinic for the last time. A  few of the mothers were present and they gave us a closing speech, sang songs for us and we prayed together. In the evening, we had a farewell gathering with all our friends, staff from the Diocese and Peace Guest House. We got the chance to say thank you and goodbye to everyone

By thursday we are packed up and ready to go back to Kigali. We will miss Cyangugu so so much! It's been an unbelievable journey, we have grown so much and discovered new things about ourselves, each other and GOD!

Another Chapter has ended - A new chapter begins. Glory to God!

- Claudia

Week 9

So it’s our last but one week in Cyangugu, we can’t believe it’s already coming to an end. The reality of it is hard to take in but we know it is life-changing for each and every one of us. So without taking much time, this week we began by visiting the tree nurseries as we had planned with Sam last week.

On Monday, we set off for the tree nurseries with Michael around 9am, for three and a half hours we worked tiresomely, counting and re-counting the Grevella polly pots. Believe me, it might seem like a simple task, but these 9.5cm by 8cm polly pots were tightly packed together and did not contain plants. Our different methods of counting took a good 3 hours! At the end of which we were exhausted. We arrived back home for lunch, and took the rest of the day as a team to plan for the days ahead as well as to work on our individual plans.

We were free till 4pm. Speciose had invited us to hers for Evening Tea. We had some beautiful African Tea with cake, samosas and chapatti. All fresh prepared on site, I am sure by Diane, her daughter. It was a night of laughs, music and love. Her home is blessed and her house is Magnificent!

On Tuesday we went back to the tree nurseries. We set off with Michael – again to finish counting the Calladrilla and Carralld polly pots. Faith emerged Chief Statistician, working out a formula for finding an estimate to work out the population of polly pots in the Shortest time – HOORAY! I think it’s

ALL PP(L * B) – BPP

See Appendix for explanation

Back at home, Faith and I prepared doughnuts for some very important guests. Faith invited a few of the local kids for a movie night. Just for one night they had a few sweets, small chops and comfy sofas and WALL-E to demonstrate her love.

The following day, we went to Murangi Farm to see the progress made since our last visit. The farm had filled the chicken coops with 500 new Belgium chicks. The cows were back from grazing and we assisted with feeding them grass – They really are spoilt! We saw the new biogas plant, which would provide electricity and power from cow dung; the awesomeness of nature!

Best of all, the maize crops had grown so much since our last visit. They stood over 6 feet high compared to the little shoots we saw about 2 months ago. What was impressive was the fact that they were very healthy too. That is what counts the most; they are truly demonstrating good farming techniques.

In the afternoon, we worked on our reports and proposals together as a group. Faith and Patrice also worked on the team case study. At early evening, we ended group work for the day and continued at 9.30am on Thursday.

The next two days we spent most of our time working on the project report and other Tearfund documents we had to complete. 

On Saturday(the 30th), we participated in our last Umuganda. The district office and the Agroforestry Commission contacted RDIS because they wanted trees to be planted for Umuganda. Sam was very happy because the grevella plants at the tree nurseries were needed by the government! He is always talking about the benefits of agroforestry plants for disaster risk management and that call was definitely a prayer answered. 

We met the team of RDIS staff from Muhanga that has come to partake in umuganda in Cyangugu. At 4pm, we all sat down to enjoy tea and talked about our 9 weeks in Rwanda working with RDIS. It was a time to hear anycomments, suggestions and criticisms that we had. It was great meeting the staff of Muhanga, we rounded the evening off posing for group photos

On sunday, we attended English service as usual at the Kamembe Parish. Afterwards, Faith, Patrice and I went with RDIS Muhanga staff to another parish under the Cyangugu diocese. Words can't describe what we saw. Check out this sneak-peek 1 minute video of the action at church.

Told you - A M A Z I N G...right!? This rounded off a brillant week, it was indeed a Sunday to round off all our Sundays in Cyangugu. Glory to God!

- Claudia

Time is running out - Week 8!

This week we were able to finalise the cooking stoves project. During the week, we went to Mundima and Gatovu to distribute cement to finish off the stoves made. Roxane, Valentin and I went to Mundima while Faith and Patrice went to Gatovu.

On Monday, we had a meeting with the village leaders to get the final list of beneficiaries who had received stoves. The village leaders went to inform the beneficiaries, that we would be distributing cement from Tuesday till the end of the week.

On Tuesday, 13 people came to collect cement; that was in Mundima. On Wednesday, 4 people came to collect cement and on Thursday, there were 3 people from Mundima who came to collect their cement. Faith and Patrice did a great job in ensuring that all 24 beneficiaries received 2kg of cement.

On Thursday, later in the afternoon, we had a meeting with Sam our co-ordinator to plan our timetable for the week ahead.

Friday was our free day, so we decided to explore our surroundings.

On Saturday, we went to the feeding clinic. Faith led a safe hand washing sessions to show the kids the health benefits of good hand washing. There were about 32 kids in attendance. We hoped that some parents would attend but it was a bit short notice. We are hoping to do it again so we reinforce the importance of washing hands regularly.

Faith made an illustration to demonstrate the information and Patrice delivered the message in Kinyarwanda. They did such a great job, it was very interactive and the kids really enjoyed themselves. Faith was very organised; she had brought a few packets of soap from England which she distributed to all the children.

Take a look at the video to see how the lesson went.

In the afternoon, Faith, Valentin and Sam attended a Rwandan wedding ceremony. We stayed for a short time at the reception. It was a good service, lots of advice for the newlyweds, lots of speeches and plenty gifts as well.

In the evening we had practice at home because Faith, Roxane and I would be singing in the choir on Sunday. Valentin preached on Sunday. Our contribution was appreciated and we enjoyed doing it for God and also represent the team.

We stayed for the Kinyarwanda Service because Jane (Gatovu village leader) invited us to see her daughter getting baptised. It was a very lively service, the praise and worship was exciting. The choir members literally danced through the congregation. There was even some ….dancing (a popular dance in Rwandan churches, Google it!)

So there you go. A thrilling end to a good beginning - It was a fulfilling week!

-          Claudia

Week Seven

Week seven has been another busy week for team Cyangugu. We kicked off the week eager to speed up the production of our Energy Efficient Cooking Stoves, and so with advice from our partners at RDIS and the help of the local village leaders, we carefully selected 4 of the 10 locals we had trained in the making of these stoves. The plan was to then spilt into two groups, consisting of 2 trained locals and 2/3 ICS volunteers (Us).  With one group working in Gatovu and the other in Mundima.

By Tuesday we were very pleased with the progress we'd  made,  despite a few hiccups, our two teams had managed to make a grand total of 29/50 stoves! :D

Also worth a mention, was the lovely dinner we had at the home of our colleague, Sam. We spent the entire evening dancing, laughing and as usual we ate ALOT! And oh, we also had the besssssssssst African Chai tea...Ever!!

Towards the middle of the week we had another special visitor, Maddie, our ???. who braved the 6 HOUR! drive from Kigali to come and see us! :) It was really lovely having her here (plus she brought biscuits! - Claudia made me put that in ;) ) and we got to tell her about all the work we'd completed during our 7 weeks here. We also got to have individual one on ones with her, and discuss our learning and growth since we first arrived. It was truly amazing hearing what we've all learnt, and interesting to see the debates and life lessons this brought up afterwards.

We ended the week on a high, sharing breakfast with the Bishop of Cyangugu, as well as other RDIS staff.It was such a blessed time, with a lot of laughs! But most importantly, we also got to share with the Bishop all the work we've been doing during our time here.

That pretty much sums up week 7, looking forward to what week 8 will bring :)

Week Six

Our Sixth Week was an exciting one, as we had been waiting for the real action of making the cooking stoves in Gatovu and Mundima to start.

On Monday we could not start as expected due to the fact that the resources were being brought from Muhanga. On Monday evening, the clay bricks finally arrived and the trainers arrived in Cyangugu to start training the next day. While waiting for the resources to arrive, we had a free day so the team decided to visit one of the prisons here, when we got to the entrance the prison guard informed us that we needed permission from the head office in Kigali.

On Tuesday, the team attended meeting at the Diocese office concerning the cooking stoves project. The meeting involved the participants needed for the implementation of the project. The 10 animators (trainees), 2 experts, the village leaders from Gatovu and Mundima as well as Sam and Michael from RDIS were present. The meeting was planned to inform more about the importance of the cooking stoves, discussing about the budget, materials used and how the stoves were going to be constructed. Sam led the meeting, he was able to explain the environmental implications from using lots of firewood. Samuel, one of the expert trainers got the chance to explain how to build the stoves. Afterwards, we were all shown the special clay bricks that had come from Muhanga.

Wednesday was the day we started building the cooking stoves. We were divided into two groups, one group went to Gatovu (Patrice, Faith and Roxane) and the others went to Mundima (Valentin and Claudia) in order to learn how to build the Rondereza and also mentor that the selected beneficiaries received the cooking stoves. We participated in building the Rondereza by collecting mud, laying the bricks and mixing the materials. On that day, the total number of cooking stoves completed was 9, 5 in Gatovu and 4 in Mundima. In the evening, Roxane and Faith made some delicious pastry, a South African pastry called koeksisters.

On Thursday we continued from the previous day. Patrice, Faith and Roxane spent the day in Gatovu and Valentin and Claudia were in Mundima. The cooking stoves made were 6, 3 in each village.  The total number of cooking stoves completed in those two days were 15 in both villages.

On Friday, the experts built 11 stoves in Mundima and Gatovu, while the animators had gone for training at the Diocese office. The experts left on Friday evening.

 As usual on Saturday, we went to help at the feeding clinic. We played games with the kids, Faith brought some colour chalks along with her so the girls where with the children as they drew on the floors of the empty rooms. The children are very creative; there were definitely some Picasso artists amongst them!  Valentin helped by fetching water for the moping and the washing up.

Sunday was a special and wonderful day for our team. Patrice, Claudia, Roxane and Faith sung a couple of songs at the Anglican Church. After church, we attended restoration church which ended at 12pm. We came back home for lunch with Jeanne, the village leader of Gatovu. In the afternoon, Theo our driver drove us to Emiralde hotel for our weekly outing. We had all some soft drinks, Patrice, Valentin and Theo had samosas for appetisers while Roxane, Faith and Claudia ordered some desserts.

We also met David, CEO of Rwanda Aid and his friend Patrick at the hotel, we stopped for a chat when we were about to leave. It was a great day!

-    -  Written by Valentin and Patrice

Fifth Week in Cyangugu

This was the last week to finalise all the paperwork for the Cooking Stoves Project. Between Monday to Wednesday, we went to Mundima and Gatovu village to complete the selection of the 50 houses who would be receiving the Rondereza stove. 

On Monday, we created criteria for selection of the households. We planned to visit both Mundima and Gatovu village but due to poor weather, we were only able to visit Mundima village. As usual, we were accompanied by Michael (RDIS Facilitator), he is gradually becoming a part of ICS Cyangugu. So we selected half of the 25 beneficiaries from the survey, twelve or thirteen who met the criteria. We chose the rest of the beneficiaries on this visit.

On Tuesday, we went to Gatovu village to do the selection of the beneficiaries. Assisted by Jane, the village leader; we selected thirteen beneficiaries who met the criteria. In the evening, we sat down to collate the data we had collected and finalised the 50 beneficiaries from both villages. We had a team meeting to discuss the progress of the project, as we have been waiting for news about the source of some resources. 

On Wednesday, we visited the villages to inform the leaders about the selection of trainees/animators. We chose to select four from each village, because the village leaders wanted to be a part of the training. Joan, our lovely ICS In-Country Manager came to visit us from Kigali. She was with us from Wednesday to Friday afternoon. 

During her visit, we visited Mundima village when the cooking stoves project was introduced to members of the village. Sam was the main speaker because as RDIS Co-ordinator he is involved in most of the projects. 

Sam explaining the project at the village meeting in Mundima

Valentin assists Sam in presenting the Rondereza, Joan is on the extreme right

It was very beneficial to formally introduce the project to the people, it definitely gave them a knowledge of who we were. We had visited the village several times during the past three weeks and the people were always curious to the purpose of our visits.

The meeting went well, people asked questions, made suggestions and some decided they would like to contribute some materials. Sam did a great job, he delivered the information effectively and to our surprise, all the people received the project positively. It is unfortunate that only 25 households would benefit from the improved cooking stoves but we are hoping that if all goes well, people would embrace the cooking stoves, mainly because of the health benefits and the benefits for the environment. We left Gatovu at around 5:30 and arrived home in time for dinner.

Joan was with us for another day so on Friday, she joined us for lunch and unfortunately had to leave that afternoon. There had been a power cut since Thursday on she had some work to do so she left a day early for Kigali. On Saturday, Valentin went to help at the feeding clinic, the rest of us went to town with Speciose; our cook.

As usual Sunday was a day for worship and for us to reflect on the events of the week as well as to plan for the week ahead. It was a great end to the week; we were going to start training soon and begin work, how exciting!

-         -  Claudia

Week Four and counting...

First of all, Good Morning! It's been a pretty busy few days for us this week. Picking up from where we ended on Sunday, we hosted Boniface, one of the choristers at church for dinner in the evening. The girls (Roxane and Faith) made pancakes and Speciose roasted peanuts for pre-dinner appetisers. All together it was a great night. We had lots of stories to share and throughout dinner the jokes continued. Boniface was great company and it just confirmed how much we have settled in here. The bad news was that our water flow stopped that evening. We did not have water from Sunday night until Tuesday afternoon; apparently all the houses in the neighbourhood were affected and it has something to do with the location on the hill. Where we live is called Mont Cyangugu - so you get the point…

On Monday, God blessed us with rain – and I say that for a reason. Myself and Faith were so desperate to flush the toilet, that at the first drop of rain, we rushed to get some bowls to collect rainwater. We called it ‘being resourceful’, Valentin called it getting Malaria (really?!) and Speciose said we could get Hyperthermia (understandable). Anyways, we are perfectly fine, no coughing, sneezing or symptoms of Malaria.
All through the day on Monday, we had been working on an Action Plan for the Improved Cooking Stoves project.

So Tuesday, we went back to Gatovu, got signatures to approve the photos we had taken previously and went round the houses we surveyed to find out if the households had indoor kitchen spaces as well the type of cooking stoves used. The day was productive but on Thursday we concluded that we should have checked these when we did the survey.

The next day, Michael, Faith and Patrice went to Mundima village while the rest of us went to town to find out the availability of the resources needed for the Rondereza stove. While in town, we bought a card and chose a birthday present for Speciose (hostess/best cook in the world!).

On Friday the first thing we did was to give Speciose a birthday surprise.We sang happy birthday and presented her with a card and a gift, she was very surprised and quite emotional. It definitely lifted her spirit; she’s been going through a tough time recently. Like a family, we shared hugs and kisses and made sure we ended her day by showering her with lots of prayers. The rest of the day consisted of discussions and planning.

At team meeting we discussed our progress with the cooking stoves and made a plan for the following week. Actually, this is concrete proof of how busy our week has been. We are basically co-managing the Improved Cooking Stoves project so we have to set everything in place in order for a smooth running, and we only have 5 weeks left to select, train and install 50 stoves in Mundima and Gatovu! Anyway, so we have meetings three times a day, basically before or after breakfast, lunch and dinner

We also looked at some examples of how organisations implemented cooking stoves in other countries. It is a big project and we need a few lessons from the professionals, as they say ‘Experience is the best teacher’.

Later in the evening, we were invited to dinner with some colleagues from England, they also happened to be members of Faith’s church (Her church has a partnership with the church here in Cyangugu)…The food was delicious and we thank God for a beautiful day.

So today was Umuganda; national cleaning day. Every last Saturday of the month, citizens are obliged to participate in a communal clean-up. We joined the citizens in hoeing the weeds on the cliff and digging trenches to aid rainfall run-off. We got a lot of attention when we first arrived, everyone talking about the ‘muzungus’ (white person/s), I'm sure they made comments on how we handled the hoe but we didn’t really pay attention to that and they got used to us after a short time. Roxane, Faith and I started with hoeing but after 5 minutes, soldiers took over. I thought it was because we were ‘young ladies’ or because we were doing it wrong but I noticed, that only men were doing the hard work. The women collected the rubbish (weeds) to clear the road. An hour and a half later, Umuganda in our neighbourhood was over.

In the afternoon, we went to help out at the feeding clinic nearby run by the Mother’s Union. We helped clean the centre and played with the children. Before porridge was served, we were happy just watching the children plays some local games. I joined in one of the games; I call it “only girls allowed”J. We sang some songs and helped serve porridge, it was an eventful day and there were more children than last week.

Tomorrow, we will be attending Zion Temple, a local charismatic church instead of our usual early morning service. Service is from 9am to 12pm, it will be our second time there. Really looking forward to tomorrow and the week ahead.

Till next time – Happy Reading! God bless X