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Favorite things about serving in Rwanda:

The climate

Rainy season view of Kigali

Compared to many places the climate and everyday average weather is pretty good; it could be worse. Rwanda has two seasons that happen twice a year.

Rainy season (September – January, March – June): cooler, unpredictable weather.  It rains here about once a day and the length of rain varies from day to day but is usually not more than a couple hours. The roads and area become incredibly muddy; too muddy to walk on or take transport in and out of the village.

Dry season (January – March, June – September): hot, dry, barren, everything dies off and becomes brown. The area becomes overwhelmingly dusty, so much so that I am usually constantly covered in a layer of dust.

Overall both seasons have their pros and cons but the weather is average, and most days you can’t complain about extreme heat, extreme cold, too much rain or too much sun.

The food; especially amatunda (passion fruit) 

You don’t have to eat anything too strange here. In fact it is quite the opposite. Rwandans usually chop, peel and cook their vegetables so much so that they lose their original flavor, texture, and nutritional value. Goat is a common and popular food here, and it is common to eat brochettes or grilled goat on a kebab.  The strangest foods I’ve encountered: goat intestines (that stuff just wouldn’t go down) and these bugs that look like worms with wings (they really do taste just like chicken). But Rwanda has wonderful fruit, avocados, pineapples, bananas, and passion fruits. The first time I ever ate a passion fruit I thought to myself: you know, I am going to be okay here as long as I have some of these in my life every day.

Women In Office

Women hold 64% of the seats in parliament. And Rwanda as a country works hard to promote gender equality. It’s a thing. “With regards to empowering women and promoting their socio economic and political participation, we continue to make modest progress. We believe that, besides improving gender relations in our country, this marks healthy progress towards realizing our vision of a united, democratic, and prosperous Rwanda.” President Paul Kagame at the 63^rd United Nations General Assembly, New York, 2008.

For more about women leadership in Africa and Rwanda click here. 
  
Imigongo

Examples of Imigongo

Or art made from cow poop. Cow dung is taken and mixed with water to form a clay like substance. Then geometric shapes are drawn out of cow dung on a gridded wooden panel. The shapes often have some form to them, and are three dimensional. The cow dung is left out to dry for three days and then the geometric forms are painted over, usually in black and white. Why do I love this so much? It only comes from one tiny area in the whole country, the south east region called Rusomo. Likewise, it was almost lost during the 1994 Genocide, but the women in this area fought to bring it back. It baffles me how one area can be so artistically creative with natural resources while other areas are void of any creativity.   

Worshiping the Cow and the Cow Dance 

PCVs dancing the traditional Cow Dance at their Swearing In Ceremony

In Rwandan culture, the cow is king. Nothing is idolized more than the cow so much so that there is a beautiful traditional dance for the cow. At our Swear In Ceremony our language teachers taught us the traditional dance and we performed it. A major part in the dance is to raise your arms up over your head and outward to mimic the horns of a cow. 

Rwandans dancing the traditional dance

Agatogo

Plantain stew. Boil plantains together with tomato paste, tomatoes, sometimes onions and green leafy vegetables. If you are wealthy or if it is a special occasion, you would add goat or cow intestines in the stew. Agatogo has an incredibly thick consistency, and makes you never want to eat again; its glue for your stomach. One bowl can fill you up for at least a day if not two, and you are not having any bowl movements during that time either. It is a delicious filler upper that makes you forget about eating for a while.  

Dressing Smart

And I don’t mean dressing smart for the weather. Dressing smart here means you look nice. If you are a woman, your knees and shoulders are mostly covered and you are wearing a nice dress, skirt, or jeans and a top. It is completely fine and normal for women to wear jeans and a nice shirt here. Dressing Smart also means that your shoes are incredibly clean, even the insides of the shoe must be clean! I have problems with this, and the levels of extreme this is taken too, but I also respect the time and attentiveness people take to make themselves look nice. There is something to be appreciated about people who value presenting the cleanest version of themselves (this is especially difficult and time consuming in a developing country) and also value each other for cleanliness.  

There is no word for please

There is no word for please, simply put you would say: Listen, I want… in a store, restaurant etc. Rwandan culture can be incredibly passive aggressive, and there is something about the non-passivity and the absence of the word please in a store or at a restaurant that makes me feel a bit more sane. It reminds me of the New York hustle and bustle, it reminds me of home.

Picking your nose            

Totally culturally appropriate. Biting your nails is very bad culture but picking your nose in public is completely fine. You can have full length conversations with people who will be digging for gold up their noses while speaking to you. And there is something about this that puts a smile on my face, especially when trying to have a serious conversation. 

Bibaho (Bee – ba – hoe)

That’s the way it goes. Bibaho translates to English as: that is the way it goes. It is my favorite saying here because nothing can trump it. After you say bibaho the conversation is finished. Also you don’t have to explain things after a bibaho either. For example, my answer to  the constant question of why I don’t go to church here. I simply say I have been a few times but it is not in my culture, and then I end it with a bibaho. Done. Finished. There is nothing another person can say after that. They will shrug, nod and walk away or change the subject. It is the perfect way of ending subject matters that can get culturally dicey and complicated. Bibaho!               

What I Do

My Nutrition Mamas after class

In July 2012 I waved goodbye to the shining white Peace Corps vehicle as it left me in my new home, a rural survivor’s village in the north east corner of Rwanda. Cyabayaga was located forty five minutes from a paved road and town via motorcycle.  The area was flat, dry, barren, dusty, and what I suspect most Americans to think of when they hear the words ‘African village’.  My concrete tin roof house was minimal, without electricity and complete with a concrete latrine and outdoor shower. The area had problems with water, but thankfully our village had it due to massive tanks installed by another PCV’s project. The tanks allowed us to fetch water in jerry cans morning, noon and night.  It was unlike the entirety of Rwanda, the land of a thousand hills; food was hard to find, the land was flat, the sun constantly on your back, and I would often break a sweat before eight am.  

I am a health volunteer and was placed at a village health center. The health center too was minimal with concrete rooms, tins roofs, and latrines, yet fairly expansive with two outdoor pavilions for waiting patients.  My assignment, to work in: maternal and child health, nutrition, hygiene, water sanitation, HIV/AIDS, and malaria. Oh boy. I lived there for over six months before I was moved for security reasons.

In February 2013 the shinny white vehicle arrived to hastily take me off to Kigali and away I went. After several touch and go meetings with Peace Corps staff it looked like Global Communities would be my new home. Global Communities is an international non-profit organization (NGO) that works closely with communities worldwide to bring about sustainable changes that improve the lives and livelihoods of the vulnerable. (That was taken from the website. http://www.globalcommunities.org/ Why reinvent the wheel when it’s right there for you.) Specifically, I work within the Ejo Heza project (http://www.globalcommunities.org/node/37053) loosely translated to “brighter future” in Kinyarwanda. Ejo Heza focuses on women’s livelihoods.

Okay, so there’s the back story and fancy jargon of the NGO community. But what do I actually do?  

Simply put, I am a nutrition and health teacher. About every third week I was going “into the field” or visiting villages and doing nutrition trainings.

 Most often, I teach the rural poor population with a Rwandan co-teacher in Kinya about nutrition. Other times, I teach nutrition and health trainers how to teach nutrition in a more effective manner. I have learned to call these things TOT (training of trainers). Other times, I am developing Ejo Heza training resources and teaching methodologies; right now we are working on finalizing a tailored cookbook for our Mamas to help them eat a balanced diet. The cookbook is aimed at meeting the needs of the mamas and uses what is available to them in the villages.

When I am not preparing for or co-facilitating a nutrition training, I am working with the Behavior Change and Communications (BCC) Officer to create the best resources to generate the most behavior change in the villages. Most PCVs work heavily in BCC no matter what they do. After all, you can build 600 hundred hand washing stations for your entire community, but if people are still not washing their hands what was the point?

There are some days that I miss village life, other days not so much. I work in the villages often, which helps with the missing-the-village part, and live in a village in Kigali (the Capital City) which is interesting and presents its own set of challenges. *Both situations have their pros and cons; some PCVs would love to be in the position I am in, while others would hate it. It is completely individual, and I’ve learned here that most things are a gamble.  

To sum up what I do is complicated and yet simple. I am a nutrition teacher, and work in BCC but PCVs generally wear many different hats doing many different things, or as we call them: secondary projects. At my former site I was developing projects, but the majority of my time there was spent figuring out how to survive daily. As dramatic as that sounds, I spent hours fetching water, finding food, and washing clothes so that I could look smart at the health center, an incredibly important cultural entity.

In this world where monitoring and evaluating is everything, I find it increasingly hard to simply sum up what me and fellow PCV colleagues do. There are labels, objectives and indicators, but the descriptions never feel right; it always feels like something is left out, missing. Maybe I took one too many abstract/modern art classes at school, or am just too much of a right –side-of-the-brain thinker. The way I see it is we are people who are just trying in many different ways and forms.   




My counterpart, Jeanne d'Arc (left), and Mama Mutoni (right) discussing kitchen gardens. Jeanne d'Arc is my strength, my backbone, my confidant.  





I'm Still Here

Every once in a while life gets in the way, and every once in a while you get in the way of yourself. In the case of this blog, both are true.

To my faithful and loyal readers: I am sorry I stopped writing for what the World Wide Web would consider to be an eternity. The past months have been the most challenging and changing of my life. Let me be clear, when I say changing I do not mean that I have been changed, although I am sure I have, but rather that change here happens often and quickly (or so it seems in respect to my service). Nothing seems to be permanent or fixed.

I have been moved from a tiny village without simple amenities like electricity and water, to the capital city of Kigali. I’ve had support systems, supervisors, counterparts, projects, and expectations come and go.

I have been terrorized by more living things than I ever could have imagined: bed bugs, fleas, bats, mice, and intestinal worms. I found two snakes in my house on separate occasions. And then later discovered one of the snakes was a black mamba. I have lived without electricity for ten months. I've been stolen from, lied to, taken advantage of, and stared at for hours that seem to turn into days. I have been treated (in a good and bad way) like a unicorn from the forbidden forest, whose blood has magical healing powers.  

I have also been instantly accepted by individuals who have received me like their own daughter. I have connected and felt connected not in a networking-for-a-job way, but in a real humanistic way. I have learned a culture, shared a culture, and had many laughs in between. I have been cared for, received, looked after, understood and loved.

I am still here with 11 months left in service, and with the determination to not only finish but accomplish a few more tall order tasks that I’ve gifted to myself. And within these tasks is the idea of maintaining this blog.

In the past 7 months I’ve seriously contemplated the point of Peace Corps blogs, and why I should revive mine. I would be lying if I said it wasn’t partly for selfish reasons. What a wonderful way to document this experience. But there are other factors, reasons, motivators for me getting back into blogging.

I’ve been hearing a lot of misinformation lately, and two things have been really getting under my skin. 1 – The single story - buying into it, trusting it, living by it. 2 – The male perspective. (The two, more often than not, go hand in hand.)  

The single story, be wary of it. We have too much faith in one story, and are too willing to accept that, take it in, and serve it up for dinner night after night. It is comfortable for us as human beings to write things off, or rather put things in a box or category and make them more logical for ourselves. And while this is comfortable, it is also problematic. “The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue but that they are incomplete.” – Chimanda Adichie. There are multiple sides to everything. 

Let me provide an example. Recently, I had the opportunity to take a vacation to one of three African countries. One of these countries was Ethiopia and it was a front runner in the decision making process. While mulling it over with some loved ones I was STRONGLY encouraged not to go for unclear reasons; something to do with the civil war and famine that happened in the 80’s, that I was well aware of. I was very taken aback by the negative reaction I received, partially because Ethiopia is one of the safest places to travel in East Africa. And especially because this rational made no sense considering Rwanda had genocide in the 90’s and I live here. Ethiopia is safe, you need to be smart about things but it is comparable to NYC, and is a Peace Corps Post. It was sad to me that people’s impressions were still a media based story from long ago. A single story; and probably one of the only that the U.S. has told about Ethiopia.

I have been a victim to the single story many times as well, and am still a little unsure about people from L.A. But the more I experience, the more I learn that everything is…complicated. I am complicated, you are complicated, Rwanda is complicated, the U.S. is complicated. Most places, people and things are complicated in one way or another. If there is anything I have learned here, it is to keep an open mind and be wary of the single story.  

So, here it is the revival of my blog. And what is the point? Well, this is my story and I want to give my perspective as a 24 year old single female in a developing country. But it is also one story of many, and I’d like to encourage readers to keep an open mind, understand the complicated nature of everything and join me until this thing is complete (if that’s even possible).

 

 

BE Camp

* *Written on December 10, 2012**

Two weeks ago I participated in my first Peace Corps camp. It was a BE camp. BE is an acronym for Boys Excelling. It is the boys equivalent to GLOW (Girls Leading Our World). GLOW is a Peace Corps wide initiative and exists in many different PC country posts. For more info on GLOW click on this link: http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/08/196065.htm BE is Peace Corps Rwanda specific.

BE Banner. Photo by: Justin McDonald 

BE camp was four days long for the boys, a  week long for the staff with three days of TOT (training of teachers). But before I get into the inner workings of BE camp, we must start with an explanation of BE club.

BE clubs begin with the volunteers who work at schools and promote youth development. Whether a health or education volunteer (the two PC programs we have here), starting a BE/GLOW club is one of the best ways to teach life skills, and improve youth development.

BE and GLOW was started in my community about a year and a half ago by my former site mate. (A site mate is another volunteer who lives at your site in a different training program.) She was an education volunteer that lived about an hour walking distance away, and worked at the primary and secondary school. During my first three months, I was able to attend, observe, and get a better feel for the clubs she started and that I am now taking over.

The focus of BE and GLOW is for girls and boys to have a single sex focus group where they can become educated partners in gender equality, goal setting, public speaking, career planning, decision-making skills, and learning confidence. While some of these skills may be obvious to American readers, there is a great void in youth development here in Rwanda.

The education system in Rwanda needs some work. While there are some Rwandan all-star teachers who really push their students to be critical thinkers in the classroom, the majority of classes go like this:

Teacher introduces the subject and speaks. Teacher writes lesson on the board. Students copy lesson from board. Students memorize lesson. A day, week, month or many months’ later students are tested on what they memorized.

The camp. See if you can find me, hint: I'm wearing blue. 

There is zero critical thinking or discussions involved. Moreover the lessons are not interactive, and are straight up boring. School is run more like a factory rather than an opportunity for students to grow, learn, and develop. In most lessons students memorize what they’ve ‘learned’, and that is the extent of it. This bothers me, and I’ve seen little opportunity for young people to think for themselves. Personally, I don’t think this is an effective learning style, and this is where the importance of BE and GLOW materializes.  

When a young person speaks to you it is common that they turn their head in the opposite direction of where you are standing, and/or look at the ground. They usually speak softly and/or mumble. The indirect eye contact, soft spoken nature, and mumbling makes an awful combination when trying to understand a bantu language. In the beginning of my service I was often confused by this behavior, but was later told it is good culture to act in this way.

So I was completely shocked, and speechless when I attended my first GLOW club. Peace, a student, walked right up to me, shook my hand, looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Hi, my name is Peace.” I had never encountered a young person with so much confidence, let alone a girl with confidence. This is rare. I was so shocked I forgot how to respond to her, and we were speaking English. How she approached me with such confidence emulates the importance of GLOW and BE, and gives a nod to their wonderful teacher.

So how do these things start? The clubs are started by PCVs in their villages, and after clubs have been strongly established, PCVs get together and decide: a) if they want to have a camp, b) when, how, what, where, and why. And finally, a BE/GLOW camp is born.

The camps are held during school vacations, and are free for students to attend. Each camper is placed into a hero group with a camp counselor, a PCV. Their group is called a hero group because their group name is named after a famous person to model their own life after. Ex: Martin Luther King Jr., Steven Biko, Gandi, Fela Kuti, just to name a few of the great hero groups we had. This acts as your family for the four days.

During camp there are three days of classes, with three classes each day focusing on one topic.

Day 1 – Communication and Decision Making

Day 2 – HIV and Malaria

Day 3 – Gender Equality

After classes there are afternoon activities including: baseball, kickball, volleyball, soccer, dance, and bread making classes. There are three meals a day (rare for Rwandans) and after dinner are the evening activities, which included a bonfire with smores. If you are ever in Africa I’ve found that smores is one of the coolest cross-cultural exchange things to do.

Video still of me teaching. Classroom size at BE was about 25 students.

The fourth day is split into two half days. The first day they arrive and get settled, and the last day includes: a closing ceremony, packing up, and leaving before lunch (if you are lucky).

PCVs volunteer to play different roles; all PCVs are expected to lead an afternoon activity and help with evening activities. I played the role of Teacher, teaching a class on Relationship Building and Partnering in Gender Equality (Day 3), and co-teaching a class on Facts and Myths of HIV and AIDS (Day 2). The classes are ninety minutes each and when you teach a class you teach three classes in a row. I did this for two days in a row, and it was exhausting but awesome all rolled into one. The most common myth in the facts and myths class: AIDS was invented in a lab in America. In every class I had at least one boy ask “but Teacha, are you sure AIDS was not invented by Americans?” While no one knows where it came from for the purposes of the class, and to eliminate confusion, I responded with: “Yes, AIDS was not invented in America, Americans have AIDS too.” This blows their minds every time.  

http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/08/196065.htm

I'm Moving to Musanze -- In-Service Training

A few housekeeping announcements before this post begins.

1. I’m sorry I haven’t been blogging. My computer broke about a month ago, and yes it has taken me this long to fix. It is still not fixed, but manageable to work on. Here we say bibaho (bee-ba-hoe) in situations like these, it means that’s the way it goes.

2. I have a new address. Please send packages and letters to the address below. Thanks!

Caitie Gibbons, PCV

United States Peace Corps, RW

B.P. 207

Nygatare, Rwanda, Africa

 3. I’ll be posting every other Sunday starting today December 2, 2012. The next post will be on December 16, 2012. Stay tuned!

****

I’m moving to Musanze. Really I’m not, but sometimes, especially on days like this when it’s a hundred and four degrees I wish I could. A few weeks ago I attended my In-Service Training, or IST. Peace Corps loves their acronyms. And during IST I stayed in this lovely oasis called Musanze.

Musanze is in the northwest area of Rwanda, and is home to five volcanoes and the infamous Rwandan mountain gorillas. It’s where Dian Fossey did all her research, and it’s absolutely beautiful. Sadly I did not see the gorillas, they live far up in the mountains, but I did get to see my first volcanoes. And have recently become obsessed with them.

Musanze is cold depending on the season, jungle-like, and filled with tourists/white people. During IST we stay in a white person hotel, complete with double beds, electricity, running water, a shower (with no curtain, thanks for trying Rwanda), beautiful gardens, and a swimming pool. I almost forgot I was in Rwanda, living in a lap of luxury I am not accustomed too. Needless to say, after ten days with a working shower, bucket bathing was hard to get back too.

The usually response when speaking about IST with friends and family is: “you have another training? I thought you were done with that?” Well, Peace Corps loves its trainings along with the acronyms, and I have several throughout my two years.

The first training after swearing in and becoming a PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) is IST. For the first three months at site volunteers are not allowed to leave. This helps with the integration process, and all around community respect. It was explained to us during IST, that it is also called Reconnect because you’re literally reconnecting with your training group, who you haven’t seen in three months. During these first three months you’re also not allowed to apply for grants, or do any projects besides your Community Needs Assessment. What you are allowed to do is observe, get to know your community, and    integrate.

 So now that I’ve hit this first goal marker in a series of very long trail markers to go, I can now apply for grants and do what I want. And yes I will have two more trainings. The next training is called MST or Mid-Service Training, which is the training you receive after you’ve completed a year.

My IST was ten days long, but it varies according to country and training group. To save you all the boring details, and trust me there are many boring accounts, here are the peaks and the pits of IST.

The Pits:

I sat in a bland conference room for ten days, six hours a day.

My computer was broken so I couldn’t use the free wireless internet the hotel offered. Whomp. Whomp.

We had training with our Rwandan counterparts for three days. This was very exciting to me until the training started on a Sunday. My counterparts are religious and asked when they had time to pray. I had to tell them that they didn’t, which was true, we were in a conference all day Sunday. This left a bad taste in their mouths, and a bad lasting flavor for the next two days.

I was away from my beloved site. A place I enjoying being at.  

The Peaks:     

GAD, or Gender and Development. I was elected one of the three new members to the PC Rwanda GAD committee. GAD is a Peace Corps wide committee focusing on gender and development. This is something I am passionate about, and wanted to be a part of during my service. I’m excited to be working with them, and for more information visit the PC Rwanda GAD blog http://gadpcrwanda.blogspot.com. Also stay tuned for my GAD blogpost on December 3, 2012.

New Peace Corps Staff. We have a new Director of Programing and Training. He is a breath of fresh air, and reminded me why I joined Peace Corps. Something that is often forgotten when struggling to survive here.

White Person Hotel! = big beds, hot water shower, good food, free internet, swimming pool, etc.

Volcanoes! Saw my first volcanoe ever.

Halloween. I got to be with Americans for Halloween, and we celebrated, yeah!

Meeting other volunteers. I’m always interested to meet other people in country, hear their stories, struggles, experience, and upcoming projects. While we had that at PST (Pre-service training), the vibe was totally different. Instead of talking about what their house looked like, or what they eat every night, (things I was worried about in PST) we talked about projects, similar experiences we’ve had, and ideas for new projects.

Overall my IST experience was successful. While there were complications and setbacks, (I think those two words are frequent feelings in Peace Corps culture) it was a good week and a half. I left feeling ready to get back to site, and excited to work with GAD and the upcoming projects for the New Year.

Inside view of Ishema Hotel, the hotel we stayed at.

Are you there God? It’s me, Caitie

This Saturday my sister was confirmed into my family’s catholic church. I’d thought it be appropriate, (maybe, probably, not really) to talk about my own faith and how it matches to Rwandan’s faith.

I first heard the phrase ‘living in a bubble’ while attending Miss Porter’s, often referred to as The Farmington Bubble. Meaning that the girls who go there live in a perfect bubble, naive and far away from the threats and reality of the real world. While that may be true, I learned more there, and grew more there, than any other place or experience I’ve had thus far. It opened my eyes to the world, and I am ninety percent sure I wouldn’t be a PCV, if it was not for MPS. But, Porter’s was not the only bubble I resided in. Rather my whole adolescence was one big bubble.

I was raised Catholic, and attended a Catholic school from Kindergarten through Eight Grade. Strangely, I took to the Catholic religion quite intently. I yelled at my parents when they took the Lords name in vain, and when we ate breakfast before mass, I informed them, on our way to mass, that we couldn’t take the body and blood of Christ. It only counts on an empty stomach (true story, look it up).

My parents are somewhat religious, but as the story goes, the public schools in my area were below par, so they put me in a Catholic school for a better education. Honestly, I’m not sure why or what made me such a devout Catholic at such a young age. Needless to say, St. Joseph’s of Vernon, Connecticut had me under their spell from ages five to thirteen.   

When I went to Porter’s after catholic school, I was thrown into a pool of diversity, unlike my town and middle school, which is anything but diverse. And one of the bubbles that shielded me from the workings of the world burst.

I began to meet girls from all different backgrounds and religions, and started to learn about their beliefs. One of my first encounters was with Judaism. There are many aspects and beliefs to Judaism but the one thing my fourteen-year-old mind clung too was their ideas about the Messiah. In Judaism the Messiah (or their version of Jesus) has not come yet, but will come and bring peace and unity to humanity. For my entire life I’d been learning about Jesus and how great he was. I had no idea there were millions of people in the world believing he has not come yet. MIND BLOWN. I remember thinking, “well, I guess anything is really possible.” These encounters unleashed a can of worms that changed me and challenged me.

Coincidently, around the same time, I was forced into confirmation classes. The timing was unfortunate for my confirmation teacher, as I was being taught to question everything in high school. And question EVERYTHING I did. After two classes the confirmation teacher knew better than to answer my questions when I raised my hand, avoiding the ongoing debate I would unintentionally create about religion, and Catholicism in particularly.

Since then I’ve been on a never-ending search for a religion, and search for a reason to keep my own. Ninety eight percent of the world believes in a higher power, and as time goes on I can’t imagine that there isn’t one. I find myself enjoying the time spend in churches; I frequently visited them in New York. But if it is not Christmas or Easter, I have a hard time going to mass, and even more difficult time sitting through one.

Recently I was listening to an NPR radio show, This American Life. Dan Savage told a beautiful story about the death of his mother, and his grapples with Catholicism. As I listened I was stunned. I felt like Dan Savage had somehow jumped into my brain, decoded my thoughts on being catholic, and reinterpreted them into a beautifully said argument on why it is hard to keep faith.

 He is more cynical about Catholicism, and ideas of Heaven, he errs on the side of atheism more than I do. But some of what he had to say, I swear, were my thoughts exactly.

“But when I am tempted [speaking about returning to Catholicism], when I feel like maybe I could go through the motions, return to the sacrament, take what comfort I can, the Pope goes to Africa and says that condoms spread AIDS [http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/17/pope-africa-condoms-aids]. Or an arch bishop in Brazil excommunicates a catholic woman for getting her nine year old daughter an abortion, but not the catholic man that raped the girl. Or I contemplate how the church views me, and the two people I love most in this world, my boyfriend of fourteen years and our loving eleven year old son. And I can’t even fake this…. Being brought up in a faith built around a guy jumping out of his tomb makes it difficult to reconcile oneself to the permanence of death. Who knew the afterlife, its cruel really when you think about it, criminal, telling children that the people they love don’t die, that there is some other place, some better place…maybe that lie is a comfort to some but it’s made death more painful for me…I visit St. James, like an addict drops by a drug dealers house, for a quick fix, to detonate the pain by losing myself momentarily in the fantasy that she lives. There is an inscription on the ceiling of St. James: “I am in your midst”.  If I were the kind of person who could believe I would believe, but I’m not that kind of person…."Dan Savage, This American Life, Episode 379: Return to the Scene of the Crime, May 1, 2009 http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/379/return-to-the-scene-of-the-crime

This American Life: every week they pick a theme, and bring you stories on that theme. That week’s theme was Return to the Scene of the Crime. Dan Savage’s story is the last act titled Our Man of Perpetual Sorrow, if you are interested in hearing the full story.

Joining the Peace Corps I was utterly aware that my feelings about faith and my host country’s opinions on faith were probably not going to match. But, ironically, I find it hard not to attend mass here. First, it is important to know that over seventy percent of Rwanda is Christian and the rest are Muslim. As a culture they are very serious about religion.

Fear of losing my identity, opinions, and self, I attempted to tell my Rwandan neighbors my true, slightly watered down, feelings on religion. The result was: “I pray in my house.” To which they reply: “that is not possible, you must go to church to see God.” Hmmm, how interesting. In Catholic school they told us God is everywhere. The Catholic Rwandans do not feel the same.

I also try things like: whether you are a good person, or a bad person is not determined by whether or not you go to church every Sunday. But that one is harder to translate, and is usually glazed over by the disbelief that I pray in my house.    

Church is about six hours long. And it kills me. The first three to four hours I don’t mind so much. There is singing and dancing, and it truly is beautiful. But then we read the bible for three hours, and I feel myself starting to go a bit more insane with each passing scripture. You know that part in church where someone gets up and reads a passage from the bible, and then the Priest gives a sermon? We do that times twelve. I’m almost positive I’ve read the whole thing by now. And the passages never seem to relate to each other. We go from Genesis, to Exodus, to John, to Revelations, to Corinthians. And this part I understand because, for some reason, there is always someone with an English Bible waiting for me when I get to church.

 There is no formal taking of the body and blood of Christ. We do it spiritually and mentally because there is a food and water crisis here. Any extra food is used for the malnourished babies, and Rwandans don’t mind taking it spiritually.  

The real kicker comes at the very end when they confess their sins. Confession is the opposite of the catholic confession I’m accustomed to in America. You know, where there are two little rooms on the side of the church. One room the Priest sits in, the other has a small pew for you to confess your sins. They are enclosed and connected by a joining wall, and there is a screen so the priest can hear you, and you can hear the priest, but you can’t see each other. You also have the option of going into the small room and sitting with the priest, which I always preferred because the other small room is dark with no light and far to scary to sit in by myself. But the Rwandan version of confession involves going up in front of the entire church, and confessing their sins. They close their confession by saying what you are thankful for. And praise God. I usually don’t understand the majority of the confessions. But when I do understand, boy do I hear some crazy things. I can’t help but think how humiliating this must be for them. And as a person of the parish you are required to sit and listen to the confessions. This can take anywhere from thirty minutes to five hours.

While I am not sure if I like American Christianity or Rwandan Christianity better, the one thing they have on us is women can be priests. They honest to God, call me a liar when I say in American Catholic churches women cannot be priests. The follow up question is why. My follow up response, I have no clue.

I grapple with religion, Catholicism, and Christianity, but in the two months and three weeks I’ve lived here I skipped church three times. This is unlike myself who, in America, would only attend on Christmas and Easter. I try not to skip it, even though I loathe it, and have developed a love-hate relationship with Sundays. Six-hour church means no lazy Sunday for me. But like I said above, I have a hard time not attending. It is a community wide thing. I feel like I am missing something when I see the entire community gravitating to the church on Sundays. And when I do skip I have the community in my backyard asking questions about why I did not attend today. When I go, they are so happy to see me that it is almost worth it.