Muraho! (Hello in Kinyarwandan)

Since I last wrote, the Human Right’s Conference has begun and all the American and Rwandan participants have been introduced. There are 28 of us all together… all the Rwandans are great; some of them speak French and some do not. (Many of them are actually Ugandan by birth and therefore speak great English, but not French).

Tomorrow we head off to Musanze – a village where the government has been practicing land reform. Land ownership has actually become one of Rwanda’s most pressing issues… it’s the most densely populated country in Africa and land scarcity is increasing and putting pressure on the population. We will be speaking with village officials as well as local families to find out whether land rights are being respected, and how the situation might be improved. We stay two days in Musanze and then come back to Kigali and head off to our homestays!

I’ll be living with a girl called Zawazi – she is actually working at my volunteer placement as well, so I have a good feeling we’ll become friends.

I also learned that another girl will be staying in Rwanda until July 28th, so I won’t be alone anymore.

That’s my update for now,

Cheers,

Sarah

*This is one of the photos I took on the bus from Kampala to Kigali - each time the bus stopped, a bunch of Ugandan men would run up to the windows selling grilled bananas and random meat on a stick...