Superbowl, Rwanda style

"Two out of the three German guys watching the Superbowl with us at a restaurant owned by a British-Rwnadan are wearing Steelers jerseys which they bought in the market here in Gisenyi, Rwanda, earlier today. I love globalization." - my facebook post, kickoff at 1:37am local time

(The homemade nachos were the best nachos I've ever had...and complete with the only sour cream I've eaten in a year!)

I found the Holy Grail!

A bit over a month ago I walked into Gisenyi's posh western restaurant (rare steak! pizza!) and was literally rendered speechless by the man standing at the bar in this T-shirt. I offered to buy it and after a little discussion he and his friend agreed to give it to me for free after laundering it. It took me several phone calls over the course of a few weeks to follow up on it, but I am now the bittersweetly proud owner of this shirt!

As for other news, I finally moved into my new house and I'm planning to put in some quality time in the village. I'll keep typing blogs but not sure when I'll have the time online to upload them, especially blogs with pictures.

Kumara masenge

Back in the days when the Rwandan franc went a little further, it was subdivided into 10 amasenge. Baby bananas, more commonly called imineke, earn their nickname kumara masenge, “finish your pennies” because they are so delicious that you can’t help but spend all your change on them.

Nowadays, a bunch of 12 or so skinny ones goes for 150-200 rwf, depending on its condition, the location and your bargaining skills. Plumper bunches go for 300 ($.50).

Note that when bargaining for produce, sellers will very rarely lower the prices on pre-arranged groups of items (bananas, stacks of 4-5 passion fruit or tree tomatoes or oranges, piles of carrots or tomatoes). However a skilled bargainer can get something extra thrown in - convince the seller to part with 6 instead of 5 passion fruit for 100rwf, add more carrots to the pile, throw in a couple little green peppers with the stack of cucumbers. Items like pineapples, papayas, and mangoes can usually be bargained for (and sellers always start with a particularly steep markup on mangoes).

Chicken transport

From the Nyanza market, months ago. Packing up to go home.

Fun in the Nakumatt book aisle

Nakumatt is the better supermarket in Kigali. A Kenyan chain, it is an East African-owned business that went international when it opened here in 2008. They’ve got it all, some things outrageously cheap and some hilariously expensive. A stroll through the book aisle, in photos:

To recap: Used babysitter's club books (less than $2), Harry Potter as "self help," and a variety of terrible looking but quite explicit erotic literature being sold in this very conservative country.

More evidence Africa doesn't need your 1 million T-shirts

Some guy thinks Africans need Americans to waste everyone’s time and money sending Africa 1 million unwanted T-shirts. If the arguments regarding sustainability, efficiency of donor dollars, and undermining existing local markets didn’t do it for you, the availability of this t-shirt for $0.80 in the market should settling things.

TIA provides alternatives to a proposal that was widely criticized all over the web.

I know I'm late to the criticism party; I’ve been busy studying for my end-of-training Kinyarwanda exam.

Off the beaten track: the Nyanza market

If you’re traveling in Rwanda and want a unique local experience, you might consider visiting Nyanza at about noon on a peak market day. Peace Corps Volunteers and our fabulous trainers come from all over the country, and everyone agrees that the best and cheapest second-hand clothes shopping is found in Nyanza. On Monday and Thursday, the back section of the market is crowded with women sorting through clothes heaped on tables or piled on tarps on the ground.

Brand names abound: Gap, H+M, American Eagle, Zara’s, J Crew, Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, etc. Just be sure to inspect for stains, holes, and missing buttons. Counter intuitively, silk and other blouses are cheapest, as low as $.09 (RWF 50), while T-shirts and tank tops (Old Navy and Target abound) might cost you as much as $.70 (RWF 400). On the male side, Armani and other designers can be found for $.90 (RWF 500). In addition to great clothes, you are sure to find some laughs at relics of errant fashions past, be they neon or ruffled.

Nyanza is also home to the former King’s residence and the Rwesero Arts Museum, both worth a visit.

The district capital, the town of Nyanza lies just off the main Kigali-Butare (Huye) road, with buses directly from Kigali (2 hours, RWF 1400) and Butare (40 minutes, RWF 500). The Volcano bus station is across from the market in a courtyard with the Nyanza Sun buffet, a solid post-shopping lunch option (RWF1000). If you’re feeling like Western food, head just uphill from the Kobil station to the Hotel Heritage ($2.50-$5; croque madame and ham sandwich recommended but avoid the “Pizza”).

And if you feel like making a detour on the way to Nyanza, be sure to check out Gatagara Pottery.

Outfits of Umuganda

Umuganda presented an opportunity to photograph some of the clothing that makes its way from the West to second-hand shoppers in Rwanda. Here are some gems:

Above left, this guy laughed at me for not hoeing well, but he had figure skates on his sweatshirt.

Above right, Harry Potter would have had the hoe going on its own with a few simple incantations. But I’d put a lot of money on this guy never having read or seen Harry Potter.

I’m jealous of this sweet Ferrari shirt, below left as he cuts up cassava branches...

Above right, I wonder if the ladies in Norfolk appreciate the fantastic workout that comes from hoeing – great for your upper back and arms!

Pats in the market!

Iron chef Rwanda

Task: feed twelve people.

Challenge one: shopping in the market in only thirty minutes. Because of genocide week, the market closed shortly after we finished lunch. I rushed down with Zilpa and Assinath, two wonderful trainers who live in my house, and we rushed around. Zilpa bought sweet potatoes and oil. Assinath and I bought beans and veggies before we split up: she went to find our a leafy green, little eggplant, and peanut powder, while I grabbed as much fruit as I could for desert. I ended up frantically haggling with two women as they packed up their fruit, trying not to pay the muzungu price. Still arguing, we were pushed out by the police, and settled up outside the market walls. The frantic shopping amidst the bustle of the closing market was exhilarating. All told, I didn’t do too badly: I was shorted on the passion fruit and tree tomatoes, but including the cheese and corn bread I bought earlier, the entire meal cost about $17 for 12 people.

Challenge two: cooking 3 dishes on two charcoal stoves. We (er, Assinath) immediately lit one stove and started the dried beans cooking. With help from some of our house mates and dinner guests, we peeled and sliced several kilos of knobby white sweet potatoes, which Zilpa then spent hours double-frying on the second charcoal stove. I soaked the fruit in bleach-water to make it safe to eat. We chopped the eggplant, peppers, carrots, tomatoes, celery, onion, garlic (sold pre-peeled in the market, awesome), and urusenda chili pepper for our “American beans,” or chili. We washed the renga-renga greens and shredded them (Assinath with just a knife, me with kitchen scissors). When the beans were cooked, I fried the veggies and urusenda with some Indian-style “chicken masala” (clove, cumin, coriander, tumeric, etc) and then added the beans. Finally, we watched as Assinath prepared the greens with toasted peanut powder, a recipe I’ll share later.

The meal was a great hit, and our three trainers as well as our night guard loved “American beans.” Our desert was a heavenly fruit salad of mango, pineapple, passion fruit, tree tomato, and banana. Everybody ate too much, and we still had leftovers.

Fabric

Retail therapy. The cheerful light blue/orange/green will be curtains in my eventual house. The others I’ll have tailored

Shopping in Butare

Butare is a university town, and besides Kigali, one of the most cosmopolitan cities, not that that means much. In the market I bought a lightweight Promod jacket for 2500 francs, or $5. It probably goes for 35 Euro in France. At the Lebanese grocery store, I held back from $4 Pringles and Nutella but got some cheaper potato chips (chili lemon and cheesy onion) plus, of course, pineapple waragi (Ugandan gin). For lunch I bought a pizza bread for 35 cents, yoghurt for 40 cents and fresh passion fruit juice for 95 cents. The supermarket has a great restaurant with quality burgers, tuna sandwiches, and ice cream, but I’ll wait until I’ve been here a few months to splurge on that kind of stuff. All told, I spent more money today than I have spent during all of training combined (excluding my cell phone), about $15.

Left, ground meat anyone? From the Lebanese super market on the left in the right photo, where you can find Western food. Also note in the right photo that Google has apparently branched out from their internet business and opened a stationary store.