Rwanda & AMCC goodbyes

Blog, oh wow, do I have stories! I’ll try to go chronologically from my last post:


I left AMCC on Sunday, May 24th and boarded a bus that night that was bound for the Tanzanian town of Kahama. This trip took about 18 hours and was mostly uneventful, save that I got to see Baobab trees for my first time in Africa!
I told the staff on the bus that I was headed to Rwanda and they advised me about what to do and where to go after I alighted in Kahama. This dusty town was bigger than I expected it to be, but they still weren’t used to interacting with mzungus like me (they told me that I couldn’t go to the Rwandan border until tomorrow bc the bus didn’t leave until then, and it took my 5 minutes to explain that I didn’t mind taking the tightly packed matatu that left in 30 minutes). This 4 hour drive was mostly flat and boring (reminded me of my home in Texas) but the end had two exciting points:
- Big rolling hills
- -A small-scale, grassroots run gold mine.

I didn’t know it was a goldmine at first, but the small town of tarps and loose wooden structures corralled my curiosity and I asked my fellow passengers what this was. It was in the middle of a bunch of wilderness, and had it’s own counterpart make-shift town about 2 kilometers away from where they actually did the digging and panning. Neat b/c Tanzania has a lot of gold mine, but most of that money probably goes overseas or goes into gov’t pockets. I don’t know why this mine is open and going, but I thought it was neat. And I didn’t see any guns or shady stuff.
That night I slept in a $4 motel that my matatu drivers arranged for me, and got up the next morning to get to the border. There was some mutual confusion and I ended up getting a refund from my matatu and gave that to a motorcycle/scooter driver and he took me the 15 miles to the border- SO FUN! This part of Tanzania is beautiful, and the Rwandan border was just gorgeous! Cascading hills, a gushing flood-fueled waterfall, and stark and steep cliffs. This was the Rwanda I had heard about, and it exceeded my expectations in physical beauty. Basically the whole country is hilly, like BIG hills (reminded me of the hills around the Bay area, huge, tall, but with flat, rice-filled valleys between them). For having murdered 1/8th of it’s population 15 years ago the country looked pretty good. Honestly, the standard of living seemed higher than all of the other African nations that I have visited (especially in the rural areas). The main reason that I can find for this is that Rwanda’s current gov’t since the genocide hasn’t been incredibly corrupt! The MP’s (Senators, functionally) actually spend the money they are allotted on their constituencies and helpful development projects, instead of paying their friends to do nonexistent jobs, or just outright pocketing the money. I’m so thankful to see this happening! Especially in light of the recent UK M.P. scandals, this is encouraging to me.
When I got to Kigali, the capitol city, I set out to find an ATM so that I could get myself some Rwandan Francs… but I couldn’t find any. None.
Turns out, after talking with a few locals and a few non, that there is no such thing as an international ATM in Rwanda. Wow. This was the first country I’ve ever been to that hasn’t had one. Fiji, Kazakhstan, Russia, Mexico, Uganda, Poland, Ukraine, England, Tanzania, Kenya, Germany, Zambia, they ALL have them. Turns out that Visa isn’t quite everywhere I need to be.
BUT the Lord still rescued me. I already wrote this story, but it’s the “right-place-at-the-right-time”-ness of it was, I believe, inspired and directed by my Dad. I happened to be in the only building in all of Rwanda where someone can get USD$ from their Visa card, and met two other young American guys who had gone there to do JUST THAT. I was just passing through the lobby and had given up looking in this place when I saw these dudes and gave them a nod. Then I honestly felt an urge that said “Ask them what to do”. They told me, and I was shocked. It turned out to be incredibly easy from then (I used my visa to get US $, then took that $ to an exchange place and got Rwandan Francs for it). They also told me where to find the hotel that I had been planning on staying in (and which no Rwandan had heard of when I asked them).
I loved Rwanda. I wasn’t feel like I was an alien from another planet, and I also found the best chapati and chai that I’ve had so far! PLUS, I could stay out at night without fear of being mugged/destroyed!!! I didn’t realize it, but I love being able to walk around at night and having my days functionally end at 6 has been hard for me.
I met my compassion bro, he was cool and chill. Knew English really well, and wants to be a lawyer. Considering Rwanda’s history I think that’s great and encouraged him to continue on in it. He’s in his last year of high school now.
I also visited the Genocide Memorial in Kigali. Very good memorial about a very evil thing. It was also a museum on genocides in general, and had exhibits on the Holocaust, Pol Pot in Cambodia, the Germans in Angola (early 1900’s, I’d never heard of this), Armenians in early 1900’s (3 million killed by Ottoman gov’t in Turkey), Kosovo/Serbia/Bosnia. Pretty sobering to realize that they have effected people everywhere no matter their religion, race, or economic status. My visit to the actual “Hotel Rwanda” (real name: Hotel de Milles Collines) was non-eventful. It’s still a functioning 4-star hotel and I found no recognition of what happened there during the Genocide. Turns out the one used in the movie is in South Africa, this one was surprisingly small, and makes the 1,000 people saved there seem even more impressive.
Then I left Rwanda! I got to the border at night, crossed after the sun went down, and then slept in a little motel about 200 yds from the port of entry. The next morning I got up, took another motorcycle back to the closest real city from the border, and began my laborious journey back. Laborious because when I arrived in Kahama at 12:30 that day I was told that the bus to Nairobi leaves at 5:30… am. So I had to wait there all day, get another hotel, and leave the next morning. Not only that, but this bus arrived in Nairobi at 10:50 PM, so I had to get a hotel once again when I got there because Nairobi is too dangerous to move around at that time of night (Kenya in general, actually. There’s no public transport at that time).
I got up on Sunday morning, exactly one week after I had left, and went back to AMCC. Almost on schedule, something had gone wrong there, so I ended up meeting Nick at the hospital instead of at AMCC. Onesmus, the toughest boy there, had gotten sick again, and was having trouble breathing. This was his…. 6th episode like this in the last two weeks? We’ve taken him to the hospital 3-4 times and it’s still happening. PRETTY frustrating. Especially when the hospital doesn’t tell us what’s wrong with him b/c it’s just not done that way in this culture.
Anyway, I got to talk to Nancy for a while, and then took another motorcycle/scooter thing (“motorbike” is what they call them here) to AMCC to say bye to the kids there. I walked in, they swarmed me and yelled and stuff and were happier than I’ve seen them be about me. That was nice, and also hard b/c right after that I told them I was leaving that day and they all became, no joke, downcast. They stopped talking, and looked down, and so I lied to them and told them that I wasn’t going to leave that day, and in fact I’d never leave again… Just kidding! For real, saying goodbye there was hard, and the kids were a lot more expressive than I thought they’d be given the culture. I’m glad that I’m planning on going back, though I don’t know exactly when it will be… hopefully by the end of next summer.
Pretty crazy to think that I probably won’t even be there for such a long time again, though. There were so many great kids there, and I became more attached to them than I thought I would. They’re smart, and sincere, and do dumb things and hit each other sometimes, and I’m going to miss them a lot. I’m incredibly thankful for AMCC, and that God let me spend time there. I believe that I DID accomplish my tasks there (build relationship with the staff, help out in physical and non-monetary ways) and I’m so thankful for that, but it is hard leaving there and knowing that their problems aren’t all better and life for them is still a roller coaster of provision and lack. I will continue to care about and love them, and I’m going to continue to live in the in between of the kingdom of God, having my heart in different places and loving things that hurt and not yet what I long for them to be.