I can honestly say that this experience in Kigali, Rwanda has already proven that it’s going to be an eye opener. From the great group of people that are going with me to the amazing family who has taken me under their wing, I can tell that this is going to be one heck of an adventure.
In this first week I have been though many different emotions. I was controlled by excitement from the plane, to touching down onto the great African continent, and driving to my new home for a month. However, as my roommates, Laura, from Texas A&M Unviersity, and Petek, a Turkish student from Duke University, and I walked into our homestay, I suddenly felt the effects of culture shock.
Living in a developing country is not easy, but it is a humbling experience. If it weren’t for our homestay mother, Martha, her husband Fabrice, and their amazing little family, I would not have grown so accustomed to our new life style so quickly. I feel right at home, loved and cared for. We were welcomed into their home on the night we arrived with a lovely dinner. The best part, it involved potatoes, onions, beef, and AVACADO. That was clearly a sign that this trip is going to be great. No matter if the three of us have to share one small room and a bathroom that may or may not have running water on any given day.
A have observed few noteworthy comments about living in Africa. First of all, it is nearly impossible to find a trashcan. The locals here do not let anything go to waste; in fact, plastic bags (such as the ones you get when going to the grocery store) are illegal in this country. Secondly, the traffic on the streets of Kigali boarder on chaotic. I have only seen a handful of stop signs and I have not seen a single vehicle even yield. There are an abundance of motorcycle taxis that do not seem to follow a single rule on the road. I have asked locals and yes there are supposed to be rules. I have now mastered the art of crossing the road of the streets of our neighborhood, Kicukiro, after having to walk 20 minutes to and from our classroom everyday. It is on these walks that I have found out that there are no other foreigners to be seen. So not only do my classmates and myself stick out, but I honestly believe that we can be seen from an actual mile away. And of course the locals take notice.
There are 20 students from around the country who have accompanied me on this journey. We are lead by our TA, Maddy Bishop-Van Horn and we were lucky to have our trip coordinator, Inka Johnson, with us as well. Dr. Cote, a professor at Texas A&M University, lead lectures about hospital equipment that we will be working with this first week. After this week, Dr. Cote will be leaving us and Dr. Moreno, also from Texas A&M University, will be taking his place fro the duration of this month.
We start out our day will four hours of language class every morning. Our Kinyarwanda teacher, Francis, has done a great job trying to get us to not sound like crazy people while attempting to speak the native language. It was been challenging to learn so much in so little time but I honestly enjoy it. Everyone has taken a lot of time out of their day to practice with the locals around our school, IPRC, and in town. Our host families have also helped improve our skills.
Proceeding lunch is our lecture with Dr. Cote, where we learned about electrical safety, lighting, batteries, electrocardiographs (ECG) and pulse oximeters. Maddy runs the labs that we have four days out of the week. In these labs we have built extension cords, learned how to solder and de-solder components in a circuit board, and learned how to properly work with and test circuit boards with multimeters in the first week. Our homework involves reading about all of these things the night before, and the readings are very informative.
I have only been in Rwanda for a short while, but I feel like I have already been impacted by the culture that surrounds me. Even though I enjoy my time here, I do miss the great state of Texas! Thank you for reading and I plan to post more soon!
P.S. Yes, I thought of high school musical when I typed out this title.