Nyundo

Thursday morning, Lydie and I set out on our little adventure towards Nyundo. At 7am we made a first stop at ORTPN, to pay for the research permit. All staff showed up, except for the guy who had the keys to open up. By 7.30am he still wasn’t there and we had to pick up some groceries from La Galette. So still no progress in the research permit, but by 8.30am we were on our way! First stop: Gitarama!

C’est la fête
In Gitarama we stopped at Centre St-Charles, the place where I’ve been staying for three weeks. Two banana-boxes were meant for the Centre, and especially for Jean de Dieu and Vedaste. These two boys come from very poor families and they have been so genuinly kind to me, I decided to do something for them. During those entire three weeks, the boys and mainly Vedaste, always wore the same clothes. Since they had the same slender bodyframe as my brother, I asked him to pack some of the things he never wore.

When I opened the boxes and handed out clothes, the boys were over the moon. They were almost in tears and kept shouting: ‘c’est la fête aujourd’hui pour nous’, which means ‘it’s like we’re having a party today’ (sort of like ‘feels like Christmas’). While I was handing out two pairs of new shoes, jerseys, t-shirts, jeans, underwear, raincoats and sweaters, they kept thanking God and jumping in the air out of joy. I got the biggest hugs ever and I was very touched by their happiness. Mission accomplished.

Roadtrip
After dropping off Lydie’s groceries at home, we continued our long journey towards Nyundo. It’s a small suburb of Gisenyi, a town next to Kivu Lake on the Congolese border. It lies literally in the shadows of the Virunga Mountains, a range of active and sleeping volcanoes.

The road took us through some amazing landscapes, with stunning views of acres, rice fields, terraces, banana trees and even tea plantations. The mountains were getting higher and rougher and we crossed rivers and valleys and a lake here and there. We’re at 2700m here and the highest volcano in Rwanda – Karisimbi – is over 4000m. It’s the second biggest mountain after Kilimanjaro on the African continent.

By 2.30pm, we had finally reached our destination; Orphelinat Noel (Orphanage Noel) in Nyundo where we were welcomed by many children, mamans (moms) and fortunately Lutgart & Jan, the Belgian couple. I was relieved to still find them here, cause they hadn’t been in touch for quite a while.

Orphelinat Noel
The orphanage is huge. Around 600 children in total are accommodated here. There are age groups from 1-5, each with their own dorms. The primary and secondary school children all share a couple of dorms, but boys and girls of these age groups are separated. A seperate dormitory has been assigned to handicapped children. And last are a couple of single rooms for the college and university students of which the oldest must be around 26 years old.

Many of these older children go to school in Gisenyi or are at boarding school in either Kigali or Butare. The orphanage is funding their education there. In the next few days I’d like to find out whether there’s a selection or that everyone gets to go as the fees are pretty high. The younger children all attend primary or secondary school somewhere in the area, although some have a 1 hour walk to school everyday.

Lutgart & Jan are people from my village in Belgium and she was initially the one who told me about Rwanda and the orphanage. They’ve been coming here for five years now and spend three months amongst the children, providing them with toys, clothes, shoes, and other useful material. Unfortunately, they had a very bad experience with the girls, which made them favor the boys. You see, amongst the boys there is a certain form of hierarchy: the older boys look after the younger boys and make sure they do the right thing. They’d make sure that everyone gets something from the stuff that’s being donated and they would even correct boys who’d abuse it or lie about what they got. The boys also accept the handicapped boys in their midst, which I thought was rather remarkable as children can be so harsh.

According to the Belgian couple, none of this hierarchy, care and integration exists on the girls side. They’d even steal the things given out to the younger children to sell on the market. So they had been very cross with the girls and decided to ignore them completely. Personally, I thought this would end up in a vicious circle. The boys would get more and more, the girls would be totally ignored and due to a lack of needed attention, they’d do things like that to get even. I decided – fingers crossed – to give them another chance and to hand out most of my donation of clothes and schoolmaterials to the girls one of these days.

New friends
Apart from Lutgart & Jan, there are others who are here to volunteer, visit or donate. Some of them are staying in a house build on the property to accommodate volunteers. Others stay somewhere downtown. I was Lucky to be able to stay in the house and met Kayti, my roommate. She’s a lovely 22-year old from England and working as an airhostess on British Airways. Of course it didn’t take long before we got along very well! Then there’s Sue, an English-born Australian living in Melbourne, and Charlotte, her best friend still living in England. They’re on a two-month journey throughout Eastern Africa, wanting to volunteer in various orphanages. Next to that they also visited a local hospital, which appears to be in such a bad shape. Patrick, a French-American vet, started the GoBeyondTheCross Foundation, and Works in the hospital. Despite him being a vet, he is allowed to help out in hospitals here in Rwanda. Sue & Charlotte will take me there one day.

The children
As in any orphanage, the situation is just sad. Practically all children over sixteen have lost their parents during the genocide. Many of the babies lost their mothers in childbirth and have been put here until they’re old enough to be reunited with their families. Esther is a little one-year old that is paralyzed and in need of constant care. Seventeen-year old Oscar was thrown into the water as a baby and nearly made it but suffered severe braindamage and is mentally retarded. One of the sixteen year old girls was diagnosed with lepracy two years ago. She is getting treatment but will eventually die. Last December, a young healthy boy came back from school not feeling too well. He was found dead three days later, cause of death unknown. In January, sixteen-year old Alice passed away as well. Then there are many children who’re HIV positive, or have some strange disease. Treatment is very basic and very limited. Most of them will never become proper adults.

Despite the many changes that have been made in the past six years by organisations such as the Point Foundation and many personal donators, there’s still a long way to go. All the children sleep in bunkbeds, with two children sharing one bed, so that makes four children per bunkbed. Sometimes they’re three, when the children from boarding school return during school holidays. They sleep on sponges rather than matresses and the smell in those dorms is often unbareable. The Point Foundation, lead by an Englishman called Charlie, has already refurbished the boys dorms and toilets, giving them new sturdy bunkbeds, new paint on the wall and wardrobes. Lutgart & Jan bought them new matresses, blankets and sheets. Next project will be the girls dorms, which they hope to accomplish by this summer. Their new bunkbeds should arrive this week already.

On my first night, Thursday, we had to attend mass and then Kayti and I decided to play with the three-year olds. There are so many of them and some got scared when we showed up. One of the girls has been such a good girl during mass and she was clinging on to me when we were playing in their dorm. More toddlers came along and suddenly one of the mamans hit ‘my girl’on her head with a stick. I was so shocked and wanted to hit this woman on her head with the f*cking stick. Why do they even carry a stick around? The girl burst into tears and I felt so sorry for her. I pulled her really close to me and gave her a big hug. I can understand a little tick to correct them – we went through the same as kids – but for no reason at all and with a stick? This maman had to stay out of my neighbourhood already, that’s for sure.

On Saturday and Sunday, Kayti and I spent some time with the babies. We even got a chance to feed them: rice and beans, always the same thing. It was quite an experience to see how the mamans pick up the children, change them and feed them. Diapers don’t exist overhere. The children wear some sort of cloth around their waists and sit on a blanket to play and eat. They are being potty trained, but most of them just pee and poo where they sit. The dorm is very smelly cause the pee is everywhere and once every hour, they clean it all up. Because they don’t wear nappies, the mamans need to change the childrens’ clothes all the time. Wich also means some of the women don’t do anything else but wash clothes all the time. The washinglines at the courtyard are always full of blankets and clothes. And of course pee and poo as well, cause the three-year olds run around and do what they have to do wherever they stand. Unbelievable.

Lake Kivu
On Saturday evening, Kayti and I took Theophile – one of the twenty somethings – to Rubona. That’s a small town next to Gisenyi on Lake Kivu, also known for the Bralirwa headquarters, Rwanda’s national brewery (Primus). I read about a place called Paradis Malahide and the volunteers Sue, Charlotte and Patrick joined us there for dinner. Theophile had invited himself, but ended up having no money at all which made us pay for his entire trip and food. Which was ok, but hen ever said any thank you or didn’t feel embarrased or anything. He’s a very nice guy, but it made me think once again about the idea that people overhere see white people or ‘muzungus’ only as money makers. Even the children take things for granted and without even saying hello or goodmorning or ‘can I please have’… they just say ‘give me this’. I was quite annoyed by that. I really don’t want them to fall on their knees and think of me as a new God, but some respect would be appreciated. The boys back in Gitarama were much more appreciative and I even got an extra phonecall from Maman Therese to thank me and tell me there has been joy in the Centre all day long. That really made my day and made me decide to donate the rest of the clothes to the Centre rather than the orphanage.

Paradis Malahide was indeed a small paradise. Located right on the shores of Lake Kivu, this little restaurant was very authentic and cosy. It was a big hut with a campfire in the middle. We sat at a bamboo table and seats. The exotic garden lead right into the lake and the views were breathtaking. Kayti and I missed our 8pm curfew and had to rush back to Nyundo by moto-bike. It was a 20km long trip, but it was worth every second! I was scared to death in the beginning to take any of these bikes, but ever since I hopped on the first one, I’ve been loving it. Wind in my hair, beautiful scenery, what a feeling! At night, you can even see a red glow coming from the lava lake of the volcano crater in Goma. It leaves an incredible impression having this sleeping giant in your backyard.

No whipping
On Sunday morning we expected a serious whipping from Maman Director – whose the main principle here at the orphanage. She doesn’t come across as very warm and open, but according to these kids she’s like the local Mother Theresa. Fortunately for us, she was off to the 7am church service and we sneeked out after breakfast to attend the 9am service. Theophile accompanied us to the cathedral, which was on top of a hill and overlooked the valley and volcanoes in the back. The cathedral was packed with people, but we managed to squeeze in at the very back. Made us able to sneek out as well whenever the two-hour service would be too boring. Although we didn’t understand a thing, we did make it through the full two hours, partly because there was a heavy thunderstorm outside and no one wanted to face that weather. I love the simplicity of life overhere. Mothers would just breastfeed their children wherever they sit and others would change their nappies in the middle of service. I can’t find the right words at the moment, but they live life in their purest form, the way it should be. No one being offended by it or annoyed or upset or waving with rules and restrictions and a complaint letter or anything. This is life, just the way it is.

Back at the orphanage, we had lunch with the staff and Maman Director, and we got away with our late arrival last night. Charlie had told us people got sort of ‘punished’ by Maman Director whenever they were late. She’d even smack you on the back with her stick! I wasn’t too worried about that, cause I would just smack her back I think. What’s with these people with their sticks anyway??

Gisenyi
After spending some time with the toddlers, Kayti and I took the bus to Gisenyi as she wanted to see the lake during daytime. I’ll be spending a couple of days around here, but she’s normally leaving on Wednesday already so we took the opportunity to go down there. We were absolutely stunned by the beauty of this place. Some of the children were playing in the water – the sun had come out – and others were strolling along the beach. The sand is quite rough though, because of the volcanic substance.

At some point a bunch of jeeps stopped on the small boulevard and a gorgious couple of newlyweds got out. They had an extensive photoshoot at the beach and you could tell from people’s outfit they were very well off. We started taking pictures, but a guy asked us whether we were going to pay for them or what our intentions were. Overhere, people often think whites sell these pictures in Europe for lots of money. I was quite frank and asked this guy what was wrong about taking pictures of happy people? It should’ve been clear we were only tourists. There were a couple of guys my age and one of them came up to me asking the same thing, but eventuelly telling me I was welcome to take as many as I liked. He is in the television businness in Kigali and hoped we could meet up for tea some time. To keep it all on the safe side, I never mentioned what I was doing overhere. In the end, this group of six guys gave us more attention than their family members. After an extensive photoshoot with them, Kayti and I continued our stroll down the beach.

Congo border
After only a few hundred meters, we bumped into a sign that said ‘border’. As it appeared, we got to the Rwandan-Congolese border where many people cross to do business, especially in Goma. We quickly took some pictures and headed back to a place called White Rock, a nice restaurant where we enjoyed a good glass of wine watching the sunset over the lake and the thousand hills.

Thursday 24th – Sunday 27th March, Nyundo 25 degrees