We boarded the flight from Addis Ababa at 10.30am and I was asleep before the plane even took off...no surprises there then! We landed in Kigali, Rwanda at 12pm on Saturday 29th August 2009. There was some paperwork to be completed, and it seems that even Rwanda have jumped onto the SWINE FLU wagon, with forms to complete about recent flu like symptoms (sorry this is really very boring isn’t it!!!???) ANYWAY...we are about to get on to the exciting stuff!!! Through customs with no problems and on to collect out baggage...and here is where the fun really begins...so, we are waiting by the carousels, and all the bags are being belched out some black hole somewhere and making their way around on the conveyer belt...very soon I am able to haul my backpack from the belt...now I just have to wait for my giant suitcase...so I waited...and waited...and waited a little longer...eventually everyone from the flight had collected their bags and suitcases...I was still a bag down...the suitcase, which contained the majority of my clothes was nowhere to be seen...I asked a guard and was taken into an office, I was joined by Mike, the project manager for VSO Rwanda, I was assured that this was not uncommon and very often cases would arrive later that day or the following day...I filled out the relevant forms and headed through the barrier, with a lot less than I had left London with! We were greeted by several members of VSO staff and volunteers already in placement here, including Ruairi, who is to be my new housemate when I get to Gisagara following 10 days of training.
Our bags and cases were loaded into the back of pickup trucks and we were taken to our hotel. Rooms were allocated; I am sharing with another teacher called Melanie. Lunch was served shortly after, salads, rice, potatoes (chipped), peas, carrots, fish, and goat stew, also known as Melange... After lunch was when I realised that in addition to all of my clothes being in my suitcase, I was also missing all of my shoes, with the exception of the trainers I had been wearing non-stop for the last 24 hours and I only had the one pair of socks I was wearing...very kindly...one of the other volunteers offered me a pair of ‘bathroom slippers’ which had been left in her room. These were very basic; one size fits all blue flip flops...not so bad? Well...they were probably a size 10 (at least) and both of them happened to be left feet...I looked very silly indeed! One of the staff members of the hotel saw this and managed to find me a matching pair! Later we walked into town to some change money, and use the internet...I nearly bought pants, but thought better of it...the pants on display in the glass cabinet were interesting...thankfully clothes dry very quickly here so that was not a problem! On the way back we went for drink as the football was on. The sun was setting by 6.30pm so we decided to head back to the hotel as the roads are tricky to manage during the day, let alone in the dark!
Our bags and cases were loaded into the back of pickup trucks and we were taken to our hotel. Rooms were allocated; I am sharing with another teacher called Melanie. Lunch was served shortly after, salads, rice, potatoes (chipped), peas, carrots, fish, and goat stew, also known as Melange... After lunch was when I realised that in addition to all of my clothes being in my suitcase, I was also missing all of my shoes, with the exception of the trainers I had been wearing non-stop for the last 24 hours and I only had the one pair of socks I was wearing...very kindly...one of the other volunteers offered me a pair of ‘bathroom slippers’ which had been left in her room. These were very basic; one size fits all blue flip flops...not so bad? Well...they were probably a size 10 (at least) and both of them happened to be left feet...I looked very silly indeed! One of the staff members of the hotel saw this and managed to find me a matching pair! Later we walked into town to some change money, and use the internet...I nearly bought pants, but thought better of it...the pants on display in the glass cabinet were interesting...thankfully clothes dry very quickly here so that was not a problem! On the way back we went for drink as the football was on. The sun was setting by 6.30pm so we decided to head back to the hotel as the roads are tricky to manage during the day, let alone in the dark!
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