Looking for Torpedo

A couple of you have asked about our little neighbor "Torpedo" from my 2008 stay in Gitarama (see June 2009 blog entry). I named her that because when she saw Micaela or me she would dash toward us at full speed and not stop until she crash landed into our legs with a big hug. Even when a native speaker of Kinyarwanda asked her what her name was, he couldn't understand her reply, so others started calling her Torpedo as well.
One day last week we drove slowly down the old street--it's even bumpier now--so I could look for her. We stopped near the house I stayed in then, and I got out and looked around for her. Some curious kids stopped to observe us (they never seem to tire of gazing at muzungus), but I didn't see her among them. We tried to ask about her, but no one spoke English, and Kinyarwanda still eludes me.
Next time, if there is a next time, I'll take a picture of her and a Kinyarwanda translator with me to increase my chances of finding her. I hope all is well with my little buddy. I'd love to see her beautiful smile again.

Location:Gitarama, Rwanda

Pile of elephants

Today I visited the elephant orphanage (it has a longer, more official name, but most people just call it the elephant orphanage) on the outskirts of Nairobi. The elephants were orphaned by the deaths of their mothers by poaching, accidents, or natural causes. Naturally, the babies were unbelievably cute--bumping into one another, rolling in the mud, and generally acting like kids.

Location:Nairobi

Public health celebrity

While finishing my dinner at Heaven, I saw the muzungu guy walk up to another table and start a conversation. I tired to eavesdrop, but they were too far away for my efforts to be effective. However, I did overhear "public health stuff," and when he was leaving that table I heard him say his name was Josh. Right away I remembered his picture from the New York Times. When he stopped by to talk to me I asked him if he was Josh Ruxin, and he said yes.

Josh is the founder and director of the Access Project in Rwanda, an initiative of the Center for Global Health and Economic Development at Columbia University. He's a frequent contributor to several publications (including this one--this information comes from his bio on the Access Project's website: theaccessproject.com), such as the New York Times and the Huffington Post, and he's been featured in the Washington Post, Forbes, Time, Seed magazine, CNN, and CNN International's "Inside Africa." He has taught public health at the Mailman School of Public Health and is the founder and director of the Neglected Tropical Disease Control Project. He has also done extensive work with the Millenium Villages Project in Rwanda.

I know of Josh through some blog posts he wrote in association with Nicholas Kristof's blog in the NYT. I believe Josh has another blog now. He mentioned that Nick had visited Rwanda 3 weeks before and had sat right where I was sitting. Now that I have connections at the NYT, you can say you knew me back when I was a humble Writer-Editor at NIOSH. (Oh yeah, I'm still a humble Writer-Editor at NIOSH...)

Best of all, Josh and his wife created Heaven in Rwanda (heavenrwanda.com), the lovely restaurant in which I was enjoying delicious food and interesting company.

Location:Kigali

Welcome to Heaven

When I arrived at Heaven, a new (to me) restaurant in Kigali, the staff greeted me with an enthusiastic "Welcome to Heaven!" I just smiled, figuring that I couldn't come up with a heaven joke they'd never heard before.
The menu, a bit meat-heavy, featured items such as grilled filet of beef with cassava chimichurri, vegetables, and mashed potatoes; fish and chips; Thai-style tilapia with rice and seasonal vegetables; and beef or lamb burger on a homemade bun with Gouda, sauteed onions, and fries. Not knowing exactly what to expect, I opted for the "eggplant stack" with green curry sauce and seasonal vegetables and a starter of cauliflower soup. When the server brought my drink, he also brought a sample of avocado soup in a tiny glass--delicious and so spicy I drank half of my Fanta citron (like Sprite) to cool it down.
Like many restaurants in Kigali, Heaven consists of a large covered deck, so you're sitting outdoors in a beautiful space that has all the comforts of indoors. I chose a seat over toward the side of the deck, where I could see the other diners and gaze at an amazing view of Kigali's hilly suburbs. (Rwanda's descriptor of "land of a thousand hills" fits perfectly. Sometimes when walking up yet another steep incline, I think all of the thousand hills must be in Kigali.)
Although the dining area probably had 30 tables, only three or four were occupied. When heading toward my table, I noticed a muzungu (that's what white people are called here--a simple statement of fact) couple sitting with an African man. The muzungu guy looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't quite place him.
The eggplant stack turned out to be a Lincoln log-type construction of lightly fried eggplant strips arranged interlocking one another in a square. It sat on a bed of green curry sauce, and was draped with thinly sliced vegetables. Everything was outstanding, and my very attentive server kept stopping by to make sure all was well. After one of my exclamations of culinary bliss, he asked, "Is it heavenly?"
The back of the menu explains that the restaurant, a "social enterprise," helps Rwanda develop its most important resource, people. It claims that Heaven sets the national standard for service and food quality. Rwandan craftspeople built everything in the restaurant, including the deck, chairs, tables, place mats. The food is locally sourced.
To Be Continued...in the next exciting installment you will learn the identity of the vaguely familiar muzungu, which may only be interesting to the public health people in the audience. Stay tuned...

Location:Kigali

Can't stand it

I just wrote a long blog post about the restaurant I went to last night, but my Internet connection cut out as it was posting. I had saved it as I was writing it, because this kind of thing happens sometimes, but it seems that the whole thing just evaporated. Gone. %{*#+^{!

Location:Kigali

Life-sustaining pool

During previous trips to Kigali, I'd had drinks at the Hotel des Mille Collines and even dipped my feet into its pool. But until Monday I had never stayed there as a guest. When I arrived in Kigali Monday morning I partly spontaneously asked the taxi driver to deliver me to the Mille Collines. To keep my options open, I had made no hotel reservations. Upon arriving at the airport, the Mille Collines just seemed the right choice.
Remember the movie "Hotel Rwanda"? The Mille Collines is the Hotel Rwanda. More than 1,200 people sheltered there for about 3 months in 1994 to wait out the devastation occurring immediately outside the gates and all over the country. Early on in this horrific time, the water and power for the hotel were shut off in attempt to force the people out. The refugees, knowing they'd be killed if they stepped out into the street, stayed put, drank the pool, and used it for cooking and washing.
The movie was filmed in South Africa with South African actors, but the set looks much like the real Mille Collines. The entrance still looks just like the spot where Paul (the "Hotel Rwanda guy" played in the movie by Don Cheadle) was left standing in the rain in a none too subtle reference to the international community's lack of assistance or intervention in the genocide.


I hadn't brought a swimsuit and didn't really plan to get in the pool. But perfect weather and beautiful surroundings forced a change of heart. So I put on my nylon, quick-dry shorts and a tank top and headed down to the pool. Initially the water felt cold, but the sun kept me warm and gradually I got used to it and swam some laps. After a long, difficult winter, it was spring again. Feeling sun on my skin and knowing that the sun (unlike in Cincinnati) would last more than a few hours or a day brought about a renewal of spirit and a life-affirming sense that things really can get better. Immersing myself in a pool that sustained so many lives felt like a baptism. Everyone who sheltered at the Mille Collines survived the genocide.

Connection test

The Internet sometimes avoids me, but I keep looking for it...
My hotel has wi-fi, but it's not free, and I'm sure I'll be surprised when I get the final bill. In the meantime, it seems that Bourbon Coffee (no bourbon in it), long a coffeeshop frequented by expats and locals alike for its wi-fi, is no longer providing that service. Yesterday, after I ordered lunch, the server told me, "intanet broken," so I thought this condition was temporary. Today I stopped by and asked if the Internet was still broken, and a different server said, "intanet gone." Me: Forever? Server: Yes, no more intanet. I am sorry, madam.
No problem, but I trust that "madam" doesn't mean the same thing to him that it does to me.
(I know it doesn't; it's a term of respect for older women, similar to ma'am. But it always startles me the first time or two I hear it.)

Location:Kigali

Thing 3

Happy hour on Friday afternoon: passionfruit juice and vodka, what else?

Location:Nairobi

My favorite thing

Thing 1: getting here. Thing 2: passionfruit. The first time I ever had one I didn't like it. The second time I had one, I squeezed it open like the kids I was eating with, and it squirted one of them in the head. Amid shrieks of the kids' laughter, I tried my third passionfruit (cut with a knife) and was hooked forever. It's about the size of a small plum, with a hard crusty exterior. You cut it and eat the insides with a spoon. The fruit consists of goop and seeds, and it's delicious. The only place I've seen them in the Cincinnati area is Jungle Jim's, and they're very expensive there.

Location:Nairobi

Dusting off my blog

I wasn't going to make any commitments about blogging this time, and I'm still not. But...a number of people have asked me about my blog (thereby stoking my writer wannabe ego), so now I'm considering attempting a few blog posts. As of today, I'm still home, but tomorrow I leave for Kenya, where I will spend some time with my good friend Micaela and her partner Hunter. And next week I'll go to Rwanda for a few days to reconnect with important friends and places.

So stay tuned, friends, family, and random blog readers. Maybe I will share some of my stories with you even before I get home. I will be attempting blog updates on my iPad, which I'm still getting used to. Buts it's a lot of fun and way more portable than a laptop. I'm trying to figure out how to post pictures, so no promises there either.

Tutaonana (see you later),
E.