Rwanda

We arrived at the airstrip... well, I hesitate to call it an airstrip as there was no runway, no buildings, nothing except this one small plane.  We would fly back to Aursha, Tanzania from here, and then on to Kigali, Rwanda.

Sorry Jan, no snyrting and no coffee for sale...

Vincent and Ony, our Tanzania drivers, and Jumanne.

We were assured when we got on board and the pilot said, 'My name is Liz, and I'm an alcoholic.'

Some in-flight entertainment was in order...

But, we arrived, safe and sound, in Arusha, from where we would take a flight to Kigali, Rwanda.  It was an enjoyable flight.  We flew at 11,000 feet, and the flight was not quite an hour long.  Our favorite Africa flight though remains as our flight with Alex on our first Africa trip.  The plane, much like this one we flew to Arusha on, wouldn't hold the last 2 of us in our group.  So two would have to go with Alex in his 4-seater.  Jan and I were all over that, volunteering immediately.  We weren't disappointed, Alex flew at about 200 feet, right over the animals.  Jan sat up front in the co-pilot's seat and had to keep picking Alex's Radio Shack GPS unit off of the floor after it had slid off of the dash!  Yee haw!  We loved it!

Our digs in Kigali.  Each 'room' was a 2 story apartment.

There are Genocide Memorials in most towns in Rwanda.  The horror will not be forgotten.  At the same time, the sides have come together in many ways to heal and get beyond this horror.  Yet the people are kind and happy, and always have a smile and a song and a dance to share.

Always a dance...

The women below are part of a 'cooperative,' established to bring both sides together in a peaceful and learning and healing way.  They make Peace Baskets together. Hutu and Tutsi working side by side, while not so long ago they were killing each other at the instigation of others. And then they give the baskets away.  Jan and I both came away with a basket, and a cheer for these resilient people.

Imagine

Children, teach your parents well.

We had lunch at a lovely outside place, replete with nice music and ambiance.  A far cry from box lunches shared with monkeys!  Eric regaled us with his Trump impressions.

This is Bernard, one of our drivers.  He lost his parents, and I think 4 siblings in the Genocide.  He was spared because he was off in another country studying.  We sure understand why he didn't want to tour the Genocide Memorial with us, since he was working and preferred to come and reflect and pay his respects by himself.  He has the nicest manner and smile.  He looks so youthful.  I couldn't believe that he is 52.

Reminding us that tomorrow we will see the gorillas we came for...

We stopped below for a bathroom break as we made our way to the Mountain Gorilla Lodge.  They had a bathroom suitable for Mzungu (definition in tomorrow's post about the gorillas).  The light in said bathroom would be on for about 10 seconds, then off for 10 seconds   It was ok as long as you made your plans while the light was on.  We didn't mind.  As a fellow traveler liked to point out, we were lucky to be here.

There was a tribal dance demonstration at the lodge before dinner.  This boy had it going on.  He got Jan to get out and dance!  Like I said, always a dance!

We were excited, tomorrow was the day we had been looking forward to.

The fire was welcome when we got to our room after dinner.

Photos and stories from our day with the gorillas will all be in the Sept 4 post.

It was time to start making our way home the day after the gorillas...

Dian Fossey (gorillas), along with Jane Goodall (chimps) and Birute Galdikas (orangutans) were called the Trimates, sent to Africa to study these primates.  Dian Fossey paid with her life.  She strongly supported and worked toward protecting the gorillas.  It is theorized that her anti-poaching efforts were the reason for her murder in 1985.  While we were on this trip, a renowned and dedicated anti-poaching activist was gunned down in Tanzania.  The clash is that those poaching have few options and are trying to feed their families   We thought it inspired in Rwanda that those who might be out poaching are now paid to be porters to help tourists on their gorilla viewing treks.

There's a lesson here.  These people were subjected to a horrific genocide, family members and friends forced to kill each other, torture, mass murder.  Yet, almost to the person, they are kind and gentle, and yes, I think happy.  They have come together to heal.

We stopped to see a local family make banana beer.  Jan trekked up to the family's abode and even sampled the product, little floating things and all.

The kids are always her favorite photo subjects.





Bananas...



Banana beer...



Umm...



Oh, the magic we shared!

We stayed in the lobby area of The African Tulip Hotel until it was time to go to the airport for our flight to Amsterdam.  Security was heavy!  Our bus was stopped, right on the road, on the way to the airport, and we all had to exit the vehicle and put our luggage on a platform for them to have dogs sniff.  We put on our game face and our luggage didn't interest the dogs, so we loaded back up and were off to deal with more layers of security at the airport.

My appendix ruptured, apparently in Amsterdam, following the flight from Rwanda.  Never again will I complain about a long flight across the water, not after this one!  I went in the ambulance at the Minneapolis Airport to the closest hospital's emergency service.  After 3 hours, I hadn't been seen, so decided we should just catch a flight home and let me handle this with my own doctors.  I still didn't know it was a ruptured appendix.  I slept on the flight to Denver, then slept the night in my own bed, then went early to the emergency room to discover it was a ruptured appendix.  I was operated on immediately, lucky it hadn't been worse from traveling in such a state.  But all's well... we're planning our next trip.