There is No "I" in Team

And then there were 5….

                Our house in Kigali feels more spacious these days. While that may seem like a good thing, but if you ask me, I would take cramp quarters anyday if it means having as many laughs as I do with our team! Kara left this past Friday to head back to Denver. The following morning Sonya left for South Africa for her practicum. (Side story: remember how Sonya got her wallet snatched here in Kigali and had a doozy of a time getting it back? Yeah well…she managed to lose it again only hours after leaving the country, “somewhere in between Kigali and Jo’burg” to quote her directly. Oh Sonya…)

                Although our team is diminishing in size, our to-do list appears to be growing exponentially. On Tuesday morning, Matt and Andy left bright and early to catch the bus back to Kibuye on their way to L’Esperance. Victor asked us to return to help him out with the small little favor of installing a lightning protection system for the solar panels at the orphanage.  Matt was not here when we were at L’Esperance in the beginning of the trip, so this is his first time! I am sure he will have so many little helpers to make the work enjoyable. BJ is also heading up to the orphanage this morning to join the other two. She had to venture to Gakinjiro (the GIANT construction market in Kigali that has everything you could ever dream of needing to build anything in the world) to pick up some supplies for the lightning protection system. If all goes according to plan, the three of them should be back in Kigali by the weekend. 

                Andrew and I are holding down the fort here in the city for the rest of the week. Just to let you all know, here are some things going on for the team this week: The 522 and 531 are due this Sunday; our geotech assessment by KIST is wrapping up; the city building permit documentation is still in the works; and community agreements have been sent to the umudugudu (trying saying that 10 times fast) and the sector. We are also doing some groundwork on fundraising from sources both in Rwanda and stateside. Before we leave country, we still want to map the community surrounding the build site, get an official land survey of the property, interview contractors and do some more sourcing of materials. 

Bertin from KIST helps us perform our the geotech testing

Whenever our group sits down for team meetings and makes a list of stuff we need to do, the amount of tasks we come up with can seem quite daunting! But somehow they always manage to get done... 

                Now that I am thinking about it, the sheer amount of stuff we have done on this trip is far more than the travel team, as six students, could have ever done on our own. Celestin (ROP’s director) has helped us work across language barriers to forge strong community ties. Sean and Jenny are always a phone call away whenever we need ANYTHING- a house, a car, food recommendations, modems, you name it. Wellars (from the real EWB Rwanda) took 3 hours out of his Sunday night to find all of the materials for the lightning protection system. Ray, Sam, and Patrick, along with the entire team at Great Lakes Energy let us borrow an assortment of tools and their very very expensive multimeter, without even a down payment! Bill and Daudi from Cal-Poly connected us to Rotary here. Manna Energy also lent us tools and helped guide our materials sourcing efforts. The leader of the Sector has given us her word to mobilize the community to help in constructing the school. AND there are the hundreds of Rwandans who have helped us when we are lost in the city or can’t tell whether an egg is soft or hard boiled. 

Wellars showed us some of his projects when we went materials sourcing!

                Even across the Atlantic our EWB-CU teammates have got our backs. Jeni facilitated an international wire transfer like a ninja. Emily is furiously coordinating fundraising schemes. Kyle and Jacob are working overtime to produce a 3D rendering of the school that we can show to people here. Kim doing gratis site planning. Oh and of course, who could forget Steve and Kara, our mentors that agreed to come live and work with us here, before they realized what exactly they were getting themselves into… There are countless other examples and people that I am sure I have left out (1000000 apologies for that).

But my point is this: Without all of the help we have gotten along the way, this trip would be very different. Our lengthy checklists would feel far more daunting if we did not have this kind of support network around us. Seeing how many people care about this project is incredibly heartwarming, and makes me very excited to see what is to come!

Jordan

MTV's The Real World Kigali

This is the true story…of eight team members…picked to live in a house…work together and have their lives taped…to find out what happens…when people stop being polite…and start getting real…The Real World: Kigali.

Kigali House: Where all the drama happens.

Tune in for MTV’s 29^th season of The Real World – this time in the heart of Africa: Kigali, Rwanda.  Watch as six University of Colorado students and two valiantly patient professional engineers tackle life in the big city and learn to fend for (and even feed) themselves.

Andrew: team member or savage paparazzi cameraman?

 

-cut to interview of Jordan-

“I mean, the house is bomb,” quips rising Civil Engineering Sophomore, Jordan Burns, “but it is hard to find an edible live chicken in this neighborhood for under 3000rwf!  Combine that with the difficulty of cooking in a kitchen full of ravenous twentysomethings eating peanut butter out of the jar, and you get grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner 5 nights a week.  It’s a culinary travesty.”

The kitchen gets crowded on grilled cheese night

 

Watch breathlessly as the roommates venture into the city!

-cut to clip of a helmeted Sonya fearlessly haggling with a glowering motorcycle taxi driver

“NO!  We agreed on FOUR-hundred francs, not SIXTEEN HUNDRED!  FOUR-hundred –magan’ANE!  OK – thank you for being honest.  *SIGH*

-cut to interview of Andy-

“I can’t believe Sonya paid 400rwf for that ride.  I would have totally talked that guy down to 300!”

Andy, happy after a good moto bargain.

 

Witness house drama of epic proportions!

-cut to clip of house meeting led by snarly-looking BJ-

“Ok guys, this house is getting disgusting.  This is why we assigned weekly chores to everybody, but instead of holding each other responsible for your assigned cleaning jobs, you guys just keep procrastinating “because you have to get a jump on the 522 document” and paying each other off with Mutzigs!  And don’t even get me started on whoever’s job it was to clean the bathroom this week!  …oh, that was my job?  Never mind.  Anyway, I’m instituting Umuganda on these premises effective immediately.  Mandatory volunteer labor for all.  That toilet’s not going to clean itself, team!”

Preparing to go in manually.

 

And watch as the team experiences heartfelt bonding moments…

-cut to clip of the team at breakfast-

Andrew: “Hey Sonya, you’ve got something on your face.  NO wait that IS your face!”

Sonya:  “Ughhh.  Whatever Andrew.”

Kara: “Aww stop fighting, you guys are friends.  Pass the peanut butter.”

Steve (over Skype):"I like you guys a lot better from the comfort of my own giant, empty house."

Tune in to The Real World: Kigali next week to witness the panic of tasks unfinished:

-cut to sneak preview of Matt standing on a coffee table trying to lead a morning meeting-

“OK troops, just one more week to go and we have to get ALL of these documents drafted, reviewed, approved, printed in triplicate, signed, stamped, and hand-delivered to every member of the Kigali development board by Tuesday.  We also have to finish the 522, 523, 531 pronto so that when we get back to the states, we can hit the ground running with the 524 and 525!  We also need to meet with the Umudugadu leader ,Sector leader, and District leader to get our plans approved, AND we need to draft our community agreement for the project.  AND we need to pin down that final geotech assessment!  Did anybody make that meeting with the Minister of Education?  With the Environmental, Water and Sanitation Authority’s deputy assistant minister?  And for the love of god, did anybody clean the bathroom?” 

-BJ

Umuganda!

Hello everyone! Matt Hulse here, writing my first entry for the EWB-CU-Rwanda travel blog. I've been enjoying my time in Rwanda for the last two weeks, and can't wait to share our recent adventure stories.

Friday marked the last day where our whole team and Dean Rob Davis were in town together. We spent time at the ROP making friends and making progress on our school construction project.

This weekend marked Umuganda, a mandatory public service day from 8am to 11am on the last Saturday of each month. During Umuganda, businesses close and public transportation shuts down severely. Roll this one around in your head for a while:

By law all able bodied persons above the age of 18 and below 65 are expected to participate in volunteer community work.

Always on alert to jump at mandatory volunteer opportunities, the team elected to join the community we're working with. BJ gave the best analogy: "It's like skiing on the weekend, you have to wake up early and then you want to bail... but once you're on the mountain you have the best day ever and feel great during and afterwards!" This proved incredibly accurate. After some quick gulps of coffee five of us set out for the site of the new land. We met up with Alex, Regis, and Patrick from ROP* who introduced us to the Umudugudu** leader of the new land.

*The Rwandan Orphans Project which we have been calling "The R-O-P" in the past, is actually referred to by the local community simply as rop [rhymes with mop]. 

**Umudugudu is the lowest structured level of 'local government' here, and is a Kinyarwandan word equivalent to neighborhood. Since 2006 Rwanda has been subdivided into 5 provinces -> 30 districts -> 416 sectors -> many Cells -> many more Umudugudus.

Umuganda in our community was managed by the Umudugudu leader; this is common in most communities. Even in Kabeza (the area where we are staying) which is quite a bit more urban and developed they have big Umuganda projects for everyone who lives there. Friday night on our street the next day's Umuganda place to meet and work was announced by a pickup truck with a massive PA system in the back driving around. It's not unheard of that skilled or professional persons offer their services to their local communities at no cost during Umuganda, such as a doctor providing free medical care and house calls. 


In our community we were directed to a small path crowded with shrubbery, weeds, and small trees that was due for expansion. BJ and Andy learned how to use kupa-kupas, long thin blades with a 30 degree bend about 15% down from the tip of the blade. The tool-in-motion looks similar to reaping crops with a scythe and can wreak havoc on the back if not properly used. I helped fell two trees using larger chopping machetes while Jordan and Kara cleared brush using hoes and wicker brooms. The result was a bunch of upturned gooey clay that will eventually get pounded by enough rain and turn hard into a new road!

Jordan swings a machete clearing brush for a new road as we assisted the community during Umuganda.

When the mandatory work period ends (promptly) at 11am, the community gathers in a nearby public space and holds a town-hall meeting. Our team was invited to sit with the community at a nearby soccer pitch while the local Umudugudu began thanking the community members. The Rwanda Governance Board [RGB] promotes that

"...the benefits of Umuganda are not merely economic. The day is intended to build community involvement and strengthen cohesion between persons of different background and levels. One such a benefit is that people can access authorities to articulate their needs and voice opinions on various issues."

Many individuals spoke up about the Vision 2020 Umerenge Program (V.U.P.) -- specifically about mismanagement concerning recruitment and biased allocation of credit and salaries to certain individuals. The Umudugudu leaders were quick to quell and console those with grievances. After every complaint the rhetoric evolved into pledges and promises for optimistic future changes and considerations.

BJ & I present at the meeting post-Umuganda to the local community.

After the formalities, questions, and thanks, a community cultural officer came up and rehashed the history of Rwanda and the significance of cultural unity. While Umuganda is always the last Saturday of every month, the June Umuganda is unique as July 1st and July 4th are both national holidays.


July 1st is Unity Day and equivalent to National Day/Independence Day. July 4th is Liberation Day which I was informed is a celebration of peace recognizing the end of the genocide. Like Umuganda, most businesses and government services are not open on these holidays while the national stadium hosts a live speech by the president and a lavish military parade.

Helicopters practicing formation for the Unity Day military parade, they always fly in the formation of 2 Hinds followed by 4 Hips followed by 2 Hinds.

We celebrated Unity Day by having an off day and enjoying a meal with Dean Rob Davis and his family before they returned to the United States. Other updates on different efforts from the travel team and those we miss back home:


Video Shoot: With wonderful camera equipment loaned by Jeff Larsen's In The Telling media group, Andrew and BJ have been conducting stellar interviews and documenting both the monitoring and assessment portions of our trip with cool footage of working team members and quality interviews. We're really excited to piece all of this footage together for educational, promotional, and recruitment pitches that can boost our team's efforts in these categories.


CVK (formerly known as L'Esperance): BJ is hard at work writing up the 531 Post-Monitoring trip report, which we're hoping to turn in on July 15th. Myself (Matt) and others will begin materials sourcing for  lightning protection equipment for the existing solar energy systems and are planning to return in the next two weeks. Everyone is excited to go back, visit the orphanage, enjoy the beautiful scenery and wonderful people.


Design: Back home, both Kyle and Jacob have jumped up to start work on the 523 Alternatives Analysis report. Encompassing most of the preliminary design work from last spring, this document will detail options on materials, roofing, foundations, as well as energy and water systems for the new school project. I am already working on the 522 Post-Assessment report and this September we'll focus on the 524 Preliminary Design report and the 525 Implementation plan -- so that we can ideally send over a team and break ground in January!


Fundraising: Much discussion has been had on the future budgeting of our project. An initial wishlist of about 8000 square feet of classrooms and office space for the new school will run upwards of US$320,000 at worst-case estimates (US$40/sqft). Andrew has put a lot of thought into fundraising ideas and opportunities for our team next year while Jordan and Andy have started a channel with the local Rwanda Rotary organization which we want to include as a potential funding partner.


New Website: Andrew and his brother, as well as Liz and Ariana back home are working on generating new content for an awesome looking web portal for the EWB-CU-Rwanda team that we hope to launch before the new school year. We'll have automation to help keep track of our recent blog posts as well as lots of multimedia and sponsorship information. This will be a great tool and information portal for our team as we kick off the new project!

A screenshot of the new EWB-CU-Rwanda Team website made by Andrew's brother!

There's plenty of other major efforts (education reports, future plans, and coordination for next year) that everyone here and back home is hard at work on. My thanks go out to an amazing team of hardworking students and volunteers that are progressing on an amazing and challenging project. That's all for now folks! Thanks for reading and feel free to leave us any comments or questions;


Matt Hulse.

Andy walks away in celebration after completing Umuganda with ROP volunteers.

Guns, germs, and bar fights

Late on Thursday night, Kara found herself confessing that two of her teammates were at the police station while everyone else was mingling at a British High Commission cocktail party…

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Earlier that day, Andrew, Kara, and I were finishing up the geotechnical assessment at the ROP land. Although we contracted out most of the assessment through KIST, we collected some samples for simple tests that we performed in our backyard with the help of jars (to look at the sand, silt, and clay layers as the soil settled in water) and sunshine (to measure water content).

Collecting and weighing soil while innocent children play nearby.

While we worked, the usual group of small children gathered around us in fascination, and one of them in particular seemed extremely intent on going through my bag. I tried to stop her multiple times, but in the last five minutes before we left, she managed to take my wallet out of an inside pocket in my bag. When I realized this back at the house, Andrew and I hopped on motos and zoomed back to the site before darkness fell. We recruited a worker from the ROP, Alex, to join us on the quest to find my wallet. As we turned the last corner, still about a quarter mile from the site, people started tagging along—everyone had already heard all about this. By the time we reached the little girl’s house, we had accumulated a crowd of over 50 people, and it was complete chaos. The girl had given the wallet to her father, who we later found out headed straight to a bar with five of his friends and blew through all the Rwandan francs (about $100) before heading to his job as a security guard. When Alex first called him, he denied knowing anything about the wallet, but the rest of the community went up in a roar of anger and several people called him back to yell at him. I desperately wished I could understand Kinyarwanda as Andrew and I stood on the sidelines listening to the shouting. Hours later, Alex and the wife took off on motos to the husband’s work to convince him to return the wallet. Andrew and I sat outside in the dark, still surrounded by people. Another worker from the ROP showed up and called the police, and within half an hour, four giant camouflaged men with AK-47s stealthily appeared in the crowd. I was watching the road the entire time and didn’t see them approach. Meanwhile, Alex managed to get my wallet back, without the money, from the gun-toting security man who was “very, very angry”—this was before we found out that he was also drunk. Alex said he had to be “careful.” He and the wife returned just when the police truck showed up to collect us. We perched on the back and held on for dear life as the truck lunged down the dirt roads. Although we were freezing and hungry, Andrew and I still had the capacity to enjoy this exhilarating ride. We arrived at the police station and were ushered into a room with dirty walls and a single light bulb hanging from a wire. After I wrote down my statement, the police left to find the husband again.

Meanwhile, the rest of the group was at a party at the British High Commission, where at an after-party at a nearby pub two Ugandan women ended up in a hair-pulling, name-calling, table-throwing fight. Needless to say, some of our teammates retired early and everyone had many stories to tell at the end of the night.

The police managed to retrieve most of my money. We found out the next day that the man was thrown into prison until he paid off the money he spent in order to set an example for the rest of the community. The ROP director, Celestin, visited him to tell him about the school we are building for families like his who can’t currently afford to send their children to school. Today I received a call that the rest of the Rwandan francs have been paid off and went to the police station again to retrieve the money. It was a fascinating experience mostly because of the way the community handled the whole affair—they easily could have defended their neighbor and deny knowing anything, but everyone participated in helping me get all of my belongings back. This would never happen in the US.

On Friday, we said goodbye to Steve, who returned to the states despite our continuous begging for him to stay. We miss you, Steve!

Yesterday was “National Work Day,” a day dedicated to community building throughout Rwanda, which Matt will write about soon. Stay tuned! So today is our first intentional “no work day.” We are taking time to lounge, catch up on news, read, and talk to family and friends. Oh, and of course… work out!

Matt trying out the make-shift weights we found in our front yard.

-Sonya