Hasta la Pasta, Baby

The view from the Mountain Gorilla View Lodge....which I'm pretty sure was called paradise.

This is a story about five college kids and a mentor who were always hungry.

The famished group would wander the streets nightly in search of nourishment that didn’t consist of omelettes and goat kabobs. They first stopped by Shakey’s the local buffet with all the exciting staples you always craved such as rice, beans and squash. Well, needless to say Shakey’s just wasn’t enough. The gang moved on.

A few nights later, as we- the group- were eating dinner at the hotel’s restaurant upstairs, a pair of mildly drunk Canadians suddenly appeared! Apparently the tall brunette and the short, stocky blonde were claiming to be twins. Well, they shared the same birthday and year, which is a mildly interesting fact, I’ll have to agree. But still, we were hungry and they were distracting us from our french fries.

“Hello there,” we say as we dip fries in Egyptian Heinz.

“WE’RE TWINS” the pair screams again.

“Yes, we know.” * exaggerated eye roll* “So, how are you two liking Musanze so far?”

And at that moment the Canadians had a moment of total lucidity.

“Have you guys been to Mambo Italiano? We’re going there tonight! It’s fantastic!” The blonde pulls out a card, “It’s owned by a guy named Alberto. Here’s his number!”

The next night, after setting up a reservation with the now famous Alberto earlier that morning, we took off for the restaurant. The directions, however, weren’t the most clear.

“I think he said something about turn left at the 20.”

“The 20?”

“Uh, wait, maybe it wasn't that…”

“Do we turn left at this street or the next?”

“OH MY GOD WATCH OUT FOR THAT BUS.”

Well, eventually we made it. If you want to picture Mambo Italiano just picture a meat shop mixed with a tiny candlelit Italian joint, complete with candles, posters of Venice and cheese or what have you on the walls, and, of course, CD’s lining the ceiling. We were confused about the CD’s too until the lights came on and made the entire place sparkle. Touche, Alberto.

            So we took our seats and looked at the menu. Pretty regular fare, even for an Italian restaurant in the middle of Africa. Pasta, pizza, sausage and cheeses, wine and assorted meat and vegetable dishes. Okay, I thought, I can live with some Rwandan pizza. So I order pizza (this is where first person comes into play here, culinary adventures are very personal, you know): a proccutio and mushroom pizza. At this point, there was no Alberto in sight anywhere. I’m expecting a fat, jolly Italian with a moustache to come out wiping his hands on his apron and saying “Molto benne! Come eat a-sausage with a-me, Alberto!” Stereotypes work sometimes, people, c’mon.

            This time, though, they honestly didn’t. While waiting for our food, in comes Alberto, the skinny, tall guy with no facial hair whatsoever. But albeit the lack of common Italian stereotypes, the man is very courteous to us very demanding and picky Americans. The food came out fantastic and just the way we hoped, not to mention that for dessert there was homemade gelato drizzled with Rwandan coffee and covered in local strawberries. Now I, for one, was obsessed.

            So we came back for more. The next time we had the pleasure of having Alberto invite us to a picnic on Sunday. How could we possibly say no? Our stomachs were already rumbling in anticipation.

            The morning of the picnic we met up with a mish mash of cultures at the bus stop in Musanze. There was some Czech, French, Italian and, well, us present, all apparently there for Alberto’s picnic as well. We all managed to cram into a bus and were taken to Kinigi, a village we haven’t gotten the pleasure of visiting yet. And man was it a pleasure. The hour and a half hike was fantastic; the views were great, the weather to die for and we only a few kids asked for money this time! Oh boy what a treat!

A frightened chameleon, which curiously made children just as frightened when you showed it to them, thus an easy way to keep them from parading behind us all day. 

            Eventually we made it. Now, the entire time I was expecting a picnic by some potato field with some sausages and cheese, not that that was terrible, of course, but just pretty ordinary.

This was no potato field, but rather the Mountain Gorilla View Lodge and this place had the works. There were tropical flora, vistas of towering volcanoes, shaded hammocks and of course, donkeys. While we napped under the shade of tall trees a meal of the best kabobs, fries, and all the avocados we ever wanted were prepared for us by the staff. Seriously, if you ever had some crazy obsession for avocados, go there. They will fill your plate. At some point the donkeys went missing and we were pretty sure they were sacrificed for kabob meat, but hey, that’s what hunger will do to ya: make you think some pretty weird things. Thankfully, it wasn’t donkey meat, but rather from a cow that probably came from down the road. Ah, the circle of life.

The crew with some friends we picked up along the way to the lodge....and Michael's eyes are closed.  

            We ate our fill, and after continuously offered more and more food ("Oh god, no, we're already so full.....well okay if you insist."), we napped some more, enjoying our day of leisure after a hard week of work, but like everything else in this short life of ours, it had to come to an end. Waving goodbye to the staff and the loud donkeys that hated all humans
, we headed back home. It was a perfect day for a group of hungry college students and mentor, and we all came back feeling refreshed, rejuvenated and ready for our last week in Africa.

The end.

May you find peace, happiness and good Italian food,

-Steph

DONKEY.