From Chris: Day 3 - Rubona

On Friday, we walked to the market in the local town, Rubona. There was lots of market traffic on the road, and as always there were friendly children everywhere. It amazes me that, after everything the people of Rwanda have been through, they remain so warm and raise children that feel comfortable running up to strangers. It's a very friendly place.

Along the way, we passed the local primary school. The kids in the school rushed to the windows to wave.

The market at Rubona is the size of a small flea market. Everything from pineapples to pens to used shoes is for sale.

 

This lady insisted that I take a picture of her and the baby so she could see it on the camera. This happened to us several times, but we also had several people get mad because they got caught in shots. A fair number of people would just run off giggling and hiding if you pointed a camera at them.

We went to Bar Mucho. It has the strange selection of liquor and beer that seems to be typical of Rwandan bars.

Outside of the bar, Savannah was of course busy making new friends. They were very entertained by the digital camera images. I think the two boys in the foreground were threatening to cut me if I didn't back off and leave the nice lady alone.

We bought fabric at this stall in the market. Stacy and Savannah took theirs to the local seamstress to have it made into dresses. Her assistants took their measurements and promised to have the dresses ready on Monday.

This little girl ran over to see Stacey. She gave her five and a big hug. She had tears running down her face and was obviously very sad. We tried to ask her about her parents but she only said one or two words the entire time we talked to her. Eventually we left her to go buy sambusa.

 

This kid was making the dough for the sambusa. He throws a little oil into the pan, where it immediately starts smoking. Then he tosses a stack of thin sheets of dough into the pan, where he pushes them around to cook them. He flips the stack, and then peels off individual sheets. The process is repeated until the whole stack is cooked. His hands had clearly been burned a bit, and his little brother--who picked up the pan with only a single layer of newspaper--appeared to have burned the ends off of his fingers.

While waiting for our sambusa, we spotted an adorable pair of feet sticking out from under the nearby door. Eventually the owner of the feet opened the door to say hello.

While the sambusa were being cooked, Stacey entertained the kids by taking pictures of them and showing them to them on the screen. Some of them wanted copies... we definitely need to bring Polaroids next time.

The  crying girl from earlier followed us over to where the sambusa are made. Stacey and Savannah swung her around and danced with her, which was so much fun that it dried up the tears and brought out a smile.

Eventually someone from her family came over and took her away. Later, when we were leaving the market, she saw us and ran back over to us. She was crying again, and got a death grip on Savannah's hand and just wouldn't let go. Someone, probably a grandmother or aunt, came over to get her this time, and she threw herself on the ground and started bawling. They didn't seem angry with us, but were very angry with the girl. With a lot of stick waving, they took her away from the market. Very sad.

These are the two fabrics I picked up for my mom.

That night, we attended Village Time, when the whole village gets together to share performances, news, discuss major issues, etc. In addition to some good old fashioned gospel singing, we got to see a repeat of the performance given at Stand Up and Be Counted. Afterward, Brian was asked up to give his perspectives on the ASYV student trip to NYC.