From Chris: Travel and Arrival

(I had trouble posting for most of the trip, as my email doesn't work here. I've got it all worked out now, however, and will be catching up. I'm back-dating the entries so that they make sense.)

The trip down here was a long one: two eight-hour flights, with a layover in Brussels. The layover was about four hours, just enough time for us to get some breakfast and relax briefly with a game of cards. This airport knows doesn't pay much attention to the time of day; jumbo glasses of fine Belgian beer were available at 7am, along with blaring music videos.

After the last flight, we were met at the airport by Barrett, the village's awesome volunteer in charge of visitors, and one of the village's drivers. Driving in Kigali traffic is not for the meek; you have to make your own opportunities to merge and cross. We stopped at Ndoli's Market (a local Bodega) to exchange dollars for Rwandan francs and to get bottled water. The trip out to the village took about an hour. When we finally arrived, the kids had made us a sign (see Brian's earlier post) and left us a basket of welcome cards.

They also left us a generous spread of tasty food, including some rare meat sambusa (the local version of a samosa), fruit salad, and some snacks. After a brief meeting to work out plans for the next day, we hit the sack.