Day 79 ~ Into the Field!
We’ve been preparing for this field visit for weeks. The plan was to arrive in Huye for the Mobile Family Planning event that was scheduled for 3pm. We head the 2.5 hours south to Huye. Home of Rwanda’s National Museum, National University, National Prison, and according to the LivingInKigali.com, a really good ice cream joint. (We didn’t find the ice cream).
We rocked up to the SFH Office at 2pm, ready for the Mobile Family Planning event only to learn that it was actually taking place 2.5 hours away in a remote village. “Was this decided yesterday?”
“No it’s been planned and approved by the authorities for weeks.”
Hmm. Okay. Yet another example of the poor communication networks inherent with SFH corporate culture and, to be honest the entire country as far as I can tell.
So we head back down the road we came on, now with two Huye SFH volunteers in tow. Emanuel, who is currently pursuing his Masters in agricultural engineering and Venuste, who is currently in year 4 of 5 of his Bachelors in Social Work. Hurrah! The first social worker we’ve met since arriving! He tells us he’s hoping to go into clinical social work and wants to work with “people with psychological problems”. Great country for it.
During the journey we discuss the budding field of social work in Africa, the pits and perils of mechanized agriculture in Rwanda, and the differences between our two countries. (I’ve long since realised that it’s impossible to convey the vastness of our country, or the extreme weather… yet, I still try.) I stumble through answering the question “why is it so difficult to get a visa to go to your country?” I bumbled on about health care and how the government takes good care of her citizens, so they’re careful about who they…. Hmm.. Oh dear. That’s not right at all. Help me out here Jordan… he mercifully changed the subject.
As we talk the road is getting more and more, um, shall we say, full of character?
Deep cliffs to our right, giant cow sized potholes mended with logs riddled throughout, stunningly beautiful terraced hills – every scrap of which is filled with some crop or other. Wheat, tea, beans, corn, sunflowers, potatoes, rice… The parts of the hills that are too steep to successfully cultivate have been planted with trees to prevent erosion.
So. Stunningly. Beautiful. The patches of wheat are yellow, the trees, a metallic blue, the earth is a rich orange, and then the greens…. oh the greens…
Unfortunately the state of the road and our hurry to get to the remote village, get the footage we need and get back to Huye, and then Kigali means stopping for photographs is impossible.
After an hour and a half of driving on this wretched road we arrive in the village. We see the Confiance (birth control product brand that SFH markets) tent set up and about 75 people sitting on the hill above it, listening to the local official (who is also a nurse) give a presentation.
The instant Jordan and I hop out of the truck all eyes are on us, and I’m confident that from that moment on, not a word of the presentation made it into the consciousness of the audience. The Muzungus* had arrived and Boy were they fascinating!
After taking a few pictures and video of the event Jordan and I attempt to hide behind the tent in order to allow for the presentation to successfully continue. Well, it wasn’t long before half the audience and about a dozen other villager’s curiosity took them over and they made their way around the tent to stand in a large group surrounding us behind the tent.
We took this opportunity to interview a woman about how family planning methods had changed her life. The gist of her response was that thanks to the information and products she received from SFH she has been able to stop at four children and her life is now much better. She was careful to tell us that she usually dresses much better than the mud-spattered clothes she was wearing, but she had been working in the fields before she came to the event.
While Jordan was filming I couldn’t resist taking video of the crowd of curious women and children that had gathered around us. I filmed them with the display facing them, mirroring their faces back at them. I was met with a mixture of fear and fascination. At one point I felt a tug on my arm and turned to see a very stern-faced woman of about 30. She pointed very seriously at her own face, clearly conveying the message that it was time to film her now. I did so. Her stern face scowled back at her and then broke out into a surprised grin. Nervous giggles erupted from others. And I realised I was causing a disturbance in the background of Jordan’s film. Whoops. Where’s you professionalism in practice Naomi?
With interviews concluded we start to leave. Somehow this draws a larger crowd. Venuste and I are in the middle of a sea of about 100 fascinated faces. One woman bolder, or more playful than the others grins at me. I greet her with the customary "Miriway!" (good afternoon) and follow it up with "Amacuru?" (How are you?) "Nee Meza!" (I'm good!) She answers in reply and then her and half the crowd bust a gut at the absurdity of Kinyarwanda coming out of the mouth of this strange foreign woman.
Venuste and I converse with a few people in the crowd for a while, mostly with one man who is clearly struggling with mental health issues, but is extremely cheery and trotting out all the English and French he has in order to converse with us. It would have been charming were it not for that look in his eyes. Manic, unbalanced, tightly-wound. He looked to be about 65, but was probably closer to 40. Do the math… He comes by that mental instability honestly.
We make our way out of the now rather claustrophobic crowd and head for the truck. Just then Emanuel suggests that we dance a bit before leaving. “We should dance with these people. It shows solidarity.”
Okay. I’m on the side of a mountain, in a remote village in the middle of Rwanda and I’m being asked to dance with a village. Who says No to that?
So Emanuel, Venuste, Jordan and I head over to the music. We dance/walk there to make our intentions clear. I don’t know what I was expecting – some sort of scene out of a movie where the whole village starts dancing and the birds are chirping and all is right with the world as the African sun sets behind the mud hut… This is not what happened.
Instead, the four of us danced for about 2 minutes while the village crowded around us and stared, and three drunk and/or mentally unstable middle-aged men joined us in the circle. One by one my male SFH counterparts left the inner dancing circle and I found myself at the centre of 100 staring people while I danced with one particularly drunk middle-aged village man. I was told later that I displayed a mixture of Congolese and Rwandese traditional dance moves… But I gotta tell you.
It got a little awkward.
I am aware that Jordan and my presence in that village today, while providing entertainment for the people, was only beneficial for us. In fact, I fear that the excitement we caused may have undermined the work that the SFH staff and local health authorities were doing. However, on the good side, I was told that 28 women from that village began some form of birth control today. So – good work was done. And Jordan and I were happy to play the pigmentaly challenged circus freaks.
*Muzungu is the Kinyarwanda word for White-skinned person.
