Beauty Inside and Out!

From Indie!

Kigali is beginning to feel like home!  Today, we ventured to the south of the capital city.  On our way to Nyungwe National Park, we stopped at the Azizi Life office--a Rwandan NGO that supports community entrepreneurship in communities far less privileged than those in Kigali.  Azizi means "beautiful," and everyone who worked for the organization is beautiful--so welcoming.   Once there, we split into two groups so that we could learn local industries. One group constructed a chicken coop, and the other (my group) went to the house of bee keepers. We started by introducing ourselves to the group of men and women who lived there. Introductions (and farewells) are very important to Rwandese people. People stand to introduce themselves and speak in gentle tones, calling on tremendous hospitality.   Their homes are humble, but the people are resourceful, proud, and incredibly warm.  After introductions we went outside and learned how to build a beehive.  This is not a mere hobby; beekeepers are central to the economy in this part of the nation where the land is not quite as fertile as it is in norther Rwanda.  The sacred cows of Rwanda are central even to beekeeping as dung is a major part of the process. They showed us how to sharpen sticks, put them in the ground, flatten bamboo and use it to weave around the stakes in the ground. After weaving the bamboo from the bottom of the stakes to the top we got to the groups favorite part: smearing cow dung all over it! We washed our hands and ate lunch together. We then made candles from beeswax, left the beekeepers' house, re-grouped and went to the house where we made imigongo and spent the remainder of the night. Imigongo is a beautiful art form that we have seen all over Rwanda--it is the oldest art form in Rwanda and originated in the home of the kings, as a wy to adorn the king's residence. Alex, an imigongo master taught us how to design a simple pattern and then use cow dung to make ridges on our wooden canvases over the designs we had drawn. It would take a day for the dung to dry so we could paint it, so instead we painted imigongo that had been made before (using traditional patterns). We ended the night all together by the fire with dinner, which had been prepared for us by the incredibly kind and generous women whose house we were sleeping at, star gazing and singing and dancing.  

Words cannot express how thankful I am that these amazing men and women welcomed us with open arms, showed us their livelihoods, shared their food, their songs, their art, and their homes with us. I felt and feel so blessed to experience the sense of community that is so strong. Dancing and singing around the fire made me feel like I had been a part of this family and community my entire life. I think we can all agree that this is a feeling that has been so prominent in our time in Rwanda, and it goes to show the incredible openness you see in people here that you don't see in many places.