Cow brides and banana beer

So now for the second instalment (if you did read the last post scroll down and read it first), our next stop was Goma, DRCongo. Its about an hour long bus ride from Ruhengeri which we took on a bus with no suspension and we were sitting in the back seat. Needless to say it was a bumpy ride. Once we arrived in Gisenyi, the town on the Rwandan side of the border we got on the back of motorbike taxis for five minutes until we reached the border. Border crossings here require forms to leave the country you’re in, walk across aThe next stop on our journey (if you haven’t read the last post scroll down and read it first) was Goma, DR Congo. It was about an hour bus ride from Ruhengeri in Rwanda on a bus with zero suspension and we were sitting in the back so it was a bit of a sort of ‘no man’s land, and then to get in to Congo you have to get a permission to travel form and pay $40 to get in. Travelling here costs a lot of money. Rwandan visas are $60 and officially Canadians need one but unofficially they stamp your passport and let you through. Once in Congo one of the project coordinators, Levi, took us to the program coordinator Papa Jeremy’s house where we had something to drink before heading to our guest house. It was really a guest house for priests in transit or escaping the conflict farther north but Bridget stays there all the time when she’s in Goma. You quickly discover some differences between the Catholics and the Quakers we are working with. In most of Africa, tea is the drink of choice after dinner though I think its more like sweetened milk with a little tea, but instead the priests eating dinner in the room offered us banana beer! I don’t quite know how they make it but I think they cook bananas until they’re like liquid and then let the stuff ferment. However they do it, its got a serious alcohol content and the after taste was as if I had eaten a whole lot of bread dough and the yeast was now rising in my stomach.

The next day was much like our first day in Kigali with Bridget working on accounting and Gunhild and I visiting project coordinators and also the women’s workshop in town where 20 women at a time are taught tailoring and receive teaching on conflict reconciliation. In the afternoon Bridget headed back to Kigali to finish up some work there while Gunhild and I were taken up to see the lava flows just above the city. In 2002 the volcano, which is still active, erupted cover a large portion of the city. The eruption was unexpected and didn’t come from the mouth of the volcano but from underground right on the edge of the city. The lava moved slow enough that people were able to escape but it destroyed many homes. Instead of reasoning that living in the shadow of an active volcano that will most certainly erupt again, people have rebuilt their homes right back where they think they were before. Their houses are made of wood but their yards and ‘fences’ are made of hardened rocks of lava. It makes for an interesting landscape.


Gunhild and I got back on the bus the to Kigali the next morning, arriving at lunch time. We spent the afternoon visiting two churches that were sites of massacres during the genocide in Nyamitaba. It was a bit of an out of body experience. I found it hard to connect what I was seeing with my eyes with any feeling. Being in a place where people have committed such unexplainable acts of violence in some cases against their friendsThe next day Gunhild and I got on a bus back to Kigali in the and neighbours. Even more unbelievable to me was that our guides in both places were from the area and at one of the churches was a survivor of the very events they were explaining.

The next day was Friday and we got on a plane for our 30 minute flight to Bujumbura, Burundi. We were picked up from the airport by friends of Bridget and went back to their house for lunch before heading to hotel to get ready to go to a dowry ceremony Bridget had been invited to. The idea of dowry doesn’t quite exist at home but it is very important here and is a bit of a curious thing. The bride is hidden away in some room in the house while the father’s make speeches. First the bride’s father asks why the groom’s family has travelled all this way and asks whether they plan on stealing their cows since they come from a tribe that’s know for that activity. The groom’s father responds saying no they aren’t here to steal but to buy a cow, a very special cow. But we have many cows the brides father will say and will get a response something like but this cow is a specific and very special one. The bride’s father will ask how much they are willing to pay for this special cow, the groom’s father will make an offer, the bride’s family will discuss it and then if they agree out comes the bride! I don’t think I know any bride to be who wants do be discussed as livestock! The dowry given used to be cows of food, but more often now is a monetary amount. After all this has taken place, about 2 hours later, we all get to eat and then go home to sleep because they had five wedding ceremonies the next day. First a civil ceremony, then a parade type thing through town to a reception. Then there is a lifting of the veil ceremony and finally a dinner for just the family and maybe a few friends. Bridget was invited to all that but Gunhild and I decided we’d pass. Erik and his son who were arriving from Norway to do the seminar the next week arrived around lunch time that day and while Bridget sat in the multiple wedding ceremonies we went to the beach.

Bujumbura is the hottest place I’ve been so far. You feel like you’re sweating after 5 minutes of standing outside. The city has a couple resort type hotels with pools right on the beach. It was the most relaxing afternoon we’d had in a week. It did however feel like you’d been transported out of Africa though. It’s a place for tourists, expats and UN and other officials or NGO workers moving in and out of the country. On the other hand it was the most ‘normal’ we’d felt in over a week. No longer being the only white people and away from the staring and calls of “mzungu” I didn’t feel so much like a foreigner anymore. I had the thought that some of the places I feel most normal are also the places the people of the country I’m in will most likely never experience.

I hope this is still interesting, one more week of travelling to go!