Oh man!! The second week has come and gone. It has been so much fun getting to know Kigali
MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY
On Monday we had our usual schedule of classes and labs.
 Tuesday was rather different in the evening. I made friends with some of the locals and I decided to hangout with them.  They took me out to a local bar where we had drinks and brochette.  Brochette is a famous roasted meat(goat, fish, beef) skewer treat in Rwanda  I really wish I had a picture, but I usually just rush into my food before I remember I have to take a photo.
 I happened to have a talk with one of the locals in our group called Daniel.
Daniel told me he studied fine arts but he was now into photography.  His main area of focus is on Rwanda in the 20th century up till present day. In his own words, He felt that Africa as a whole is always represented in pictures as a continent of suffering and impoverished people.  He says that his photography focuses on the growth and strength of the nation. He strongly believed that archives should be kept for future generations to fall back on.  I was moved by this conversation partly because he saw a bright future for his country and the effort he put towards achieving this dream was impressive. Apparently, he hired cameras and travelled for hours to different parts of the country to capture this amazing side of Africa that he loves.  The night ended with lighter conversations and a tonne of laughs. I was pleased 
Wednesday: It was poker night with the locals from the college we live at. We meet some professors that taught civil engineering and we talked about the values of teaching and how it has improved their lives. We exchange some lingua in French, Kinyarwanda and English.  They were pleased to teach us a song that went like this
                     Bienvenue Bienvenue au leur payee
THURSDAY, FRIDAY, SATURDAY
As usual, this was the start of the weekend for us. We ended the day by having some ice cream. I called it a night early enough tho, because I felt a bit weird. By weird I mean tired and 
Friday was a really good day. Like my roommate Maddy says, it was Great!!
We visited the hospital this week. First, we got introduced to the technicians and the director of the hospital. After that, we were divided into three groups to troubleshoot and fix some broken equipment. I was in a group that had to fix operating room lights that weren’t working.  The control board of operating room lights was broken in that capacitors and some resistors we burned out.  To fix the problem, we had to find the service manual and specification sheets from the manufacturer. Because of the limited time at the hospital, we didn’t have the chance to complete the task. We were for sure introduced to the troubleshooting process of medical devices in the developing world.

Saturday, we took a day trip to Nyungwe rain forest.  It was a 10-hour bus ride to and fro from the capital. During the trip we made a pit stop at some canteen where I finally had the best brochette ever.  It tasted so good that I bought three skewers.
Getting to the rain forest, we went on a hike down the hill to the canopy walk site. A Vancouver Canadian company built the canopy for tourist purposes in Rwanda. GO CANADA!!!!
  During the hike down, we crossed over some red ants.  Now red ants have the worst sting ever. How do I know??? Well, I was the only one in the group that managed to carry one in my socks. I obviously didn’t know this until I got to the middle of the canopy, when I felt a painful sensation. I squealed.  I will have more pictures to better yet explain what happened on saturday. 

SUNDAY
I found an awesome coffee shop in the kimihurura district called shokola. This had to be the best find of the week because my insides could finally settle into a peaceful oblivion.  I started this blog post at the coffee shop but never finished it.  We went to tiani’s and papyrus where we got coffee and Italian food.  I would highly recommend this district for anyone who loves food and coffee like me.  

WEEK 1
SATURDAY 11:20am
I left Toronto at some godly hour of 11:20 am for a 13hr flight trip to Ethiopia.  I had a 3hr layover and a flight to Kigali that day.  Chilling in the wait room, I stumbled on other EWH students and we all embarked on the 2 hr. flight from Addis Abba to Kigali.  We arrived Kigali at 12:40pm local time.
SUNDAY 12:40pm
 From the airport, we ventured to the IPRC to meet our host famiies. My first impressions of Kigali were rather pleasant. I was taken aback by the vast hills and red sandy color that donned the city. Upon arrival at our home for the next 4 weeks, we decided to explore the streets.  We started with the corner stores and open Market Square. But because we were jet lagged, fatigued and sore we decided to call it an early night.

 MONDAY 7am
 At 7 am, we experienced our first bucket shower. It was exciting but it was just the beginning of a rather eventful day. We had a nice breakfast of ginger tea and bread.  The day started with a little bit of orientation and introduction to the participants of the program. After, we needed to get Internet started up which required us going into town.  We took motos (okada, bikes, scooters) whatever you call them to town. I probably haven’t used those in almost 10 years now.  Oh Lord! The excitement.  Getting to town, we tried to get the Internet fixed but to no avail. We were starving, so we ate at our first Rwandan buffet stand, which was just the beginning of many buffet type restaurants.  We did a bit of exploring to another open market, up the hill and down the valley. Made a pit stop at an Internet café and played a game of cards for a couple of hours. We headed back to home.

TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY
I still struggled with jet lag and a bit of homesickness. I started enjoying the routine though. Kinyarwanda lessons are lots of fun because we all struggle with pronunciations but survival instincts take over, we literally cannot function in without speaking the native tongue.

 THURSDAY
 I haven’t laughed this much in so long......
This thursday was not particularly great or bad. It was an okay day. I had a lab earlier on and blew up the transformer of my converter. I tried fixing it with a soldering iron but I completely destroyed the whole package.  I decided to buy some snacks and head to the computer lab for more work. Mr nice guy Portuguese broke his laptop and he was in sour mood.  we ended up talking about the days unfortunate events while he taught me a bit of Portuguese which I forgot in no time.I can’t remember the details of our conversation but I know it fell somewhere between scienceyyy and funny jokes.  But I just remember us laughing away all the troubles we faced today

FRIDAY, SATURDAY
It was ground breaking day at the college. A project that was funded by the Korean government at the IPRC. They are to build a new teachers training college. After the ceremony, we had cocktails {or as they say, we raised the roof}  and a group of cultural dancers entertain us. This week, we couldn't make it to the hospital so we visited the BMET lab at the school. It was a nice day getting introduced to the devices that we had only seen in theory. we played around with oxygenators, patient monitors and infant warmers.

On Saturday, we had a tour of Rwanda. We started off at the memorial site in Nyamata village of the eastern district. This memorial site was church where a large number of Tutsi people were murdered. The tutsi people believed that the church would be a scared hiding place for them since this was the case in 1992. But, this time was different in that the hutu's blindly followed orders from the government and executed all the people at the church. In the memorial site housed a burial ground of up to 50,000 tutsi people.  The stories of how people were massacred were told and I find them a little bit gory for sharing. 
After that , we visited the reconciliation village with about 56  hutu and tutsi families. The formation of the village was encouraged by the Rwandan government to promote peace between the tribes. We had the opportunity to hear stories of two survivors of the genocidal period from both tribes. The account was quite heartbreaking both also brought an opportunity for reflection in our own lives. Through their stories, I found that I finally understood the saying " TO AIR IS HUMAN AND TO FORGIVE IS DIVINE". We danced with the villagers and shared a drink with them. 

We also visited a basket weaving site and learnt a bit of how to basket weave. DAMN!!! it's really difficult,my hat goes off to the women.  We visited a health centre and a farm to end the tour around Rwanda.
I really enjoyed the first week so far. I like my team mates, my host family and the people of Rwanda. Hopefully week 2 will have more exciting endeavours to be talked about.

I am in my finals days of being in Canada (My last official day). talking about my departure to  friends has been difficult.  I have had legit nightmares of the worst case scenario of things, but I am hoping for the best. The more I tell people about it, I catch myself saying "What the hell did you get yourself into tracy".  
CHEERS!!!! to new beginnings and adventures. I will keep you updated on my journey and the events over the weeks in R
Rwanda