My bags are packed and I’m ready to go, but to be honest there really isn’t much in my bags. All I have are a few shirts, some pencils, malaria pills, a positive mental attitude, my camera, and about twenty-five energy bars in case we run out of food. Tomorrow night twelve other Year Coursers and I will embark on a journey completely different than any other experience we have ever had.
As part of the Social Action track on Year Course, we will be volunteering at the Agahozo-Shalom youth village in Rwanda. For those who don’t know, Rwanda is a small country in southeast Africa that has recently overcame a genocide, and has since become one of the most progressive countries in the area.
For one month, I will be volunteering at the Aghazo-Shalom Youth Village, which is a school for Orphans of the Genocide. The school was started by a Jewish woman from South Africa named Anne Heyman, who made the connection between the challenges that Israel faced after the Second World War, and the current state in Rwanda. The village is very modern, and holds up to five hundred high school students, who live, study, and undergo therapy to cope with memories from the genocide. At the village I will be farming, helping out in the kitchen, teaching the kids English, sporting, and having an all around awesome time!
After a ton of preoperational meetings, I would say I feel as prepared as I could be to go to Rwanda, and am pretty dam pumped. The culture in Rwanda is completely different from American or Israeli culture. For example, in Rwanda food is only eaten during meals, and it is simply unheard of for someone to walk around eating an apple. Here are some things about the village that will be cool to look out for.
Rwanda Scouting Report:
Pros
-Great group of Year Course kids
-Tons of delicious fresh fruit!
-Weekly school wide runs around campus with 200+ students
-Africans are nasty at soccer (futbol)
-I get to go back to High School
-Don’t have to cook
-Will be more fun than college guaranteed
-Will give me lots of new perspective
-The option to take pictures with little Rwandan children and then set it as my profile picture
-It’s gonna be fun!
Cons
-Malaria
-Power outages
-Showering?
-Missing Year Course
-Won’t get to watch the Patriots crush the Giants live
-Are there any cons to this trip?
I wouldn’t say that I’ve necessarily always had the idea to go to Africa, but I would say that this type of trip is always something I’ve wanted to do. This is really a once in a lifetime opportunity too see the world, and to help people at the same time. Hopefully they have some good Hummus there!
The Crew for the next month!
Year Course and Yavneh Alum Tamar Gaffin-Cahn(on the right)
ALEX YOURE GOING TO HAVE AN AMAZING TIME! and showers are barely a con, they just dont happen. its fine. haha. and thats so nice of you to put up that photo of me! PLEASE keep a detailed blog when you get there and say hello to the village for me and young judaea from last year (especially the john lennon family--that was my family!)
ReplyDeletea few places you MUST go:
1. when you get into ribona during their market days, go to a little alley behind where they are selling bananas and beans and there will be one or two guys making simosa-like things. they were the most delicious things. no meat too :). have eating contests with people and beat my record of only 8. the winner was 10 or 11 i think. ask the long term volunteers about the simosas because they will probably know what i am talking about.
2, the first "store" on your right when you walk into ribona is a bakery-like place. get their food and try the yogurt milk thing. its pretty gross but that is their closest thing to dairy.
3. go to the bar in ribona. dont drink straight from the bottles because they reuse them so don't forget to take a straw. try their foods. the bathroom is behind the bar. try their beer too! and cokes are crazy expensive.
HAVE AN AWESOME TIME!
I wil say hi to John Lennon for you. Thanks for the tips on Rubona! Going to Kigali tomorrow. This place is so much fun!
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