Mt. Kabuye

This is a re-post of a mass email sent on July 4th:


Hello again,

I’ve been pretty busy with work, and am starting my own projects at a health center in a rural district, Rohunda, about 20 minutes away from my town. The staff at the health center is pretty amazing, and they’ve made me feel welcome since the first day I started working there. I’m spearheading a wait time project at the center, and am currently doing a baseline assessment and will hopefully be implementing a successful change in the near future. Wish me luck!

I’ve finally moved out of my expensive hostel and am crashing at my coworker/peace corps volunteer/friend’s apartment until I move into my new place. My future home is with a doctor at the district hospital who is letting me sleep in her kitchen for free…well, actually, her former kitchen since she emptied it out for me. I was a little confused at first when she showed the room to me with all her kitchen supplies in it…

Weekend excursions have all been insane adventures. I’ll send another email with info about my trip last weekend to Uganda, but in this one I’ll focus on my climb up Mt. Kabuye in Gakenke with Karen and a few doctors from the district hospital.

So…according to the doctors, the climb was supposed to take 30 minutes, with a 1 hour bus ride there. And of course, it ended up being a 30 minute car ride with a 5 hour climb, and us scaling over several mountains just to get to the foot of Mt. Kabuye. No joke. This little hike turned a huge multi-mountain climb also included a cave exploration, some serious sliding down a massive cliff, traversing through a field of grasshoppers, and a text from me to my coworker saying that I was stuck on a mountain and that she could have my package that my parents sent me if I never came back. Of course I survived, but not without some important lessons that I learned while on the mountain:

1. Take whatever time estimate someone gives you in Rwanda, and always multiply by at least 8 to get a realistic time estimate.
2. Once a mountain trail disappears, that means that no sane, adult local ever goes there. We learned this the hard way.
3. Kids will show you the way to get down a mountain…but only after they take you to all of their favorite places first…which may include tiny swamps/ponds and caves.
4. Keens are amazing. Didn’t have any blisters, scratches, or bruises at all, while all my fellow climbers did. They’re one of the best investments I’ve made in my life.
5. When sliding down a cliff, don’t look down or up. It’s scary to see what you actually survived, and it’s even scarier to see how far you still have to go.
6. Rwandan women are some of the strongest people in the world. They can quickly scale mountains while balancing 80 pounds of fruit on their head and a baby on their back…while wearing flimsy flip flops. I have much respect for them.
7. Rwanda is truly one of the most beautiful places in the world. While climbing down the mountain, we stopped for break in a grassy area. The view was breathtaking, with patchy green mountains surrounding us, a beautiful sky above, and the valley below. It was one of those moments that I’ll keep with me forever.
8. Karen is truly an awesome travel partner! I’ve endured some difficult situations with complainers and whiners, and Karen is definitely not one of them. I like how we’re both pretty positive people. Despite being incredibly exhausted, we ended up laughing at the absurdity of our situation, all the way down the mountain.

So, with that said, I’ll leave you guys. I hope you all are doing well, and that summer in the states is fabulous. I’ll probably send another email out soon about my trip to Uganda this past weekend…and then afterwards, a more serious email about some of the sobering things I’ve seen here in Rwanda, why I’m here for the summer, and the work I do. Take care. Write back! I miss you all! (Below are some pictures from Mt. Kabuye)

View from the top of one of the mountains on the way to Mt. Kabuye... The little red lettesr spell out "End Point." Funny thing is, is that the doctors pointed out the school (the end point) to us in the beginning of the climb, but never bothered to tell us that it was our final destination!

Me on top of Mt. Kabuye and in the "King's Cave" the kids brought us to. In the top picture, I was leaning back to prevent myself from falling forwards.

One of my favorite pictures. This is Karen and Jean Paul lounging on one of the steep hills we stumbled down. You can see the cliff we scaled over in the background. Grand.

The adventurers! We found a stream on the way down and decided to take a little rest.