Beauty in the Struggle

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This week marks month 9 here in Rwanda! Here is the song that inspired this blog title, Love Yourz by J. Cole. 

I have to admit that this past month has been my most challenging period of time since being here. Between housing issues, being sick, missing home, and other random moments of bad luck I've experienced a mixture of annoyance and nostalgia, but all is looking up!


 I spent a few wonderful days in Gisenyi (on lake Kivu, on the NW border of Rwanda, right near the DRC border) with a few PCV friends, which was a much needed relaxing trip! Unfortunately it rained most of the time, but I still succeeded in pretending like I was on a tropical beach vacation. 


Gisenyi Gals <3

View of Lake Kivu from Paradise Malahide 

At the Rwanda-DRC border crossing! Don't worry Peace Corps we didn't cross 

After the trip we spent a few days in Kigali for Valentine's day weekend, which started off great until one of my friends was robbed while we were walking to dinner. Luckily we were all fine, but it was definitely an unsettling experience.


These are our fierce faces....

The following week my cohort spent the week in Muhanga District for a BCC/PDM training with counterparts from our health centers (I'll let you figure out those acronyms by yourself :) This training was basically to help us spearhead effective and successful projects and collaborations in our communities. Although it was necessary and helpful I'm not gonna lie- I spent the majority of it playing trivia crack, breaking my no games on my cell phone rule (yes it's a thing). I guess karma really is a... well, you know how it goes, because unfortunately I got sick in the middle of the training so I had to spend the last two days of it on medical hold in Kigali. 

Since being back at site I've been focused mainly on my library project. My library partners and I will be starting to renovate the library this month, with the donations we've received so far! The book donations from the America book drive and the Rwanda mobile library program will be arriving in May, so we are hoping to have the library fully stocked and open to the public by July!

Here's a 'before' picture of the library. #started


This Saturday I'll  be holding a Hygiene day with some children in my community. As I mentioned in my  previous posts I facilitate a kids health club day one Saturday a month at my health center. Last month our topic was Malaria. I gave a lesson, we played a few malaria games, drank some fanta (yeah... that doesn't really go with the health theme...) and played sports at the basketball court in my village. Here are a few photos from the day:





We were exhausted from running around, so why not teach them the art of taking a selfie? 


Until next time,
Vanessa

Comments

  1. PledgeMarch 2, 2015 at 3:34 PM

    love the freakum outfit #ILookDamnGoodIAin'tLostIt

    ReplyDelete

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