Queen V

Senegal Last week I returned from a two week trip to Senegal, where I attended the Stomp Out Malaria boot camp with a staff member and fellow volunteer. I had been looking forward to going to this training for awhile and was very thankful for the opportunity to do so. This training brought together volunteers and staff members from 16 countries in Africa who are involved in malaria work. We were able to receive technical training relating to malaria in more detail than I could ever imagine! There were a variety of guest speakers from different organizations that talked about their role in malaria work. One of these organizations, CommCare, is currently working in 4 districts in Rwanda to roll out a health surveying app with the IRS (Indoor Residual Spraying) team/ community health workers, and it turns out that my sector is one of the target areas for this program! In addition to full days of malaria related lessons, activities, and delicious food, many other volunteers and...

  Hello! I got back to site yesterday after 3 weeks away. If you keep up with my blog you're probably wondering when am I ever in my village and the answer is  not enough! I've essentially been living out of my backpack for the past two months. This time around, pretty much half of my community thought I was in America-which I am pretending I am as I eat these cheez-its (thanks Grace!) My time away was all in country, which included the following stops: Kigali (Meetings)--> Rwamagana (Assisting at PST)-->Ruhango (GLOW/BE Camps)--> Kigali (Health 7 Swear in). Although I was looking forward to all of these events, I was a bit nervous about leaving site for that long-it was the longest span of time I'd been away since moving here. With ongoing weekly projects like the WASH lessons and the community finance classes,  I had to put all my trust in my counterparts to ensure everything would continue smoothly, which it did! On my way to the health center this morni...

Muraho! I spent the past 4 weeks split between time at site working on some projects and activities, followed by a family vacation with my Mom and two sisters in Rwanda and Uganda!  Here are the highlights in photos: WASH Village Chief Meeting- June 10: My 3 WASH facilitators, Vestine, Venuste, and Ally orienting the 9 village chiefs to create hygiene clubs in their respective villages. Kids Club, Nutrition Day- June 13: My monthly kids club met to learn about nutrition and how to make a healthy plate, followed by a sports day and a hat giveaway, courtesy of my Titulare!  Library Project-June 19: 10 boxes of donated books from the book drive were shipped from Philadelphia. Thanks to my family for the organization and shipping!  Library Project-June 23: Health Posters (Malaria, HIV, Hand Washing) courtesy of Peace Corps are finally up!     WASH Village Training- June 22-26:...

This week marks one year in Rwanda!  Here are my ramblings about what I've been up to this past month:   Musanze I spent a long weekend in May visiting a volunteer in Musanze (the main town in the Northern province)  with some fellow volunteers. In addition to spending at least a quarter of the trip at this amazing restaurant, we went on a 4 hour hike with some visitors from the states. These pictures don't do it justice!  All Volunteer Conference After our weekend in Musanze we traveled to Muhanga (yes, this is where 90% of peace corps trainings take place) for the All Volunteer Conference. Before heading to the conference Tracy and I spent a night at Graces' site in Muhanga. We enjoyed the luxuries of tacos (with meat!!!), candy, and the best 90s playlist ever before heading to the conference the next day. All vol brought together all volunteers in Rwanda from both the health and education programs. About 50 of the 70ish volunteers in c...

A lot has happened here in Rwanda since my last post. If you've seen any of my Facebook activity, you may have some idea of why I can truly say that April has been the most challenging month for me and many of my fellow PCVs, since the beginning of service. A friend and fellow health 6 volunteer, David, passed away last month while on vacation. He left behind an innovative project to bring water bleach dispensers to his community to improve water sanitation.  Fortunately, PC Rwanda will be continuing his project through his memorial fund, which you can donate to here, any support is truly appreciated. This past month I also had a few friends and fellow volunteers end their service early for different reasons, so my cohort became a lot smaller in a matter of weeks. Despite all that happened, I was lucky enough to have my Dad in town for part of this difficult period. He had a business trip to Nairobi which is just an hour flight from Kigali, so he was able to visit ...

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 ...

I was inspired to write this post (well, series of ramblings) from an article I read today called  Blackness in the Peace Corps   and from the Peace Corps Black History Month initiative to hear and share the stories and experiences of PCVs around the world. In many of my previous blog posts I've mentioned in some way or another  how being a black PCV in Africa differs from the experiences of people of other races on the continent. That revelation really isn't too surprising. Oftentimes ones race influences ones experiences, with both similarities and differences encompassing them. For me, fully explaining my identity as Black/ African/ British/ American requires a long explanation of my family's heritage. If you know me personally, you've probably heard this lengthy explanation to some extent. Yes I'm American, I lived there for 18 of my 23 years of life.  But I was born in Wales, and have British citizenship. Ah yes, I'm African too. My Mom was born and ...