Life in Butare

So what is life really like in Rwanda?

It is simple, yet more complex. Everyday tasks take more effort, yet seem to make more sense, more real. You have to do more to accomplish the same task in the US. For example, we have to turn on a small generator that generates added water pressures prior to showering. We treat our water by collecting tap water in 20 gallon jerry cans, add a certain amount of bleach solution to the water, and let sit for 30 min prior to drinking. We “top up”our cell phone or internet for our phones as we go, similar to pay as you go in the US. We have to converse with our moto taxi drivers and negotiate a price prior to leaving. We haggle over prices at the local market.

Our house is in Taba a Northern suburb. Our friends call it the yuppie area of town, and I can see why. Most of the houses here are really a compound, an enclosed area with grounds, smaller buildings for storage or worker’s quarters, and a main house. Each compound has thick, high walls, with crushed glass or iron spikes on the top of the walls to ward off any would be intruders. Each place has thick iron doors that open up to the street. Ours is manicured with bushes, tropical plants, and high pine trees native to Africa. The back yard has large, raised mound gardens, with plantain trees near the back fence and compost “hole.”

We eat well, mostly vegetarian. I send Evanys to the market weekly with ~ $30 for groceries and supplies. One the weekends, we buy a few more groceries for about $8. I eat out twice a week at lunch, spending about $3 each. So, best guess: $50 per week for food for 3 people.

Now this is coming from a guy who is living in a nice house, in a nice suburb, with guards and a housekeeper/cook. I have it pretty well off. What about the people that work in the market, on the motos that I take to work everyday, the nurses and orderlies that work at my hospital? What is life really like in Rwanda for them?