12 hours in Kibungo

You wouldn't think much can happen in the 12 hours between 8:30pm and 8:30 the next morning. But then again, you haven't lived in Rwanda!

8:30pm - Tuck mosquito net into bed. Set my alarm. Relax with my book, "The Hour I First Believed" by Wally Lamb. It's really good so I read for an hour. 

9:30pm - Turn off head lamp, put in ear plugs (due to 5am morning parades) and go to sleep.

2:44am - Wake up to itchy legs and feet from bed bugs that I got on the weekend. They are driving me crazy. Put on amazing anti-itch cream I bought in La Paz after being eaten alive in the Amazon Rainforest. Seems to work. More or less.

4:11am - Wake up to cell phone ringing. Look at name. It's a Rwanda bus ticket seller named Eric. I gave him my number a while ago incase I need to catch a bus in a hurry. This is typical. Cheap to call in the middle of the night so why not! Do not answer but instead "block" the caller so I cannot hear it if he calls again in the middle of the night.

5:15am - Hear, through my ear plugs, the singing and shouting and dancing and chanting of the kids outside. They are in school to learn about Rwandan culture for the next two weeks. This has been going on for a week already. Somehow manage to get back to sleep.

5:45am - Wake up to guard sweeping outside my front door. Again, manage to fall asleep.

6:31am - alarm goes off on both watch and cell phone. Hit snooze. Lay awake. Finally get up. 

6:37am - electric is on so I boil water in the kettle for coffee. 

7:15am - put water on kerosene stove to boil for an egg.

7:00 - 7:30am - enjoy toast and bananas with amazing coffee. Read my other book - "Road to McCarthy" by Pete McCarthy.

7:31am - put egg in water to boil.

7:33am - take egg out. Go to blow out stove but forget to turn down wick. One blow and flames leap toward the ceiling, cap to keronsene resevoir blows off and goes flying across the room. There might have been sparks. Thanks to my habit of not putting my face directly over flames, my face is still intact. Eyebrows may be singed but I have yet to look in a mirror. 

7:40am - eat egg. 

7:45am - leave for work.

8am - arrive at work. Shake hands with entire office. Print off a calendar for Frodauld. Log in to check email. 

8:17am - Suzanne stops in to give me my first invitation to a Rwandan wedding from a woman who works in the district. 

8:30am - feel eyebrows to see if they are still there. They appear to be.