week one

i am in a coffee shop in kigali. a nice one. with wifi and iced coffee and big couches to lounge in. i'm here with two friends, having laptop time, reading the news and planning next moves. moves for the immediate future (tonight) and the distant future (next year).

this first week was seamless: i have taken almost daily naps in the hammock in my room. Raph and I have drank a lot of juice and watched louis on the projector screen. there were two parties at the house last weekend. one full of dancing rwandans celebrating a graduation and the other full of ex-pats celebrating the chinese new year. there was a lovely dinner in a Grace's backyard, as her parents were visiting and nearly two dozen of us sat around and ate delicious pasta and salad by candlelight. i have spent my days wandering in search of faster internet. i got horribly lost one day through the poorer part of town and came out sunburned and with a marriage proposal. kigali is hilly. my dreams of getting a bicycle have been quickly squashed due to how often i would have to get off to push it on foot.

wednesday was a national holiday (hero's day. held to recognize the heros who saved someone during the genocide) and a handful of us bussed to musanze (3 hours to the north) to have dinner with a rwandan family. it was nice and quiet. and enjoyable to get out of my house and kigali for 24 hours. we just sat and took some beer and coffee and watched cheesy music videos.

walking in town. volcanos in the distance.

brad, ernest and i outside of ernest's home

new friends

preparing guacamole (a mzungu favorite)

i am working on transitioning to the Lauren that is not dependent on the internet. the one that doesn't freak out when i can't check my email for 24 hours. it's a slow process but i'm hoping to get there.

i have made a plan for the next little while. i (believe i) am laid-back, but there is always a plan brewing. always something that motivates me. i have a handful of contacts working in organizations in rwanda. i hope to meet them in person in the coming weeks and sell myself as a viable candidate for an internship/job position. i really want to stick with the refugees. so, that narrows the field considerably in rwanda. more opportunities in the DRC. it's odd to come to a place where human rights catastrophes and conflicts equal job opportunities. the message certainly gets lost somewhere. but i am applying. and emailing and calling. and hoping.

for something that starts in early May. i'm going to spend the next 3 mos traveling around. first in E. Africa with Justin then i'll be leaving in mid-March for a 6 week road trip in the big yellow bus that will end in Cape Town for Burning Man. more on that to come. but i'm excited. once in a lifetime opportunity to travel with good people through a part of the world i have never seen.

i have been listening to this song a lot. i miss you. i am beyond safe and healthy. and thank you to everyone for militantly posting news about the komen foundation, so i know who to be upset with. 'cause planned parenthood is doing a lot of good.