rain and some thoughts

It is the rainy season here now…and lately it’s been pouring, which I find pretty nice since it is no longer really hot in Buja. Anyways, let me give you a quick recap of my past two weeks…

The week before last week, I was in Buja and nothing special happened. I was working and hanging out as usual. I decided that I would paint and decorate my house, inspired by my friend who painted her house different colors and made it look fabulous. I picked out dark red(burgundy) and purple and spend Saturday, Sunday and Monday painting but I didn’t finish even though a friend was also helping me. In fact we only painted two walls and half. I have a popcorn wall so most of the painting had to be done with brushes, which took forever.

Then on Tuesday, I went to Ruyigi. We (two co-workers and I) got there Tuesday and left Friday, so we only had two full days to work. Wednesday, we spent the day at office and Thursday we went to visit two of our collines. As we get on the road my stomach doesn’t feel very good and then we have a flat tire! The driver stops the car and proceeds to change the tire and I try and help. But of course, after I am done posing and pretending like I am helping, I just let the driver do his job and I discuss Burundian politics with my coworker. I find out there are elections at several levels..the commune level, the presidential, assembly and senate and finally colline councils all next summer. It should be interesting but Peter (Pierre Nkurunziza) doesn’t face a serious challenge as he is really popular in the country where people appreciate primary school and public health care becoming free during his tenure (of course quality and accessibility is a whole different matter.) The tire is replaced and we are off to Musha and Muvumu.

At night, I surprise my friend from work with a cake…and well it looks pretty awful. I had asked our logistics person whether I could order a cake for her and not only had I paid an overly high price for it but the cake turned out awful (see pic) Lesson learned no more birthday cakes in Ruyigi. Friday, we leave in the morning and get to Bujambura early afternoon. My weekend in Buja was good: I hung out with friends and had a good time.