Ahem… Attention please, speech.

My next birthday wish will be to one day celebrate my birthday Rwandese style because here, there’s just a little bit more icing on the cake.

Let me explain.

This past weekend, I was lucky enough to be invited to a colleague’s house for his birthday, and it seems that there’s no better venue to witness how people here value the time that they spend with each other than at a birthday party.

After an introductory room full of handshakes (I think I’ve so far failed to mention the handshaking culture here) and kind offerings of drinks and food, a fellow colleague, Pedro, stood up and began to recite a speech. Although it was all in Kinyarwanda, I gathered by tone and gesture that he was talking about what kind of a person Victor – the birthday boy – is.

The speech didn’t stop with Pedro. I soon discovered that Pedro was the emcee who would introduce the next twenty minutes of speeches made by members of Victor’s family, his long-time friends, and his colleagues. They spoke of their first meeting with Victor, funny stories from the past, and the qualities that make him a good friend.

Again, I didn’t understand the details of what was being said, but the warmth and openness in a room where people, some who haven’t met each other, got to know one another through sharing their stories of Victor was truly touching.

I can’t recall any event involving people of my age group back home where a chunk of time is devoted for such sincere expression of emotions. I mean, usually birthdays when your twenty-something mean countless shots and loud dance floors.

I’ve already observed that they way people interact in Rwanda is generally different than how they do in North America. On average, I think it’s safe to say that people here make more time for each other and are not caught up with being busy. Computers suck up way less time here than they do at home and I believe this is not only an access issue, but also a matter of choice. Lunches are longer and many people have enough time to go home to eat and even take a short rest. People stroll down the sidewalk at 8 a.m. on their way to work instead of the keeping up with the bustling shuffle you face in most Canadian cities. And like I said, upon arrival pretty much anywhere you go, you shake everyone’s hand and probably exchange a few sentences about how life is. It’s so nice to spend the first ten minutes of every day greeting your coworkers.

I guess we reserve these love fests for ‘monumental’ occasions, like a 50th birthday, or a retirement party. But some good things don’t necessarily have to wait until your older. I’m definitely going to up the ante for the next birthday that comes around.

Back at Victor’s place, after “Happy Birthday” was sung in both English and French, the coffee table was pushed to the side of the room for the living room dance party that stretched long into the night.

Hell of a big closet

Identity is a complicated thing.

Composed of intangible expressions and ways of being in the world that are rooted in a particular time, place and history, identity often is a site of contestation in political debates, at home, in the workplace, and in the media.

And the space given in Rwanda to discuss homosexuality is much smaller and less tolerant than in Canada.

I consider my political orientation almost militantly open-minded – though I don’t always feel the need to verbalize my views. I choose my battles, but I generally advocate that people have the right to believe what they want so long that they respect a common living and conversational space.

Good, old textbook style Canadian upbringing.

I suppose that I just grew up with the idea that being gay is okay. My parents have always had gay friends, and lots of my friends are homosexual.

But in Rwanda, homosexuality is illegal. When people told me that before I arrived, I assumed that meant that gay marriage is not legal. I thought that its prohibition existed in the upper echelons of bureaucracy, written on the pages of some dusty legal texts. Not in the viewpoints of the average Rwandese.

First Days on the Job

I’ve had some interesting first days on the job as a reporter at City Radio. It’s a private station based in Kigali but its broadcasts reach most of the country. The programming is a mixture of music and news (mostly the former) and broadcasts in Kinyarwanda, French and English.

I cut my teeth on a press conference yesterday morning. The Supreme Court of Rwanda invited a bunch of journalists to a conference room in a five-star hotel to discuss the current state of court reporting. The conference and the workshop that followed was one hundred per cent in Kinyarwanda, so it was a challenging first story to report on. I was fortunate enough to sit beside a man named Mark from a weekly paper called Umuseke who kindly translated the important details enough that allowed me to write a story.

The Vice President of the SC spoke first, and basically said that legal experts and journalists should work more closely so that the media can better cover legal issues. He also encouraged journalists to be more knowledgeable in media law, so that they may know their rights as to what they are allowed to report on.

After talking to some journalists at the conference, I understand that the main problem with court reporting in this country is that many journalists don’t know the intricacies of the court system, and as a consequence, shy away from covering such stories. The obvious result is a weak culture of public journalism monitoring the development and execution of the law, leaving legal behaviour largely unchecked.

The workshop that followed – which involved a judge and other legal officials made a few long speeches and a few Q & A periods with the fifty odd journalists in attendance – is the first of many to come. And from what Mark explained to me, the journalists there expressed an enthusiasm through the kinds of questions they were asking toward sharpening their legal minds to become better reporters.

I had the opportunity to interview the Secretary General of the Supreme Court, and included the clip on my evening news report. It’s not very common to hear clips here because many newsrooms don’t have recorders and microphones for their reporters. The news bulletins at City Radio are usually a long script read by one person.

I had written up my story on my laptop, and when I had finished I called the news editor over to check it out. He seemed impressed that I managed to scrounge up an English story from a four-hour meeting in Kinyarwanda. He then began handwriting my story out on the back of a sheet of paper. I then realized that I hadn’t seen a printer anywhere in the office, and it dawned on me that they must write out the newscast everyday. Three times a day. In three languages. I remembered all of the paper we used in our radio workshop at Carleton, printing off draft after draft of the same story with extra-large font.

It’s the simplest things we take for granted.

Anyway, I’m really enjoying my first week at City Radio, and the people that I’ve met there are infinitely warm and kind. I’m looking forward to the work I’ll get to do over the next two months.

For Bob

Hidden Afternoon Jams.

So, we got into a taxi and told him to take us to Kimisagara – a neighbourhood in Kigali that we haven’t been to yet. We soon discovered that it’s a bit off the beaten path for the muzungu.

We made it to the edge of the hill that we live on, and then ascended up onto another one. The three of us ladies hopped out of the taxi when he stopped in front of a sign that read “Kimisagara.” To our surprise we didn’t find a club or a bar – what we expected to host the reggae jam our colleague Ian invited us to. Rather, we were met by the sight of hundreds of people gathered to watch a football game in the field at the bottom of the hill. The outer edge of the sea of people watching the game made no qualms about staring at us, pointing and laughing, and saying something about muzungus. I guess a lot of them don’t make it out there.

We thought for a second that we missed the concert, as we were an hour late.

But Jesse reminded us that this is African time – and here, nothing happens on time.

We walked around a bit, taking in all of the googly-eyes on the sidelines, and then we heard the bass. It was coming from somewhere to the left of the sea of people.

Rather than walking through the crowd of people who seemed to think that we were an event competing with the soccer match, we decided to turn around and take ‘the back way.’

After turning even more heads because our shortcut ended up being through backyards and alleys, we found the hall the reggae jam was at.

Here’s the evidence.

Hosed

This afternoon was my first real experience of the markets in Kigali. I heckled with the best of ‘em, but I was also had.

I walked around with Kate and Tanya in search of a few necessary things. First, an FM radio so I can start listening to the station I’m going to work for next week. Next, I needed to get a pair of shoes because the ones I brought here are DESTROYED already. The walk from our house to the place where we catch the motos is along a dirt road – a red dirt road. Yes, the earth is like a burnt rusty blush powder, and it sticks to black suede shoes like a wad of gum on your favourite sandals. I should also mention that this brilliant powder gets all over my legs, making me self conscious about how unclean I must look (you can’t see it on everyone else’s legs).

Anyway, the point of this story is not what I bought or how dirty I am, but how I managed to get myself some good deals. I called on my past experiences of heckling with sales people – they always call out an outrageous price, so you reply with one that is equally outrageous. You dance back forth, walk away a few times, both knowing all along that you’ll meet somewhere in middle.

I managed to get decent prices for a small radio and a nice pair of bronzed coloured flats  (I thought they’d go nicely with the burnt orange ankles).

Tired from all of the heckling, I decided to cross the street and grab something to drink and read the paper. I found a paper boy and paid him the three-hundred francs for a copy of The New Times. The paper boy takes the money and walks away. Another man came up behind Kate and I, and offered to sell her the paper. I showed him that we already have one. Then he said, “No today, today.”

I looked at the paper I just bought, and the paper boy – who was off around the corner – sold me a paper from May 1. After all of that heckling for the big stuff, some street newspaper boy ended up scamming a journalist of all people into buying a week old daily newspaper.

So funny!

Moto-Loco

It’s like coffee times a thousand.

Today, Shelley, the program coordinator (and our babysitter extraordinaire thus far), thought we were ready to experience the cheapest way of getting around Kigali – by ‘moto’, a little diesel-powered motorbike that weaves its way through people and heavy traffic. My first ride was early this morning and I if I’m going to be starting out every morning like that, I can definitely skip the coffee.

It was the first time the bunch of us “muzungus” (a.k.a. foreigners) split up, to make our way downtown on a mission to get cell phones and check out our future media placements. There are no addresses here, so you name drop locations and landmarks, and hope that you’ve reached an understanding with your driver and get to the place you want to go.

Even though I spent the entire heart-racing twenty minutes white-knuckled and mumbling profanities in a language the driver couldn’t understand, by the end of it, I felt completely exhilarated, and halfway confident that I can get back on the back of the bike and do it all again.

I quickly observed the traffic rules that prevail here: the largest has the right-of-way. The larger taxi-buses do whatever the hell they want, then there are these cute little semi-trucks things, cars come next, and finally the motos. The few cyclers are at the bottom of the chain, and my sympathy goes out to their nervous system.

Don’t worry mom, I’m wearing a helmet.

In the afternoon, the lot of us went to check out the media locations Kate and I will be working at. Kate’s at Newsline – a weekly-(ish) alternative newspaper. It’s impressive that they can do so much with what appears to be very little resources.

Next we went to City Radio, the private radio station that I’ll be starting at sometime this week or next. It seemed pretty chill, somebody was checking out the latest Ciara video. Everyone seemed open to having me there – I’ll definitely have to work on my French.

Anyway, post more later… running out of battery and internet time.

Love y’all.

On Route

Inklings of what’s to come…

In less than two hours, I begin my 25-hour journey to Kigali. Lots of deep breaths and cup after cup of orange pekoe tea have provided some temporary comfort for those pre-departure jitters I’ve got coursing through my veins.

The first departure point: my parent’s house in Windsor, Ont. Soon, I’ll get in an airport taxi-bus with about fifteen other sleepy people bound for Metro Detroit Airport. I zip over Washington and from there catch a 16-hour flight destined for Addis. I’ve never been on one of these super long flights before. I’m wondering how many pilots it takes to get there. Is it like life-guarding where they rotate in fifteen minute cycles? Is there a healthy stock of Red Bull in the cockpit? How many times will they feed us? Will it be rolls of lovely injeera bread beneath a steaming tray of beef tibs? (A recovered vegetarian can only hope.) Anyway, I’ll be relieved when I land in Addis, because that means that I’m only three hours away from Kigali where I meet the Rwanda Initiative crew. So excited!

I think I have everything: laptop, recorder, microphone, meds, clothes, DEET, mosquito net, flashlight and a couple of books. This is the lightest I’ve ever packed. I think I’ve brought more things with me going clubbing in Montreal for the weekend.

I’m looking forward to becoming very pink very fast (a shout out to my British roots for giving me such fair skin that it’s almost see-through). I remember when I was in India, the cook in the house I lived in would point to my face, and with what sounded like a quizzical concern in her voice, would say “Lal! Lal!” which means “Red! Red!” I plan to make a similar impression in Rwanda.

As I told people what I was up to this summer, they often returned their interest by asking me what I expected from this experience. Even though this became somewhat of a standard question, I never developed a rehearsed answer. I’m just excited, and honestly, I don’t know what to expect. Maybe I have no expectations, just excitement and an open mind. Anyway, I’m very grateful for this opportunity and I hope to make the best of it.

My dream job

Wow.

I feel incredibly satisfied and lucky to say that I have found a job that I would be more than happy to do – day in and day out, this decade and the next.

Seriously.

For those outside of my immediate circle, I’ve been interning in the music department at the CBC for the past two weeks, and it’s been absolutely great.

I’ve never had this experience of the hours in a workday flying by, forgetting to eat lunch, not minding staying past 5 p.m., and actually getting excited on the weekend to start again on Monday.

I may be a little ways away from being able to do this as a form of sustainable living (even though I seriously thought about giving up all of my possessions and apartment so that I can live in a shelter or through the generousity of others and give my labour away for free. I don’t know what I’d do with kitty though… so my strategizing stopped there). But I still feel so lucky that I’ve been given this opportunity to experience work that I find endlessly interesting.

I was reminded last night that my blog is also supposed to be about what it’s like trying to make it in the journalism profession (thanks, Andy). I’ll be posting much more about that in the weeks to come.

I leave for Rwanda in one week. I found out yesterday that I’ll be interning at City Radio, and from what I understand it’s a local station that broadcasts in all three national languages – English, French and Kinyarwanda – and is a mix of both music and news. So excited and nervous.

But I’ll work through the folds of those tensions right here… Yep, blog the pain away.

Stefan Betke and the TENORI-ON

I had a chance a few weeks ago to do a phoner with the Berlin-based sound design artist, Stefan Betke, a.k.a. Pole.

What a great guy to interview; he was so open about his creative process. Follow the link to the interview that’s published on the Mutek magazine website:

http://www.mutek.org/magazine/index.php/post/4

Pole is playing at the SAT in Montreal along with Sutekh, Robert Lippok, and Pheek on Friday, April 11th. All of the artists will demonstrate their workings with the the new YAMAHA sequencer, the TENORI-ON.

Check out what this thing can do:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SGwDhKTrwU&feature=related

The Busy Disease

A properly written story for a class assignments in journalism school, much like those for the ‘real media world,’ should substantiate claims made in the story with the appropriate sources, hence the whole ‘reporting’ side of journalism.

Over this first grueling year of j-school ‘bootcamps,’ (9 to 5 type days that involve going over everybody’s work in fine detail, critiquing everything that’s right but more often what’s wrong), I’ve learned to report for different mediums, print, radio, and now television. This transition throughout the year has not only sequentially led to a heavier load to cart on and off the bus when I go reporting, but it’s also necessitated a different relationship with my sources.

I’ve noticed how people change when you put a microphone in front of their face. Add a video camera into the mix, and the change is even more obvious. (Note: I absolutely don’t exclude myself from this phenomenon). Print, is arguably the easiest to source your story: you make few phone calls, jot down a few comments and there’s your verification. But generally, regardless of what technology is used to record the interview, a lot of people are apprehensive about talking to “the media” these days.