Rwanda and Rory
There is so much to write about right now I barely even want to blog because I like things to be spaced out evenly. This is just going to be a big blob of random information. Humph. I'll begin at the beginning.
Fourth of July. A rather obscure holiday for me. As I've always had to celebrate two independence days, one with a little more forced gumption than the other, it takes part of the joy out of it. Also, we aren't actually in America 90% of the time. No fireworks. No real Americans. Happy 4th! Of course we make the best of it with the food and games and whatnot.
Holidays in Rwanda are different.
I've noticed that for one thing, there are about half as many expats in Rwanda as actual citizens. So for our American holiday, they had at least forty Americans there. Aidan also made us some explosives. It was a rather fancy, complicated firework that sent sparkles and fire spewing in all directions. The secret? Take a bunch of match heads and wrap them in paper. Then set it on fire. Ha! One of the best parts was presenting a goat as a birthday present. Best idea ever. At the end of fourth of July, we had a brilliant idea that led to awesomeness. That awesomeness is a good dozen pictures of sparkler pictures. Right after Fourth of July ended, the girls decided to crash the Boy Scout camping trip. We drove in a far over-crowded car to the lake and made the boy scouts set up the tent, make us dinner, get us water, make a fire, and do all their boy scout things that they were supposed to do, plus some.
That night, we had an impromptu sing-off between tents. In my opinion, Abby and I took first place with a loud rendition of One Day More. Jessica and Cassie followed with a lovely version of I See the Light, and the boys, who have all been stuck watching Tangled five times a day, reprised the chorus loud enough for the entire lake to hear. It was followed by an immediate command for sleep by the parents.
The next morning, we did MAGOOLAGCLIKBHTOFWDI. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, that is an acronym. It means 'Maddie and Abby Go Out On a Lake And Get Completely Lost In Kayaks But Have Tons Of Fun While Doing It.' Luckily, Dad and the interns found us in the canoe before anything terribly... more drastic happened. We spent the whole day probably on the lake more often than on land. When we came back that day we were all in dire need of showers.
The other highlight of our Musanze trip was definitely the dancers we saw. We drove up to a fancy mountain lodge place where the rich people who go see gorillas stay. It was beautiful. We were on a big hill on top of a mountain, and from our perch watching the dancers, we could see three volcanoes behind them. It was not terribly cold, but not at all warm. The dancers did a lot of jumping and stomping, and even from ten feet away, you could feel the vibrations in the ground. At the end everyone got up to dance with them, and they gave me a spear to hold. A spear. For Maddie. To dance with. Luckily, I didn't mortally wound anyone. Then we ripsticked down the twisty sidewalks and had amazing tea.
We drove back to Kigali and stayed with the Reeves for another week. Second after getting Hannah to put the books down, we spent a lot of time at the pool at the fancy hotel where super rich people stay. I would have swam, but it was an entire eighty degrees and I wore a jacket. Instead, Hannah and I sneaked around the hotel pretending to be devilishly rich and forget which room we were in. I also cleaned them out of all their pastries. And refused to wear shoes. So my true colors came out.
The last two days were mainly occupied with two things: Man of Steel and other superhero movies. We saw Man of Steel twice(it was far too awesome to see once), and Batman Begins once and Thor once. We crashed the Koonces' house the last two days and played Nerts and watched movies. We also tried to kill each other with their plethora of deadly sharp weapons, but that was foiled quite quickly.
Our flight out would have been pleasant, if it wasn't at two in the morning, and if we weren't plastered next to some guy in a leather jacket I dubbed 'Sir Wingspan'. He enjoyed jabbing his elbows into dad's stomach. Luckily, he was asleep most of the time so when dad had to eat with his elbow in Sir Wingspan's face, no protests arose. Luckily, the hot uncomfortable flight lasted about two hours and we had a nice layover in Addis Abeba. It was chilly but not too cold, and even from the airport you could see the unbelievably gorgeous mountains. Our next flight was on a plane possibly older than my father. The nice part was that the coffee was heaven and it was cold enough to be enjoyable. I spent most of the six hours with my good friend Reuven Malter. When we stepped off the plane, we were able to dash and shove our way in front of most everyone else to get through Customs right away. Getting our bags took longest, especially because there was a lady who decided to tread on my toes and take every single bag off, check if it was hers, then toss it back onto the conveyor belt. We finally reunited with Mom and Michal and we all went to pig out on tacos. Last night, needless to say, we fell asleep at eight thirty.
Today, we went shopping and I made mom get jeans that fit her. Now I am sitting here blogging and drinking coffee and simply being happy to not be traveling... Well, happy to not be on an airplane. I am fifteen hours from home and I still feel like the traveling is over. I suppose that's the degree of comfort I have with international transit. In the words of my mama, "My Rory is home!" Go figure. I don't know any other fourteen-year-old girls who read Jewish literature for six hours. Except Rory Gilmore.
Fourth of July. A rather obscure holiday for me. As I've always had to celebrate two independence days, one with a little more forced gumption than the other, it takes part of the joy out of it. Also, we aren't actually in America 90% of the time. No fireworks. No real Americans. Happy 4th! Of course we make the best of it with the food and games and whatnot.
Holidays in Rwanda are different.
I've noticed that for one thing, there are about half as many expats in Rwanda as actual citizens. So for our American holiday, they had at least forty Americans there. Aidan also made us some explosives. It was a rather fancy, complicated firework that sent sparkles and fire spewing in all directions. The secret? Take a bunch of match heads and wrap them in paper. Then set it on fire. Ha! One of the best parts was presenting a goat as a birthday present. Best idea ever. At the end of fourth of July, we had a brilliant idea that led to awesomeness. That awesomeness is a good dozen pictures of sparkler pictures. Right after Fourth of July ended, the girls decided to crash the Boy Scout camping trip. We drove in a far over-crowded car to the lake and made the boy scouts set up the tent, make us dinner, get us water, make a fire, and do all their boy scout things that they were supposed to do, plus some.
That night, we had an impromptu sing-off between tents. In my opinion, Abby and I took first place with a loud rendition of One Day More. Jessica and Cassie followed with a lovely version of I See the Light, and the boys, who have all been stuck watching Tangled five times a day, reprised the chorus loud enough for the entire lake to hear. It was followed by an immediate command for sleep by the parents.
The next morning, we did MAGOOLAGCLIKBHTOFWDI. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, that is an acronym. It means 'Maddie and Abby Go Out On a Lake And Get Completely Lost In Kayaks But Have Tons Of Fun While Doing It.' Luckily, Dad and the interns found us in the canoe before anything terribly... more drastic happened. We spent the whole day probably on the lake more often than on land. When we came back that day we were all in dire need of showers.
The other highlight of our Musanze trip was definitely the dancers we saw. We drove up to a fancy mountain lodge place where the rich people who go see gorillas stay. It was beautiful. We were on a big hill on top of a mountain, and from our perch watching the dancers, we could see three volcanoes behind them. It was not terribly cold, but not at all warm. The dancers did a lot of jumping and stomping, and even from ten feet away, you could feel the vibrations in the ground. At the end everyone got up to dance with them, and they gave me a spear to hold. A spear. For Maddie. To dance with. Luckily, I didn't mortally wound anyone. Then we ripsticked down the twisty sidewalks and had amazing tea.
We drove back to Kigali and stayed with the Reeves for another week. Second after getting Hannah to put the books down, we spent a lot of time at the pool at the fancy hotel where super rich people stay. I would have swam, but it was an entire eighty degrees and I wore a jacket. Instead, Hannah and I sneaked around the hotel pretending to be devilishly rich and forget which room we were in. I also cleaned them out of all their pastries. And refused to wear shoes. So my true colors came out.
The last two days were mainly occupied with two things: Man of Steel and other superhero movies. We saw Man of Steel twice(it was far too awesome to see once), and Batman Begins once and Thor once. We crashed the Koonces' house the last two days and played Nerts and watched movies. We also tried to kill each other with their plethora of deadly sharp weapons, but that was foiled quite quickly.
Our flight out would have been pleasant, if it wasn't at two in the morning, and if we weren't plastered next to some guy in a leather jacket I dubbed 'Sir Wingspan'. He enjoyed jabbing his elbows into dad's stomach. Luckily, he was asleep most of the time so when dad had to eat with his elbow in Sir Wingspan's face, no protests arose. Luckily, the hot uncomfortable flight lasted about two hours and we had a nice layover in Addis Abeba. It was chilly but not too cold, and even from the airport you could see the unbelievably gorgeous mountains. Our next flight was on a plane possibly older than my father. The nice part was that the coffee was heaven and it was cold enough to be enjoyable. I spent most of the six hours with my good friend Reuven Malter. When we stepped off the plane, we were able to dash and shove our way in front of most everyone else to get through Customs right away. Getting our bags took longest, especially because there was a lady who decided to tread on my toes and take every single bag off, check if it was hers, then toss it back onto the conveyor belt. We finally reunited with Mom and Michal and we all went to pig out on tacos. Last night, needless to say, we fell asleep at eight thirty.
Today, we went shopping and I made mom get jeans that fit her. Now I am sitting here blogging and drinking coffee and simply being happy to not be traveling... Well, happy to not be on an airplane. I am fifteen hours from home and I still feel like the traveling is over. I suppose that's the degree of comfort I have with international transit. In the words of my mama, "My Rory is home!" Go figure. I don't know any other fourteen-year-old girls who read Jewish literature for six hours. Except Rory Gilmore.
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