Isaac met me at the lodge to drive to Rwanda.  The journey would take about 6-7 hours on dirt roads and a good stretch of paved road and then back to dirt to get to my hotel.  I am staying at the Mountain Gorilla View Lodge in Musanze, Rwanda.  The hotel is very close to Volcanoes Park where I will trek for Rwandan gorillas.

We passed a lot of beautiful scenery on the way to Rwanda.  The rolling hills of crops look like a lush patch green quilt the way the crops are divided into terraces to avoid soil erosion. Occasionally a few monkeys would scamper across the road to say hello.

We passed a UN refugee camp for the displaced residents of the Congo who fled from the violence between the government and the rebel fighters.  The camps are a large fenced in area with just a series of huge white tents, each about 60 ft in length, and a few UNICEF tents dispersed throughout I suppose for supplies.  There were quite a few people in the camp, and I suppose more will come since the cease fire is over due to the failure of the peace talks.  I saw in the news that the government refused to sign the peace treaty with the rebel fighters. In response, the rebels said they will begin fighting again.  Will the Congo ever have peace?

When we reached the Rwanda/Uganda Border, it was like the Wild West.  People crossing by foot, by bicycle, by motorbike, and by car.  There was an armed guard standing at a flimsy metal gate.  One side of the gate said Rwanda and the other side said Uganda.  Isaac pulled the car to the side because I had to go to the police station to have my passport checked.  The building was a one-room concrete block about 6 ft x 6 ft.  The officer sat a small wooden table.  He checked my passport and gave me a 1-inch square piece of lined notebook paper with a number and his signature.  I took my passport and this square of information to the Immigration building, which was a tad large concrete building. Sitting just outside the door was a man with a table of exit cards.  He motioned for me to come over and handed me a card to fill out.  The card asked for the usual info (name, passport number, DOB, etc).  On the top was handwritten arrival.  I told him I was departing.  He said he didn’t have any cards saying departure and it didn’t matter anyway.  I went inside the building after filling out the card.  There the immigration officer sat at a counter behind glass.  I slipped my passport and the square through the opening in the glass window and she crossed out Arrival and wrote Departure. Then she looked at every page and visa in my passport before stopping at the Ugandan visa.  She looked at me curiously and then stamped my exit visa.  After taking photos at the border gate in front of the Ugandan side and the Rwandan side, I went to the police station on the Rwandan side.  The armed officer was in the entry way and he just looked at my passport and told me to go to Immigration.  US citizens do not need a visa for Rwanda.

The Immigration side of Rwanda is a bit more wild west. People are pushing and shoving in the line and there is no real order.  I was in line behind four people.  I left about 6-inches of space between me and the person in front of me.  This drunken guy jumped in the line in front of me.  I was not in the mood to fight with a drunk so I let it go.  Then as he was next in line, he motioned for his friends to join him. Suddenly there were six people trying to shove in front of me.  Pissed I went around them and stood to the side of the glass and glared at the Immigration officer.  He looked at me and told me to get in line.  I put on my best “Veta face” (For those who don’t know her, she is my sister and she has a look that she gives people and they bend to her will) and said authoritatively, “I was in line and then these six people pushed ahead of me.” His supervisor heard me and told the Immigration officer to process my passport.  The line jumpers never moved aside so I had to reach in front of them to hand in my passport.  He stamped it and I hopped in the car.  Isaac was busy exchanging money for Rwandan money from a man with a huge stack of bills.  He asked me if I wanted to change money and I said no. I really wanted to keep my US dollars and use an ATM.  Unfortunately, none of the ATMs in the little town of Musanze would accept my debit card so I will have to use my cash after all.  BUMMER!

As we drove through the town we passed a few mass burial sites from when the Hutu slaughtered the Tutsi.  For those who do not remember, the mass genocide took place in the 90s when the Hutu killed the Tutsi because they had received better treatment when the Belgians were in power.  Before the Germans and the Belgians came, the Hutu and the Tutsi had lived in peace.  The Tutsi, although smaller in number, had dominated the ruling class because they were cattle ranchers as opposed to farmers, which were the Hutu.  Although the Tutsi were the wealthier ruling class they lived in peace with the Hutu and no distinctions were made.  In fact, Isaac told me if a Hutu became a wealthy and owed cattle, he could claim to be a Tutsi.  When the Germans and the Belgians came, all this changed.  They issued identity cards and decided the Tutsi, with their longer noses looked more European and were smarter than the Hutu.  They created a list of physical characteristics and each person was classified by these characteristics as either Tutsi or Hutu and given ID cards respectively.  The Tutsi received more privileges and better treatment than the Hutu. Thus, the split between the two groups began, which eventually boiled into political rivalries, anger and rage among the Hutu for the Tutsi and ultimately the mass genocide in the 90s.

We finally got to the Mountain Gorilla View Lodge.  It’s an older hotel of yesteryear.  I am in a stone hut with a fireplace, but the room has a damp, musty odor.  It is much cooler on this side.  Again, there is only electricity at certain times of the day and there is no internet (Farewell Mahogany Springs Lodge…I miss you already).  As I arrived there were a group of about twenty teens dressed in traditional clotting performing traditional dances for the guests.  I watched for a while and then went to my room to get ready for tomorrow’s trek.  Dinner is at 7 and then I plan to go to bed.  I have to get up at 5 for the trek and it is raining.  I hope it stops because I do not want to trek in the rain.  Good night.