I traveled to Rwanda from July 8th - 23rd for work. It was definitely an interesting experience. The country suffered from the horrible genocide in 1994, but had made remarkable progress. It is one of the cleanest and safest countries that I have visited. To keep it clean, they have outlawed plastic bags! Here's a few pictures from the trip.
I wasn't able to get too many pictures of the countryside since we were usually zipping by in a car...but here's one in Kigali...it really is the land of 1000 hills and there is always a great view with rolling hills for miles...
Baskets, baskets everywhere...even on the national seal and money...these were actually being prepared for export to the US to be sold at Macy's
Paul, Mark and Patrick enjoying a glass of warm milk at the local milk bar...I declined to try to the warm milk...makes me queasy just thinking about it...yuck...
The country's main exports are tea and coffee and here's a tea field
An exmple of the houses in the rural areas made of adobe bricks
Here is the hotel from the movie, Hotel Rwanda:
http://www.unitedartists.com/hotelrwanda/intro.html
This building is across the street from the hotel and I forget the significance, but you can see the bullet holes from the fighting during the genocide
They have constructed many genocide memorials throughout the country to remember the atrocities and to remind people so that it will not happen again. There is a main museum and memorial visit in Kigali that includes the history and documents the genocide that killed 800,000 - 1,000,000 people in Rwanda.
This is from the Murambi Memorial Site: "A school where 27,000 people were killed. A stark, shocking monument, hundreds of corpses are temporarily preserved and currently displayed in the school."
A smaller memorial at the National University of Rwanda
We went to Rwanda to evaluate the feasibility of procuring food from smallholder farmers for school feeding programs. Currently, the main school feeding programs in Rwanda are through the World Food Program with commodities from the US through the McGovern-Dole Food for Education program so all that to explain...we visited schools and here are several of the secondary school students greeting us with a traditional dance...
Preschool students enjoying their mid-morning snack
Secondary-school students enjoying their lunch - this program was actually funded by the parents of the students
The main method of transportation of goods is bicycle and your head so here's a few scenes from the highway...surprisingly, they had pretty good roads in Rwanda, well, at least the main roads...
Fabrics in the market
Curious kids in a local market
Vendors in a market near Kigali
Some doanted US commodities "not to be sold or exchanged" found for sale in the market...
Bananas - they grow a lot of bananas - here's just a few on their way to be sold in the market....
I wasn't able to get too many pictures of the countryside since we were usually zipping by in a car...but here's one in Kigali...it really is the land of 1000 hills and there is always a great view with rolling hills for miles...
Baskets, baskets everywhere...even on the national seal and money...these were actually being prepared for export to the US to be sold at Macy's
Paul, Mark and Patrick enjoying a glass of warm milk at the local milk bar...I declined to try to the warm milk...makes me queasy just thinking about it...yuck...
The country's main exports are tea and coffee and here's a tea field
An exmple of the houses in the rural areas made of adobe bricks
Here is the hotel from the movie, Hotel Rwanda: http://www.unitedartists.com/hotelrwanda/intro.html
This building is across the street from the hotel and I forget the significance, but you can see the bullet holes from the fighting during the genocide
They have constructed many genocide memorials throughout the country to remember the atrocities and to remind people so that it will not happen again. There is a main museum and memorial visit in Kigali that includes the history and documents the genocide that killed 800,000 - 1,000,000 people in Rwanda.
This is from the Murambi Memorial Site: "A school where 27,000 people were killed. A stark, shocking monument, hundreds of corpses are temporarily preserved and currently displayed in the school."
A smaller memorial at the National University of Rwanda
We went to Rwanda to evaluate the feasibility of procuring food from smallholder farmers for school feeding programs. Currently, the main school feeding programs in Rwanda are through the World Food Program with commodities from the US through the McGovern-Dole Food for Education program so all that to explain...we visited schools and here are several of the secondary school students greeting us with a traditional dance...
Preschool students enjoying their mid-morning snack
Secondary-school students enjoying their lunch - this program was actually funded by the parents of the students
The main method of transportation of goods is bicycle and your head so here's a few scenes from the highway...surprisingly, they had pretty good roads in Rwanda, well, at least the main roads...
Fabrics in the market
Curious kids in a local market
Vendors in a market near Kigali
Some doanted US commodities "not to be sold or exchanged" found for sale in the market...
Bananas - they grow a lot of bananas - here's just a few on their way to be sold in the market....
