Solving 'General' Mysteries

My Saturday began with me putting in a workout DVD on my computer, getting all sorts of crazy to Jillian Michaels Banish Fat, Boost Metabolism in the confines of my little room, while listening to all the noises of my neighbors getting ready to start their day. The sounds of people pounding out wet clothes on the concrete, making tea over a fire, sweeping the entrance to their homes intermixed with Jillian yelling at me not to “phone my workout in” was just plain funny. I know. I feel bad saying I was doing a Jillian DVD when I could have been doing the Ruffle Shuffle, ;) but…I needed some motivation. Oh, it’s also strange that I was even doing a DVD workout here…It's that running seems to generate A LOT of attention("Getting Fit! Yes Masunga!) and a few followers. The other day a boy, maybe 7 years old, ran with me the entire time(and I think was slowing down for me!) with his over-sized blue rain boots on. So for this day I had to do something under the radar.

After my morning of Jillian I decided not to go into Kigali center right away, where there’s a great café that I’ve been frequenting…Instead I thought I’d search for some tea nearby the school. I had seen little shops all around on a walk earlier in the week. I even thought I knew the exact spot I wanted to go… I was feeling adventurous. It seemed so peaceful on the street, and I was thinking that Saturday is a nice day for exploring. Turning down the road to my destination though, it was eerily quiet.  Interesting.  As I got a bit closer, I saw that the store was closed. I was standing on the sidewalk looking longingly at the dark store when a boy came up to me and said hello. I stumbled through a Kinyarwanda greeting(his name was Michael) and we established quickly that our best form of communication would be gesturing and laughing, while each attempting a few words in English and Kinyarwanda. His English was a lot better, thankfully, than my 4 word vocabulary base of Kinyarwanda. I gestured to the closed store and shrugged my shoulders. He smiled and shrugged his back. Then he said what I thought was “General Activity." I repeated it back. He smiled and nodded. “Yes. General activity on last today of month.” 

“Saturday today?” I asked.

“Yes.” 

“What is general activity?”

“It is activity. Everyone does it.”  

“General?”

“Yes”

Hmm. He gestured/told me to follow him to other stores that might be open. He had such a happiness about him, and really wanted to help me…. so I followed him. Along our walk, he would point to the hills and say, ”general activity” I would nod, and try to decipher what that meant. Every time a group of people passed, Michael would comment,“Going to general activity”. By now I was imagining general activity to be either a huge town wide meeting. Or a giant dance competition.

Eventually we got to the next set of stores, but they were all closed too. I was getting pretty hungry, which meant I was moments away from uncontrollably laughing or crying. I was worried I’d submit Michael to that, so quickly said I’d have to get a moto-taxi into town. He looked disappointed, and gestured to his face. “Facebook? I will look for you.” Facebook! I laughed and said yes we should be friends on Facebook, but as we tried to understand each other’s names I think it’s safe to say we’ll more likely meet each other on the road….

With thoughts of tasty breakfast treats and large neighborhood games of bocce ball in my head, I got to town… Only to find all the stores closed there too. Oh. no. By now, I knew enough to say, “general activity?” to a security guard holding watch in front of a building. He nodded very seriously. “3-4 hrs. Stores closed.” I started laughing(slightly uncontrollably) at the idea of me even posing the general activity question to someone.  I knew I had only minutes before combustion, so I walked to the hotel I stayed at when I first came to town. Luckily they were open, and while they weren’t serving food, they did have soda so I chugged a Coke as fast as I could. When I could talk I looked at the startled man behind the desk and said, “Please tell me what general activity is.”

“Yes. Miss it’s like a community clean up day. We all clean a bit of our neighborhood or school or home. Clean up day. Once a month on Saturday.”

Ohhhhhhh.  The Coke and his answer immediately unclouded my brain.

“That’s amazing!” I said. “The whole city does this?” He nodded.

“Wow.”

And with that, the mystery was solved. General Activity is.... General. Activity. Clean up!

I was even happier to be in Rwanda than before(and that was pretty happy). I love the idea that everyone works together like that for one Saturday a month! I can’t explain it, but in all the groups of people we’d seen going to “general activity” no one was dragging their feet and no one looked annoyed either. I am beginning to understand the incredible pride Rwandans take in their country, and how much effort they will put in to make sure it keeps improving. I hear it all the time with the girls I’m teaching .…they all want to attend colleges in the U.S. but then come right back to Rwanda and “be a part of the change and help the country grow."

That’s been in my head all day, along with all the truly kind people I’ve met here so far…..

After I got back to school later today I was told the water was ‘out’, but the cooks who have started preparing tea and lunch/dinner for me(“Ah, but you are all alone! No mother to prepare your meals!” ;)) had already filled two large canisters of water and put them at my door. They told me dinner would be at 7 and if I didn’t mind, I should eat with everyone in the dining hall.

So, at the end of a day that started with me searching for solitude with Jillian Micheals, I found myself in a huge dining hall with 500 other people, the confusion of general activity settled…  the smell of fire that I love and miss from when I spent time in Botswana all around me and of course I had all my little neighbor friends saying, “Masungu.” And a few brave ones saying “Kath a leen”. Then laughing hysterically.

Neighbors!

My surprise water delivery