We have now been in Rwanda for 7 days, so here is my belated start to travel blog posting. Disclaimer: I hereby declare myself immune of any accusations of tortologies, oxymorons and any other literary abominations that certain relatives may try and point out upon (proof-) reading this blog.
Our trip here took us through Bangkok (18 hour stopover) and Nairobi (6 hour stopover). Twenty-four hours after finishing our end of year exams, we touched down in Bangkok - 6 a.m. local time. Customs etc. were a breeze to get through - couldn't quite say the same for the arrival lounge. Many thai taxi drivers telling us they would take us into town for 'good price'. We took the free bus. First on the agenda was food. We put our faith in a young lady selling thai curry and rice on the side of the road. Two dishes and two bottles of spring water for 50 bhat (AUD 2.50) made for a fantastic cholera/typhoid-free curry breakfast.
Next up - sight-seeing. We 'lucked' upon a middle-aged thai man and his trusty steed - the tuk-tuk. He said he would take us to 'all tings bootiful' and 'big buddhas'. He kept his promise - for only 400 bhat he drove us around old bangkok town, waiting outside each attraction. We soon learnt there was a devious catch to this service. In between each attraction he took us to clothes store, jewelry stores and a souvenir store, each time picking up free fuel vouchers for ‘tourist delivery service’.
Bangkok driving is an experience. Median strips are non-existent, the dotted white lines might as well be non-existent. Similar story with traffic lights. Two-way roads become three and four-way. Intersections are mayhem. And yet during the entire day, we didn't see one accident. Amazing.
We left Bangkok fairly early - traffic on a friday afternoon is chaos so we were told. Slept at the airport until midnight when our flight left - Kenya Airways, direction Nairobi. Slept the whole flight, woke up to the flat landscape that is Kenya. Stop-over was equally uneventful.
Nairobi to Kigali (capital of Rwanda) was a quick flight, touching down in Rwanda at 1pm. We met a nice Swedish diplomat on the plane who gave us some tips about Kigali - what restaurants and bars to go to, where to get a hold of her if something went wrong etc. Rwandan immigration/visa acquisition is quite the task. We got our ‘temporary visa’ on the way in for USD 60. Since then we have had to revisit Kigali to renew the visa for another USD 60.
Mark O’Kane an Lara Nilsson came to pick us up from the airport. Mark is an Australian Engineer who has spent the last four years in Rwanda as the principal of a secondary technical school (ETO Gitarama). Lara is a school teacher from Brisbane and has been volunteering for the school teaching Maths, English and Sport. We are staying at Mark’s house on the school premises for our six weeks here. The school is in a small town called Butansinda, 1.5 hours by car south-west from Kigali. It’s about 20 km from the Burundian border and is 15 minutes drive from Nyanza where Sean and I will be doing our hospital rotation.
Could be a while till my next post - currently using the school’s internet (a luxury here in itself)
which is dependent on a fairly unreliable power source.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment