19th April 2020

We’re now in the middle of the rainy season and this weekend is predicted to be particularly heavy with floods and several areas have already seen flooding.

The rain is usually preceded by the crashing of thunder and dark clouds before it pours down. It’s difficult to get out as the sky is looking like this more often than not. After being at home for a couple of days, I decide to take a chance during a sunny moment and manage to walk 3 miles to a shop quite a way out.  I’m stopped by a policeman who takes my temperature, and I see them regularly on my route. The streets are mainly quiet and everywhere looks a bit surreal.  I see beautiful views over central Kigali and it seems hard to imagine that just a month ago I was travelling through the streets on a moto.

Later in the day I have another chat with my landlady, it seems there are some people for whom the food distribution is not enough, and many are hungry.   People in the neighbourhood are trying to help, people are sharing what they have with each other and I’m learning more and more the uselessness of money unless you can use it to share with others.  I manage to raise some money between myself and my family which my landlady distributes – the feedback she later gives me is humbling.

Lockdown has been extended for another two weeks, bringing us to the end of April at the earliest, and the wearing of masks is now going to be compulsory in public and in shared compounds.  Some of the many sewing companies scattered around Kigali are being asked to produce them, which fits in nicely with the drive of ‘Made in Rwanda’ thus reducing imports and contributing to world shortages. Prior to lockdown, there were machinists on virtually every street who could run up a dress in a matter of hours using their lovely Gitenge material, hopefully now this would enable many of them to continue working.