8th March 2020

I’ve been in Rwanda for just over two months.  I meet with Katie and Hannah, two other volunteers who arrived at the same time as me. Katie and I live in Kigali, the capital.  We’re lucky to be living in the city and that our placements are here. We’re part of the busy buzzing and developed infrastructure that is Kigali which has shown tremendous growth in the last 20 years.   Lots to do and see, restaurants and cafes, shops with home baked bread and other luxuries not available in most parts of Rwanda.  Hannah lives in Rwamagana, an hour and half away by bus and travels in often to visit.

Hannah has found a great restaurant called Asian Kitchen that serves tasty vegetarian Chinese food.  We meet there, then go and meet up with Katie at the hotel we’d stayed in when we first arrived.  By coincidence, we meet two new volunteers who have come to work on the project, one from Australia and one from Ireland. We swap stories and details about the project. They have yet to be allocated their homes but will be moving sometime this week.

Today the authorities in Kigali have banned concerts and large public gatherings because of fears of C-19.    Residents are divided, some have turned to social media to applaud the preventative move, but others see it as heavy-handed given Rwanda doesn't have any coronavirus cases at the moment.

The first gig to be affected was an International Women's Day concert which was cancelled hours before it was due to start.  I get messages from the Rwandan people I work with wishing me happy Women's Day.

In the UK there are over 300 cases but most people are carrying on as normal.