Uganda to Rwanda

Rwanda to Uganda from Ricky Norris on Vimeo.

By the amazing Ricky Norris

The Remba House

Courtesy of my roomie Seth Johnson

Week Three

Busy week with a full, ambitious agenda. Remba's director, Rachel and I are still chugging along with the event planning for next months beauty competitions. We have locked in the events location and dates, and now it is up to us to get the word out and promote this thing. Registration and orientation is coming up on the first weekend of July with three competitions to follow each weekend thereafter. We are hosting the events at a brand new venue, Shokola, which is designed to host special events and will be the perfect environment and ambience for what's to come. This week we will begin salon interviews to capture the beauty industry in Kigali and connect with Rwandan stylists. I have been so busy and preoccupied with event coordinating and PR, that I haven't had many opportunities to be on the ground and connect with the ones who we are ultimatly here for. I am so excited to explore this countries salons and individuals and get to know the people we are here to serve on a more personal level.

Working on African Time...

An ongoing adjustment when when working in Africa as all things here move much slower than the western norm. A constant reminder that we are here doing business development for the beauty industry in a developing country. First and foremost we are here to serve the people and not focus on our American agendas. I am so impressed by this country, its resilience, and evenmore its progressivism. Rwanda's President has put a large emphasis on bringing the countries service industries up to par. He wants to focus on customer service and more efficient business practices to accomodate the countries growing industries. This will attract and support the rapid foreign business and investments coming through Rwanda, and set it apart as the leading economy for the continent. The more meetings I have and the more time I spend here, the more apparent and condusive it is that we start Remba here in Kigali. If there is anywhere in Africa that our vision can be reality it is here. The direction that this country is heading in, is right in line with Remba's mission of not just supplying handouts and survival skills, but generating the much needed opportunities they deserve. With only six weeks left, my immediate goals are too coordinate and host next months beauty professionals contest where we will discover our scholarship recipients that will be enrolled into Remba's leadership program. They will be trained, fine-tuned, and partnered with aspiring stylists to share the education they recieved and perpetuate our resources. This mentorship model is a cultural norm in Africa where learning is cummunal and shared without the threat of competition, but rather the need for cooperation from one another to survive. My long term goals are to learn the do's and dont's as we pilot this program in Kigali. These lessons will later become the manual to recreate Remba in other developing countries worldwide. Being a part of the beginning is really something. Half the time you feel like you have no clue what you're doing, and the other half you're on top of it creating something amazing. I am working with an incredible team. The director, Rachel, has the biggest heart and truly lives to serve others. The directors of our partner organization, Keza, are inspiring visionaries with ample experience and wisdom to feed off of. And lastly but certainly not least, our film crew. Seth and Ricky are brilliantly talented and creative. I am so proviledged to spend a short time with these individuals who needless to say I am very fond of.

Hit the ground running...

I spent my first weekend at Lake Kivu in Gisenyi. Beautiful. We stayed at bungalows on the shore of the lake and soaked up the sights and the sun. In the distance we could see the silhouette of the mountains of Congo, and travel by boat to a small island offshore. Enjoyed a relaxing weekend and then back to Kigali to start work this week. The rest of my team arrived this morning and it is so nice to finally have them all here. They are now settled into our new house and it is already beginning to feel much more like home. Contrary to preconceived notions about the standard of living in Africa, Kigali is a worldclass city with many of the western comforts and ammenities. There is a high concentration of westerner's working, researching, and residing in this city so there are many restaurants and hotels to cater to their business. With a thriving high-end market for service and products, Keza has a lot of work to do. Yesterday I met with the owner of the one and only spa here. It is a lovely establishment with great potential. They have set the bar for other salons to follow and strive for. And, with our program we can provide cosmetology training and develop business. By raising the quality of the beauty industry out here we can create some healthy competition, inspiration, and incentive for local women cooperatives to take a trade and sustain a career for themselves. Today, I met with Joy, the founder of Gahaya Links. She is a huge inspiration and mentor to me. She is a social business entrepreneur from Rwanda. She founded a training center for marginalized women from the community to be skillfully trained in basket making. She enrolls sixty at a time into her two week intensive training course, provides housing for that period, and materials. They leave enriched with a skill and then return to their village to train the other women in their community. They then sell their products back to Joy, so long as they meet her standards of quality. She then sells them to Macy's where they are available for purchase by people like you. She is currently working on expanding her goods into linens and jewelry. Her social business has been featured and supported by Oprah, Bono, and political figures alike. It was an honor to meet with her and I look forward to spending more time with her at her training center this summer. She wants an inside perspective on young American girls and what we like so I will be that girl for her! I am working on building a relationship between Keza and Guhaya Links. Between meetings and meetings and meetings I have been very busy, extremely inspired, and in awe of the power and possibilities of social business development. I am learning so much and working hard to create opportunity and build a better reality.

Day Two

I am so proud to be a part of Keza Organization, working on the Remba Team! Everyone that I work with has been such a pleasure to get to know, and having their good company will keep me from getting homesick this summer. Yesterday I had my first visit to the Buranga Center, which is the Keza Headquarters here in Kigali. It is where all of the jewelry making and production happens amongst the thirty-seven women who Keza trained as skillful jewelers and business owners. I was amazed to watch the process and love that goes into each bead that is handmade by these resilient and deserving women. Today, I visited the new house that I will move into on Friday when the rest of my team arrives. It is a comfortable house with it's own vegetable garden, a view, and just down the street from the U.S Embassy. I have been responsible to get the house prepared and ready to be moved into by the end of the week. I met our house staff, and tried to make our house a home for the months ahead. Eager for my team mates to arrive so that we can all move in and get down to business. In the meantime I have been getting acquainted with the city and all that it has to offer. I love the fact that I get to practice my french here, and I am slowly picking up kinyarwandan to break down the language barrier between myself and those who do not speak english nor french. The scenery here is beautiful as the rainy season just ended and everything is very lush and green. I had no idea how much I missed the crazy rides on the back of motos, aka boda bodas in Uganda. They are the cheapest and fastest way to get around in the city, and often the most thrilling as you are on the back of a motorbike hauling down the road, weaving between traffic. I love it. Don't worry, unlike Uganda, they make you wear a helmet here.

I Made It!

After numerous flights, delays, and layovers, I am here in Kigali! Got in today early evening just in time to take in the scenic drive from the airport to the temporary housing that I am staying in. The house is off the beaten path not too far from the American Embassy. With little time left in the day to become acquainted with the city, I opted to get settled into the house and went out to dinner with Keza's Chief of Operations. Today's journey was long and exhausting as there were a few delays. My last connecting flight from Addis Ababa, Ethiopa to Kigali, Rwanda had some technical difficulties. After taking off, the captain notified us that our right generator had gone out and that we must turn back immediately. Then, we had a hold on our landing and had to fly in circles for at least forty minutes in order to burn off the fuel and excess weight so that we could land. After touching ground we had to wait for another plane. After a few hours, an employee gave us the choice between departing immediately with no lunch served, or waiting another two hours so that the crew could prepare the food carts to serve lunch for another flight. An obvious choice to me, I was ready to just get to our final destination with or without the airplane food that is served. Grateful to have made it here safe and sound and looking forward to tomorrow. I will meet some of the other interns that are out here this summer, move into our new housing for the interns, and get a chance to get to know my way around town. I am so excited! Turning in for my first nights sleep in Rwanda...good night!