Just call me Mzungu

Today was my first day at the Gihembe refugee camp. If I had a Rwandan franc for every time I someone called me a Mzungu today I would be rich. Okay, no, I wouldn't be rich because there are about 600 francs in 1 dollar so I'd just be up a buck or two. I'm told Mzungu means "white person" in Kinyarwanda. I googled it and it apparently it literally means "confused" but that's the word they use for all white people whether or not they're confused. I probably qualified as a confused white person today so they were pretty accurate I guess. Literally though, groups of refugee children surrounded me staring and saying, "Mzungu, mzungu," and "good morning" (even at 4 in the afternoon haha). They smile when they say it though and seem to get some kind of kick out of me so I guess it's alright. We were careening down the muddy hill  in the pouring rain leaving the camp at the end of the day in the transport van and I could see kids faces light up when they saw me and their little lips mouthing "mzzzuunguu" in slow motion out the window. Most of the time I'm okay with the attention because I realize that they don't see white people that much. Sometimes though, it's difficult not to let it get to you. I've never had people stare at my constantly before. I realize I look different from you, kids, no need to stare, point and state it. Anyways, I'm sure I'll get used to it or they'll get used to me- whatever comes first.

There's much more to say about Gihembe than people staring at a white girl though, so I'll move on. I mentioned before that there are about 20,000 Congolese refugees living at the camp. I was able to sit in on the staff meeting for the coordinators and medical personal from all different sectors from HIV/AIDs to water allocation to Gender based violence, etc this morning so that gave me a good idea of who people are and what they do. Most of the staff are Rwandan with a couple of Ugandans. I spent the afternoon with the nutritionist who showed me around and told me all about the different programs and their target groups. There are supplementary feeding programs for pregnant and lactating mothers, qualifying children under 5, people with iron deficiency anemia and people with HIV/AIDs. They have the kids actually come and eat at the nutrition center because of the concern that the supplementary food would be shared with others or sold. They have regular weighings and track the kids growth and abdominal girth. The kids are no longer in the nutrition program when their waist stops growing from what I'm told. I'm going to spend the week getting to know the various health programs and then work with the staff to figure out where I can best concentrate my energy. More to come on that.

I'll just make one more brief comment on the water supply at my Rwandan residence. I think God is trying to give me a teeny tiny glimpse of what it's like to be a refugee. We are supposed to have running water from 6am to 2pm. From my experience over the last three days, this is not really happening. I don't think I realized what a princess I've been up until now. Not having running water makes everything complicated. You have to flush the toilet with a bucket of water, use a different bucket to bathe, fill and refill all those buckets with water from a heavy jerrycan. I continue to attempt to turn on the faucets for some reason- it's so defeating. This is a tough life, but I'm surviving so far.