March

At the end of March I was able to travel to Bukavu, Congo. Unfortunately I forgot to take my camera with me, so I have no pictures of the trip. Bukavu is a sprawling town on the southern shores of Lake Kivu. I stayed in a hotel that had a partial view of the lake and at night you could see the lights of the fishing boats.

While I was there, I visitted the family of one of my friends, Alphonse. They fed me lots of fish, potatoes and ubugali (a kind of pasty dough made from casava that looks like mashed potatoes, but is rather tasteless on its own). They talked to me in their limitted English and in Swahili with lots of signs. Alphonse's mother and aunt did some traditional Congolese dancing for me which is very different than Rwandan dancing. For one thing it uses the hips a lot more and the arms less; the ryhthms are also different.

I was only in Bukavu for two days, but during that time I could see that the town seemed to be somewhat poorer and less well kept up than Cyangugu on the Rwandan side of the border. However, the people that I met were friendly and welcoming and I enjoyed my time there.