I am carrying, of all things, a package of Tiffany blue napkins; three chocolate bars whose wrappers are designed to look like $100 dollar bills, Ben Franklin’s eyes winking from behind spectacles; a package of diapers, 32 count, for babies three to six kilos; and eight kilos of fried donuts called amandazi. My left arm starts to ache so I switch the bag to my right arm, alternating back and forth as I make my way down past the shops, the market teeming with its Saturday evening visitors, Nyamata High School. Perhaps for the last time, or, at least, for a while.
What does it mean to leave a place, I wonder. At five o’clock in Nyamata, the sun is an egg yolk dripping gold light over the whole town. People walk along the streets in the crush of the evening heat, not in any particular hurry, it seems, to get to where they’re going. I feel like I am moving too fast for the moment, so I stop for a bit, the sun blinding my eyes even behind my sunglasses. The sweat prickles down the back of my neck, and I shift my bag again, weighed down by all those donuts, flour and sugar and oil. I already feel a longing to return here, even if I haven’t yet left. I tell myself that if I wait here long enough, I can fix every detail of this place into a far-reaching corner of my brain: the shops, colored red or blue or yellow according to the mobile company that’s sponsored the paint; the way the stone sidewalk begins to crumble right before the gate of Nyamata High School, the blocks giving way to a sandy hill; the two empty billboards whose steel bones stretch towards the sky. When a place has left such an impression on you, I reason, it is only natural to want a lasting impression of it.
The ache in my arm reminds me that I’ll need to move more quickly now if I want to make it back to the guest house in time. We are getting ready to host a goodbye this evening to celebrate all that has been accomplished this week: we’ve helped AVEH to rebuild their kitchen; Lucia has designed and executed, with the help of the group, a mural of the Rwandan landscape in AVEH’s play area; we worked alongside folks in the community to clear a field for AVEH to expand their compound; the students have, miraculously, built four chairs for children with disabilities out of cardboard and cassava glue at CECHE. Without the kindness and dedication of our community partners, however, none of that work would have been possible. Though we have already said our goodbyes at the worksites today, I am grateful that tonight will give us the opportunity to stretch out these goodbyes for a moment longer [is there any language in which it is easy to say goodbye? if so, I’m not sure I’d want to learn it anyways].
So we’ve pulled our laundry from the line (paint-covered pants and dish towels and once-white socks) and swept the courtyard sidewalk for this evening. There’s heaps of sweet sliced pineapple and thirty bottles of Fanta and Coke and Sprite stocked in the fridge, delivered up to the guest house in two red crates with peeling white letters on the side. We’ve wrapped gifts for everyone in brown paper bags (Ben Franklin’s face sliding in with a knowing look) and signed certificates of community service hours for all of the students – fifty hours, no small feat. The students have put together a playlist of music to sing the day away: Bob Marley, Frank Sinatra, Leon Bridges, ABBA.
Walking up the hill to the guest house for what will likely be the last time, at least for a while, the red dirt works its way into the soles of my feet. I’ll be glad to deposit the donuts onto the wood table outside our kitchen but I know that when I walk through the yellow door of the guest house, the hardest part of the evening will still be ahead of me.
What I don’t know yet is just how moving the evening will be. I don’t know yet that I will spend an hour or so talking with Claver and Theogene from CECHCE about family (and that Theogene, married for over twenty years, will tell me that patience is the most important child to nurture in a marriage). That the students will gather around Roger, who has been helping us translate at CECHE, to make animated predictions about the World Cup Final (France is the favorite). That there will be, for once, leftover donuts. That Divine, whom I thought we had said a final goodbye to earlier this morning, will manage her way out of a neighbor’s wedding towards the end of the ceremony to eat dinner with us. That Claude and Eugene from AVEH will address a lovely postcard to each student as a reminder of our time spent together, just as CECHE had done earlier this afternoon. That Claver will be lost for words when he receives the diapers, a gift for his new baby Noriella, who arrived in Nyamata only days after we did. That Habisona will stand up when the ceremony is coming to a close to thank our community partners and our group for helping make this experience possible for her. That other students, then, will be inspired to say a word of thanks as well. That Sofia will remind us all that we received much more than we gave. That Roger, who has worked with our students for two weeks, will laughingly share how he wondered about them finishing the chairs, only because at their age, he was not so motivated to help others as he has seen the students to be. That Zach will end the night by suggesting it’s not goodbye, but see you later. And that I, slightly out of the fluorescent light’s beam of reach, will embarrassingly give a small sob at the thought of all these people, gathered together.
What does it mean to leave a place, I wonder. Just this, I think, stepping through the door.
–Kayla
