How do you even start with something that feels like has been continuous for months? It is one of the strangest feelings, to have been such a short time in some place, but feel like it has been ages. Welcome to life in Rwanda. Tonight marks one week since we have been in Africa, and if I hadn't known better, I could've sworn it has been a few months. I can't tell if this is because we have been on the go since we got here or just living a daily life in a completely new place. It's almost comforting to feel like you know the area. Our first few days were spent getting us familiar with Rwanda in Kigali at a mission. We were introduced to Rwandan food (rice, potatoes, beans, and meat), visited a genocide memorial, and were thrown head first into Rwandan culture. We also managed to squeeze a few more vaccinations in there, totaling 4 shots in 2 days. I'm not sure if it was meant to be an introduction to Rwanda, but it worked well. At the end of the week we headed to Nyanza, south of the capital. Describing the landscape to someone that has never been to Africa is like trying to describe colors to someone who is colorblind. They know the general idea of what it should be, but the reality is so much more. Rwanda is so utterly beautiful while at the same time being completely rugged and ramshackle yet peaceful. It's such an amazing contradiction. There is so much poverty, heartbreak, and pain, but it still has this aura about it. Africa is so untamed and wild, it's phenomenal in it's freedom. Rwanda has the topography of northern Idaho, with lots of hills and smaller mountains, but the landscape is all Africa, with the characteristic red soil and greenery everywhere. Nyanza, where we are training, is a good size city of around 300,000 with basically one center market, a street of shops, police office, and school. People are everywhere!!! We are about 5 minutes from the center of town, which makes walking there convenient. The internet cafe has been our local hotspot. The market is an amazing work of genius, creativity, and mayhem. It sells everyone from clothes and shoes, to vegetables, to mattresses. It truly is a catch-all, traditional African market. Thus far I've only ventured in a couple times, but managed to come out unscathed, and was even able to converse enough to buy mangoes (Mwembe). Our days consist of pounding our brains full of Kinyarwanda for 4 hours a day, followed by medical, tech training, cultural education, or safety and security. I'm in awe of what we are doing as it seems like we are studying non-stop. Thus far a few things we have been taught to say are, Nitwa Kerry. Ndi umunyamerika-kazi, ndi umuganga, na ndi umusityagyeri wa Peace Corps. Ntuye y' Dubai na mfite icupa dy'amazi. (My name is Kerry. I'm an American, I'm a nurse, and I'm a trainee with Peace Corps. I'm from Dubai and I have a bottle of water.) While the language learning makes you want to tear your hair out, the language coordinators are fantastic and always willing to "correct" our pronounciation. We have a total of 12 so we are rotating between two a day. They are all smiles. There is so much that has happened it is nearly impossible to break it down into individual days or events. We've been given host families in order to integrate into the community. My host parents are Pascal and Agathe, though I've only met Agathe so far. Thankfully she speaks English well since she is a primary school teacher, which also means she is able to teach me basic Kinyarwanda! Everyone is so enthusiastic, they love having us around and talking with us! Most of our days have been spent wandering around the main center, studying like mad, and catching whatever moment of peace we can. We are split into groups of 8-10 per house, with 4 to a room, and only 2 bathrooms! (8 girls and 2 bathrooms!!!) We also have two of the language teachers living with us. My house is called Kitchen house, because, well the kitchen is literally in our backyard. We have electricity surprisingly, but no running water; so flushing the toilet consists of pouring bucket water into the bowl. Fun times! Bucket baths are the norm, although everyone on the staff is fascinated with my solar shower, which apart from washing hair, amounts to the same as a bucket bath since the only place to hang it are the waist high faucets. I haven't been able to discern if they are just appeasing me by saying it's good, or if they really think it's a cool thing. Too bad they would never tell me even if they did think it was ridiculous. There are still a million and one things that I could spend my time writing about, but I fear that unless you are experiencing it, it's difficult to grasp the excitement of every detail, thus I will spare you. (Unless there are requests for me. :-)) As my training director Mup says, it's Africa!