Leave your carrier bags at home

Why on earth is she calling it that? Carrier bags are illegal in Rwanda, so I made sure that I ditched mine at Doha.  It seems a strange thing to outlaw, but seeing how clean and tidy the streets are here, it makes sense.   So if you come here at some point in the future, don't bring any carrier bags. 

I have travelled a long way since my last blog, when I sat at blogging and catching up with Guiding admin overnight at Doha International Airport, whilst sipping Pepsi.  It got light very quickly – it was as though 5am came and God switched the lights on in the Middle East.  Doha International Airport is absolutely vast – it is a complete miracle how my bag made it from London to Kigali, via Doha, not forgetting a short stop in Entebbe (Uganda).  A bus took me to the Kigali plane, and we passed hundreds of other Qatar Airways flights bound for a myriad of international destinations.  I slept almost the entire way, waking only for breakfast.  I read through all the information I had received about the conference, to have it fresh in my mind.  I started to read my time management book, but ran out of time to continue.  We touched down briefly in Entebbe, Uganda's international airport.  I caught a glimpse of lush, green Uganda, where I spent a semester studying, back in 2004.

The satisfied clunk of the wheels onto the Kigali tarmac meant that I was finally in Rwanda.  Welcome to Africa.  Welcome back to Africa.  This place is somewhere else.  Africa grows on you like nowhere else.  I first came to Africa in 2002, as a naive 19-year-old, eager to explore this curious place.  I spent time doing the gap-year thing - teaching children (English and French), then travelled, mostly alone, but often with people I met along the way, all the way around Ghana, then around West Africa and all the way up to Timbuktu.  Since then, I have been to different parts of Africa on various projects - often travelling a bit afterwards.  I have nearly been to Rwanda on two occasions, but this time I have actually made it, and it feels right.

On the plane,  I met the members of various delegations from Australia, Japan and Pakistan, and we arrived like a mini-contingent from Doha, to be greeted by the awaiting welcome team.  We bundled into the cars and headed for the hotel.  The streets of Kigali are clean, fresh, organised.  The 'motos' (motorcycle taxis) awaiting passengers on every free piece of land are organised, numbered; they even have numbers on their helmets - yes, helmets! They didn't have helmets or numbers in Uganda in 2004.  It's a whole new world. 

The organisation of this event has been epic and it is wonderful to be part of this very special event.  It's going to be  a week of thinking, learning and growing for us all, where friendships will be made, partnerships formed between organisations, and commitments made to taking our Stop The Violence projects forward. 

Guiding is all about learning by doing, and that is what the week will be based around.  We are going to be learning about how Guides du Rwanda works.  We are going to go home equipped to change something, develop something, within our MOs or our communities.  This is a huge opportunity and very exciting.  There are 51 participants here,  representing 28 countries.  We are in patrols.  My patrol is made up of delegates from Bolivia (Adri - if you are reading this - I am with Celeste!), Rwanda, Japan, Cook Islands, Nigeria and Madagascar.   What a great combination! Already, we have talked about our countries, our organisations, and our journeys to get here, which vary from 20 minutes (Rwanda), to more than 30 hours (me - am still not quite sure how it took that long  - I'm a bit confused by the time differences still, having gone back to the future).

We did a series of activities to get to know each other, overseen by the Facilitation team, which includes Rachel who I saw at Our Cabana, just a few weeks ago.  It's a small, small world. 

One of the things we did was to come up with groundrules for the week.  (Pip - you'll be pleased to know that one of ours was - eat with a different person every meal, which was agreed on).  We have an intense programme ahead of us, including learning more about violence and gender, sharing our pre-work, reflection, action planning, campaigning and community visits.  Our patrols have been given  duties, which take the form of blogging for the WAGGGS website, running energiser sessions (some impro, perhaps!) and organising the evaluation each day.

We did a great activity earlier, where we had to write our own recipe for what we hope to gain from this week, and variously include different types of skills, diversity, partnership building etc.  It  was a clever way to think about why we are  here.  My patrol is leading the reflection session in the morning - I knew I'd use the 400  post-it notes in various shapes for something like this!

There is something wonderful about being part of Guiding, and if you're reading this and not involved (I know at least 3 people outside of Guiding), then come and get involved.  Look at the website www.girlguiding.org.uk and read about the opportunities which are there for you.  Go and help at your local unit - there are units all over the UK, and the world.  So if you're elsewhere, you can get stuck into Guiding  there as well!

I'm going to sign-out there as it is time for bed, and I have to go and organise my mosquito net.  Am taking a cocktail of anti-malarials to fend off African mosquitoes and any lazy Guatemalan mosquitoes who may still be lurking in my bloodstream. 

We have a very exciting week ahead.  Keep reading for updates, and look at www.wagggsworld.org for more.  Thanks for reading.  Here's to a meaningful week ahead.