We had started to feel like we were getting into a routine here in Kigali; however, thanks to illness and cooperative drama, this week definitely shook things up.

On Monday, we went to the field bright and early as usual, but quickly found out that nobody in the cooperative knew we were coming. There was some miscommunication (probably because they expected to have the election that day), so all of the women were working on various other jobs. Because a good number of the women were busy with things outside of the village, we were unable to hold a training. This was frustrating because we are starting to really feel the time crunch, and every training period is so valuable! We instead handed out the translated documents from the previous Friday’s training to the women we could find, played with some kids for a little while, and then headed back to the office.

After lunch, Rachel and Hannah went to the office to finalize Toussaint’s application (mentioned in the post from last week). Sarah and Connor, both exhausted from the weekend, went back to Chez Theó for good, long naps. The evening ended like most Mondays at SoleLuna for trivia night. The big difference this week, though, was that WE FINALLY WON!!! Just kidding. We got dead last. Sarah is still extremely bitter. We parted for home after the scores were tallied, and Rachel and Sarah may or may not have bought a ridiculous amount of ice cream as a consolation prize. It was delicious.

On Tuesday, we rolled into the office around ten, worked on stuff (I know, super descriptive… Stuff maybe refers to last week’s blog post? Should have taken better notes at the time oops), Connor finally shipped a package of papers to Hong Kong for his study abroad (yes, he waited until the last minute and it cost him $75), had lunch in town at an Indian place called Zaaffran (that means saffron woah), spent hours at UTC, went to Nakumatt where Sarah bought disappointing cheese (Rwandan cheese is called Gouda. It does not taste like Gouda. It tastes like the death of all your hopes and dreams.), and ate Theó food for dinner yay.

P.S. We didn’t get charged extra for the scratches on the Akagera car! Double yay!

P.P.S. We have now visited every Bourbon Coffee (like Starbucks but with real food) in the city except for the one in the departures section of the airport. Except for Connor. He went there when he got deported, so he wins the Bourbon contest.

Wednesday was quite a day.

That morning, we left for Cyaruzinge unsure if we were going to be able to hold elections; we had distributed papers in Kinyarwanda to most of the cooperative members on Monday, but we didn’t know if they knew what to expect at Wednesday’s training. We brought along Sarah and Rachel’s housemate Kaleigh and her mom, who was visiting from the United States. Kaleigh does communications within HDI and has been working there for about a year, so she was eager to check up on the Agaseke cooperative at such a dynamic time. We showed up at the Cell office and were told it was booked for the day, so we headed to Providence’s house where a few women were waiting, quietly knitting.

As more and more women started trickling into the compound, we came to understand that the women expected to have elections that day. We didn’t recognize a lot of their faces, which probably should have been the first sign that the cooperative had more depth than we expected. In a cooperative, the members are the most valuable pieces of the entity and are expected to be engaged in the work the cooperative is doing. For almost half of the cooperative members to be disengaged to the extent that they were never present at trainings meant that something was probably up.

As a crowd of over thirty women struggled to fit on the woven mats, we passed out the remaining documents and made a quick game plan to review the positions and responsibilities before elections started. Nadeg and Claude didn’t miss a beat; Nadeg picked up our Kinyarwanda document and proceeded to rattle off information to the cooperative, pausing for feedback and clarifications about the roles to be elected. Claude (we assume—we can never be quite sure sans translation) briefed the cooperative on the meaning carried by the election process and asked for their input for the day.

The review process took a while, but finally it was time for elections to begin. There was some distress in the beginning about the election process, because in the past the cooperative has instead nominated candidates and proceeded on general consensus. Because these elections were looking to be sensitive, we decided to do them anonymously. Kind of.

At this point Sarah wasn’t feeling well, so she headed back to Kigali with Kaleigh and her mom. Connor and Hannah meanwhile scrambled to rip up tiny sheets of paper in an attempt to create anonymous ballots, but as soon as they did this a disagreement broke out amongst the women. There was some confusion as to who exactly was in the cooperative and if women should be able to vote if they had not been attending trainings or meetings. After this was mediated and a few women were kicked out, Claude and Nadeg made a list of all cooperative members and decided instead to call up each member one by one to record her vote.

Three Presidential candidates emerged: current President Providence, outspoken Claudine, and quiet Adelfina. At first we were all a little surprised to see someone challenge Providence’s leadership, as she seemed to “rule” with respect. Each candidate entered the compound separately, gave a short speech, and left; then the women came up one by one to place their votes. The atmosphere was visibly tense.

As soon as all the women had been called up, Claude shuffled by to us to give us the vote counts as Nadeg lined up the next positions to be elected. Connor and Hannah (and Claude tbh) were shocked at the election results: Providence had been ousted and Claudine would be the new cooperative President! This had so many implications for the cooperative’s cohesiveness and general functionality – in fact, more than we originally imagined. As Claude announced Claudine’s victory, huge cheers went up among the cooperative members and Providence seemed stunned.

The cooperative women seemed relieved and declared that, since the role of President was the only sensitive one, voting needn’t be anonymous any longer. The new (traditional) voting procedure involved all candidates standing in the front and each voter moving to stand in a line behind her preferred candidate. Quickly Adelfina was chosen as Secretary and Angelique as Treasurer. Connor, Hannah, and Rachel sat surprised as Providence left the scene and did not run for any further positions. In fact, the last five positions (Auditors, Seller, Marketers) ran unopposed.

Hannah and Rachel had started feeling sick at the beginning of elections; that, coupled with the shocking turnout of the elections, was enough for everyone to decide to push the final decisions to Friday (re: the last four women who were supposed to be elected to learn and teach on the knitting machines). We had a little time on the way home to process the elections, but we honestly weren’t sure what the next steps would be, where trainings would now be held, where the goods would be stored, etc. We all (including Claude) felt confident in Claudine’s capacity to be a good President and were encouraged by that.

When we returned to the office, we found out that TOUSSAINT HAD BEEN ACCEPTED TO GRAD SCHOOL!!!!!! He got his scholarship and will be leaving for the Netherlands in August!!! So pumped for him! Also WOW quick application turnover.

We had originally intended to spend the afternoon buying a second knitting machine but, alas, we [almost] all spent the rest of the day in a pathetic state on Rachel and Sarah’s couches. The End.

Thursday was uneventful, as the three ladies were still sick; the majority of the day was spent horizontally. Sarah eventually got too restless at her house and dragged Rachel over to Hannah and Connor’s. Thanks to Amber and Yannick, we were able to watch movies (The Royal Tenenbaums and the beginning of A Theory of Everything) and The Big Bang Theory until the day was over. Indian food delivery happened too, for those who could stomach it. Not too much else to report about Thursday.

On the Sarahannah side of things, Friday morning was pretty similar to Thursday.

Connor and Rachel went into the field which was, as Connor later described it, “rocky”. While it’s typically impossible to understand what’s going on in conversation, Connor and Rachel were somehow able to deduce that there was intense conflict. Through Providence (the old president) shooing everyone away and a short chat with Claudine (the new president), Nadeg (our awesome translator) was able to gather the story, as follows:

After the elections on Wednesday, there was a lot of tension within the cooperative because of the presidential turnover. There was basically a divide between those who voted for the old president and those who voted for the new one. That night, some women had allegedly bullied Providence by throwing stones at her houes. So, the bickering we witnessed in our shortlived village visit had been Providence blaming Claudine and her voters for the stoning. In their defense, Claudine claimed that the violent acts were done by those women who Providence had kicked out of elections, saying that they weren’t active enough members of the cooperative to have the privilege of voting (basically they didn’t pay their dues).

Regardless, Providence was understandably hurt by the happenings of this past week. Kinda sounds like The Real Housewives of Cyaruzinge, I know.

Since Claude has a close relationship with the community and experience with their conflict, Nadeg didn’t feel like there was any reason we should remain uselessly witnessing fighting in the village, so we headed back to the office. Our coworkers responded to our story slightly horrified. Connor and Rachel then headed home to check on the sicklings, getting bagels on the way. That night, we welcomed back our appetites and headed to Ogopogo for dinner.

Takeaways from this week:

Cooperative dynamics are a lot more complex than we thought
One should be careful of what they eat lest they get food poisoning or some other undetermined illness
One should always drink lots of water lest they get chronically dehydrated
Sleep fixes all most things
Ohmygosh we only have two more weeks here

Amahoro y’all,

HDI Team