Number Five: Dryness

Maybe this similarity is a bit of a stretch, as it is not ALWAYS dry in Rwanda.  During rainy season it’s actually QUITE wet, but at this time of year, Dubai and Rwanda are both dry, dry, dry.

Rwanda is dry and dusty and gives you black snot when you walk outside for extended periods of time.

Dubai is in the middle of the desert and always dry and hot, hot, hot. 

That’s about as far as this similarity goes, so I will take this opportunity to enlighten you on our desert safari experience.  If you ever make it to Dubai (which I would highly recommend), you HAVE to go on a desert safari.  We rode in Land Cruisers and sand bashed in the dunes.  It is quite a thrilling ride, I must say. 

After the sand bashing, we parked at camp and rode some camels. 

We got Henna tattoos on our feet.

We tried on Arabian traditional dress. 

We were then entertained by a man who spun and spun and spun doing amazing feats of dress and undress all the while.  He would have been a fabulous contra dancing partner! 

After the pre-dinner show we had an Arabian BBQ feast which was DELISH.  

After dinner we were entranced by an Arabian belly dancer.

 After a fabulous day in the desert, we returned to the big city.

Number Six: Bus Rides

Anyone who has ridden a bus in a foreign country will tell you what an experience it is.  (Don’t believe me, just ask my friend Rachel

YOWZA! The result of her attempt to leave Kigali by bus two weeks ago… Don’t worry, She had a nice safe flight to Nairobi the next day!)

Bus wrecks aside, the bus riding experiences in the UAE and Rwanda share some similarities.

First, the duration of a bus ride between Dubai and the nearest city (Abu Dhabi) is the exact same as a bus ride from Kigali to practically any other city in Rwanda.  You leave one city, ride for 2 hours through vast nothingness (desert in UAE, rolling green hills in Rwanda) and arrive in another city.

Second, the price of a two-hour bus ride is very inexpensive.  15AED (4USD) from Abu Dhabi to Dubai. 1700RWF (3USD) from Kigali to Musanze. 

Third, more often than not, the person sitting next to you will do something endlessly entertaining.  In order to illustrate this point, I will share with you a brief anecdote from a past Rwandan bus ride and a brief anecdote from our bus ride to Abu Dhabi.

Once upon a time, I boarded a bus in Kigali.  I took the very back window seat on one side.  Anna took the very back window seat on the other side.  Three very smartly dressed Rwandan women with very limited English sat in the three seats between us (one of them tried her hardest to switch seats with me, but I prefer being squished between a person and a window rather than a person and another person and respectfully declined (in English) her request (in Kinyarwanda)).  After this woman accepted her fated seat, she decided we should be friends.  Her name was Grace.  She combed all of her friends’ hair and then did the same to mine.  She attempted to style my hair just like Anna’s was styled 4 seats over.  She obviously didn’t have much experience with Muzungu hair, but I let her have her fun.  When I busted out my iPod a few minutes into the voyage, she decided she needed to hear the music as well and took the ear bud from my right ear and placed it in her left ear.  She rocked out to The Avett Brothers, Old Crow Medicine Show, and the like before she started requesting T.I., Michael Jackson, and Rihanna, none of whom I could oblige her with.  When we arrived in Musanze, it was all I could do not to laugh at the ridiculousness that was my bus ride.

Once upon a time Anna and I boarded a bus in Dubai.  The bus driver swiftly forced the men sitting a few rows back to move to the back of the bus as buses in the UAE are segregated by gender.  Women and children only in the front of the bus!  As Anna and I were about to sit together, a woman dove from her seat next to a man and stole the window seat.  So, I sat next to a man (gasp!) and Anna sat next to said woman.  She didn’t speak a lick of English.  At one point in the trip, Anna applied some makeup, and the woman stole it away from her to write down every word on the compact in her little notebook.  Later she apparently got a whiff of something smelly and decided to cover it up with her spray deodorant.  She sprayed it on herself and into the air and about gagged me across the aisle.  I never did smell the “bad” smell, but the “good” one sure was strong!  Just as we were about to get off the bus, she gave Anna not one, but two pieces of apparently foul tasting candy as a token of her appreciation for having such a pleasant seat companion.

Moving outside of your cultural comfort zone and onto a bus in a foreign country is something everyone should experience at some point in life.  Just steer clear of Kampala Coach if you’re traveling in East Africa!

Number Seven: Good Indian Food

As you may know, my absolute favorite food in the entire world is a good cookie.  Sugar, chocolate chip, snickerdoodle… you name it, I love it.  Now as difficult as it may be to believe, cookies are NOT readily available for purchase in Rwanda.  And as I’ve mentioned to you before, variety is also not readily available for consumption in Rwanda.  But one thing that is readily available is the best Indian food I’ve ever consumed.  Chicken Tikka Masala from Khana Khazana in Kigali is enough to turn even the worst of days into the best day of my life every time I eat it.

There are LOTS of Indian immigrants in Dubai and thus plenty of Indian restaurants to choose from.  Along with the opportunity to consume McDonald’s,

Burger King, Taco Bell, Chili’s, and Dunkin’ Donuts in Dubai, I also had the treat of some good Chicken Tikka Masala at a little local establishment.  It was ALMOST as good as the Indian food in Kigali. 

(Some other notable eating experiences in Dubai:  3 separate Lebanese feasts,

an Arabian BBQ, sushi, pad Thai, and Cold Stone Creamery cake batter ice cream with chocolate chip cookie dough to name a few.)

Number Eight: Dress

Since the UAE is an Islamic country, you see a lot of traditional dress in Dubai.  Men wear long white dresses and white or plaid headdresses.  Women wear long black dresses and cover their heads and sometimes faces in black fabric as well.  These things all have names, but as I said two days ago, Arabic is difficult and even though I heard the names of each article of clothing numerous times, none of them stuck.  Anna and I donned these outfits on a couple different occasions.  Once for fun on our desert safari and once in order to be dressed suitably to visit the 3^rd largest mosque in the world (with the largest chandelier in the world). 

While most people dress very western in Rwanda, there are many women who wear beautiful long dresses made of very colorful African fabrics.  The traditional formal attire of Rwandan women is equally as beautiful and equally as long.

The similarity of dress comes in the modesty of both cultures.  The only knees I have seen in 7 months are my knobby ones in the shower and a select few tourists in both Dubai and Rwanda who aren’t exactly culturally sensitive in their packing for vacation.  

Number Nine: Nokia Mobile Phones

In your land of iPhones and Androids, you may not have as much appreciation for this similarity as I do, but maybe if you take yourself back in time about 12 years, you’ll understand better.  Remember your first cell phone ever?  Not the car-phone-in-a-bag or the Zack Morris gigantor-phone, but that first Nokia, you know, with the Snake Xenia game to play when you were bored (or wanting to show off the fact that you had a cell phone).  Now do you recall the standard ringtone?  If not, go to Dubai, or come to Rwanda.  You’ll hear it everyday and everywhere.  In Dubai I was constantly restraining myself from reaching for my cell phone on the bus, in the malls, on the streets, etc.  Every time I heard that chime, I wanted to read my text message.  Unfortunately, Rwandan cell service doesn’t quite stretch to the Middle East…

While many people in Dubai (and even Rwanda) have Blackberries and iPhones, it is obvious that Nokia dominates the cell phone market in both lands.  There are many different types of Nokia phones, but I am of course partial to my version with the built-in flashlight and endlessly entertained by Snake Xenia, Bounce, and Nature Park.  While I had no service in Dubai, I regularly utilized the converter function on my phone to convert both currency and temperature.  (Did you know that 47 degrees Celsius is a blazing 116.6 degrees Fahrenheit?)

Number Ten: Foreign Language

The official language of the United Arab Emirates is Arabic.  The first official language of the Republic of Rwanda is Kinyarwanda.  These are two of the most difficult languages for a native English speaker to learn.  I am definitely a word person, but even after 7 months in Rwanda, I still only barely follow the simplest of Kinyarwanda conversations.  The only conversation I can semi-successfully have (besides “How are you?” “I’m fine”) is the one I have while bargaining with moto-taxis (I’ll provide a sample conversation translated to English so you can follow it).

Me:  Union Trade Center

Moto-taxi driver:  Five hundred.

Me:  No!  Three hundred.

Moto-taxi driver:  (rambling in Kinyarwanda)

Me: (making noises like I am following what he’s saying)

Moto-taxi driver:  Four hundred.

Me:  You’re expensive!  Three hundred.

Moto-taxi driver:  Okay…

Me:  Let’s go!

In Dubai, the only word I learned in Arabic was “hello,” which sounds strikingly like goodbye in Kinyarwanda.  Not knowing Arabic is not a big deal in Dubai, however, as only 25% of the population is local.  The remaining 75% are expatriates and speak mostly English.

Rwanda is pushing for everyone to learn English, but it is a slow and grueling process.  I’m trying to expedite this process, at least for the students who fall under my tutelage.  Slowly by slowly Rwandans will learn English and be able to communicate on a more global scale.

Top Ten Similarities between Dubai and Rwanda

During our three-week vacation from teaching at Sonrise, Anna and I decided to take a little holiday…to Dubai!  Dubai is an incredibly fascinating place, and I would highly recommend a visit there to anyone.  The best description I can give you is that Dubai = (Disney World + Los Angeles + Las Vegas + Manhattan)^infinity and beyond.  It is different than any other place in the entire world.  

Back in April, I authored a series of blog posts on the differences between Rwanda and the US.  In that same vein, I want to share with you the top ten similarities between Dubai and Rwanda from the eyes of an American. 

While I have been relatively silent as of late here in the blogosphere, you can rest assured that you will have a fresh new blog post to read every day for the next ten days if you so desire! 

Keep your eyes peeled for number ten!