Buying Land

This turned out to be a very busy day for Mark! He went off to town with Bruce first thing in the morning to go to the bank. The remainder of the funds needed to complete the purchase of the land had been transferred from a bank in Nairobi to the bank here in Kigali. Unfortunately there was a bit of a mix up and with changing the money from one currency to another, there would be a significant loss of funds. Bruce spent a considerable amount of time negotiating with with bank manager and was able to not lose quite so much. They had to leave without the money, though, because they had an appointment with the EMI team and didn't have time to get through the paperwork and all.

EMI is a missionary organization that is based in Uganda and they assist churches and missions with their building projects by doing land surveys and drawing up site plans. They are the ones who came out in June and Mark came to Kigali to meet them. Well, they are in Rwanda for a different project but had agreed to an hour or so meeting with Mark and Bruce to discuss the current obstacles and possible changes to the plan. We had thought that they might come to our house and have lunch with us, hence the apple pie. However, they had several appointments that morning and were unable to come over.

At some point in the morning, following the meeting with EMI, (Mark will probably have to explain this better) Mark and Bruce ended up at the mayor’s office and met the top urban planning manager for the city of Kigali. This person is the boss of the urban planning manager in the district where the land is. That impromptu meeting went well and was positive except that as the city gets more organized, they are also coming up with more regulations so Mark will have to pick up a new list of what’s needed from the district office. He hopes it’s not too much more than they are already preparing.

After those meetings, Bruce and Mark went back to the bank to collect their several thousand dollars (in cash) to take to the forex bureau to change it into Rwandan Francs. The bank gives a poor exchange rate so that is why we withdraw $$’s and then go the forex to get the francs. The highest currency bill here in Rwanda is a 5,000 which is worth $8.90 right now. So imagine the bulk of money Mark had to carry of several $1000 in RWFrancs!!

Mark came home with Alexis and they ate some lunch and then they ran off to the land to pay the remainder due for the new parcel of land. Mark said it was an interesting process. The group of men there all were speaking Kinyarwanda which he didn’t understand any of it except for a few numbers. There was a contract handwritten in Kinyarwanda stating where the parcel of land was, the amount it was sold for and the date the occupants had to be off the property, etc. They were talking away and then their voices got louder and more argumentative sounding and louder and faster! It seemed that the seller was refusing to sign the contract. Mark was thinking, “Oh, no. He’s upset because we’re late paying the balance due and he wants more money!” After a few minutes, Alexis translated for Mark and told him that the standard time for an occupant to vacate the premises is 2 weeks but the owner had previously requested a longer time period so they agreed on 4 weeks at their last meeting. Now he saying he wanted 3 months! Alexis was adamant that that was too long and was trying to explain to him that when the construction starts, Mark wants to use the house as his workshop and store room and the family needed to be out. So this is what all the arguing was about. In the end they agreed to 6 weeks but now the whole contract had to re-handwritten. Alexis had been the one who had first written it out and he told the seller that if he didn’t like it, he would have to rewrite it! So, more discussion, more writing and, for Mark, more waiting. When they had arrived in the house, the TV was on and the movie, “Amazing Grace” was just starting (in English). The TV stayed on during the whole event and so Mark at least had something to do while he was waiting for all this! The movie was finished before they were done! Mark said one thing that was kind of funny was that the seller was really talking loudly and sounded terribly upset but then, there was a break for a couple of minutes and he would pick up us 8 month old child and bounce him on his knee and laugh and sweet talk the baby as if nothing was upsetting to him. As soon as the discussion started back up, he was back to loud talking. He was like a switch turning on and off!

While Mark was off at his meeting with EMI and at the bank in the morning, I had spent a good portion of the morning studying Kinyarwanda. Joyce came over for our weekly session and we went over the vocabulary that I was working on. When it is only me and the helper, it gets very tiring working on Kinyarwanda for 2 hours – when Mark is here we take turns practicing and reviewing so we each get a little break. Anyway, I got tired of doing our review and I wanted to work on numbers some more so I got out our Skip-Bo cards and taught Joyce how to play! The requirement was to say the numbers in Kinyarwanda (which I had to keep reminding her). She had a great time playing the game and she won! I think I have a better grasp of the numbers 1 -12. She said another time we need to play a game to learn colors. Maybe I’ll get out UNO.

As we were playing Skip-Bo, it started to rain and then it rained harder and harder. Pretty soon we couldn’t hear each other any more and I thought it didn’t sound like a normal rain so I looked outside and lo and behold! It was hailing!! Quarter inch balls of ice were bouncing around on our grass! They looked like little insects out there bouncing around! I sent a text to Mark to say that it was hailing and he sent a message back saying it was sunny in town – a 15 minute drive away!! Crazy! Well, all of a sudden it stopped – no rain, no hail – just silence. Joyce and I looked at each other in amazement. It was as if God turned off the faucet! Just like that.

We were invited to the Bonvallat’s house for supper that night so I offered to bring the apple pie and whipped cream (fresh cream skimmed off the top of our milk each morning). I went ahead and walked over there and Mark came a bit late, straight from his land purchase ordeal. Myriam made lasagna – Yummy!! And the apple pie was perfect. They live up on the hill a bit higher than we do and have a better view of the city. From their front window we could see a fascinating lightening storm and eventually the rain came up to the house. Because it was dark outside, it was spectacular!