Experience Worth Sharing (29 August 2010)

Bourbon Coffee. It’s as about Western as things can get in Kigali. A coffee house with a coffee menu to make any Seattle native at least comfortable, and a dine-in menu with such things as a goat cheese baguette sandwich, various panini, and a selection of five variations on the hamburger. To top it all off, an internet connection suitable for a relatively stutter-free Skype video chat (well, at worst we have to switch between who uses video, but we get to see each other).

There are multiple locations of Bourbon Coffee (as there would be for any good western-style restaurant). One of the locations is at the MTN Centre, about a 30 minute walk from where I am staying. The Centre houses three floors of bars, restaurants, shopping, and offices for MTN, a telecommunications company. Janet and I planned a “Skype date” at 4:00 p.m. Kigali time, and I set out a bit after 3:00 p.m. to make my way to the MTN Centre.

As I was walking, about ten minutes from my goal, I spied walking towards me on the sidewalk three lovely ladies. The first, was a two-year-old girl, walking with choppy but excited steps as someone just shy of mastering the art of being a biped. Just behind her, wearing what presumable were her Sunday church clothes was who I presume was her mother, perhaps a woman aged in her thirties. Finally, as you may guess, the last woman of yet an older generation was in tow, wearing a most exquisite traditional African dress. As we met on the sidewalk, and wanting to respect my elders (the two of them, that is), I stepped off the curb just inches onto the roadway so they could comfortably pass, without maneuvering around some lumbering rugby-player sized expat clumsily hiking the streets of Kigali.

As I stood there, watching the delightful family pass, the most wonderful thing happened. This little girl, adorable in anyone’s eyes, changed course and aimed her happy deliberate steps right at me! Without a hesitation, she opened wide her arms, and gave me the most welcoming hug a two-year-old could give. “Miriwe” I said in reply (meaning hello) and we adults all shared smiles with one another. It absolutely made my day, and gave a wonderful story to tell Janet when we connected.

Week in Review (23 Aug. 2010 - 27 Aug. 2010)

I turned in my first case assignment this week. It was an appeal from the High Commercial Court (a relatively recently established specialized court in the justice system). The assignment came my way because the pleadings were in French (though, some court documents were still in Kinyarwanda). Working in French in terms of legal documents came a lot easier than I expected. With the aid of a French-English legal dictionary that I brought with me, and a very handy online dictionary, I was able to get through the assignment in a good amount of time (although far less productive than I am used to in the States, working in my native language and having Westlaw and Lexis to assist with research). The absolute most fascinating part of the assignment was that Rwanda is still in a civil law system, so there was no precedent to guide the outcome of this case (which, in the states, would have been quite simple). For example, the pleadings, after citing to the relevant law, used persuasive authorities like law textbooks to support their positions and interpretations of the law to the facts of the case. It seemed like a classroom academic exercise more than resolving a commercial dispute at the highest Court of the country.

What I can say about the case is that it involved contract law, and that Rwanda uses essentially the Belgian Civil Code from the 1880s. Yes, you read that correctly. There have been some modifications to the law, but seemingly not many. In the end, the Code is much like the U.S. common law of contracts, with fewer defenses to enforcement of contracts, and less specificity. And for all you MPs in Kigali reading this . . . take a look at the Uniform Commercial Code and think about it . . . think about it . . .

My other work at the Court consists of policy-based administrative reports, which is a vague way of saying “trying to make the justice system more efficient.” At all levels of the judiciary, access to the system is seemingly not a difficulty, but backlogs of cases are a problem. Hopefully this will improve in the coming months.
The week ahead . . . more research . . . more reports. I also start my continued coursework for my LL.M. degree, and two afternoons will connect via Skype (or try to) to the class to participate remotely.

More updates to come soon.

Weekending (20 Aug. - 22 Aug. 2010)

Working for the weekend – it has never been so true. Although, my mantra these months will be “Working for 18 December,” which is when I will be re-united with my Dearest. Until that happy day, however, it’s the weekend that gives the greatest pleasure. As opposed to life in law school, as a summer associate, or many of my colleagues practicing back home, we are expected not to work on the weekends. Yes, that’s right – not to work on the weekends. In fact, most government ministries and private offices end work at 1 p.m. on Fridays for employees to engage in “sport” (or some other leisure activity). Perhaps this is something the ever-increasing-waist-size American populous should consider . . . but I digress . . .

The weekend. My second in Kigali. After dinner at the house on Friday several of us expats decided to take a beer on the town at one of the more popular and upscale establishments – Papyrus. First lesson about Papyrus - if you’re taking a taxi or moto-bike, you have to say “Pop-ee-roos” or they won’t know where to take you. Second lesson about Papyrus, or any of the nicer Kigali establishments – expect to pay more, at least twice more, for what you’d get at a local bar. Granted, the food is generally considered to be better, and by better I mean Western (e.g. a stone-fired pizza oven at Papyrus). The restaurant had a rather large patio filled with about half expats and half locals, and a small dance floor that was jam packed like sardines in a can (which was altogether surprising given the ineptitude of the D.J.). It was a nice place to hang out, and to my greatest delight was situated right next to a cheesemonger – someone with whom I shall become familiar during my stay here!

After Papyrus, a couple guys and I ventured on to a Kigali night club – The Cadillac Club. It was about midnight, and the place was slowly starting to fill up. Dancing is dancing, or so I thought. Much like weddings in the U.S., I quickly found myself as part of a circle with my mates, and some local Rwandans. In fact, upon surveying our small group, the circle was comprised of most if not all guys. Okay then, we dance.

Now, I have spent some nights watching the television show “So You Think You Can Dance” with Janet, and it (perhaps wrongly) inspired in me some confidence that I actually knew how to dance. I would like to think that I held my own. The shock of the evening, however, was when, at one moment when I was dancing in the middle of the circle, a Rwandan guy moved into the circle with me. “Oh, yeah, I got this” I thought, remembering SYTYCD episodes where dancers “battled” with each other, a sort of rhythmic back and forth hip-hop fighting by way of dance. My new friend, however, had another idea . . .

So, it seems that, with a purely, shall we say, “innocent” intention, guys dance with guys, in a way that would make you think it was not, shall we say, “innocent.” How did I discover this you ask? Why, when I was taken by surprise by a local Rwandan who tried to engage in such dance with me. WHOA! It was a surprise. I politely backed off, smiled, and cried a little inside.

No, but really – it was a fun time, and interesting to experience yet another cultural difference while I am here.

Saturday was a relaxing but busy day. I spent the morning walking to the market in the Kimyoronko district with a housemate, Sam. It is a giant open-air (covered) market, with vendors of food, clothing, and other wares. On the shopping list were bath towels and an umbrella (to prepare to the upcoming rainy season). The name of the game is negotiation, and what a lesson. The rule, as I have come to find it, is not to hesitate to walk away. You’ll find someone to sell at the price you want, and the adage of “a bird in hand is better than none” is no truer than when you’re walking away with money in hand. I have to say I am quite pleased with my skills, and left satisfied with the cost of my purchases.

The rest of my day can pretty much be summed up with the phrase “beer and brochettes.” Lunch and dinner with friends consisted of beer (Mützig) and brochettes (goat) accompanied by either chips or bananas (chips are thick cut fries for the American-Anglophiles out there, and bananas are the starchy plantain variety, boiled or fried). A bit of time in between meals to watch British Premier League Football made for entertaining delivery of more beer, and a Rwandan house-party birthday celebration continued the trend after dinner, and well into the evening.

In total, it was a great social experience, and a well needed one to combat the occasional home-sickness that will hopefully occur with minimal frequency during my time here.

By the end of this weekend . . . a summary of my week at the Court and some exciting projects that are keeping me busy!

Babies - 22 Aug. 2010

So . . .

I’ve been meeting a lot of Rwandans, especially at the Court, where I’m the “new guy.” I tell them about myself, that I’m married and my lovely wife remains in America, and if in my office I show a photo of the two of us. I say that we recently celebrated our five-year wedding anniversary before I came to Rwanda. Then, without fail, the question is delivered . . . like a 100 mile-per-hour fastball thrown to a five-year-old on a tee-ball squad.

“How many children do you have?”

Now, be aware that I am somewhat prepared for this. After having dinner with one of my Rwandan friends, and telling him that Janet and I have been married for five years and have no children, he said that, culturally speaking, it was not the norm to be married for so long and have no children. In fact, to have such a familial situation would lead to but one conclusion . . .

Well, I can be naïve. No, no, really, it’s true. But, today it occurred to me, as I gave the brief history of Brian and Janet my statement about children (or the lack thereof) was met with a sort of sad pitying disappointment. “Ohhh” I was told, with the impression that such a thing would not be spoken of again. I explained that I’ve been in law school, and then came here, and so forth.

Of course, about ten minutes later it occurred to me that my colleague perhaps thought something else – that I was afflicted with, shall we say, a certain dysfunction. “GAH!” I exclaimed in my most excited inner monologue. Upon examination, I have come up with two solutions – shorten my and Janet’s marriage by a few years, to seem normal by Rwandan standards; or, pretend that our Shih Tzu Briscoe, and our cat Katie are actually our children. What a dilemma.

One week on the job - 18 Aug., 2010

On Wednesday 11 August 2010 I had my introductory meeting with Hon. Aloyise Cyziayne, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Rwanda (her title in Francophile is Presidente, but to Anglophiles she is known as Chief Justice). I arrived at the Supreme Court Building accompanied by representatives from a USAID project, though which my clerkship was facilitated. We were greeted at the ground floor entrance, and ushered up stairs to the fourth floor, where the Chief Justice’s office is located. We were directed into an office, and took a seat on some couches in the office. I presumed that this was the Chief Justice’s office, but it was just a place for us to wait until she was ready to meet with us, and we were ushered out of that room and into her office (a far nicer room).

The Chief Justice is a quiet woman with a commanding presence. Sitting with her was certainly an intimidating experience. We had a brief conversation, largely in French, and I was instructed that I would start the next day at 7am.

My first few days were spend familiarizing myself with Rwandan law. There are three official languages in Rwanda – Kinyarwanda, French, and English. If you’re really lucky, you can find some documents (like the Constitution) that are in all three. Often times laws, especially older laws, are only in Kinyarwanda and French. The country as a whole is in the midst of a transition from French to English. So, most Court personnel are eager to speak with me in English, until we hit a wall and have to switch over to French.

My fist assignment was to edit and re-write a speech the Chief Justice is giving at the end of the week at a conference on good governance in Nairobi. It was a fun assignment, and I imagined myself as Rob Lowe from TV’s West Wing! This week I received my first case assignment, an appeal from the High Commercial Court in a contract dispute. There is definitely no legal research equivalent to Westlaw or Lexis in Rwanda. There are some online sites for searching laws, but there’s also no guarantee that the PDFs will be accessible online. The Court building has a small (SMALL) Court library on the 6th floor (stairs only – whew!) where all the laws can be accessed. Things are relatively slow moving, because the pleadings are all in French (and some unimportant documents in Kinyarwanda). The hearing is next week, and I expect to have my memorandum complete this week.

Everyone has been very welcoming, and people still periodically pop in to introduce themselves, and say hello. If I had to sum up the Rwandan culture, I would say that everyone has been very welcoming and gracious. It is truly a nice experience to feel so welcomed by just about anyone you have a chance encounter with.

Kigali City Tour - 9 Aug. 2010

Daniel Bey – the man, the myth, the legend. Well, a man, mythical to some, and legendary at least to me. I met Danny during law school. He was in the first year of the concurrent JD/LL.M. program, and given that I took many LL.M. classes, we had the opportunity to be in class together, and to work on Law Review with one another. All around great guy. Danny worked as an intern with the Ministry of Justice in their legislative drafting bureau for seven or eight weeks over the summer. Danny was tasked with showing me the proverbial Rwandan ropes my first day. Arriving on the eve of the Presidential election, Monday 9 August was declared a national holiday. Much of the country was shut down, at least until the early afternoon, to accommodating the voting process.

I called Danny and he took a moto (small motorbike taxi – cheapest way around town) and met me at the apartment where I was staying my first week (until I found my own place). It is in the city centre, and within walking distance to the Union Trade Centre, also known as UTC. It houses the African version of a Super WalMart, called Nakumat, which is open 24 hours, and is generally far more expensive than the open air market, of small stores around town. There are other stores and restaurants at the UTC, but again, paying a premium. We took at bus to the Supreme Court, just to see where I was working, and began walking towards Danny’s apartment, stopping for lunch at the Hotel Lyco for coffee and brochettes (French for kabobs). After a stop at Danny’s place for a beer, we continued our walking tour of the city, stopping every hour or so for a soda, or a beer. Some of the highlights included a bar called “The Space Joint,” and one called “La Nouvelle Monde.”

We came back to my side of town, and had a cliché dinner at one of the more touristy restaurants, Chez Robert, right next to La Hotel des Milles Collines (we went to Milles Collines first, but it was way way way too expensive!!!).

After dinner we met up with Danny’s (and now my) friend Bob Gakiire. Bob works in the Ministry of Local Governance, and spend the day as an election monitor in southern Rwanda. We had beer, and talked. It was a great time. What was tremendously interesting was the droves of people running, arms waved with excitement, towards Amhoro Stadium. Here the President, Paul Kagame, was holding a rally to celebrate the early election returns and his predicted re-election. Excitement was in the air, and it was truly marvelous to see the celebration of Rwandans at the re-election of their leader.

Travel Day - 7 Aug. 2010

Traveling to Africa from the U.S. is a marathon of a travel experience. It involves, typically, nearly 24 hours of travel. My flight from Detroit to Amsterdam lasted just under eight hours; and the flight from Amsterdam to Entebbe, Uganda was the same. Add a two-hour layover and my inability to sleep (much) on airplanes, and that’s 18 hours already. Let me tell you what you don’t want to be – a guy having traveled for eighteen hours straight, and moreover awake for 24 hours, arriving in Africa.

Greeted with the customary “it is not permitted to take photographs of the airport” message, I arrived at customs in Entebbe. As is the usual with Customs lines anywhere, there were several booths where frenzied passengers hurriedly filled out customs forms (not available on the flight) and rushed to be the first in line to go through customs. After staggering around and thinking “why do I need to fill out a customs form if I’m only transferring planes” I saw a small room with a sign overhead that said “transfers.” I went in to see another passenger sitting, and a woman behind the counter. I showed my itinerary and passport, and said that I was headed on Rwandair to Kigali. Although I did see a computer sitting on the desk, she wrote down my name and information below the other gent’s and I was instructed to take a seat. Another woman appeared, short, wearing a bright green vest over her otherwise normal-looking airport employee outfit, and an extremely pronounced limp. She said that she was going to take our flight information, and our passports and come back to get us. Now, generally speaking, I was always under the impression that the rule as far as passports goes is – don’t let them out of your sight. Letting the short hobbly lady run, well, scamper off with my passport seemed like perhaps one of the worst ideas possible. After telling her that I had three pieces of checked baggage, she came back and fetched me to “deal with” the situation, as Rwandair only permitted two pieces of checked baggage. She led me on walk through the Entebbe airport, past security, and to the ticketing counters. It was a small room, relatively speaking, with several small kiosks, most of them not staffed given the late hour. A young slight man said that there would be a fee, of 74 dollars. My first inclination was to whip out a credit card, which I promptly did, knowing that they would not be able to process it. I then begrudgingly admitted that I did have cash, but pleadingly said that I was an intern, with not a lot of money. Then, two more workers, women, cam to what seemingly was mu rescue, after I said that I paid $350 USD for that particular bag in Detroit, and that it had been checked all the way though to

The best part of this, unbeknownst to me at the time, was the third bag, for which I was to pay the fee, wasn’t even in Uganda! It somehow missed the connection, and was sent on another flight via Kenya, and would arrive two days later (and did arrive, safely).

After a one hour delay in Uganda, we were off on a small Rwandair jet and a flight that lasted no more than 40 minutes. After a short line at immigration, and reporting the missing bag, I was met by Danny Bey (a 3rd year ONU law student finishing his last week of an internship here) and Geoffrey, one of the drivers for the USAID project. I was greeted with smiles, a 1L bottle of water, and my mobile phone. It was an excellent way to end a long and stressful day.

the rwanda experiment

So, three years ago Janet and I started a blog entitled "the ohio experiment" to chronicle our move from Wisconsin to Ohio for the purpose of my attending law school. After three years of life tormented by classwork and study, and marked by very few blogging entries, we're going to have another go at this...

For those who don't know, after the Ohio Bar Examination, and a marvelous 10 days of much needed quality time with my wife, Janet, I set off for Kigali, Rwanda to serve as a clerk to the President of the Supreme Court of Rwanda (that's Chief Justice in U.S. terms).

the rwanda experiment will chronicle some professional, but mostly personal experiences for family and friends, as most of you do not have the benefit of daily Skype conversations that Janet and I have. the rwanda experiment is so named, as was our other blog. I will include bits from what will become an extensive travelogue of my time in Africa. Stay tuned. I'm behind on my travelogue already, but will have extensive posts in the near future.

B.