Six things.

• Just found some picutures from Pieter Hugo's Nollywood series. I am not sure I like them. He notes that "the situations are clearly surreal, although they could be real on a set". Quite a few of these pictures, however, could actually be really real in Africa!
• Laura Seay - the author of the excellent blog Texas in Africa - has a page with tips on conducting research in the DRC. Although I have much much less field experience, much of it sounds very familiar. Thanks!
• So last Tuesday I went to the Rwandan Embassy to get a visa; luckily I could sit down and wait for it. I forgot a book and therefore closely studied my itinery. At the back of the page STA reminded me that I "had chosen not to purchase the STA Travel Protection Plan". And that if I would purchase the STA Travel Protection Plan within 14 days of making your deposit or initial trip payment, I would received additional protection for... terrorism. I am really curious how they do that. :)
• If you put your passport in a washingmachine (see here), you do have a lot of empty pages again. Awesome!
• Macartan (my supervisor) is teaching a course on violence next semester at Columbia. I'm also his RA and one of the things I therefore just did was reading through the Syllabus. First, it's going to be a great course. Second, it also reminded me of an interesting article by Jared Diamond that I read in the New Yorker already some months ago (note: the article received lots of critisism).
• In a few days I will be heading to Bukavu in Eastern Congo. Mom, please don't read this.