Back. 1/4

Back. A very appropriate word. After weeks hereby another blogpost. After weeks I am also back from the field. The last month I spent my time throughout Sud Kivu: in piroques, on motorbikes, and many hours of walking. From end October I did the same in Congo's province Maniema. The first part of the evaluation has started and the teams are deployed. I arrived back in Bukavu a few days ago. A break? Definitely not. Tomorrow Raul and I start the training of the Sud Kivu and Maniema teams for the second part of the evaluation. Needless to say, there is so much to tell - I have had so many great experiences over the last weeks. Hereby four brief posts with several pictures to give at last some idea.

October 18. With the Sud Kivu team to the first village. In South Kivu

there are three teams of two for the first part of the evaluation. On this

picture: Because it is the first village we went all together: one car and

two motorbikes.

Most of the times villages are not reachable by road.
On the picture: walking for two hours to reach the
village. The views are gorgeous though.

One of the things the evaluation teams do in a village is to conduct a
large meeting with the villagers to inform them about Project RAPID. We
require that at least 25% of the villagers are present. On the picture:
One of the team members conducting a general assembly.

On the picture: And the views! Amazing!

Because the teams work often for 2 days in a village
at arrival we ask whether there is a place where we
could sleep in the village. This is never a problem. On
this picture: In this village in Sud Kivu's territoire
Kalehe we were especially lucky. Not only was there
a hospital with beds (and no patients) where we could
sleep. In the evening the village offered us rice and a
living chicken. The chicken tasted great.