He gets the mélange, too.

Wow, time flies. It has been a churning whirlwind of a term filled with unexpected holidays and massive upheavals to schedules. I’ve been so consumed by getting things done and managing the mismanagement that the blog has been neglected. Expect a few more blogs before my service wraps up in three weeks. Term ends in about two weeks, then a week of preparing reports, then some freedom.

Evan and I, like Sawa, have become common figures in the Nyagatare scene, traipsing to the market, eating at a few different establishments, and drinking at one local watering hole on occasion. Generally people have grown accustomed to seeing us around, especially the motorcycle taxi drivers and university students. This blog is dedicated to those university students who try so painfully hard to pretend they are our friends.

When we’re out and about oftentimes university students will approach us or make contact when we walk by. Inevitably they tend to act as if they know us, even though our range of what I might call friendly acquaintances at the university is quite limited. Most often, they belie their posturing by calling us Ivan and Isaac – our two cover names given to people who we quite likely will never see again or don’t particularly want to hang out with at any future date and time. Ivan and Isaac are common names in Rwanda, Evan and Zach are not, so we just make it easy for them. The ruse has extended into our private life as an inside joke.

Evan’s take on the whole situation is good, and it’s best explained by the simple statement, “He gets the mélange, me too!” (A mélange is just a plate of mixed food – gastronomically terrible but filling). You see, sometimes we wonder if people psychologically make themselves our friends simply because they observe us so much and find commonalities. Wow, he drinks beer at Blue Sky. Wow, they eat omelets at City Center Restaurant. Wow, they shop for crackers at the ‘supermarket.’ Just like me. This kind of identification is fine except when it actually intrudes too much into my real personal life. If someone wants to yuck it up for a few minutes on the road with the umuzungu, fine. That’s often a funny exchange. There are even some university students I enjoy sharing a beer with. However, it becomes a little tiresome when you become a linguistic punching bag for someone’s poor English and drunken Kinyarwandan.

While I enjoy meeting new people, and I certainly have met some interesting people in Nyagatare, the simple fact is my social circle is relatively small for a reason. Evan and I socialize with people with whom we have more in common, whether it’s another volunteer, a professor at the local university, or a teacher at school who we particularly like. Ten months have been enough to convince me of that. So watch who you call Isaac, you might just give yourself away!