The acculturation process continues. Rebecca and I had drinks at our first open-air Cameroonian beer bar last night with some friends of ours. Yeah, we've even got those fast. What a difference a country makes.

I've also started making professional contacts. The price for a temporary press card went up to 50,000 CFA francs, about $100. The folks at the Communications Ministry couldn't show me any documentation why the price went up that much, but I figured that even with the bribe it's a lot cheaper than working in Rwanda. They told me that the price rise was because they had to justify their costs to the Ministry of Finance. To be fair, it used to cost around $10, which seemed unrealistically low.

Anyway, here's my first Cameroon story. Take a guess at what it's about. Time's up. Corruption.
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0603114.htm.

Still no word on my DaMN Rwanda story. But it'll be there. Eventually.

May 29, 2006

Greetings from the armpit of Africa.

Ha, caught your attention there. But just because I’ve called Cameroon the armpit of Africa doesn’t mean I don’t like it. Quite to the contrary, it looks like both Rebecca and I are going to enjoy Cameroon.

No, the armpit of Africa refers entirely to the geography and climate. If you look at the map, Cameroon is right up in the place where the bulge of West Africa meets the torso of Central and Southern Africa. So, it’s in the crux, like an armpit. Plus, it’s hot and humid in Yaoundé, much like my armpit in this climate. Yummy.

That’s not entirely fair, though. Cameroon is about the size of California and has just about every climate zone on the continent within its borders. Up in the north there is desert and savannah, so we’ll be able to see all the hippos, lions and giraffe we missed in East Africa. The west of Cameroon, along the coast, is reportedly among the wettest places in the world. It is also punishingly hot, according to the guidebooks and friends, but the beaches are great. Douala, the country’s commercial capital, is nestled in this area. The east of the country is dotted with mountains and is part of the central African rain forest areas. This part of the country also has gorillas, so we’ll be able to see the beasties we couldn’t afford to see in Rwanda. They’re apparently not as spectacular as the Rwandan gorillas, but honestly, a gorilla’s a gorilla to me. We’ll be able to see the fellows in their natural habitat and that’s fine.

There are over 250 ethnic groups in Cameroon, each with their own language, many of which are incommunicable. Yet the country is at relative peace. I don’t have any large, global statement to make about this. It’s just an observation.

Bec and I arrived safe and sound on Thursday night. So did our luggage, so we’re already one step up on our Rwanda experience. To be fair, and I am always fair, our bags got lost in London on the way to Kigali, not Nairobi or Rwanda. So we can blame the English for that one.

CRS-Cameroon handled our visas and we got them in an e-mail. You’ve got to love a country that let’s you scan a visa into an e-mail, send it to someone coming from Rwanda and then let’s you enter the company with only a printout as proof.

Rebecca has a dispiriting commute to work every morning in the apartment CRS is giving us until we find our own place. I don’t envy her. She has to walk out of our apartment, hang a left, then a right and then a third left – all without going down a flight of stairs – and she’s there. That’s right, our apartment for the time being is in the office. It does have its perks. First of all, it’s extremely large and pretty comfortable. We have the office Internet in our house, which is great, although sometimes the router goes out. But still, we can listen to NPR in the morning. I can listen to the Yankees when they play in the afternoon. Hopefully we’ll have it in the next apartment – that’s probably what we’re going to do – so I can listen to Ranger games on the radio. It’s the little things, right.

Bec’s co-workers all seem extremely pleasant. Her boss, Jennifer, has two boys, 6 and 3, so I’ve got friends at my own maturity level. The local staff is extremely welcoming and competent. We had met a few in Kigali when the CRS regional meetings were there, and were greeted in Yaoundé with hugs. There’s a young Italian guy who works on corruption issues based in the CRS office, although he doesn’t work for CRS, who we’re told is lots of fun and good at what he does.

Plus there’s Ruth, who lived in Rwanda for years and who is the regional technical adviser on HIV/AIDS based in Yaoundé. We met a few times in Kigali. She’s a lot of fun, and when she found out we were coming to Yaoundé, she said, “Charles will be so excited there will be another husband with nothing to do.” Well, I don’t know about nothing, but he sounds like a good guy to go exploring Yaoundé with. We’ve already arranged to go restaurant trolling with Ruth and Charles – for those of you who didn’t get Rebecca’s last blast e-mail, she’s very excited about the food here – and they’ve invited us to go to the beach at Kribi with them.

As for me, once the Internet comes back, I’m sending in my first story and photos in to the Catholics. Jennifer invited us to an event at a Catholic school for an anti-corruption curriculum, and I got a story out of it. As always, I will provide the link when it appears. I’m still waiting for my last Kigali story to get published in Dallas, but hey, it will. They liked it, but it’s the problem of fitting it in the paper.

I think this will be an interesting – and far easier place – to work. First of all, everyone who knew anything about Cameroon before I wrote about it here raise your hands. Both of you can put your hands down. Don’t worry. It took me weeks of research in Kigali to know anything about it either. There are hundreds of stories here in Cameroon alone, plus there are neighbors with stories bursting out the seams, including Chad, so I’ll get some Darfur in without going to Darfur.

The attitude towards the international press is far different here, mostly because there are few if any foreign journalists based in Cameroon. For starters, I get a three-month grace period to work here free, and then it’s 5,000 for the year. Excuse me, that’s 5,000 CFA Francs, around $10. In Rwanda, it was $300 for the first two months and $1,000 for the year. I didn’t pay that thousand. Nobody does.

More importantly, people talk to you. They’re not afraid. And they won’t look like they’re going to kill you when you pull out a camera. It’s extremely refreshing.

Now, the country isn’t all mangosteen and cream. As I’ve said before, the country is extremely corrupt, one of the worst in the world in that respect. It’s odd knowing that, because I expect that the response to every question will be, “Give me $20 and I’ll tell you.” That hasn’t happened, yet.

And despite being blessed with ridiculous natural resources, including oil and abundant timber, people are poor. That’s where the problems of corruption come in. There isn’t even universal primary education here, despite there being a 65 percent literacy rate. I had earlier read that the rate was around 85 percent, but I was wrong. Either way, it’s one of the highest rates in Africa. I wonder whether that literacy rate is holding among kids.

No more walking around with my headphones on or my wallet in my back pocket. I’m not even sure how much walking around I’m supposed to be doing here. We have our security briefing at 3 this afternoon. But I can’t imagine Yaoundé is as safe as Kigali. Nowhere is as safe – from street crime – as Kigali.

Cameroon is a chance for a new beginning for Bec and me. And since this is a new beginning, there will be changes on the blog. First, you may have noticed that I’ve changed the way I do the dates, from the pretentious 29 May 2006 to the normal human being May 29, 2006.

Second, you may have noticed the change of names on the blog. The URL will stay the same, still www.evanrwanda.blogspot.com. But the name is now “Another Day in Shrimpistan”. Now, why Shrimpistan? It all comes from the country’s name. Cameroon derives its name from the Portuguese word for prawns. The Portuguese never colonized the area, but their missionaries were among the first Europeans to make it to this part of Africa. Traveling up the rivers, the missionaries noticed huge numbers of prawns in the river. I like to imagine that one of them asked, “What should we call this place?” and another said, “Camerao!”, dumbfounded by the number or prawns. The Germans, French and British all liked the name so much that the people in the country were stuck with it.

Bec then dubbed the country Shrimpistan. I wonder what the people here will think of that.

Since I’m insane, I was hoping that the people here would be more along the size of their namesake. Bec told me that I shouldn’t get my hopes up. But I did. I hoped. I was wrong. It seems ironic that people named after shrimp are really large – tall and broad. But they are. And so, living in Shrimpistan, I am the shrimpiest of them all again.

But it’s okay. They’ve got mangosteen, the world’s greatest fruit, here.

I think we’re going to like this place,

23 May 2006

This may well be my last posting from Rwanda. The rumor is we’re out of here on Thursday. Rebecca’s got the tickets in her hand as we speak.

The only problem is the people in Kinshasa who are working on the project that kept us here in the first place are still working on it. In fact, one of them told Rebecca that they wouldn’t be done with a draft by Thursday. Of course, the final grant proposal is due on Friday, so what are they doing? If they don’t let us leave – I don’t care whether they finish – I fear Rebecca may renounce her pacifism, fly to Kinshasa and kill somebody.

Either way, I’ve got to leave. My visa expires on Friday, and I don’t want to be living here illegally. I won’t be able to bribe anyone because no one will accept. But there will probably be a fine the potential size of which makes me quake in fear.

I feel like everything I’ve written about Rwanda has been negative. I don’t want to leave people with the impression that that’s all I’ve felt since we’ve been here. Part of it was that I was really bored the first few months in Kigali. I was writing stories, but not nearly enough. The other part is that bad news makes news. When things are going well, it’s hard to consider that abnormal.

So I want this last Kigali posting – probably my last posting about Rwanda because dwelling on things is singularly pointless and stupid – to talk about some of the things I will look back upon fondly. Some of them will be tinged with doubts, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not rooting for Rwanda.

There are a lot of good things to be said about the government here. They are hard to work with – there are times when visitors say glowing things about their dealings with government officials and I wonder if they’re talking about the same people – but they do have a vision for the country that goes beyond lining their own pockets. They like to call themselves “visionary”, but call me crazy, I don’t necessarily buy it when someone calls themselves something like that.

Yesterday I went to a private investment conference in Kigali. And while the investors and government officials spent all morning patting their backs and saying stuff like it only takes two weeks to start a business here, there were some impressive plans that have already started.

Let’s start with the bad stuff, though. The bureaucracy here is ridiculous. As I said, it’s not corrupt; it’s just Byzantine. It is not possible to pay fees directly to government ministries. First, one has to get a bill from the ministry, run over to the Rwanda Revenue Authority which is on the other side of town, wait in line with the rest of the country, then run back to the ministry in question. This is after collecting the 17 documents with stamps. So, yes, it may take two weeks, if everyone an investor is supposed to meet with is available for the scheduled meeting – highly unlikely – and the line at RRA isn’t too long – again, don’t hold your breath.

But the most important thing I saw yesterday is the government’s plan for Kigali. In short, they want it to be the African Singapore in 50 years. Why not? They want high-rise buildings. They’ve started to build an airport that will be the size of Heathrow in the same 50 years. They see grand boulevards with entertainment and business going on everywhere.

The government also has plans for resorts along their many lakes, which are gorgeous. Shopping is coming to Kigali. They envision the country becoming a tech center, a call center and a transport hub. Again, why not?

Now, there are things that I could point out. Aw hell, I will point out. There are very few plans for the areas outside of Kigali, a recurring problem I’ve found in Rwanda. Even with new shopping options heading to Kigali – the first shopping mall opened up while we were here and another should be open soon – there are still very few people in this country who can afford to buy anything. Rwanda wants Kigali to become Singapore. But look at Singapore’s neighbors. Then look at Rwanda’s neighbors. Singapore was able to service needs in other relatively developed economies like Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong and even South Korea, Japan, Indonesia and Australia. Rwanda’s got Tanzania, Burundi, Uganda and the huge, sucking vortex of the Democratic Republic of Congo surrounding it. Who in those countries has any money to buy the services Rwanda wants to make its central business? Again, I’m rooting for all of them. I just think it’s a lot of variables to pin a country’s hopes on. I hope I’m wrong.

One thing that gives me hope, and has made Rwanda interesting, is that it’s a country where I’ve seen significant changes in the 10 months I’ve been here. Between construction starts, new government policies and an increasing number of people out on the streets at night, seemingly being social, I’ve seen things beginning to build up. If they can keep this up, then they’ve got a shot. When people say they want to develop the country, they sound serious. I believe them. I just hope they remember to try to bring everyone along.

I’ve already written about the police. We like the police here. And we’ll definitely miss our house. It was a comfortable place to live, and a nice respite.

Most important of all, I’ve met some wonderful people here who do care about the country. Among them are the Focus reporters. I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder of anything than watching Helen, the first reporter sign up, get herself to write better. There’s a huge difference from the first story of hers that I read to the last story I edited. Yeah, I helped. But the thing that makes me proudest is how much she wanted to get better, and how much she worked at it. You wouldn’t believe the difference.

Then there’s Teta, who originally showed up to run errands. Now she’s decided that she wants to stay in journalism. Finally, there’s Magnus. Magnus is goofy. Magnus is a space cadet. But Magnus also has this tremendous sense of justice, and responsibility to help stand up for the left behind. We had to stop him from writing so much about street kids and beggars. He never wants to write what everyone else writes. There’s always another angle. He’s my kind of guy.
There are many other people I could mention that made my stay interesting and worthwhile, but I’d be here all day and so would you. Get back to work.

All of these good things don’t get rid of my doubts and misgivings about what’s going to happen in Rwanda. I’ve written enough about them and don’t want to cover old ground. But they do give me hope that things may actually get better.

Rebecca and I are now on to bigger and better things. We get to Yaounde late Thursday night (I hope) and I’ve already got a story to write on Friday. A few other outlets have expressed interest in stories from the region already. It’s good to hit the ground running.

18 May 2006

I’ve never been able to get U2 tickets back home. I’ve always wanted to get them, always meant to get on line early in the morning when they went on sale. But a combination of cheapness, laziness and bad luck has kept me from ever seeing them live.

It took moving to Kigali to get even close. Bono is here today, and one of the side benefits of being a journalist in a country like Rwanda – even when there I don’t have a story to do – is I get to go to the press conferences.

Bono – or Mr. Bono, as the Rwandan emcee called him – is here to launch the Red Campaign. Motorola, Giorgio Armani, the GAP, Converse, Nike, American Express and other companies are selling red products and a portion of the profits goes to fund the U.N.’s Global Fund Against AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Motorola is even doing something near and dear to my heart – they’re building their Red cell phones at factories in Nigeria. Ah, private business enterprises. Not only did it take me moving to Rwanda to come in close contact with Bono, it took me coming to Rwanda to become a free market capitalist. Anyway, Rwanda is the first country to benefit from the Red campaign. That makes sense, since unlike many African countries, when a country donates money to Rwanda, it can be confident that all the money will go where it is intended.

Mr. Bono is shorter than I thought. That’s one of those things I always notice, because I’m crazy. And he tried his best to say hello in Kinyarwanda. He got it right up to the last syllable. He said “Murahoo” rather than “Muraho”. At least he tried. That’s more than I can usually say.

I had a long list of questions I wanted to ask Bono. They weren’t softball questions; they were going to be tough ones. No, "What's your favorite song?" "When's the next record coming out?" kinds of things. Real questions. He was here touring AIDS clinics. Well, AIDS isn’t the biggest killer here – not like in other parts of this continent. Does the flow of money into AIDS keep other important development projects from receiving money they need? Bono talks about trade being key, but he means trade with the rest of the world. I don’t disagree. But African countries don’t trade with each other. In fact, they have ridiculous taxes on goods going from country to country. Does Bono think that trade will get Africa out of poverty if there is no inter-African trade?

But I had a violent case of the hiccups that lasted until now. So I didn’t want to embarrass myself. Plus, there were all these people from associations for people living with HIV/AIDS, and they wanted to ask questions of the big Irish pop star/activist. It felt wrong taking their time. I also wasn't able to get him onto my friend Sunny's radio show. Stupid hiccups.

The good thing about Bono is that he could’ve answered my questions intelligently, because he knows his stuff and is serious about it. He’s not some doofus celebrity spokesperson. He passionately talked about how the House of Representatives cut $2.5 billion from President Bush’s aid budget, after saying they wouldn’t. You could practically see him shaking with anger. You could also see that he knew the legislative process in the United States better than I did, which is kind of embarrassing. Get me the School House Rock videos fast. When someone asked about the dangers of foreign donors stopping money for anti-retroviral drugs that keep people alive – they pay for pretty much all of them in Africa – Bono simply said, “I think we have to be sanguine about that fact” and keep lobbying, and keep getting private companies involved in the process.

We’re not invited to the big Bono cocktail party and dinner tonight. That’s okay. I’m losing my voice. At least the hiccups are gone, after 10 hours.

17 May 2006

We got into a car accident on Friday night. It wasn’t serious. No one was hurt, and the car Rebecca was driving (a massive Toyota 4x4) was in relatively good shape afterwards. The front left bumper was out of place and the axle on the front left wheel was bent so the truck was hard to drive. There wasn’t much damage other than that.

The only reason I mention this relatively minor incident is as we prepare to leave Rwanda – originally we were scheduled to fly out on May 20, but that has been pushed back to May 25 – the accident was an illustration of everything good and bad about the country. Unfortunately for my perceptions of the country, it was more of the latter.

We had just finished off a very pleasant dinner with my friend Andreas and his girlfriend Evin. She’s Kurdish, and the name causes no end of difficulties. When I was talking to Andreas or floating in and out of paying attention, all of a sudden I’d hear, “So Evin, say something in Kurdish.” I’d run through the memory banks for a few seconds until I remembered that I didn’t speak Kurdish. Fortunately, Evin is smarter than me and answered quickly. I simply sat there with my usual look of utter bewilderment.

Now, back to the story at hand. We were driving Evin and Andreas home because they don’t have a car. Bec followed all of the traffic rules as we pulled up to their compound. She slowed down. She signaled that we were turning left. She looked behind her.

And then out of nowhere, a car tried to pass us on the left and wham! right into the wheel-well on the front driver’s side. The Rwandan driver left his car in the middle of the street where the accident happened. His little sports car – an approximately 10-year-old black Toyota Celica – sustained far more damage, but everyone in it was in fine form.

Bec pulled over to the side of the road to get out of the way. The other driver jumped out and started yelling that we were leaving the scene of the crash and that we had done something wrong. He was doing all this in French, and let me tell you, French is not an intimidating language.

“Why did you hit us? What were you doing? Didn’t you see me coming around your left?” he shouted.

“You hit us. I was making a left. I didn’t see you because you were going way too fast,” Rebecca responded calmly.

“Are you saying that I’m crazy? Are you saying that I can’t drive?”

We didn’t respond. He kept yelling.

It went on like this for about 20 minutes, with the Rwandan guy’s friend piping up in English on occasion with all kinds of nonsense. He said that our blinker wasn’t on. It was. He said they weren’t going to fast. They were. “You shouldn’t drink and drive,” he said to Rebecca, despite reeking of alcohol. “That’s right, you shouldn’t,” she responded.

Finally, they threatened to call the police, which we wanted them to do. But before the police came, they called some guy, apparently a friend. He kept saying that they wanted to come to an “amicable solution” which involved us paying for the damage on the idiot driver’s car. No deal.

All the while, I was keeping calm and watching Rebecca’s back. If you think I’m making this up, you can ask her. I was totally calm. Andreas and Evin did the same thing. Occasionally I’d tell the crazy screaming guy to calm down, told the English-speaking passenger to keep quiet because he was stupid (not in those words) and asked the weird guy who just showed up who he was. “You don’t need to know who I am,” he said. “Yes I do. Who are you?” And then he left.

I didn’t mention the other two passengers in the idiot mobile. Two young women piled out of the back seat. They were dressed for a club and appeared to be woozy. They kept calling their friends to say that they were in an accident with muzungus. They were dismissive, annoying and arrogant, much like the guys in the car.

This is where all the bad stuff about Rwanda comes in. First of all, they drive in an unbelievable position. When a person sits in the driver’s seat, the driver manages to fold himself (or herself, let’s be fair) in such a way that his head is literally up his butt. I guess that there is a periscope and they find a way to extend their feet down to the pedals. This is of course the perfect position for driving insanely fast up winding, curving, poorly lit streets.

Then there is the inability to acknowledge any personal fault. We hit them. How? I don’t know. But it was clearly Rebecca’s fault for slowing down, putting on her left-turn signal and making the left turn she had warned other drivers about.

Then there was the attitude among returnees to Rwanda that they are in charge – everyone else has to do what they say or get out of the way. The guards at Evin and Andreas’s compound – they live at the Swedish development agency compound – all told me that the Rwandan driver was at fault. He was going too fast and tried to pass us on the left. His car was in the wrong lane after the crash. But when the Rwandans saw the guards talk to me, they rushed over and started yelling in Kinyarwanda. These kids seemed like they came from a serious family, with serious fathers and serious mothers. We imagine that they were yelling at the guards something along the lines of, “Do you know who our parents are? Do you know what will happen if you say something against us.” Whatever they said, it worked. When the police came, the guards had nothing to say.

Security guards in Rwanda are usually under-educated demobilized soldiers and poor. There may be an ethnic component to all of that, but I’m not sure. There are Hutu and Tutsi security guards, even though technically there are no Hutus or Tutsis in Rwanda. Either way, the returnees run this country and in my view are turning everyone against them. They appear to know nothing about the country, and care even less that they don’t know anything.

Then there was the muzungu nonsense. As Rebecca said, “Does it matter the race of the person that they hit?”

Finally, there were the relations with the rest of the world. At one point, I turned to Andreas and Evin and said, “They’re going to blame the international community again.” At which point Rebecca made comparisons to the way they deal with the Genocide, which always involves talking about how the international community let them down, with Rwandans picking up machetes and killing each other a distant fourth in reasons for the deaths.

“At least we can leave this stupid country. These guys have to stay,” I said loud enough so everyone could hear me. Rebecca seconded that, much to my surprise.

Finally, the police showed up. This is where the good parts about Rwanda, the parts where we both think this country might go somewhere other than back to darkness, come in. The police officer that took the statements was professional, like the rest of the Rwandan police. Andreas pointed out that the Swedish police trained Rwanda’s. Who knew there was crime in Sweden?

Anyway, he simply took the statements from Rebecca and the driver. The driver tried to do his statement in Kinyarwanda. Rebecca asked him to do it in French so she could understand. “Yes, do it in French or English so everyone can understand,” the policeman said.

There was never a question of a bribe, as is the case with police in most African countries. There was no favoritism towards the Rwandan driver. The policeman moved the process along as fast as possible, doing all the necessary forensic checks with a tape measure and writing everything into his notebook.

If all of Rwanda functioned like its traffic police, then I’d be more comfortable about where this country is headed. But more of the country is like the two drivers. Shyaka Kanuma, the now executive editor/managing editor/advertising director/marketing director/lead reporter of Focus is actually far more representative of the country, and much like the kids with whom we had the run-in.

It’s kind of funny that one of the last entries I will write from Rwanda – I am so out of here mentally – is about driving, just where I began. It’s amazing how a country’s behavior on the roads can be emblematic of its behavior in everything else.

The most important thing is that we’re okay.

5 May 2006

The grand Focus experiment is over. After new information – some of it too ghastly to even contemplate – I finally quit today.

Here they are, and then no one will have to read about this nonsense again until the book comes out. Anybody know any publishers?

My descriptions will be mercifully brief. When Shyaka fired Sunny, he trashed my erstwhile replacement in front of the staff. He didn’t say any of this to Sunny, of course (he’s incompetent, he can’t do the job blah, blah, blah…) and none of it’s true. That was bad. I can’t write the other thing I heard until I know it’s true. But I may have to find out.

Anyway, when I realized I was going to counsel a potential volunteer not to join Focus, I realized I was wasting my time. It was making me angry, making me cynical about everything on this continent. I’m still skeptical about Africa, but I know there’s a lot of good here. I feel oh so much better.

On the way out, Shyaka accused me of trying to make the paper fail. I told him he’s the one doing it. He told me he “knew about my whispering campaign against him,” I told him he was paranoid. He wondered why I kept coming back. I asked why he didn’t have the courage to fire me if he didn’t want me there. He didn’t respond.

So now he’s all by himself and the paper is on its last legs. I’m hoping I’m wrong, because what Shyaka’s doing is important. I’m rooting for him, but I also know in my heart he’s going to kill this thing. And that’s just the way he wants it.

Now, we’ll have room for happier – and funnier – topics. I’m learning how to drive manual transmission. Stay tuned to hear me ask, “Did I just break it?”

4 May 2006

Full marks to Mo Q. Chin, who not only got the clue I gave in my last posting, but managed to advance it with further information in the comments section of the blog. Mo, since I can’t give you a prize or even the big hug you deserve, you get acknowledgment on the blog and a gold star.

Still no word on when we’re going to Cameroon. Hopefully we’ll find out soon, but we both really want to get out of here. I edited out some words that might get others in trouble. Nothing serious. I'm just paranoid. Rwanda does that to a fella. I'm perfectly happy getting myself in trouble. I just don’t want to drag anyone else down.

And speaking of getting in trouble, Focus is disintegrating right before my eyes. And you know what, I don’t care. Shyaka likes to blame other people for bad things that happen, but that’s only because he can’t admit when he’s wrong.

The new computers that are sitting next to me in the office are a perfect example of his utter mismanagement and self-sabotage. Last Thursday (April 27) he came in boasting about the new computers that would be here the following morning. Friday morning passed, no computers. Friday afternoon passed, still no computers.

Friday evening he says that he’s picking them up on Saturday. Saturday was umuganda, so that means no work. Umuganda takes place the last Saturday of every month. It’s not a surprise. The schedule never changes. I knew this. The staff knew this. Everyone knew this. Shyaka, who is fond of telling me that he knows the Rwandan market better than me, somehow did not know this. I came in on Tuesday (Monday was a holiday – May 1. International Day of Labor. I’m surrounded by Commies!) to find no computers. “Saturday was umuganda, then Sunday was Sunday then Monday was a holiday,” was Shyaka’s excuse.

Tuesday went by, and still no computers. Wednesday morning, they two refurbished computers finally arrived. But there was a problem. The power cords for one computer and monitor had the wrong connectors so we couldn’t plug them in. The other computer and monitor didn’t have power cords at all. Focus’s new computers are a little grungy looking, but that doesn’t matter. At least, that’s what we thought.

Our new designer, Lee, found all the cords we needed by the afternoon. I was sitting outside at the time he plugged everything in, but about two minutes later, everyone came pouring out of the office. “The computer exploded,” Eunice, one of the reporters, said. She was laughing, so I knew everyone was okay.

“I plugged in the monitor, there was a crash and then the thing started smoking,” Lee said when he came outside.

I sauntered in. The smoke had stopped rising out of the computer, but the acrid smell hung in the air. That dissipated soon as well.

A computer technician from the Internet café downstairs was in the office checking out the new computers because Shyaka hadn’t. Instead, he just took the guy’s word for it that they were up to specifications. “These things only have 256-k or RAM,” Abdul said. Now, I don’t understand computers. In fact, I fear them, to be honest. They bring joyous news, like the release of the entire 1994 Eastern Conference and Stanley Cup Finals on DVD (Let’s Go Rangers!). But I still wonder how the tiny hamsters manage to get all that information from the United States into my machine. But even I knew that 256-k of RAM sounded miniscule.

“You can’t run anything on this,” Abdul said. “It’s way too slow.”

After Abdul left, we had trouble getting the second monitor on. It worked for a little while but we couldn’t turn it back on. After a little jostling and checking different sockets on the power strip, I got the plug into one that worked. After the initial sound of a television flicking to life, there was a nasty whirr. That was followed by a small crash. The small crash was then followed by smoke and the same smell of burning circuits that hovered in the office previously.

“Awww man,” Shyaka said. “They sold me bad computers.” Did they, or did he just go to a crook? There is a place that does sell refurbished computers. It’s reputable. I know at least one person who got a computer from them and it works just fine. But why do things easily?

The final insult about these new computers is that one of the keyboards is missing the letter v. How do you write without the letter v? It’s only a four-point letter in Scrabble. I couldn’t even put my name on stories without the letter v. Shyaka was unaware of this problem. He hadn’t even looked.

“And he’s going to blame everyone else,” a Focus staffer said to me.

All of this happened on the same day that Shyaka fired my replacement, for basically no reason as far as anyone can tell. Apparently, Sunny was fighting with people. I never saw this, and no one could point to any real instances except one, and Sunny said he didn’t realize he was in a fight.

I’ll admit that Sunny, who is Rwandan and whose name I am spelling correctly, is obnoxious and immature. But he was dedicated. He had even quit smoking so he could get up the stairs to our top-floor newsroom easier. He wanted to make this work. One of our reporters is Sunny’s recent ex-girlfriend and the two of them even found a way to work. Sunny had severe food poisoning on Monday night and I had to tell him not to come to work on Tuesday. He shouldn’t have even come yesterday, but he did because he cared about Focus.

But Shyaka, in his eternal struggle to undermine everything he does, decided to can him. When Sunny said something like he was disappointed that he never even had the chance to make it work, Shyaka started yelling at him, “It’s my paper and it’s my money. I’ll do what I want.”

So the reporters, and others, are starting to jump ship. Two have already left, while two more are investigating other opportunities because they’re tired of Shyaka yelling at them.

Pay is two weeks late. Not that it matters, or that I’ll even probably ask, but I haven’t been paid since February. Andreas, our Swedish volunteer, has stopped coming. Shyaka always wants me to call him, and I say no. He’s a volunteer and he can volunteer not to be here. I was getting heavily involved when I was training Sunny. I was about to show him how to lay out pages and work with the designers. I’m not doing that with Shyaka. If he wants to run everything himself, he can run everything himself. I’m just coaching reporters and telling Shyaka I’m here to answer questions. Sometimes I think that’s juvenile, but in reality it’s best not to enable Shyaka. If he wants to destroy what he’s building, that’s fine.

It’s at the point where every decision Shyaka makes is bad. What really needs to happen is what George did on Seinfeld when he got the job with the Yankees. Shyaka needs to start eating chicken salad, on rye, with a cup of tea. But he won’t, because it’s all everyone else’s fault.

Remember earlier, when I got fired, I wrote that I was scared about what would happen after I left Focus? I’m giving Focus two, three months tops. I overheard Shyaka say to his brother, who lives in Bujumbura, that Focus has to survive. It won’t, and it’s his fault.

What a shame.