Category: design

On the road, part two

Cindy at enclos*ure5 Comments

On the second day of our recent trip to the north of Rwanda, we visited a border crossing with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), this one located between the otherwise contiguous cities of Gisenyi (Rwanda) and Goma (DRC).

Looking over the barrier to a street in Goma, DRC.

We watched a line of people, almost all carrying large parcels of food, waiting to enter  eastern Congo.

People laden with food to sell in the DRC.
I believe these chickens (who are traveling on someone’s head) would be called non-intending immigrants.  Nevertheless, they are destined for pots in the Congo.

We watched another line of people, now almost empty-handed, coming back into Rwanda.

The line to leave the DRC.

Afterwards, we headed about 10 miles east to visit a small hydro-electric plant.  The unpaved road to the plant was too rough for the bus, so we had a walk through the neighboring village.

Bananas outside a village house.
House door with a blue patch.  Cassava (aka manioc) plants and beans grow in the foreground.
Hollyhocks by a doorway.
A typical garden of bananas, taro, cassava, and beans.
A stream bordered by long-hardened volcanic lava. The fast-moving water runs approximately parallel to the water pipe supplying water to the hydro-electric plant.
A house under construction with a roof-line typical of the Rubavu District. It seems to echo the surrounding hills and nearby volcanoes.
The Keya hydro-electric power plant. The water enters from the blue pipe on the right.  Built by the Rwandan government with the support of Belgium, it provides 2.2 megawatts of power.
Water runs out the other side of the plant, beans planted right up to the edge. On the far left is a tank capturing rainwater from the roof of the plant’s office.

We ended our trip at the Pfunda Tea Company factory. Two thousand people work on the Pfunda Tea Estate, and the company also runs a cooperative for area tea farmers. All the tea is raised without pesticides, and, in February 2011, Pfunda Tea Company became the first company in Rwanda to obtain Rainforest Alliance certification.

One hundred and fifty people work 8 hours shifts in the tea factory, day and night. They will produce over 4.4 million lbs. (or 2 million kgs.) of black tea this year. The climate, altitude, and soil of the area is excellent for growing high-quality tea.

The Pfunda Tea Factory

The design of the factory and its surrounding grounds — even its signage — struck me as remarkably consistent, orderly, and pleasant.  Lots of straight, clean lines in red paint and low hedges.

A test plot of tea bushes.
A factory tree laden with moss and ferns.
The green tea leaves dry here for approximately 15 hours. The factory smells like a combination of cut grass and brewed tea.
Dried leaves on their way to be processed. 
The leaves are finely chopped.
After the oxidation process, the now-black tea rolls off the belt and into buckets.
And put in piles before being bagged.
The factory is very orderly and clean.
A relief to tea drinkers.
The testing and tasting room.

Waste water from the tea processing is diverted to a garden pool and treated with “Effective Microorganisms,” a product that cleans water and eliminates bad odors with a combination of microorganisms that were collected and cultivated naturally.

A barrel of Effective Microorganisms.
A waste water garden pool in the rain.

As we travel, I am always looking for recurrent elements in the landscapes and urban surroundings through which we pass, as well as in the architecture and craft.  I am trying to grasp what Rwanda really looks like, what it cares about, how it experiences its environment (and how I experience its environment) and how I can interpret at least some of  that in a garden design.

On the road

Cindy at enclos*ure6 Comments

The farm in yesterday’s post overlooks the Nyakabingo tungsten mine, located about 10 kms. north of Kigali.

The mine was the first stop on a two-day bus trip organized by the Foreign Ministry for diplomats. We felt a little like we were on a school field trip — only one with a police escort and a press van.

While we were at Nyakabingo, I turned down the invitation to see the mine from underground and instead photographed it from an upper road.

Paths and steps descending the hillside of the mine. About 700 people work there removing tungsten, a chemical element used in incandescent light bulb filaments, x-ray tubes, and superalloys.

The afternoon itinerary included a stop at the Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge.

The Lodge is one of two “swishy” (as Bradt’s Travel Guide puts it) places to stay in the vicinity of the Parc National des Volcans and the mountain gorillas. The other one — the Virunga Safari Lodge — we toured last month. Both cost around $500 to $600 per night per person.

Paths to the five cottages, with the volcano in the background.

Sabyinyo has the advantage of being only 10 minutes drive from the entrance to the park headquarters. Like Virunga, it offers accommodation in individual cottages.

A Sabyinyo cottage. The lodge levies a $58 per person per night community fee, and the community also receives a 17% cut of the lodge’s profits.
Two other cabins.

Also like Virunga Safari Lodge, the landscaping is kept simple so as not to compete with the gorgeous views.

The view from a cottage window.
One of the views at Sabyinyo, somewhat obscured by clouds.
A path through the bamboo.
Patio at the entrance to the main building.
A large fern by the patio steps.
Another very large fern near the main building.
Ferns and other wild plants along the path.
A smaller wild fern
Fern detail.
Impatiens native to Rwanda.
The water retention pool.
Small stream gorge filled with bamboo and eucalyptus.

We ended our day in the village of Susa, largely made up of 96 homes built with the assistance of the Rwandan government.  The people who live there include Genocide survivors, Batwa (pygmys), and Rwandans formerly living in exile in Tanzania.

Village homes with tanks that capture rainwater runoff from the roofs.

As the light began to fade, we were greeted by dancers.

Susa village dancers.

Bird’s eye landscape

Cindy at enclos*ure9 Comments

A recent visit to the Virunga Safari Lodge in the north of Rwanda made me think of Russell Page’s book, The Education of a Gardener, and his words on handling a hilltop site with a view.

About halfway up the nearest volcano, you can see the line between cultivated fields and the park, where the mountain gorillas live protected.

The Lodge –near the Parc National des Volcans and the famous mountain gorillas — has extraordinary views. Guests can see two lakes and several volcanoes.  But Page wrote that such a location is not ideal for the gardener.

“If I were to choose a site for a garden for myself,” he wrote, “I would prefer a hollow to a hilltop.  A panorama and a garden seen together distract from each other.  One’s interest is torn between the garden pattern with its shapes and colors in the foreground and the excitement of the distant view.  Everything is there at once and one has no desire to wander to make discoveries. . . .”

If, however, one does have to have a view, he advised: “Above all avoid any garden ‘design’ or any flower color which might detract from the main theme, which in such a case must be the view. . . . If there must be flowers they should be close against the house or below a terrace wall and so only visible when you turn your back to the view.  I would arrange the gardened part of the garden — flowers and shrubs — to the sides or far enough below, so that they and the view are not seen at the same time.”

Landscaping around the dining hall and lounge is simple.

The landscape designer for Virunga Lodge seems to have worked right from the book, with beautiful results.

There are a few garden flowers and shrubs, but usually the existing wild brush has simply been cut back to allow for a few flat grassy areas and paved paths.
The focus is on the gorgeous view of Lake Burera.
Local volcanic rock was used in the construction of buildings and walls.
A path to a banda or individual cabin.
A trail to nearby villages. The lake is in the middle distance, topped by more hills and clouds.

About three hours drive from Kigali, the Lodge has eight “bandas” or individual cabins, which operate on solar power and use rainwater recovered from the rooftops.  It is very expensive at $600 per person per night,* although this is inclusive of all food and drink (including alcohol).  (We just stopped by for a look.)

This simple grass “room” sits along one of the main paths.
The path crosses this room, which is outlined with a low wall.
A long room with regularly spaced columns near the entrance to the Lodge.
The bandas have stone terraces.

To get a better sense of the layout and location of the Lodge (and what it’s like to arrive by helicopter), you can watch this short YouTube video.

The same morning as our stop at the Lodge, we visited two local schools and a nearby village family. Our guide was an American businessman working with faith-based development endeavors in Rwanda.  He took us to the site of a house he is building for himself. At the moment, it’s just a stone and concrete foundation set on the edge of a hill.

But again, the views were absolutely amazing.  He wisely plans to leave the land surrounding the house (which is all sloping downward) very natural, hoping to attract as many birds as possible.

Lake Burera.

Living here, one might begin to feel like a bird.

*There are reductions for Rwanda residents.

The songs and dance of Bwiza

Cindy at enclos*ure3 Comments

A local singing group from the Kigali area released their first CD, Kwizera, with a concert at a local venue on Sunday evening.

With “stirring vocals, traditional amakondera flutes and stunning poly-rhythms,” the group offers ancient and more recently written songs in the traditional style that is their legacy from the Rwandan royal court.

Kwizera means “to hope” in Kinyarwanda. One of their songs says, “Ngwino grebe Rwanda yacu nziza, ubu turakomeye”  — “Come, look upon our beautiful Rwanda, now we are strong.”

The group performs dance as well as song. Here are a few photos from their performance at an October craft fair held at the American Embassy.

One of their songs says, "Rwanda, now you're mature. Let us sing about you; the world has to know you." The modern songs were written by Ngarambe Valence of Bwiza.

The group is from a community known as Bwiza, located on a mountaintop near Kigali.

A few years ago the village was barely surviving, living in poverty and poor health and unable to send its children to the neighboring school for want of shoes.

Now, with support of local officials and a small Seattle-based NGO working with the Kigali-based Health Development Initiative – not to mention the generosity of individual expats and Rwandans – the people of Bwiza are rebuilding their lives. Once hunter-gatherers, they now have goats and cows and are harvesting larger crops from newly-built terraces.

If you are in the U.S. and would like to buy a copy of Kwizera, go to the Seattle website.  The CD is free with the purchase of 3 bags of Rwanda coffee (click on the Coffee Rwanda tab) or a $35 donation to the NGO. You can also watch short videos about Bwiza.

(If you are in Rwanda, leave a comment, and I can put you in touch with someone selling the CDs.)

Recently, some craftspeople in Bwiza learned to make this highly efficient cookstove, which uses less wood and provides a more stable base for the cooking pot. The sales of stoves they don’t use themselves will also help support people in the village.

More fuel-efficient cookstove. Training for making the stoves was provided by the American tea company Sorwathe.

Here are a few photos of the beautiful craft products that were available for sale at the October fair. In previous years, the proceeds of the event went to Bwiza, but this time, as other efforts have improved their lives, they performed at the fair for a professional fee.  The 2011 proceeds from booth rentals and entrance donations will go to several other nonprofit groups around Kigali.

Bags made from African "wax" cloth.
These baskets were crafted with traditional techniques and modern bright colors.
Wax cloth and recycled paper jewelry and pretty clutches.

Faithful and true ground

Cindy at enclos*ure1 Comment

Is anything more poignant than an old graveyard?

An angel headstone, the words have faded.
Mt. Zion Cemetery.  Click the photos to enlarge.

Mt. Zion Cemetery is tucked behind the apartment buildings and townhouses of the 2500 block of Q Street, NW, at the edge of Georgetown.  I often pass it on my bus ride home. On Wednesday, as I was walking home after the earthquake, I stopped to take a closer look.

A group of headstones at Mt Zion.
A family enclosure.
The Logans were a prominent Black Washington family.

The burial ground covers about 3 acres.   Many of the headstones have fallen or have been moved over time and are now consolidated into a few groupings.  The grass is neatly cut and trimmed around the stones, but there are no flowers or other plantings.   The woods of the Rock Creek Park trail surround the cemetery to the north and east.

What I suspected as I looked around — later confirmed by some online research — was that Mt. Zion was an old African-American cemetery, a reminder of the time (from the 1700s until the 1950s) when Georgetown had a large Black population.

A group of tombstones overlooked by townhouses on Q Street.
A woman’s headstone.
Nineteenth and early twentieth century headstones.
A stone pillar once stood upright and held the railings around a family’s graves.
A broken headstone from the 1850s on the ground.
Someone has left behind a book of poetry.

Beginning in 1809, the cemetery’s western side was used by the Mongomery Street Church for the burials of its white members and their slaves, as well as of free African-American members.  It was known as the Old Methodist Burying Ground, and its largest monument marks the graves of the white Beck and Doughty families.  It was a biracial cemetery for a biracial (but not equal status) church while slaves were still being sold in Georgetown.

Old Methodist fell into disuse after Oak Hill Cemetery, located just to the west and north, was founded in 1849.  In 1879, the plot was leased for 99 years by Mt. Zion Methodist Church, the oldest African-American church in Washington.

A group of graves at the edge of the woods of Rock Creek Park.
Another view.

The east side of the cemetery had already been purchased in 1842 by a local cooperative benevolent association of Black women and had become the Female Union Band Graveyard for the burial of free Blacks.

The entry sign to the cemetery.

For decades, both cemeteries were well maintained, but eventually lack of funds led to disrepair, and the last burials were held in 1950.

In the late 1960s, the cemeteries were threatened with removal of the graves for development.  Various local groups and individuals worked together to save them, and, in 1975, they were declared a Historical Landmark of Washington, D.C., and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

A small, lone headstone.

There’s a complete history of Mt. Zion Cemetery  by Pauline Gaskins Mitchell in the appendix of the 1991 book Black Georgetown Remembered, which can be read at this link.  The complete book can be purchased at Amazon.

ADDENDUM: “A 2 Georgetown Cemeteries, History in Black and White,” New York Times, October 21, 2016, here.