The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World (20 page)

I smiled and carefully wrote my name.

"Now write my name in the sand." And he slowly spelled his name for me: C-H-O-W-D-H-U-R Y.

Then he scooped up the two names and dumped the sand into his pocket.

"In Rajasthan, we have a tradition," he explained. "First, the woman writes her name in the sand; then she writes the man's name in the sand. And then the man scoops up both names and puts them in his pocket. And then they make love."

I looked around: emptiness in every direction. "I am an idiot," I thought to myself. "A complete idiot."

"Chowdhury, that is a nice tradition for you, but it is not my tradition." I told him I wanted to go back to jodhpur immediately, that I didn't want to stay with the family anymore. He just shook his head without any real protest, and we got back on the camel and then onto the motorcycle and drove through the night until we reached the guesthouse, stopping intermittently for tea.

The night ride home was not the smartest approach to driving. Trucks with no lights barreled down the highway, and we swerved around huge oxen that would appear from nowhere in the motorcycle's headlight. We arrived at the guesthouse, covered in dirt and exhausted, after having sung nearly every traveling song we knew just to stay awake.

For the umpteenth time, I reminded myself that traveling as a single woman is not the same as traveling as a man. I was no longer an innocent abroad, but I still plunged into adventures, only rarely considering the consequences to myself and having neither time nor inclination for a great deal of reflection. I was out to change the world, to know it and to love it for all its exquisite beauty and perfection as well as for its flaws.

After a few weeks of wandering India and doing little studying, it was time to take the GMAT in New Delhi. I found myself in an early morning queue outside the American Embassy with hundreds of young, dapper Indian men and one or two other women.

We waited in the scorching sun from 7:00 a.m. until almost 11:00 a.m. with neither food nor coffee until a middle-aged Indian woman with a notebook finally appeared to inform us that 100 more people than expected had shown up. We would have to wait a few more hours for them to collect additional exams. Perhaps, she asked sweetly, some applicants could come back another day?

I told her I was living in Rwanda and had come to India just to take the exam. She said I would take it that day, but it might require a wait. Two hours later, I finally found myself in the Center for the Blind, ill equipped for us, with tiny sightless children wandering in and out of the room, sometimes bumping into our desks while we scrambled to fill out the test, all the while sweating in the monsoon heat, doing our best to ignore our hunger or thirst.

Halfway through the exam, a women's club opened its weekend celebration with music blaring from a loudspeaker outside. I couldn't help but laugh and put the entire exam into the context of where I was and what I was trying to do with my life.

Stanford was my only choice for business school because of its stellar reputation and its public management program. If my application was rejected, I reasoned, I would pursue another path. I returned to Kigali thinking about Africa's relationship to the rest of the world, its connec tion to India, and how I wanted to be a part of all of it somehow. I knew I needed time and additional experiences, and after being in Africa for more than 2 years, I started readying myself to go home.

BEFORE LEAVING, I DECIDED to climb Mount Nyiragongo, one of Central Africa's tallest volcanoes at 3,470 meters (11,385 feet), standing above Goma across the border in Zaire, about a 4-hour drive from Kigali. I loved hiking and climbing, as did my Canadian friend Charles. We'd already been teased for being the two North Americans who exercised in the midday sun when everyone else was taking a proper siesta.

One Friday we left work and took off for Goma in Charles's little Renault, driving through the streets of Kigali past markets teeming with fish vendors and young children in bare feet, ripped jeans, and T-shirts donated by US volunteer agencies. There was a tragic irony to young kids in rags wearing T-shirts boasting of the prowess of the Harvard rugby team or Princeton crew. Boys rode by on ancient Raleighs, carrying passengers, with cardboard signs saying "Taxi" hanging from their seats.

Listening to Bob Marley and Cat Stevens, we wound around small mountains covered with patchwork fields of maize and bananas. Longhorn cows loped alongside the cars on the road, followed inevitably by young boys with spindly legs who pushed and prodded the huge beasts. As we neared Gisenyi and, thus, Lake Kivu, though we'd seen it countless times, its sheer size and beauty left us in awe. Old, white colonial houses across the lake in Goma sat on manicured lawns along its shores, and sun-scorched fishermen stood and pushed their dugout wooden boats along the blue water with long poles, waiting for the evening catch. Tranquil ripples floated from the water's edge, and the evening sun sent soft beams of light pirouetting across the lake.

Close to the Zaire border, we drove faster so as not to miss the checkpoint's official closing. Crossing into Rwanda was effortless and efficient, but getting past the Zairians always required a negotiation. After arguing with the customs officials and refusing to pay a bribe, but finally getting clearance to pass, we were stopped by the guards again. They wanted us to take them to get a beer nearby. Two soldiers jumped into the backseat of the car, one of them holding an AK-47 across his lap. They directed us to a tiny shack where the beers were cold and the peanuts salty. We ended up sharing a beer while the soldiers insisted on telling us jokes and thanking us repeatedly, disregarding the fact that we'd not really had much choice in the matter.

A half hour later, we were on our way again. On the dark road, we passed a boy in shiny red pants and a bright yellow shirt strutting alongside women dressed in rainbow colors with babies on their backs. The very wind seemed to sing. In crossing that border, I felt like we'd left Kansas and arrived in Oz, where life was lived in Technicolor.

The car crawled through craters like an army tank on uncharted terrain, but within minutes we were in Goma, a sleepy town known to us mostly for its dance clubs. From the veranda of our hotel, we could see the black, stark lines of the volcanoes through the mist, and just outside in the darkness, we made out the shiny polyester colors of more boys on their way to dance. Knock-kneed baby goats scampered alongside tiny children walking with their mothers in the dark.

We dined in our hotel and then found a dance joint, a hot, dark little box of a place teeming with people, the scents of sweet, smoky sweat and perfume mixing with liquor and cigarettes. Women in tight satin dresses moved their hips provocatively as a DJ with a too-cool voice peppered his African-French with English and Swahili slang while spinning Madonna, Bob Marley, and African music. We danced and danced until 4:00 a.m. and decided that we would wait until Sunday to climb the volcano. The next day would be devoted just to seeing the countryside.

I went to bed thinking of the tragedy in Zaire. Mobutu Sese Seko had been president since 1965 and was reputed to have a $5 billion personal bank account in Switzerland, thanks in large part to aid money from the United States, France, and Belgium especially. The corruption and mismanagement of his country had led to pervasive poverty, chaos, and a lack of education. I remember once meeting a little boy who asked me to take him home with me because I was a rich woman.

"How do you know I am rich?" I asked him.

"Ah, madame, because you are American."

"But I'm not rich," I said. `Just being American doesn't mean I'm rich. There are all kinds of people, rich and poor, there."

"In Zaire, we are all very poor," the little boy responded.

"Your president isn't poor. He's very rich," I teased.

"Ali, but madame, you see? He is the president!" he said with finality and assurance.

Morning came quickly, and I was grateful for having an easy day before our big climb, though we knew our decision to delay till Sunday would put pressure on us to get across the border before it closed at nightfall. After a breakfast of mangoes and bananas with a cup of strong coffee, we drove along the river past tiny villages of thatched-roof huts surrounded by aloe plants and bright red hibiscus. The sense of freedom compelled us to whoop and laugh aloud. Little could we imagine then that Goma would become the epicenter of the Rwandan refugee crisis after the genocide. It would get hit again when the volcano we were to climb, Nyiragongo, erupted in 2002, destroying nearly half the town and leaving half a million people homeless. But back then it was a simple place with few rules and beauty all around it-the right prescription for giving us a feeling of freedom often missing in Rwanda.

Driving across the country, we passed wide, open fields, gigantic blue lakes, and little villages of round, thatched huts made of sticks and mud. Women sat together drying peanuts in the sun as children ran to the side of the road to wave at us and yell "Hello, hello" in their sweet, singsong voices. We came upon a game park and spent hours amazed by the giraffes and antelopes, buffalos and monkeys, and the vast expanse of nature. After a couple of beers in the reserve's lodge, we finally realized how late it was. Night had fallen, and we still had a 4-hour drive back to our hotel in Goma.

Charles's car pushed along dirt roads in the blackness, the Renault's headlights illuminating skinny eucalyptus trees whose shadows looked like haunted dancers. We barely spoke, each of us watching for trucks flying at us or bandits roaming. Suddenly, into the glare of the headlights charged a roaring elephant, raising its giant trunk before charging across the road in front of us. Charles slammed on the brakes and the car swerved to miss the animal. Our hearts pounded as we watched the single, angry male continue on his rampage.

When we finally reached Goma, it was nearly midnight. The hotel dining room was closed. There was only one place to find food: the dance club. Off we went, eating fish and fries, unable to stop dancing again until 3:00 a.m.

The sky at dawn was nothing like it had been the day before. Heavy clouds portended storms, and the air was thick with moisture. We were exhausted, lacked proper clothing and gear for a climb, and couldn't find anything for breakfast because it was so early on Sunday morning. "Are we crazy enough to climb that huge volcano and come all the way back?" Charles teased. Knowing the answer, he added, "Just promise we'll take it easy."

Nyiragongo is just 8 or 10 miles from Goma, so we reached it quickly and found our guide, Alphonse, at a designated spot on the road. He was a short, athletic man with blue-black skin and a scowl on his face wearing army camouflage fatigues and a matching cap, with an AK-47 slung over his shoulder. I never saw him smile. It was clear that this guy wasn't going to lead us on any sort of carefree climb.

Alphonse asked us if we were strong and could keep up a good pace.

Charles responded, "It's no problem. We're in great shape. She runs and I play tennis every day."

I knew that was the wrong answer.

Alphonse didn't say a word. He just put us in our place with his oneman boot camp. With alacrity and drive, our taciturn guide stepped a full meter at a time at a pace that forced me into a full run. Though I could barely breathe, I was enthralled by the scenery: patches of bamboo and different varieties of hardy flowers in yellows and oranges. A thick canopy of trees covered the trail for at least a third of the climb.

As we reached the second and third stages of our 5-hour ascent, the air became much colder. My soaking-wet tank top and shorts were hardly adequate for these conditions. We trudged onward through more highaltitude vegetation, still dense and speckled with purple and yellow flowers. Toward the top, the terrain became rocky and bare-we were climbing on black and gray volcanic rock, slowly placing one foot in front of the other. I couldn't stop shivering from the cold and berated myself for not having paid heed when I noticed that Alphonse was wearing an army green sweater, a cap, long pants, and boots for this journey.

But the summit made it worth the work. The crater of the volcano was enormous, all rock in different shades of grays and browns and blacks with steam pushing through its cracks. It wouldn't erupt for another 14 years, but when it did, it would change the face of the area surrounding it.

To celebrate our ascent, the three of us shared the only food in our possession: a piece of Belgian chocolate and two hard-boiled eggs. Our single bottle of water was long gone.

And our adventure was just beginning. Within minutes, the gray sky turned bright white, throwing hail the size of golf balls at our heads. I began shivering uncontrollably. Our only recourse was to run down the mountain, trying unsuccessfully not to fall, sliding and ripping our shorts on the volcano's sharp surfaces.

Finally, we were back below the tree line, but torrents of water came in heavy sheets, transforming our path into a river with thigh-high muddy water. Still we walked, holding one another's hands so as not to fall. As we neared the bottom third, the rain finally slowed, but we ran into a blockade of branches and trees that had fallen across the path, creating an 8- or 9-foot wall that looked impossible to move.

Looking like drowned rats, we stood and stared, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. The thought of standing even for a minute without moving forward felt unbearable to me. I threw myself into the branches, only to collapse and scrape my legs from top to bottom. Finally, helplessly, we made our way over, breaking branches and falling, but somehow getting to the other side-and then we were home free. Nearly 9 hours after starting, we reached the road, a little worse for wear but happy to stand on flat land.

It was after 5:00, and we had to be at the Zaire border crossing by 6:15 or 6:30 to ensure that we'd reach the Rwandan side by 7:00 p.m., when the border closed. But we were ravenously hungry, and I was shivering uncontrollably. When Alphonse put the back of his hand to my forehead, his first warm gesture of the day, he said I had hypothermia and insisted on taking me to a place he knew where they would give me soup.