After school, I stop at a small neighborhood boutique on my way home. I buy ingredients for dinner like tomatoes, eggs, bread, and sometimes vegetables such as avocados, cabbage, green beans or green peppers. I usually cook simple meals like eggs and avocado toast or pasta with vegetables. If I can find rice paper in the city, I love making spring rolls and peanut sauce!
When I get home, I take about an hour to relax. Trying to be an extrovert in Kinyarwanda for the entire day drains me, so I need a break after work. I might read or watch TV on my computer. Sometimes I wash a little laundry by hand while I watch TV to keep it from adding up to a huge pile of clothes.
Around 4:00 p.m., I start preparing dinner. Before cooking, I have to wash all my vegetables twice using filtered water to make sure they’re clean. I try to eat between 5:00 and 5:30 p.m. That might sound early, but the sun sets around 5:30 here, and I like to finish washing dishes and throwing away food scraps before it gets dark outside. I have to throw my garbage 50 feet away in a big dirt ditch surrounded by banana trees.
After dinner comes one of the biggest differences from life in the United States: getting water ready for my bucket bath! I store water in seven jerrycans, each holding 20 liters, which I fill once a week at a communal water tap. To bathe, I heat water in my electric kettle two or three times and take a bucket bath. After, I do my skincare routine and get ready for bed.
By about 8:00 p.m., my chores are finished and it’s finally time to fully relax. Because of the time difference, it’s still early in the United States, so I like to call friends or family back home.
