Water in Rwanda

Water (the lack of it) is a big problem in Rwanda.  For roughy half a year, there is hardly any rain.  Even in the capital city, Kigali, water supply can be cut off for a whole district for months.  People who can afford it buy water delivered by water trucks.  Others carry water in plastic cans themselves.

For most of the villages up in the hills and mountains there is no water supply at all.  Many people spend hours each day carrying water up to their houses.  Vendors ferry water cans with bicycles.  They are pushing the bicycles, because the unpaved roads are too steep and rough to ride on.


It has not rained for such a long time, and it is so dusty, that the banana leaves have turned brown.  Fortunately, it is not because they are dying.  They are simply covered by a layer of red earth.




Even then, many of the women, even in fairly remote places, are dressed in clean, brightly-coloured dresses.   Evidently it is a matter of pride for them the way they present themselves even while they are simply carrying out their daily chores.

And everywhere we go, whether in Kigali, Ruhanga, Rwamagana, or villages up in the mountains, there is hardly any garbage on the streets, in and around houses.    Even in the height of the dry season.  Simply amazingly admirable.