when odd becomes normal

when I walked home from work last night I remembered my blog post from the first week about the little odd things that strike the new arrival in a place like kigali. I also noticed that in fact, I am becoming more and more rwandan in many ways, I am internalising certain practices that at the beginning were so incomprehensible to me. and in light of my upcoming visit to europe at christmas I am actually getting a bit worried that my behaviour will no longer be compatible in many ways with that which is common currency back 'home'.

one of the odd things which are becoming normal to me is that people tend to walk on the roads rather than the pavement. either they walk on the opposite side of the road from where the pavement is, or even more oddly, they walk next to the pavement. why is that? I have been wondering that for ever and a day. last night I left the office after dark, and since mugging is on the increase I was not feeling as comfortable as I have been in the past about walking home. I chose to walk on the opposite side of the road to where the pavement is for the simple reason that there would be less people on that side of the road. eventually I got uncomfortable with the cars driving past me with the width of a hair to spare and decided to go for the pavement anyways. of course I had to cross the middle of the street where the famous grassy partitions are which you are not allowed to step on. and did what few people do, I crossed it, taking extra care not to step on the actual grass.

the pavement near my office is actually good, flat and even, and provides enough space around the trees planted in its middle to be able to walk on it. but once you get further into my neighbourhood the ground is strewn with big stones, unevenness and obstacles you can easily trip over. and of course the lighting is minimal, even when the street lights are working. so I started walking on the road next to the pavement. a revelation. if you don't want to break your toes and twist your ankles you are better off sticking to the road which is flat and easy to walk on in the dark. and so I am starting to understand the sense in some of the odd customs of people here :-)

so now I'm simply hoping that I won't be found wandering the streets at home next to the pavement... having said that back home cars take a wide berth when there's cycles or pedestrians to be avoided. I am equally worried that I will remain in the custom of rwanda and pretty much graze the people - I don't think it would go down too well. I am also going to be extra careful not to honk the horn at absolutely everything and everyone that looks like they could get in my way - it is not a very appreciated custom back home, whereas here you cannot drive without honking in regular intervals, be it to make yourself seen, to announce you're home, to greet friends, to express your anger at other traffic participants, or to simply send a warning down the road.

and finally, I have a funny vision of myself buying a pack of chewing gum at the busy kiosk in the central train station taking my time enquiring about how the person selling the gum to me is. here, you do not start any transaction, no matter how simple, without first greeting the person, and asking them how they are. this applies to the phone, to the shop, to the pharmacy, to everything. and it will be weird to interact with people without this little ritual.

overall I'm curious to see what oddities I will detect once I'm in europe, and how I will look back onto my life and its customs here from the european perspective. odd is normal, normal is odd - and what is normal, and what is odd anyway?