A Quiet Night Out

Beautiful moon over Kigali.

My friend Christiane has been staying the past couple of nights as she's building an eco lodge in Kibuye and has lots of paperwork to file with the government.

It's always a pleasure to have her. Mostly we sit on my porch putting the world to rights.

View From My Garden

Last time she cooked me an incredible meal. This time we went out for one. Decided to check out a Chinese restaurant, the name of which now escapes me. It's down the back of New Simba. Anyway, it was really lovely. I went for the pork dumplings and Christiane had the sweet and sour beef, which was deliciously crispy. The place was silent, we were the only ones there, so we sat out on the balcony gassing.

Unfortunately, this is where the drinking began. Christiane rarely gets out to the big city, so when she is here it's a treat to go out for the night. Not so much to do in Kibuye. We ended up back towards home along the bar strip of Kisimenti. It is literally a long dirt road filled with bars. She knows the owner of one of them, so we settled down to continue chin-wagging until two in the morning. I have an impressive hangover.

Strange thing was, the place was completely empty - on a Thursday night.

The restaurant was empty, the bar was empty...

This is probably partly because it was bitterly cold. Google reckoned 17c, but it felt much colder and the day had been hot. We were shivering.

However, there's also been a crackdown on noise in Kigali. There's been a big initiative to hush down the churches. Authorities have been walking in and walking out with their sound systems. A policy I'm not at all averse to. Some of them are incredibly loud, and it's certainly a lot quieter on a Sunday morning now. A friend used to suffer a lot because of the churches, to the point where she went into her local church one day to ask them whether they thought God was deaf? "If you can kneel in your home and whisper a silent prayer to God, and he hears you, why do you need a megaphone and a sound system to reach him on a Sunday?" she asked.

I'm no stranger to the problems of noise myself. I had to move house from Gikondo because I was staying in an apartment where I couldn't get a single night's sleep uninterrupted by music or loud gatherings. So, I'm all in favour of noise restrictions, I really am.

But it does seem to be taken to extremes on occasions. Friends have told stories of being at events that were closed down at seven or eight in the evening. One told of a poetry recital forcibly closed by police with big guns. I'm not exactly sure what they were expecting to find at a poetry recital - explosive words, revolutionary ideas, hard hitting sonnets?

It's led to an atmosphere of caution which seems to be affecting the nightlife. When we enquired as to where everyone was, the new policy was mentioned. It's partly that the government wants to curb noise pollution, partly that many bars don't have a bar license, and partly commercial jealousy. One friend was telling me about the time they were at a live music event which was closed down at around eight-thirty, the instruments confiscated, and they were sure it was because of a complaint about noise from the bar next door. You can complain about noise anonymously, there's a hotline, but if one bar on the strip is doing a roaring trade it's tempting for other bar owners to stick the boot in.

So, noise is an issue that's being worked out at the moment. If that was the main reason the bar strip in Kisi was completely empty that night, then it's having a serious impact on the nighttime economy. I completely agree that residential areas should be quiet at a reasonable hour, but there also needs to be sections of town that are non-residential and allow people to have their fun. There are so many fantastic restaurants and bars in Kigali, and a growing number of people with expendable income. The city is very safe, violence is extremely low, and some of the live bands that play are phenomenal. There needs to be space for celebration.

Amahoro stadium has a license until about eleven or eleven-thirty when they have concerts. That seems a reasonable time for bars. Vang Vieng in Laos was a backpacker's paradise, but they also had a curfew of eleven o'clock for music. In Germany there are certain hours of the day when you can't mow your lawn or disturb the neighbours. I'm in favour of that for early mornings here. I've been woken up at five-thirty in the morning by people digging gardens and playing their radios, even in one of the quietest neighbourhoods in town. It's partly a culture of early morning starts, and partly that houses aren't built with noise reduction in mind. Without double glazing, and with most houses having open mosquito-screened air vents to the outside world, there's very little between your ears and your neighbour's sound system.

One issue I'd like to see addressed is the horn-beepers. People who own cars beep their horns to notify their guards that they're home and want the compound gate opening. I hear this anywhere between five in the afternoon to midnight most days. I've been woken up by it. And if they beep the first time and the guard isn't quick enough, they just keep beeping. Great big Rav4s honking away. This would be forgivable if it wasn't for the fact that absolutely everybody in Rwanda has a mobile phone. If you have a mobile phone, and your guard has a mobile phone, why not call them to tell them you're outside? Beep your phones, not your horns.

Meh, anyway. I do love the fact my neighbourhood is so quiet. I'd like to see some balance found with the bars. 

Anyway, it was lovely to see my friend again. She's back to Kibuye today. 

She managed to find me a giant tub of Nutella, which has been in short supply lately.

Without it I've been experimenting with healthier options: lost bread with honey and fruit salad. It was okay, but it's just not the same.