march6th

March 6, 2008

“Hello Phones”, is our cell phone store here in Rwanda. It's a one-room shop with fluorescently-lit counters on three sides, packed with mobile hand sets, behind which loiter bored-looking sales clerks. It sitst between a dry goods store and an electronics mart off one of the main business streets in downtown Kigali, a dirt street without sidewalks. I remember the details because it took us three trips there and back to get a cell phone that worked.

The first handset seemed fine, and despite that fact that it's tiny screen sported incomprehensable German text, we we reassured that there was a way to re-set the language to English. We left excited, and happy.

Two days later, after asking ten or so people for help, including our guest house manager, security guards, maintenance men, several doctors, secretaries and an assortment of passers-by, we were back at “Hello Phones”. It took some searching to find the place on our own, because of the plethora of similar shops that had somehow sprung up in the vicinity since our first visit. We stumbled past “Hi Phones”, and into “Hallo Phones” only to relize we were on the wrong block. Eventually we made it to “Hello” again.

The same clerk recognized us—not difficult since a mixed couple of white folks, tall man and short, red-headed woman, were unmistakeable. Another half dozen or so people scrutinized the phone, uttered expletives of shock and dismay in Kinyarwanda, and passed the handset on to the next person. Finally, a young man who appeared to be the cell phone techno geek started to pound furiously on the keys. After a short while he threw down the phone and said, in success “Shit!”. Again, we left happy.

However our disappointment quickly returned. It turned out that to make a call, we had to dial the telephone number four or five times, and still, we often did not connect. We were told that the network was on the fritz. “Keep trying”, said our friends, “It happens to us too. There are too many people trying to make a call.” We kept trying. No luck. Our friends tried to call their phones on our phone. No luck again. We headed back to “Hello Phones”.

The third time was a success. The bored assistant spoke to a supervisor and they tried to call too—again, no luck. They swapped out the SIM card into another model handset, and--Bingo. We were in business. We said good bye to “Hello Phones”, half certain that we were likely to be saying “Hello” again, in the not too distant future. �