{{HUH – guess I wrote this back in December – but never hit publish…so here it is}}}
So if you saw our family picture yesterday – you’ll probably have noticed our tree had a certain bald-10-year-old-from-1965 vibe to it
In Kibuye, our Tree-Hunting tradition was: who is away for Christmas so we can steal the artificial tree they brought over in a container?
Here in Kigali, we felt we had a new playing field wide-open to us. We were no longer in a village of a few dozen, we’re in a capital city. We are going to find a tree!
There are plenty of places where you can buy plants, trees, etc. The selection is pretty amazing, and the prices are pretty good. They tend to all be down along the bottom of the various valleys that serpentine through this city of hills. Wetlands are protected from development, so nothing can be built in them, however, just having a bunch of plants sitting outside appears to be well within the rules as they are all over the place. We tried a few and kept coming up with the same thing.
50cm tall cedar trees.
After striking out so many times we decided to get two of them, and two pots, to have as a backup.
Finally, at one plant place, Susan noticed some proper Christmas trees next to the rows of bamboo, palms etc.
They were actually growing in the ground, and not sitting in bags like the others, but he insisted that they were his, or at least he had the right to dig it out of the ground. We were thinking about whether we believed him or not and there was suddenly an older gentleman with a rudimentary hoe right there, ready to dig it out.
We picked one that looked the most Christmas tree-like… and let the man have a go at the hard soil.
They dug it out, carried it to our truck – which was already completely full as we had been buying plants for our house & yard each time we stopped to look for a tree. But there is always room for a Christmas tree I suppose.
We definitely got some interesting looks as we drove through the city to get back home, but it was worth it.
Today – Dec 26 – there are still needles on the tree, and no decorations have fallen off, so I think we can say this thing served its purpose.
We were hoping it might do better in its pot, and we could transplant it, but it’s not looking THAT good.
Feel free to comment….