The volunteer packed her bag

For her New Year's Eve party my sister requested that each guest bring a game. Mine was 'The cardinal packed his bag'. The cardinal packed his bag and in it he put an apple. The cardinal packed his bag and in it he put an Apple and his Boots. The cardinal packed his bag and in it he put an Apple, his Boots, some Crayons....

Compared with the recognisable structure of the three day workshops, today is largely unknown. I'm promised to David Bucura but he has other duties for most of the day, it emerges. I am to go to his house and see if I can construct some demonstration items in his garden. There will be three or four young people to help me. There have been earlier mentions of also teaching one song to his church choir for the newly introduced English language service.

I declined his suggestion of a seven-o'clock start today. I'm to get myself to the Friends Church compound at Kagarama, 15 minutes' steep uphill walk away, for nine. The challenge is to take everything I shall need and nothing to add unnecessary weight to my backpack.

Before leaving I apply sun cream and take my anti-malaria and anti-histamine pills.

I wait only a couple of minutes on the bench in the shade near the church gate before David's car appears, driven by Celestin. I've travelled with him several times before, he likes practising his English with me, and to my surprise one day last week it was he who led the 30 minutes of worship at the beginning of the day a Friends Peace House. (Understanding his role or status is beyond me. It seems that he drives for Friends Peace House and the Friends Church, but for others as well, using a variety of cars, and paid directly in cash by whoever has requested his services. His work for HROC will not last long because one of the team is having driving lessons.) I have been looking through my book of Taizé chants while waiting. I decide to try one on Celestin. It has to be simple and in English. Here is one with straightforward melody and harmonies, and only a few words. They're not words I would choose for myself, but they seem very like many of the hymns sung here. (Old joke: How do Quakers sing hymns? Slowly, so they can read ahead and see if they approve of the words.) 'Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.'

As we drive I teach the words and the melody. Before long we are harmonising ad lib. That was a good choice.

Where are we going? I don't recognise this part of town at all. It's a local government office. There is a queue of about 20 standing in the sun and another 20 or 30 sitting on rows of benches under a canopy. David comes to the car. I am to get out and greet his brother's mother-in-law, her daughter and two more relatives. The brother lives in Coventry. Could I take a small present? I check that he would collect it from me. 'OK, but nothing too bulky, please.' I have no idea whether this was premeditated.

David assures me that at least one of my gardening team speaks French. He looks at some of my illustrations and asks to photocopy them – a first. Celestin drives me to the Bucura house, singing happily.

By lunch time I have used (not in alphabetical order) sun hat, sunglasses, laminated teaching pages, paper from my pad to give to my students, mini-laptop and flash drive to show photos of earlier workshops here, gardening shoes, camera, English/French dictionary, scissors, boiled drinking water in a bottle, a selection of seeds, and finally a book to read while my lunch is cooked. (I've finished 'Machete season', read the Rwandan sections of ''The key to my neighbour's house: seeking justice in Bosnia and Rwanda' by Elizabeth Neuffer, and am starting on 'Between vengeance and forgiveness: facing history after genocide and mass violence', by Martha Minow, which seems very well worth reading so far, despite being 10 years old and focusing on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa rather than the more recent efforts in Rwanda, which are my main interest.)

David arrives as I am finishing my lunch. I don't know which of the party had to sign a document; it took all morning.

Now after lunch it's raining and thundering before we have begun to construct the compost heap. I'm composing on my laptop but I'm down to 34% battery. I decided not to bring its power cable.



Four hours later and I'm back home, computer plugged in, to finish the tale. In the afternoon three of us made a compost heap of a cubic yard or so, with the surrounding soil so sticky I was carrying about half a pound on each shoe. I used my gardening gloves and secateurs.

What did I bring back unused? Umbrella, lightweight long-sleeved shirt, descant recorder, four photocopied pages from the 'Friends' Hymnal', hand sanitiser, money and phone – combined weight probably under a pound. Satisfactory.