Fake gangstas and rastas abound in Musanze, and this is one of the key reasons why I’m addicted to the town: to bust fake gangstas and rastas because that’s my duty whenever I’m sufficiently idle. Like now. Who are these fake gangos and rasta boys, you may want to know? They’re the chaps who wear dreadlocks and smoke marijuana because they’re gangstas and rastas, who must therefore smoke and wear dreadlocks. Fake gangstas are those chaps who buy cheap, dust-coated and wrinkly Intore or Impala cigarettes by the stick from the roadside vendor, then proceed to shamelessly repackage it in that used Dunhill pack they just stealthily picked from the roadside gutter. Obviously to fake gangstas, that wrinkly, dust-coated Intore stick of cancer tastes better when bought by the stick, off the street, and first transferred into a used Dunhill pack. Some people have all the time! Fake rastas and gangstas are those guys who drink petite Mutzig because it’s apparently cool, but should you present them with the big Mutzig, they’ll now start to behave as if it’s Kanyanga they just got served. Recently I asked one fake rasta in Musanze why he smokes weed and he told me he’s an “upcoming local artiste and all celebs smoke weed”. Fake rastas are those chaps who have it in their head that they’re God’s gift to unsuspecting white tourist women because they have dreadlocks and smoke weed. Fake rastas believe that any white woman will fall for an African man with locks and who smokes marijuana and wears shorts and sandals and a tattered Bob Marley T-shirt all the time. Fake rastas aside, Musanze remains very loveable to me because along the way from Kigali, there is a famous and irresistible stop at Nyirangarama –home of Agashya, rumored to be some of the best maracuja juice in the entire Great Lakes region. The problem with Agashya is that although it is among the best passion juice there is in East Africa, it’s scarce to find in Kigali, the reason I’m always forced to make weekly bus trips to Nyirangarama. I have tried to ask my friends who value fresh fruit juice where I can chance upon Agashya in Kigali, and no clear response has been forthcoming so far. If anything, why would I have to sweat and slug it out in the thick human jam and clogged roads of Nyabugogo just because I want to experience Agashya delights? In fact, we need Agashya at the neighborhood alimentation ASAP! I also like the neatness and social camaraderie of the jogging culture in Musanze as opposed to that to be witnessed along the mean and unfriendly super boulevards of Nyarutarama and Kiyovu of the rich. Lastly, it is the sheer draw of the lazy, balmy, almost sedate rumba classics played by a secret DJ at the Muhabura Hotel’s terrace bar.
