I arrived in Kigali in January 2022, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, with absolutely no idea what I was doing. Eight months later, with my Shooting Touch Fellowship in the rear view and myriad East African adventures under my belt, I feel like a grizzled, seasoned expat with a strong understanding of the Rwandan context, and a deep appreciation for it.
For the better part of a year, my days were filled with countless hours at the basketball court, playing, coaching, or coordinating events. Many more hours were spent sitting on wooden benches in modest village homes and churches, listening semi-obliviously to endless Kinyarwanda speeches in honor of birthdays, graduations, and weddings.
Simultaneously, I became a true Kigalian, immersing myself in the city’s sports and arts scenes, and spending what little money I made on hearty lunch buffets and my favorite cheap Rwandan beers. Every few weeks, I would retreat to the village to focus on work, check in on my friends and their families, and plan for my future.
I experienced some particularly amazing moments during the final months of my Fellowship, and only now – as I sit on the rooftop of a hostel in Fez, Morocco – do I finally have time to sit, reflect, and write it all down.
In May, the Basketball Africa League (BAL) Finals came to Kigali for its second annual championship tournament. The BAL is the NBA’s first professional league developed outside of the United States, and as one of the central hubs for basketball in Africa, Kigali was a natural choice to host the league’s championship.
Because of our relationship with the NBA and our role as the largest youth- and women-serving basketball organization in Rwanda, Shooting Touch was invited to the games as special guests and social impact partners. We teamed up with the league for their BAL4HER initiative – an NBA program focusing on gender equality in sports and business. Through that partnership, Shooting Touch helped lead a female empowerment workshop and brought 50 of our women and girl hoopers from the village to experience African basketball on the biggest stage.
I was lucky enough to attend the BAL Finals alongside my Shooting Touch colleagues and beneficiaries, where we were welcomed by some of the key figures in African basketball, including BAL President Amadou Fall, former NBA players Joakim Noah, Luol Deng, and Ian Mahinmi, and many others. The momentum and energy gained from the BAL experience has launched Shooting Touch into exciting new territory, and it feels like we are on the brink of (more) major growth and impactful new partnerships.
Just as the BAL Finals concluded, my friend Caleb came to visit me from Santa Barbara, and we jetted over to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and then to Zanzibar for a week of adventure and relaxation. We spent our days deep-sea freediving in the blue waters of the Indian Ocean, eating our weight in seafood and coconuts, making new friends (mostly cats), and learning enough Swahili to navigate from beach to beach and finally to the narrow streets of Stone Town.
When I returned home from Tanzania, time was already ticking. Work consumed my weeks and many of my weekends. We had an incredible visit from the VOLeaders, a sport-for-development leadership academy for top student-athletes at the University of Tennessee. We also hosted clinics and health testing events, ran a Summer League for our top youth players, and completed our Malaria Health Unit. And oh yeah, we built and launched a new Shooting Touch basketball court!
I mixed in a few other adventures over the final months, including an epic three-day bike trip along the Congo Nile Trail in western Rwanda, accompanied by my good friend Josh. That trip deserves a blog post of its own, but in short, it was remarkably strenuous, exhilarating, and – despite many hours spent dealing with broken bikes and searching for mechanics in remote villages – an absolute success. Even with very little preparation and essentially no recent biking experience, we managed to pull off a 100km ride along the shores of Lake Kivu, some of the hilliest terrain in East Africa, and we took in some breathtaking views along the way.
Recently, I used my final vacation days to visit one of the few destinations in Rwanda that I hadn’t yet seen. My friends and I camped on an island in Twin Lakes, which lie dramatically under the volcanoes lining the Rwanda-Uganda border. I hadn’t camped since arriving in Rwanda, and the experience allowed me not only to reflect on my adventures, but also to look forward to my upcoming visit home to California, where camping and diving await me.
At the end of August, I completed my fellowship, packed up my things, and departed Rwanda for Cairo, Egypt, where the 2022 Basketball Without Borders (BWB) Africa camp was hosted. BWB is an annual NBA Africa event held for the best youth basketball players from the continent, and as a Shooting Touch Fellow, I had the honor of working the camp alongside the NBA’s Academy and International Operations teams.
I have been following BWB closely since 2017, looking for my way into the African hoops scene, and being there with some of my childhood heroes was totally surreal. It was a grind, as we supported the event’s daily operations and acted as 24/7 chaperones for the kids, but I also had the unforgettable experience of coaching the youth alongside NBA figures such as Steve Kerr, Chauncey Billups, Dikembe Mutombo, Grant Williams, and Malcolm Brodgon.
I still haven’t quite wrapped my head around it all – leaving Rwanda, working at BWB, traveling for a month, returning home – but at the moment, I just feel immense gratitude for the chance to explore the world, meet some of NBA’s top coaches and executives, and to engage with the next generation of African basketball stars during this important stage of their journey.
For now, I’m traveling through Morocco, Portugal, and Spain for the month of September with my dear friend, Sam Dines. Then I’ll be returning to California for the next few months to spend time with friends and family, handle some business, and do a lot of hiking, camping, and diving. After many months away from the Pacific Ocean, all I can think about is getting back in that water and soaring. Fishing with my brother and (finally) drinking some nice craft beers. Visiting my parents and spending time in nature with them. Camping in the Cuyama Desert with old friends. Reflecting, resetting. And then we’re back at it!
While this is my final Fellowship Blog, I plan to keep you all in the loop with highlights from my travels and updates on my future endeavors (hint: Rwanda!). Much love!
Shooting Touch Blog 