Adolphe Mutoni has always had a dream to be involved in the development of the tourism industry despite being occupied in sports as a player for the national volleyball team for about 10 years. In 2015, he left for Belgium to pursue career development opportunities and returned this year determined to play a role to enhance tourism. He opened a guesthouse known as Viavia Traveler’s Café Kigali, in Kibagabaga, where his focus is to teach international tourists Kinyarwanda. He believes that, if tourists spoke Kinyarwanda, they would communicate with ease, enjoy the city and its experiences, going to the market and generally more comfortable while in Rwanda. This he believes also enhances their experience of the Rwandan culture, food among other activities. Tourists are fast embracing the idea Mutoni hired teachers who teach Kinyarwanda lessons to international clients, every Monday and Friday. With the lessons being free, they have attracted a wider audience bringing him clients from Ghana, USA, Kenya, among others. The guesthouse has six rooms and one dormitory. Mutoni chose to support local energy but not importing furniture, but rather to employ local carpenters to make the beds, tables, and chairs. “After the Guesthouse was thriving, I thought it was the right time to start a cafe, so that guests didn’t have to move to search for food. Two months back, we picked some food varieties from Belgium that actually people liked. He explained that, the guest house has a playground where parents can leave their kids to play, as they attend their meetings, or have a moment with friends without interruption. The playgroup and the playing equipment are free of charge. The entrepreneur also takes tourists around Kigali for exploratory visits as well as to buy locally made products. He is certain that this is a way of supporting locally made products and portraying the uniqueness of the Rwandan culture. He explained that the number of his clients ranges from 20 to 50 a day, with the number going up over the weekends. He has so far employed nine workers and has hopes of employing more as the business grows. “There is a huge transformation from the time we started up to now, we could have like four or five clients a week and sometimes we could even go a week without a single client. But our clients recommended us to other tourists,” he noted. He is also looking forward to improving service delivery and keeping in touch with his clients for feedback and review. His future plans include putting his guesthouse on the by offering quality services, working with tourists’ companies to boost the tourism industry and opening open up more branches. editor@newtimesrwanda.com
