Oreison Bana

Oreison grew up in Nyamirambo, a dense, restless quarter of Kigali with a reputation that preceded it. It was a hustle, and he does not soften the description: a neighbourhood where drugs and bad influence were close enough that escaping them was never a given. What he had was parents who worked to hold him steady, supporting his emotions, pointing him toward a path that would carry him through and out of the world he was born into. He finished secondary school and went straight into the hustle himself, working to support himself and to put something back into the home.

Tourism found him in 2015, and it found him at his own doorstep. He began by showing visitors around Nyamirambo, the streets he already knew, the life he already lived and built everything that followed from there. It is a beginning that says a good deal about how he guides: not from a syllabus, but from the ground up, starting with the place he could speak about most honestly.

The turning point came at twenty-two, on his first volcano hike, when he came face to face with mountain gorillas. He had never imagined he would meet these giants in person, or watch the ordinary business of their lives up close. It settled something. His love for nature and wildlife deepened past interest into commitment, and with it came a fierce eagerness to show people his own country.

Cycling is what led him to guiding. Oreison is a cyclist himself, and it was through that world that he met Claude, a fellow rider who took him into the bush and gave him his first professional guiding work. Oreison does not describe him as a colleague or a teacher. "He is more than a person to me," he says. "He is a creator of another version of me." They remain in touch, and Claude remains someone he can rely on. The bike has stayed with him since - in a country built on hills and famous for its riders, it is one of the ways he prefers to show people Rwanda, moving at a pace that lets a place be noticed rather than passed through.

Wanting this life set him apart from everyone around him. Nobody in his circle, not friends, not family, not schoolmates, knew anything about wildlife or considered tourism a career. There was no one to ask, no one to follow and no map. Building a profession without any of that was, in his words, like setting out on a long journey alone. It was tiring, and often it was lonely, but giving up never entered his thinking. He had faith in the career, and every group of travellers he hosted sent him back out with more courage than he arrived with.

For Oreison, guiding is also a way of approaching God. He is a believer, and the wild is where he meets creation on its own terms, a separate world, a unique part of what was made. Meeting new people, talking with them about how animals live, sitting with them in front of something none of them will forget: that is where he feels he belongs. It is also, plainly, how he makes his living and supports himself, and he sees no contradiction between the two.

Alongside guiding, Oreison works as a safari nanny, and he speaks about it with the same seriousness. Taking responsibility for someone's children in the field is a weight he considers an honour, and it is what allows parents to be fully present on their own trip rather than watching over their shoulder. The work has taught him to read children, what they respond to, what makes them happy, how to notice what is missing in a child's moment and meet it. He believes it is making him a better man, and a better parent.

His specialism is the first-time traveller. He has hosted many, and he watches for the particular excitement of someone who is about to see something they have never seen. That is where he puts his effort, on the explanation, the sighting, the small unadvertised gem, because he knows the whole point is a memory that stays for life.

Oreison is also a painter, working in landscape, portrait and wildlife. It began in his free time, but it has become part of what he offers: he has sold his work, and he builds painting into guests' itineraries as an experience in its own right, an afternoon spent looking hard at a landscape rather than photographing it and moving on. For guests travelling with children, or anyone wanting a slower day between drives, it is a genuine alternative to another game drive. He is a reader too, particularly of stories.

He dreams of guiding in Kenya, a country that stunned him on his first visit and left him wanting to be part of its guiding community, and of working in Botswana.

Home location: Rwanda

Guides in: Rwanda, Uganda

Languages: English and French 

Daily rate: $