Vestine Musanayire grew up in a family with nine siblings whose parents were farmers. Apart from her, only two brothers attended university, and the privilege is not lost on her. “After 1994, the entire French educational system in Rwanda changed to an English one,” she says. “I had a secondary school diploma in biochemistry, but I wasn’t selected to attend the University of Rwanda due to the political leadership in place at the time.” In 1998, she was grateful to win a scholarship to study for her bachelor’s degree in Bangalore, India, where she spent four years, and now enjoys her work as a specialist in bacteriology at the RAB in Kigali.