Ups and Downs

Yesterday was full of both emotional and topographical ups and downs.  We were nervous early on, since it would be our first day without Eric and with our new guide, Benon (rhymes with Lennon).  "You'll love Benon.  Everybody love Benon," Dr. Pasick had told me.  We'll see.  We got up, had our first quick breakfast--thank you Inside Afrika Boutique Hotel for your knowledge of Western Continental Breakfast  Buffets (Footnote 1)--and walked up the street to meet Benon.  We had no idea what he looked like, but assumed that he would recognize us.  We're pretty recognizable around here.

As we walked up the street, we heard a comically Muppetish voice (2) yell, "HABERRRRRRRRRRRRR!" from across the road.  We assumed this was Benon.  I walked over to greet him with my hand extended, which he promptly ignored.  "First we hug, then I shake your hand," he said, and proceeded to fulfill that statement without waiting for my approval.  Then he did the same with Ellen.  We love Benon.  Benon is in his mid-twenties, just finished his undergraduate degree in Business Administration, and  is about to begin his MBA.  He also has lots of American friends (3), seems to really enjoy his work, and is cheaper than I am.  Like I said, we love Benon.

Ellen and her new BFF Chantel

Benon suggested that we walk to the bus stop, then take a bus to Gisozi, the part of town where the Genocide Memorial is.  Sounds good.  About a fifteen minute walk later, we see a large white van.  Benon said something in Kinyarwanda to the driver, who nodded, and we got on the bus.  It was very old and the seats were torn and patched.  Ellen looked terrified.  Since we were the only ones on the bus, though, I figured it wouldn't be that bad.  What I soon found out is that the buses don't leave until they are full (4).  As I took my last gasps of air, and thought "at least I got to see the gorillas before I died" the bus began moving and air began to circulate again.  Not too bad after all.  Ellen even made a friend-- a pretty, well-dressed woman sitting beside her named Chantel who practiced her English.

The bus ride was pretty short--about ten minutes or so-- and we got off at the Museum.  It would be a relatively unassuming place by American standards, but is a large and ornate complex by Rwandan ones, with a small pool and sculpture out front, and lots of green space.  We got wanded by a large security officer with a large gun, whom Benon told I was a teacher.  He smiled-- teachers are well-respected (but underpaid) here.  Sounds sort of familiarish.

The museum is broken up into three main parts: gardens and mass graves outside, a museum floor devoted to the 1994 Tutsi Genocide (5) inside downstairs, and, interestingly, almost an entire floor upstairs devoted to other genocides of the twentieth century-- more on that in a minute.

A mass grave, still with room left.

We retrieved our Audio Guides and began in the outside portion, which consists of three levels of mass graves and several small gardens.  There are Two Hundred and Fifty-Nine Thousand people buried on this site (6), in huge, concrete-covered mass graves.  They are in coffins, but there are typically 8-10 people in each coffin.  All were killed in or around Kigali.  Most are unidentified, though an effort is underway to identify as many as possible, and put their names on a nearby wall.  One of the graves is still "open;" that is to say, they are still finding remains and burying them here.  The opening is covered with glass, so we could see the coffins inside.  It is almost full.  I don't know what happens after that.

Since this is a holiday week (July 1 was Independence Day, in remembrance of the day the Belgians left, and July 4 is Liberation Day, marking the end of the Genocide) there were numerous large bouquets of flowers (7) on the graves, many displaying the words "Never Again" or "Always Remember" in English, French, and Kinyarwanda.  It was incredibly moving.  Ellen asked Benon if he thought it would be okay if we placed some small stones on the graves, and he said he thought it wouldn't be a problem.

We went upstairs first, since there was a large group downstairs.  I was totally surprised and impressed by the amount of floor space (which is in high demand) and energy that has been given to educating the public not just about the events here, but also the genocides in Namibia, Armenia, Germany, Cambodia, and Bosnia.  The museum is truly devoted to educating people about the commonalities among all genocides, which is a relatively new and important approach.  The museum also did an incredible job with a totally trilingual approach-- every exhibit and explanation is in Kinyarwanda first, but with flawless English and French subheadings.

Downstairs is all about Rwanda; early on there is significant blame placed on the German and Belgian occupiers, who implemented their race science and hierarchical cultural system on a people that was seemingly without either beforehand.  Then the next sequence of exhibits was, more or less, informational-- preparations, how the genocide began, the events, etc.  The truly haunting portions came at the end, when we entered several consecutive rooms filled with disturbing artifacts: the first with lighted boxes filled with skulls and bones of victims, the second with victims' clothing on display, the third with photographs of several thousand victims before they were killed.  Even though the first two rooms were more gruesome, they were almost artistic, so they didn't affect me too much.  The photographs were very difficult.

One of the most moving and disturbing memorials I've ever seen was back upstairs-- a room devoted to children who were murdered.  Huge pictures of the children when they were alive were backlit on the wall, and underneath each one was a small glass podium with inscriptions of the child's name, age, favorite foods, best friend's names, last words, etc.  It was gut wrenching.

Ellen and Benon at Starbucks Bourbon Street Cafe.

We walked out of the museum in a sort of daze, and I think it's because of that that we ended up walking all the way back into the center of Kigali to find lunch.  It was about an hour long walk, mostly uphill, and it was pretty brutal, but it felt good to get the fresh air and decompress.  We ate at a coffee shop that is, essentially, the African Starbucks, but we were happy to have something a little comfortable after being uncomfortable all morning.

After lunch we walked around Kigali in search of souvenirs, but a lot of places were closed on Sunday.  So we were happy to head back to hotel to relax before getting some Indian food for dinner. (8)  Then we pretty well crashed.  I'll explain what happened today in the next post.  

Notes:
(1) Our buffet experience in Africa has been that you walk up to the buffet and look at the food in front of you but do not take anything yourself.  Instead, you point at what you want and then the Uniformed Teenage Girl/ Buffet Sentry gets it for you and puts it on your plate.  "Thank you," I say every time, to which UTG/BS replies, every time, "Thank you too."
(2) Half Bert from Sesame Street, half Kermit, African accent.
(3) I know this because he named them all for me.
(4) By "full" I mean "Cirque-du-Soleil full."
(5) That's what Rwandans call the Rwandan Genocide.  They also spell genocide "Jenocide."
(6) That number deserves to be written out.
(7) Interestingly, all the bouquets were covered with netting, which I thought was purely decorative until I saw one off of which the netting had fallen.  It was being harvested by bees.
(8) It's worth noting that we were given fair warning that coming to Rwanda would not be a memorable culinary experience.  We've asked a few people if there is a place to get good Rwandan food, and received the same bewildered "what's wrong with you?" look from all of them.  I'd draw a parallel to England-- just as there's no English cuisine, so to speak--quintessentially English food is the food of the poor--there doesn't seem to be a Rwandan cuisine either.  Or if there were, it would basically be corn, potatos, peas, and bananas in some combination or another.  Not something to really seek out.