Rwanda

R W A N D A

I always take a novel with me whenever I travel and my book of choice for the East Africa trip was Aidan Hartley's excellent The Zanzibar Chest. It's a fine account of a war-journalist's experiences in East Africa and other various parts of the world. He makes a comment that, when comparing what is needed for the world press to take notice of a story, goes something like this, "the death of one American is equal to that of ten Israelis, 100 Palestinians, 1,000 Bosnian Muslims, or that of 10,000 Africans". Times that latter number by a hundred to get how many Tutsis were slaughtered by their rival tribe the Hutus in order to get the support and attention of the international community in only one fateful month during the spring of 1994. I've been to many war torn countries in my lifetime but I don't think any of them can quite compare to Rwanda. Unfortunately, this picturesque mountainous slip of a country, once dubbed the "Switzerland of Africa" is now inextricably tied to the horrific events that unfolded here almost a decade ago. However, walking around the streets of Kigali, it's hard to imagine the bloodbath that took place here in 1994, when almost a million people were mutilated in the matter of a month in one of the most horrible attempts of genocide this planet has ever witnessed. Incredibly, Rwanda is now one of the safest countries in the region to visit and its capital Kigali, when compared to Nairobi or Dar es Salaam, is extremely safe.

A lot of credit must go to the Rwandan government who are doing a sensational job of rebuilding after the horrendous conflict between the Hutus and Tutsis that occurred here. The government has tackled three main issues that they believe contributed to the genocide; racism, (lack of) education, and poverty. The first step to alleviating racial conflict was to abolish the tribal divide that had socially torn the country into two for so long. There are no more Tutsis and no more Hutus - now everyone is simply "Rwandan". Second is education, and the government has been taking enormous steps to ensure a quality education is available to children and adults of all ages in Rwanda. The third issue is poverty. This is probably the most difficult problem to tackle as extreme poverty is omnipresent throughout the continent - not just in Rwanda.

The scars of the genocide are still there to see. It's not uncommon to see people walking around with a limb or two missing and Rwanda does currently have infrastructure problems as there is a major lack of two basic necessities; electricity and water. In fact, after 6pm, virtually all of the public electricity goes out throughout the country, with the exception of the higher star hotels and a handful of restaurants and establishments throughout town that keep their own private generators running. So if you're going to Rwanda, bring a good flashlight. Water is another scarcity. In fact, my hotel, the Gloria, had a nice bathroom, complete with sink, bathtub, and sit down toilet. Only one problem.... no water! I also had an incredibly difficult time trying to find a bottle of purified water in Kigali. I had to enquire at several corner shops, pharmacies, supermarkets, liquor stores, and cafes just to find one! It seems as if it is easier to buy alcohol than it is to get clean drinking water in Rwanda!

Right: Rwanda is known as the "Switzerland of Africa" or the "Land of a Thousand Hills". Picturesque Kigali shows why

Below: Straw thatched houses on display at Butare's National Museum

I was only in Rwanda for three days - just enough time to take a city tour of Kigali, which took us to several of the genocide landmarks. These included, the site where 10 Belgian UN soldiers were butchered (thus prompting the UN to withdraw their troops from Rwanda right at the country's darkest hour) and the adjoining bullet-hole covered building where moderate Hutu prime minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana was assassinated. We also went by one of Kigali's overflowing prisons (apparently there's something like 120,000 genocide perpetrators in Rwandan jails), as well the infamous Milles Collines Hotel - where the movie Hotel Rwanda was based on. The hotel doesn't look anything like it does in the movie and when I enquired about that, I was told that the entire movie, albeit one short shot in one scene - was filmed in South Africa.

The highlight of the morbid, yet highly educational tour was a visit to the National Memorial Center - a museum built in dedication to the victims of the genocide in Gisozi, just outside Kigali. The museum is built on two levels; downstairs you have pictures and various memoirs from the Rwandan genocide while the upstairs section is dedicated to various genocides throughout the last century, including the Jews in Germany, the Armenians in Turkey, Namibia, etc. To some who lived through this, a visit to the memorial was too a little too overbearing and it was common to see grown men and woman breaking down inside the museum.

For my second day in Rwanda, I headed southwest of Kigali to catch a little sample of life in rural Rwanda. I went to the Butare, a small town close to the border of Burundi and Congo. Butare is known as the intellectual capital of Rwanda and this is where the National Museum of Rwanda is located. It's a fine showplace that was a welcoming contrast from the grim things I had seen the previous day at the Genocide Memorial Center in Kigali. The museum in Butare's exhibits celebrated the more positive aspects of Rwandan heritage such as basket weaving and thatched huts. It has many interesting archeological and ethnological displays, as well as a very reasonably priced souvenir shop.

After two days in Rwanda, I headed east for Uganda. I wish I had more time to absorb the culture of the friendly Rwandans but as it was I had to move on. I left extremely impressed at how the Rwandans were coping with their swift and sensational recovery from the carnage that had occurred only a decade earlier. These are some of the photos I got from Kigali and Butare.

Above: Outside the Kigali Memorial Center

Left: The site where ten Belgian UN soldiers were killed. The killings prompted the United Nations to withdraw its peace keeping force, paving the way for one of the most horrible events in human history.

Below left: Another street scene of Kigali

Below: "Hay man!" posing for pictures in Butare