A signiyo umenya nawe ukimenya ntuba waranyishe.

“If you had known me, and you had known yourself, you would not have killed me.”

I’m not exactly keen to post this blog entry, particularly because doing so leaves me feeling extremely conflicted. On the one hand, I consider myself nothing of an expert on the Rwandan genocide, and moreover I was only in the country as a one week tourist. Further to that assertion, I am hesitant to linger on this dark chapter of history because I do not wish the subject to be the only thing that springs to an outsider’s mind when I mention my trip.

While in Kigali, we were hosted by a European-Rwandan family. The oldest Rwandan, a 30 year old, recounted to us an exchange he had with a German who had flown to Kigali to work with his company. The woman had asked him for details on which train she should take in order to get out into the countryside. Rwanda has no trains. When he heard this question, he looked at her as if she was crazy. “Excuse me,” he asked her, “but do you know anything about Rwanda?” No, she responded, she really didn’t.

“You know what she knew about Rwanda?” he continued, “All she could talk about was that terrible movie that is full of errors. All anyone in Europe seems to talk about is that show.” He was clearly agitated, and I knew that he was referring to the Hollywood movie known as Hotel Rwanda.
Leveraging the silver screen for history lessons is light years away from painting an accurate portrait of any world event– but I am afraid to say that for most of the world, the image of Rwanda is often shaped through by this Don Cheadle flick.

I have no desire to perpetuate bad news in a glamorized fashion. It is neither my place nor my right to do so. But, at the same time I recognize that it has been 21 years since these unspeakable acts were committed, and I fear that as the world spins further away from that period, the younger generations (and even the older ones) will forget how grave the genocide really was. Both for the nation of Rwanda as well as an international community that did nothing.

UNAMIR= United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda

I am going to post some (hopefully respectful) photos from a few of the sites that we visited while in country. It was not an easy endeavor, hearing the stories, witnessing the bullet holes, bones and dark masses of blood that still paint the walls of brick churches that were falsely designated as safe havens. But the story must be told, and the Rwandans who run these sights truly tell the stories with dignity.

Lt Gen Roméo Dallaire served as the Force Commander of the UN Assistance Mission to Rwanda from 1993 to 1994. I am in the midst of reading his autobiography, and will include a couple of his thoughts.

“It is my feeling that this recent catastrophe is being forgotten and its lessons submerged in ignorance and apathy. The genocide in Rwanda was a failure of humanity that could easily happen again.”

“What I have come to realize as the root of it all, however, is the fundamental indifference of the world community to the plight of seven to eight million black Africans in a tiny country that had no strategic or resource value to any world power”

Rwanda is working hard to honor, remember and respect the events that came to a head in April 1994. When you come and experience this country of extraordinary beauty, you too will observe the memorials and try stay composed as you wonder how 800,000 people were allowed to be cut down with almost zero international reaction. But then you look at how far the country has come in 21 years, and you hear about the 1997 massacre at a secondary school when militia demanded that the students separate themselves along ethnic lines- Hutus and Tutsis. The students stood their ground together and responded by telling the men that they were all Rwandans.

As a community we all know better. I pray that in the future we will all do better, too.