Hotel Rwanda

If you haven’t seen the film Hotel Rwanda starring Don Cheadle, I advise you do so.  With that said, here’s an overview of the story from 30,000 feet.  As the genocide takes place in Kigali, a four star hotel becomes a safe haven of sorts.  The temporary manager, Paul Rusesabagina, uses his connections to protect over 1000 people from death.  The movie was based on a true story, and it was nominated for three Oscars.  There’s since been some controversy surrounding the story as Rusesabagina (a Hutu) has called out the current president and government (installed after the Tutsi-led RPF took the capital), but it’s good story nonetheless.

Anyway, as I mentioned before, Rwanda is known as the Land of a Thousand Hills, and the story centers on the Hotel des Mille Collines (hotel of a thousand hills).  While the movie was filmed at a hotel in South Africa, it is in fact a real place in downtown Kigali, and they offer day passes to their pool for 5000 Rawanda Francs ($8.33 USD).  Our group took up the offer on Saturday, and it was somewhat of a surreal experience.  To many outside of the country the hotel is known for its role in the genocide, but the reality is that it’s still a hotel.  There are still workers to pay and bills to be met.  In effect, they’ve moved on because they had to move on.  It’s an interesting situation that seems to permeate the country, and it was one of the main reasons for instigating the Gacaca courts. Sentencing confessed murderers to anything less than life in prison seems unthinkable, but locking away 100,000 accused criminals in a land of 12 million just isn’t feasible.  For more on the topic, read this article by Philip Gourevitch (it’s long but good). 

If you’ve paid attention to my few facebook statuses, you’ll know that today was my first day in the hospitals.  However, I’m still behind on my posts, so I probably won’t begin discussing that until tomorrow or Wednesday. 

-Scott  

A bottle of coke generally costs around 300 RF ($0.50 USD) at local bars, with prices extending up to 1000 RF ($1.67 USD) at fancier restaurants.  A bottle of coke costs 1500 RF ($2.50) at Hotel des Mille Collines.  Here is my 1500 RF coke bottle sitting poolside.

David, age 10, killed by machete

A few days ago our group of students visited the Kigali Memorial Center in downtown Kigali.  The grounds include some memorial gardens, a museum documenting the 1994 genocide, and mass graves containing around 250,000 genocide victims.  It’s both impressive and informative.  We took a generally self-led tour using audio guides that began with a flame that burns for 100 days every April-July (to signify the ~100 days of genocide).  We then walked past the rows of mass graves, with one grave still prior to completion (they continue to transfer bodies to the site as more graves are found elsewhere).  After that we walked through gardens with varying meanings and fountains representing unity followed by division.  The museum itself was created by the same group that designed the Holocaust Centre in the UK, and it looks like it was made with as much care.  All captions are written in Kinyarwanda, French, and English, and video clips provide options for subtitles. 

As a little background, since the genocide was so widespread, Rwanda enacted a judicial process called Gacaca courts for perpetrators of the genocide.  Here, people could confess to murders (aka “work”) in exchange for reduced sentences (i.e. 10 years of prison for 10+ murders).  One of the most interesting videos in the museum was of a man listing off who he had killed at such a court.  He showed no remorse and almost seemed put off by the questioning.  Keeping in mind that the Hutu were killing the Tutsis during the genocide, he also explained how he prevented the death of a Hutu woman who had married a Tutsi.  While he hacked her arm with a machete for her choice of a spouse, he made it sound as though it would have been barbaric to let others kill her for her spouse alone.  It was as disturbing as it was fascinating.

The museum tour winds down with some history of other genocides (e.g. The Holocaust, Cambodia, Bosnia) and ends with rooms dedicated to children of the genocide.  Sparsely decorated, the rooms present brief pictures of children who were murdered 17 years ago.  Each picture is accompanied by the child’s name, age at death, favorite food, aspirations in life, and mode of death.  One example that stood out was David who wanted to be a doctor.  Killed by machete at 10 years of age. 

-Scott

A line of roses has been laid along the edge of a mass grave along the outskirts of the memorial grounds.  Noticing a few red roses mixed in with mostly white, I took the opportunity to take a picture drawing focus to the individual in the sea of death.

"A Mzungu!"

It’s now approaching 10:00 AM here in Kigali, and we just wrapped up breakfast.  We’re meeting with Yakov and Tanya (two doctors from East Lansing) at 11:00 to discuss our time in the hospitals starting tomorrow, but I have a little time to kill before then.  I won’t go into too much background about Rwanda (you can read about the country here and genocide here), but I will say that they have an interesting amalgam of languages.  The country was first colonized by the Germans in the 1800s, but Belgium took primary control during World War I.  Because of this, French is one of the country’s official languages, along with Kinyarwanda.  A few years ago, Rwanda entered into the East African Union, so English is now an official language as well.  Add in some tribal dialects, and you have a variety of options to choose from when trying to communicate.  Main attempts to teach us the local language have focused on Kinyarwanda (if you can count hello, thank you, yes/no to be learning a language), but I feel like I may actually be better off if I could relearn some French.  You can generally find someone who knows English if asking for help on the street (aim young), but the few French speakers in our group are generally the go-to people. Still, English is being pushed heavily, and most signs and labels are now written in English making life much easier (significantly more for me than the Rwandans having to learn yet another language).

Apart from some language differences, there’s also the color difference.  I’ll admit that we stand out a fair amount (particularly in large groups), and you learn quickly that white people are known as “mzungus.”  I wouldn’t say that there’s a particular positive or negative connotation associated with the term, but it’s just the way it is.  When we walk down the street, mainly in our neighborhood, so far it’s become common for children to proclaim our presence (“A mzungu!”) and wave from the edge of the street.  However, it is not uncommon to meet other mzungus “in town” (downtown Kigali).  Some restaurants cater to “us” more than others, and I think it may be a tourist stop for some French speakers.  We’ve also met other young Americans here, but they almost seem put-off by our presence. Rwandans are generally social people from what I’ve noticed, and they’re willing to say hi in passing or start short conversations on the bus (more on that later).  While we’ve had a couple conversations with other English speaking Caucasians here, it’s often a chore just to get eye contact in passing (the most we got was a “sup” from a group we passed in our own neighborhood). Maybe it irks them that they’re not saving the world single handedly like they thought they were?  Or maybe you start to find new mzungus obnoxious once you’ve been here a while?  Time may or may not tell (we’re only here for a month), but it’s been an interesting observation.

We’ll see how much I can hold to this blog thing once we start rolling tomorrow, but I’ll attempt to get another one up tonight or tomorrow.

-Scott

We pass a school every morning on the way to our bus stop.

Muraho!

Muraho (hello) from Kigali, Rwanda!  I arrived in Africa via Ethiopian Airlines a few days back, and I think we’re pretty much settled in at this point.  My goal is to provide daily updates of varying length, but we’ll see how it goes.  We’re actually staying in a very nice locale on a hill overlooking the city, but it’s still Rwanda.  The water has been out more than it’s been on, the electricity has already gone out once or twice, and the internet is spotty.  However, with that said, Kigali is actually quite modern compared to what I suspect many of you would believe.  We purchased cell phones through MTN (essentially TracPhones) with solid connections, and I purchased a wireless modem for less than $30 USD through Tigo that allows 50 MB per day.  There are also a number of restaurants and cafes that advertise internet hotspots.  I wouldn’t advise entering a restroom without hand sanitizer, but it could certainly be worse.

As for where we are staying, we have a very nice place belonging to Association Mwana Ukundwa (AMU), a non-profit organization dedicated to assisting orphans of the genocide.  It’s run by a woman named Rose who, during the genocide, vowed to protect God’s children if He protected her (more on AMU here).  The house has 8 rooms with 2 beds in each, and it sounds like the funds raised from the med students on the trip actually help pull the place together (funds from last year’s group allowed for the curtains and mosquito nets we’re currently enjoying).  It’s really a nice place they have here, and I’m sure the picture I’ve attached doesn’t do it justice.  We have a half hour walk down a hill to the nearest bus stop (first dirt/clay, then cobblestone), but it builds character… and the view from the top is worth it.

Seeing as it’s now 12:30 AM here in Rwanda, I’m going to call it a night.  I hope to pop in again tomorrow.

-Scott

Rwanda is known as "The Land of a Thousand Hills," and the AMU building sits on one of those hills.  The resulting view is gorgeous.