“The world withdrew….and watched as a million people were slaughtered
Many families had been totally wiped out, with no one to remember or document their deaths.
The streets were littered with corpses. Dogs were eating the rotting flesh of their owners.
The country smelled of the stench of death.
The genocidaires had been more successful in their evil aims than anyone would have dared to believe.
Rwanda was dead.”
I stood there in shock thinking to myself just how f ed up the world really was back in 1994 when the Rwandan Genocide took place, as I finished reading this statement at the last panel during my team and I visit to the Genocide Memorial museum. As a historian I have always been one to always hear both sides of every story, and try to not let my own bias enter into my mind, but I found myself actually getting angry at the people that laid the foundation for this tragic event to even happen in the first place. I felt so many emotions, but the emotion that was the strongest was anger. Anger over the fact that the US did nothing to intervene because they didn’t seem it worthy enough to be involved in any way, anger over the fact that the one group that did the killings were going off of lies that they were told by outside influences, anger at the fact that they had no moral compress, and anger at the fact that the innocent lives of children were taken just because of the fear that they might come back to take revenge for their parents deaths, and so many other reasons.
Genocide is usually the act of a government and its collaborators to destroy a part of the population under its control. Genocide is never spontaneous. It is an intentional act of multiple murder, aimed at destroying the presence of the victim group. Its perpetrators do not respect age, gender, occupation, religion or status. Not every act of genocidal murder results in genocide itself. Different types of crisis have different names such as politicide (murder of political groups) and ethnocide (murder of ethnic groups). This does not imply that one is “better” or “worse” then the other but they are different in either motivation or outcome. Whatever the term used, victims of mass murder feel often with good reason that they have suffered a genocidal attempt on their lives.
As am historian I have traveled to some pretty intense historical sites in my life. The ones that have really impacted me have been the places that deal with genocide/mass killings. An example of one of these places was The Killing Fields as that place really impacted me by knowing the likely hood of everyone of my friends would most likely be killed because they were educated and/or Christian. The other place that has now also had a huge impact on me was Kigali Genocide Memorial as that impacted me by the thought of what if I had friends that were of a different ethic group then me, and what would I do if faced with that situation of turning on my friends or be killed myself by my own people (answer is that I would rather not betray my friends, and risk death for protecting them).
Also the fact that it happened during my lifetime, and even as a 8 year old, I remember hearing about the events in a faraway land called Rwanda especially the events where 10 UN peacekeepers were killed by the rebels (there is a memorial to them called the Belgian Peacekeepers Memorial that I asked if we could visit as well, and for me that was heavy as that was the part of the genocide that I remember hearing about when I was young and I wanted to share that memory with me new teammates, and I hope that going there had as much of an impact on them as it did on me). This was all that I remember about the genocide as once the world powers pulled out of the country, all news coverage was non exsistant until the end of the genocide in July 1994. At the time I never would have dreamed that I would ever come to Rwanda, let alone on the 25th anniversary of the Genocide, but it just goes to show just how cool God is and his timing for everything as if we had stuck to our original route then I would be in Uganda this month rather then here, and missed out on getting to experience all of the Liberation Day festivities too.
I have only been here a week, but in that week’s time I have fallen in love with the Rwandan people as despite their tragic past with the genocide the people of Rwanda are so warm, open, and genuine once you get to know them as they are also quiet & reserved. Seeing just how much fun they are as some of my teammates and I were dancing with them in the stadium square after the Liberation Day ceremony on July 4th. One of the staff members shared with us a bit of his story, and it was such an incredible story to hear. Overall the people here are just awesome.
I am so honored to be here as this was the one country in Africa that I was looking forward to serving in while on the race, and the fact that I get to spend a whole month serving here is just so awesome.
As one of the displays in the museum said:
“Rwanda is a country of hills, mountains, forests, lakes, laughing children, markets of busy people, drummers, dancers, artisans and craftsman. We managed to squeeze thousands of hills and eight million people into its 26,338 square km. Our land is rich and fertile, and the climate pleasant. This has been our home for centuries. We are one people. We speak one language, We have one history.
In recent times though genocide has cast a dark shadow over our lives and torn us apart. This chapter is a bitter part of our lives, but one we must remember for those lost, and for the sake of the future.
This is about our past and our future;
Our nightmares and dreams;
Our fear and our hope;
Which is why we begin where we end…..
with the country we love….
Rwanda you have my heart, and I very sorry that the rest of the world didn’t pay any attention to you during your time of need back in 1994.
Also I highly recommend watching the movie “Hotel Rwanda” as it does do a pretty good job of telling one of the many stories within the genocide. As I watched it 3 times leading up to coming to Rwanda. If you wanna know more, please do your own research on the genocide as it is something that everyone in the world should know the history of, and learn from it so that genocide like what took place here can never happen again.
Til next time your fellow sister in Christ,
Bonnie
Team Titan
P Squad
Psalms 18:2
YOLO
