Kigali Genocide Memorial

Today I visited the Kigali Genocide Memorial. I took a short Moto Taxi ride to a non-descript location in one of the many valleys in Kigali. The building was marked with a simple white sign which said, "Memorial."

The Memorial is divided into 3 main parts inside and a mass grave outside, holding the remains of over 280,000 slaughtered Rwandans. The bottom floor is dedicated to the Rwandan Genocide. It starts with the divisive colonial experience in Rwanda and the steady build up to the Genocide. Its very well done and powerful. After going through the facts of the genocide, you come to a room full of pictures of those killed. The next room is a room with the clothing of bodies found. The final room on the bottom floor is filled with the bones of those killed. Entire boxes filled with skulls. Piles of femurs. You can see that some of the skulls have been smashed in indicating the method which that person was killed.

The second floor is dedicated to Genocides which have taken place throughout history including, Nazi Germany, Cambodia, Bosnia and Armenia. Its crazy to think how often this insane thing has happened.

The last section of the memorial is dedicated to the children who were killed. I guess if you're planning to eliminate an entire people, you have to kill young and old. This was the saddest and most disturbing part of the whole memorial. I was alone in the rooms dedicated to the children. An entire room would be dedicated to 2 kids. There would be a big picture of a child. Underneath, there was a plaque reading: Name:, Favorite food:, Best Known For:, Age:, How they were killed: It was horrible. As the exhibit progressed, the kids got younger until the last few were less than a year old. Most were murdered by blunt force or machete.

I walked out of the place, glad I'd brought my hat and sunglasses. Then you are confronted with the mass graves. The place is very quiet and peaceful. I guess its hard to be loud in a place which makes you think so much.

As I left the memorial, I was back in Rwanda. Living here for almost 3 months and immediately after visiting the memorial, its still hard to link these 2 things. Even after seeing photographs, watching videos and hearing stories, its still impossible to imagine. Its hard to believe that nearly every Rwandan I've met here has gone through that horrible tragedy.