The Land of a Thousand Hills

Muraho! Hello!

Two weeks ago today, I returned from the beautiful Land of a Thousand Hills. After being rather overwhelmed with all the various things I needed to catch up on (I was two weeks behind in two summer graduate courses, as well as getting ready to move to another house in just over a month, etc!), I am making myself take some time to reflect and share with you, my friends.

My plan is to post a blog daily this week so as to recount to you some of my experiences, thoughts, and feelings.

Rwanda took me by surprise. Its indescribable beauty, the rolling hills that were covered in wisps of mist, the lush greenery, its lakes and rivers, its rich tracts of banana plants and corn, all of these things captivated me. With temperatures being in the realm of the 70s and 80s, it was neither too hot nor too cold. It was close to any sort of consideration of paradise.

Kigali, the capital, a city of red tin roofs nestled on the hillside, bustling with tranquil and peaceful activity.

I fell in love with the country!

However, my spirit was clouded by a dark, incomprehensible specter that constantly and painfully fluttered in the back of my mind. I had done my research before arriving in Rwanda. I knew of its painful history and especially that of its looming neighbor, the Democratic Republic of Congo. I knew how conflict in Rwanda had flooded its banks and brought about two large-scale wars in the Great Lakes region of Africa. One of these conflicts has been called Africa’s World War and is said to have ended at least five million lives. However, these facts and figures were merely flickering in the database of my memory as I instead drank in the heavenly refreshing landscape of beauty.

During our first full day in the city of Kigali, our team was shuttled in our make-shift tour bus/van across a bridge as we trekked over the hilly landscape to our lunch location. While crossing the bridge, I heard the tour guide remark, “From this bridge, this is where they threw many bodies…” What?! I was jolted from my state of blissful contemplation by that dark specter and wrenched to the harsh reality. This bridge was a bridge of death. A place of horror and indescribable suffering. It was where evil meted its torment and reaped its harvest. 


As the bus barreled over this non-descript bridge, I attempted to no avail to at least somewhat grasp the enormity of the tour guide’s remark. But how could I even situate such a piece of cursed fact in a mental context of one who has never experienced conflict beyond the bickering and infighting of fellow employees in a college setting and the gossip and power struggles within Christian ministries and churches?

My spirit continued to be clouded by the lurking shadow which demanded a response to the question: How did such earthly beauty produce the unspeakable carnage of hate, fear, betrayal, and ultimately, genocide?

We finally reached our destination: Hotel des Mille Collines, Hotel of a Thousand Hills. For those of who are familiar with the movie, this was the setting of the film Hotel Rwanda. This is where a hotel worker bravely saved over a thousand bereaved souls who were threatened with extermination during the fateful days of the Rwandan genocide. And here we were, about to have a nice, rather luxurious luncheon at a place where hope met fear and battled for supremacy in the hearts and minds of those who were once sheltered here. The irony.

From there we drove to the most emotionally charged site of our tour that day: the Kigali Memorial Centre. I will not dwell too much in my description. But it was a jarring experience to say the least. We walked through the building and were told by the tour guide and by the words, pictures, and videos placed on the walls of the center the story of the Rwandan genocide. 1,200,000 murders of Tutsis and moderate Hutus. Neighbor killings neighbors. Children being chopped by machetes. For the first time in my life, I was confronted with rows upon rows of human skulls. Only glass separated me from the remnants of a shattered life. There was a room dedicated to hundreds of personal photographs of the people killed in the genocide. There were clothes put on display with blood stains still apparent on the fabric. Each skull, each photo, each garment told a horrific story of how a beautiful life was lost. Then, there was the children’s section of the museum. Once again, photos of children and several plaques, each describing a child’s story: a name, an age, a favorite food, a favorite game, dreams for the future, and a description of the manner the child was murdered. These children were either hacked by a machete, killed due to the unwilling abandonment by their murdered parents, drowned, left in the fields to be taken care of by the elements and wild animals, and so on.

Outside of the memorial building, the atmosphere of horror and shock became that of eerie quiet and sorrow. I walked in a beautiful garden carved on the hill side. The garden was dotted with at least ten if not more, large, rectangular, cement blocks. These were mass graves. In all, at least 250,000 people are housed in these cold, cement blocks. There were fresh flower baskets and bouquets of roses and white lilies that were carefully and lovingly set on these blocks. The sign stated “Please do not step or sit on graves.” Wow. My spirit wept while my eyes stayed dry and my face stoic. I could hardly understand all that I was seeing and hearing.

My spirit heavy, I left the memorial and waited while the others continued to finish their tour.

While contemplating, I saw a group of bright yellow flowers. I walked over in order to brighten my countenance. Then I saw one of the flowers hanging directly over the gutter that ran next to the flowerbed. That is Rwanda, I thought. The beauty of Rwanda soaked in a muddy bloodbath. Now this flower is trying to bloom again. A beautiful, bright flower hanging over a dark, dirty sludge of waste and filth. And yet, still it bloomed.

And this was my first full day in Rwanda.

Murakoze, thank you for reading, my friends!

Eric