The G-word

Back then in January when I started telling people I would go to Rwanda for my work, almost everyone made the same face. It's that face you make when somebody tells you that tonight you'll be eating in a 5 star restaurant having steamed mice meat accompanied by mashed leeches with a cockroaches syrup. It's that combination of surprise and disgust, mixed in with a little bit of shock. And they all repeat that word slowly, as if they haven't heard it right: "Ru...wan...da?!?!?"

And that is for one single reason only. What happened back then in 1994. Yes, it has been 14 years ago and it lasted about 100 days, but most people seem to have that image stuck in their minds as if today it is still a daily thing. Well, actually it still happens sporadically in the very remote villages. I am, of course, talking about the genocide. There's no way you can do a blog on staying in Rwanda and not touching this subject at all. I will not start with a history lesson here, apart from saying that it is a lot more complex than the simple version of Hutu's trying to wipe out Tutsi's. For starters, they executed their own as well.

I'll admit, apart from watching Hotel Rwanda a few years ago, I actually did not know much about the story. Back then when it happened, I had just started my first job at the bank in Curaçao. That island is already not known for its focus on world affairs and the fact that the story was barely told outside this country didn't help either. I could've - and probably should've - read up on it before coming here. In the end, it didn't matter that much, as once you get here, you're knowledge on the subject will quickly be updated, as it still dominates life over here.

Not that people talk about it much. Quite the contrary, but prosecution of the leaders is still going on, some hard-liners are still hidden in the jungles of D.R. Congo, a lot of campaigning is done to ensure this never happens again and of course, many people here lost close family members. Some lost all of them.

Some three weeks ago I visited the Kigali Memorial which is a 'museum' dedicated to tell the story, to educate on the subject for prevention purposes and to bury the unidentifiable bodies still found today. It is a large two story house with a very well kept garden. The ground floor tells the story of the genocide starting with the colonisation and how the different occupants contributed to the division between the Hutu's and the Tutsi's. It is mostly text, photo's and a few 2 minute video interviews with survivors. In the centre are two different rooms. One with a large collection of family portraits of victims and the second with mainly bones coming from dug up mass graves. A bit eerie.

The second floor is a collection of small rooms, each dedicated to a different genocide in the history of the world. Obviously there is one dedicated to the second world war, but also to the killing fields of Cambodia and the fairly recent Serbian acts of genocide. Yes, Europe is actually quite the 'leader' on the subject. Oh yeah, there's also one room dedicated to the Turkish acts in Armenia some 100 years ago. Yes, while European governments are disputing among themselves and with Turkey whether or not to label it a genocide, it seems that the Rwandans have already officially made up their minds.

Then April 7th is Genocide Memorial day. The entire country goes into some sort of mourning. It's a countrywide funeral and everybody attends. Restaurants and bars close, sport activities are put on hold and people are quite subdued. My hotel even drains the swimming pool and closes the gym for the entire week. It is an extensive and lengthy commemoration, probably also due to the fact that people have different days in which they lost their family members.

There are calls out there suggesting that it has been a while ago now and that the people should start looking forward and not mourn the past any more. At least not to this extend. It's a tough and sensitive subject and let's face it! 14 years is not that long ago. It is less than a single generation! By comparison, how many years has the second world war been commemorated?

Well, whatever the result of that debate, the genocide is still very much a subject today. Just two weeks ago was the 4th annual Rwandan Film Festival. They quite appropriately named it Hillywood. The head of the organising committee announced that this year it would be less 'heavy' as previous years and they would even have "some comedies programmed". Well, some colleagues and myself attended most of the evenings and studied the entire programme, but the only comic part about the festival was the state of the technology used. Programmes printed after the festival, screens that waved in the wind, copied or - more likely - downloaded movies with Dutch (!) subtitles and an inflatable screen that simply did not inflate.

And the movies were all on sub-Sahara Africa and what happens or happened there. Let's face it, not much of it is great material for a comedy. Also, as a film-maker said with some disappointment, they do not get subsidies to make non-historical movies. The American and European NGO's that provide the funds have objectives to educate and confront the viewers, more than to stimulate the art of film making in Africa.

In the end I only watched one movie. It was on the subject of - obviously - the genocide. It is called Shake Hands with the Devil and it is the story of the Canadian United Nations General at the time of the genocide. It describes mostly how he, his staff and soldiers, the UN and the local and international political community acted during these 100 days. It is based on his autobiography and a very insightful story, especially from a political standpoint.

Other movies on the subject are, of course Hotel Rwanda and Shooting Dogs. The later is called that, because that's all the UN soldiers were authorised to do. They shot the dogs that were feeding themselves on the rotting corpses lying on the streets... In the first week I also met a French film crew, which had been here for months and were shooting a movie on the role of the French before and during the genocide. It is not a pretty story. The working title - and probably the release title as well - is Operation Turquoise.

For the time being, many persons will still make that face when hearing of coming here. That will change at some point, as this is a nice country with some very nice people. True, a lot of them did not-so-nice things back then and the country has been trying to deal with it since. They've abolished the registration of tribe on identity cards and spend a lot of energy in education. As a friend of mine here said, when asked whether he was Hutu or Tutsi: "We are all Rwandans".