On Tuesday, we said goodbye to Peace and everyone at the Umbumwe Hotel, and headed back to Kigali. We were initially in a bit of a rush, because Archbishop Kolini wanted to meet with us and discuss the project, but just as we were about to be late, Jodi called to say that Kolini wanted to meet later. What a relief that was! In America, we say “Slowly but surely!” In Africa, they say “Slowly but slowly!” It certainly fits.
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- Riding through Kigali
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- Reid, Jarret, and Jon with Gorilla
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- Lunch at Des Mille Collines (Hotel Rwanda)
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- Street in Kigali
After we got to Kigali, we had lunch at the Hotel Des Mille Collines, which was the actual hotel that inspired the movie Hotel Rwanda. After touring the Des Mille Collines, we walked up and down a few of Kigali’s hills, and found a couple of interesting markets. But, we also saw that dramatic differences existed in Kigali, with the slums pressing up against the tourist district, and many people who looked like they might have lived in Bigogwe recently.
On Wednesday, we toured Kigali and the surrounding areas, looking at different memorials of the genocide. One of these memorials was within the city, because it commemorated all the people within the city to be victims of the genocide, many of whom were buried on the grounds of the memorial compound.
In the afternoon, we visited another site outside of the city, Ntrama Church. In 2007, I had visited the same site, and it shows the still-present marks of the genocide. Almost 5,000 people were slaughtered in and around the church. The bones, clothes, tools, and blood of the victims are still in the church, to show just how terrible the genocide was, and to show the Western World what happened to Rwanda as the rest of humanity turned a blind eye.
