SCARS

It was always going to be difficult to gage the scarring left after the ‘94 genocide before actually arriving here. The scars are physical, mental and now appear to run deeper into the Rwandan society. It’s difficult to talk in generalizations and of course I have been here less than a month so I cannot be taken as any form of authority. I also must state that I speak for myself and nobody else and I speak as though to friends and family to whom I give this blogger address.

It is perhaps easier to talk of the physical scarring I see all around me. Beggars in Tanzania were formed mainly of street children, those in Guadeloupe appeared ruined by rum, those in London/Oxford/Portmouth were the homeless, and those in Senegal appeared wracked by extreme poverty or disfigured by polio. In Rwanda, the vast majority who tap at bus windows and reach out on the streets of Kigali are seemingly healthy and often young. Save two lost limbs. Two hands no fingers. Eye sockets no eyes. Arms to elbows and no more. Stumps for hands, elbows, knees, fingers. Crutches. Walking or dragging oneself around on hands as legs have been cut off at thigh level. These people are healthy save these mass intentional disfigurements and can only have been caused by machetes, blades, knives and mass frenzy. Who can ever know the internal scarring? Who can know the real story behind the laughing woman on my bus last Friday who had a two centimetre wide scar running from ear to mouth?

The less visible scarring appears to have resulted in a type of ‘English stiff upper lip’ syndrome. We are advised and asked not to ask too many questions, not to go to local trials, not to ask ‘divisionistic’ questions about ethnicity or political leaning or actions. People talk in terms of ‘before’ and ‘after’, sometimes mentioning ‘the war’. The word genocide never existed in Kinyarwanda before 1994. People are firmly Rwandan, not Hutu or Tutsi, though I have heard the term ‘Hutsi’ used once. They are often shy and reserved – lacking the vivacity of the Congolese or the openness of the Tanzanians here. Once again, I speak in generalizations all of which have exceptions and will be hotly debated, especially as despite the reserved nature of many, there is an intense self-awareness and I have often been keenly asked how I find Rwandan people – and my response – whatever it may be is often analysed and related in terms of genocide.


MEMORIALS

I promise not to dwell, but I want to note this, even if just for my benefit. As part of our in-country training we went to the main memorial site in Kigali – with thirteen mass graves, a museum and witness accounts, photos and heart-wrenching videos. It is easy to think of war or violence in terms of figures, economics and blame. Lives lost, numbers trialled, guilty parties, important dates... However, the memorial used this kind of almost blasé style of reporting in their memorial devoted to children’s lives lost to incredible effect.

Name; Agnes Age; 4 Favourite food; chips How killed; Macheted whilst in mothers’ arms.

Or, stabbed in both eyes then heart, or, as with a 9 month old baby; slammed against a wall. But, with this raw basic style of reporting, the starkness only makes it more shocking. The question of how though hovers over everything.