Harder things.

On Friday I went to visit the National Genocide Memorial.

Most officially get out of work shortly after noon here, and I also had befriended through my research a Zambian doctor at IntraHealth who was also new to Rwanda.      

     

He told me the week before that he wanted to go see this memorial as all those who come to Rwanda do out of respect.  However, both our work schedules being highly demanding (his even more than mine) we found ourselves desiring rest more than anything.

So when we finally met up for lunch last Friday and found ourselves en route the memorial, the visit was a month overdue. We picked up flowers, as was the custom, to lay upon the mass graves and arrived at the memorial only ten minutes later. It was very close to town and not far from where we both worked.

Sometimes I wish I could say I was a Rwandan when it comes to dealing with these kind of things. And to be honest, when I say dealing with, I don’t really have to deal with anything. I did not lose anyone, I did not witness the brutal massacres of my parents, or the screams of my sisters in water tanks and wells. Rwanda is not my land, or my people.

Sometimes I wish I was older in 1994. Older than four so that maybe, I could have been a doctor by then. Or even a peace keeper who broke the rules. Who decided that Kofi Annan did not, and could not have the last words on human lives he was not there to witness perish. I try to stop myself from thinking like this, but sometimes I still do.

I am angry, so angry, as I stand there in front of the large cement block with no trace of who lay underneath it. My Zambian friend attempts to comfort me, but even he knows there are somethings in life one can never fully explain. He is much wiser, and older than I and soaks in the pain of the memorial like oak tree with its roots so deep one can only wonder how the water is still soaked up down there.

I told him I only cry when I am confused. And I hope he understands. I feel I stupid in front of the few other straggly visitors that afternoon. Crying like I had something to cry for. I tried so hard to stop, I bit my lip. Who goes to the genocide memorial on a Friday afternoon anyways?

Inside, I soaked in every detail of what I saw. The colors of faces in photographs and names. It made me feel better the more I knew, as if I had made some sort of effort. That I was less ignorant than the four-year old who had no clue.

I watched a school of Rwandans being guided through and they passed me and stared. And then I felt really out of place. I think they must have concluded, for logics sake, that I must at least be Ugandan.

I could not go into the room with bones. On display like the dinosaurs in natural history museums. Except nothing about this was natural. Once again this did not make sense, and made me want to cry.

I left and felt hollow. Rwandan ceases to humble me. To have created from ashes and levels of trauma even the DSM could not encompass, a country that is whole again.

I could not explain to Candy how I felt because once again nothing made sense, nor did I think my feelings mattered much now. But I think my Zambian friend and I could agree on one thing as we shook hands to depart back into our separate lives, we have to go back. And we no matter our work schedules, we could not forget now.

Maybe in a month or so we will go back, and try to make sense of things again.