Upsetting last day
Trip Start
Jan 22, 2008
1
65
79
Trip End
Aug 22, 2008
Kigali,
Rwanda
Sunday, July 13, 2008
We got a Atraco minibus from the main bus station/Sotro tours from taxi park(600Frw - 60p for an hour drive) to Ntarama and got off the bus where there was a big sign to the memorial and walked 20-30mins along the main dirt road to the church where 5,000 people were masacred.
The Kigali memorial centre website state
"Ntarama Church is the site where some of the most brutal killings of the 1994 Rwandan genocide took place. The church at Ntarama was seen as a safe place by almost 5000 people, many of whom were women and children and who went there for sanctuary. But Ntarama was not a safe place. The victims of the genocide remain there, their bones still strewn with lifeless chaos where they fell nearly ten years ago. Their belongings cover the floor; clothes, suitcases, - the last remnants of a desperate flight for life."
We saw a brick church with bouquets of flowers at the front, peoples possessions and clothes stacked up at the sides and then at the back where skulls and bones that were found in the church. This somehow did not hit home or wasn't deeply upsetting until a maybe 30 year old guy came up to us and told us how grenades were thrown into the church and people came in with maschettes and killed everyone except 10 people who hid under other peoples bodies and he was one of them. I could not believe that he worked in a place that must cause him so much pain on a day to day basis. To speak to a survivor made the place so real... words cannot really describe ....
As we were leaving a military colonel came to the site (briefly) and asked if we wanted a lift to Nyamata, which meant we did not have to walk back and get a minibus since he dropped us right to the door of the church memorial - we were really greatful.
At Nyamata there is a church where around 2,500 people were killed. Once again someone told the Hutus that people were hiding in there and people came to massacre them. The church is full of peoples clothes and behind it there are some mass graves that you can walk down into and see the coffins covered in purple and white silk and many skulls and bones. Another truely moving memorial.
