Monday morning: Jonathan has classes to teach. Molly, Philip and I set out to explore the city, change money, and get passport pictures. Changing money is truly a trip. It turns out that no one in Rwanda will accept any bill that is dated prior to 2000. While we knew to make sure that each and every bill was intact, with no creases or cuts, it somehow slipped out of my consciousness that Laura had told us we could only use post-2000 currency. Hence, about half of our money was useless. The other half was in $20 bills. While you can get a decent rate of exchange at the Four Ex (the foreign exchange bureau of choice), that is only true if you are exchanging $100 bills. $20's are considered lesser currency, to be low-balled. So our first exercise in bargaining was to work the rate back up to something approaching reasonableness.
We decided to apply for permission to attend the Gacaca hearings on Saturday, after our return from an expedition to the mountains to see the mountain gorillas. This was an amazing process. Our first task was to procure passport pictures and photocopies of our passports, then report to Daria, the person at the church who knew what to do next.... More about this later.
We took a city tour, 4 hours, one of the best tours I have been on in any city of the world. They gave us time at all the right places, and covered the city and the issues in the most meaningful way. We began at the Belgian Soldiers memorial, the place where the 10 Belgian "blue hats" were killed while attempting to protect the vice-premier after the premier's plane had been shot down, the opening act in the genocide.
We then visited the home of Richard Kant, the first German governor, a very learned and respected man who loved Africa. He situated the capital at Kigali by figuring the exact center of the country, measured from all angles. The city encompasses 3 mountains. Two of them had names that were too hard to pronounce, so the city was named for the third, Mt Kigali. He had a beautiful home in the hills.
From there we went to the genocide memorial. Beautiful gardens, with a sense of peace. Another Viet Nam memorial type wall, again with some names, and long blank spaces crying to be filled in with the unknown names of the hundreds of thousands of unknown victims killed in Kigali. Inside, the story of Rwanda's history, the genocide, and events leading up to it. There was a Children's room, personalized: photo, name, favorite thing: "David: loved football, made people laugh, wanted to be a doctor, killed by machete." Lisa, infant: favorite food: mother's milk, favorite person, mom, thrown against wall". The last room was pictures. Many people gave the last picture they had, and sometimes it was taken long ago, for example John, pictured as a 7 year old, but died at 17. Many of the pictures were splattered with blood.
The genocaires made sure as many people as possible were implicated in the deaths. Every family
had either victim/perpetrator/collaborato
We saw the government buildings, then stopped at a craft market, a coop that had been moved off the streets and given land by the government to operate together on the outskirts. Wonderful workmanship to the goods. We vowed to return, and did so on Saturday afternoon with Laura.
Tuesday: Philip and I continued the application process for the gacaca hearings, thus exploring the bureaucracy of Kigali. Molly began work. Daria sent us downtown (a 20 minute cab ride) to the general revenue office to pay 1200 francs (about $6) and get a stamped receipt to take to the gacaca application office -- located on the other side of town, another 20 minute cab ride away. At the pay office: 3 lines, none moving, about 5 people ahead of us in each. We took our place in line, patiently waiting, until Charles, our driver entered. He was apparently not feeling as patient as we, because he took my hand and literally dragged me to the front of one of the lines, thrusting me in front of the first waiting person, who objected vocally. They got into an argument, but Charles would not give way, and prevailed. I faded back and shoved Philip forward to take the glares of the displeased. Apparently this is the way that mazungas get preferential treatment in Kigali, and they do.
Upon leaving the revenue office, we headed to the Gacaca office via Ethiopia Airlines. We had begun trying to buy airline tickets from Addis Ababa to Lalibela on Monday. On our first trip to the office we could not book the tickets because the computers were down. Our second trip took place over lunchtime. I did not have my glasses on, and thus did not see the "closed for lunch" sign and walked right past the armed guards and into the office where a lovely lady proceeded to take time off from lunch to make the booking. Meanwhile Philip, who had stopped to run an errand, saw the closed sign, armed guards, and spent a frantic half hour searching downtown Kigali for me. However, I could not purchase the tickets because the airline would not accept a credit card; nor would it accept my cash, because it was dated prior to 2000. Thus, we had to return to pay. So we tried to, only to be told that the computers were down. Actually, the man behind the counter went on to say that the computers were not turned on nationwide until 2 p.m., so we should return after that. We explained that we would not be around then, so he put the tickets on hold for us to purchase in Addis Ababa on Sunday. Maybe not efficient, but certainly courteous and ready to make life easy for us.
Back to the Gacaca application: We arrived at the office, across from the soccer stadium where the UN peace-keeping forces were quartered. The official in charge said there were three categories of people allowed to attend: journalists, researchers, and observers. Somehow we missed hearing him mention observers, so we decided to fill out the application with me as a researcher, Philip my assistant. We started to take the application and leave, when the official asked where we were going, and offered us the use of his computer to write up our proposal. He helped us log on, gave ideas, and reviewed everything as we wrote. At the end of 20 minutes, we had developed a concept of a course on the subjects of Rwanda, genocide, and the truth and reconciliation process; and my loyal researcher had added to this the components of a web page for world-wide viewing. I actually have hopes of trying to give some lectures on our experiences, if possible. Clearly, as all of you receiving these letters can tell, we feel compelled to share what we have seen and witnessed.
The application itself was remarkably thorough, focussed, and fair, asking all the appropriate questions about background, research plan, how the project would further the interests of both the researcher and the Rwandan people. I found myself drawing on all my lifetime of experiences -- under publications going back to migrant articles and court management and administration of justice reports. Also cited our ongoing support of the Africa Great Lakes Initiative (through support of Laura's work over the past two years) and our contacts with the problems through her work. Our friendly official looked everything over and told us to return the next day and pick up our credentials.
From the moment we left the office we began brainstorming the sort of seminars we should give -- and any application form that can draw that sort of response from people is truly good.
On the way home, Philip decided to buy clothing from the market -- a truly unforgettable experience! Everyone shoving their wares in his face; many of the stalls had their own cartel, keeping their rival cartels clothing out, while drawing pants and shirts of all styles and colors from their friends. No one willing to bargain at all on price until we got in the car to drive away. A total zoo!
From here on until Saturday, the tales will be fun! We set off to see the gorillas tomorrow morning.
Sarel and Philip