Kigali- (Nyamagabe) (Day 27)

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Yves had told us about a memorial we should see and since we didn't have any plans we decided to do it today. We took the bus at 10:30am and were supposed to be in Nyamagabe at around 1pm. The busride turned out to be a real adventure. Firstly we almost had an accident, because a boy with a bike full of jerrycans rode directly in front of the bus without looking. There were only a few centimeters left between him and the bus. Next we stopped in Huye where we had to get on a different bus. The bus wouldn't go though. It turned out that two (white) tourists wanted to take their dog with them, but the bus driver didn't want to take the animal with him. After half an hour he changed his mind and took them, too. Only 5 minutes a huge fight escalated between the driver and the passengers. They were arguing and Nellie and I just sat in the middle not understanding a word. I really had to pull myself together so I wouldn't start laughing, because the situation was so bizarre. As it turned out there was some misunderstanding between the driver and the passengers and some of them had bought wrong tickets or something like that. The fourth thing that happened was a huge oiltruck lying on the street with oil spilled all over the place. With an hour delay we finally arrived in Nyamagabe. We took motos to the memorial and it turned out we were the only ones visiting. A guide showed us the outside after we had been through the inside exhibition. It was a school building in which 50,000 Tutsis were killed. In some of the "classrooms" the preserved bodies of some victims were displayed. I was standing only centimeters away from them and could've touched them since there was no glass or fence or anything as a seperation. In the end the guide showed us a grave where children had been buried alive. We were just shocked and couldn't say anything. It is unbelievable what people can do to each other. Also it was an experience we could never have in Europe. I didn't take any pictures, because I felt it would be disrespectful, but if you google "Murambi Memorial" you'll know what I saw. We then went back to the city and I decided to eat something before we started our journey back to Kigali. Going into the first restaurant we saw we had noone there speaking English or French. Eventually a man came to us and when I asked what they had to eat he said: "Bread and beans" I told him I would take that and was quite confused when I had a plate in front of me with meat and platane. Well, I mean the colors were kind of the same... At 4:30pm we took the bus back and this time it all went smoothly. Back in the hotel we played some Skip-Bo and then went out to meet Yves at a bar. We asked him what he did in his free time with his friends and his answer was very amusing to us: Whenever they have some money they leave the city and get a goat to slaughter and beer. What a party! When we returned to our guesthouse we went to sleep quickly since it had been a loooong day.

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