Murambi Genocide Memorial Centre

December 11^th, 2023

I contemplated going on a guided hike near Nyungwe Forest (to avoid paying the park fee) and then visiting the Murambi Genocide Memorial Centre in the afternoon.  It was an overcast morning that looked like it would rain.  The hike would have cost $30 USD which seemed overpriced to me, so I was glad that I kyboshed that idea and decided to head a bit earlier to Murambi.  I should have left even earlier as the heavens opened up and it started to pour.  I waited for 20 minutes and it seemed to let up a bit.  I had a view down the road and saw a bus coming.  Supposedly they only come once an hour, so I decided to make a dash for it.

 

Even with my small umbrella, I ended up getting my pants wet, but it was no big deal.  I hopped on the bus and it took about 50 minutes to arrive in Murambi.  There I took a boda boda the 2.5 km away from the main road to the Murambi Genocide Memorial Centre, which is the other of Rwanda’s two UNESCO World Heritage Sites (the other one being the Nyungwe Forest).

The place looked deserted as I walked through the gates and uphill through the cobblestoned parking lot towards the main building.  Turns out it was very quiet…I was the only visitor so far that day.  I was greeted by Stanley, a museum curator and later I found out a researcher as well.  He gave me a five-minute general overview about the Rwandan Genocide and about this area specifically.  I was just finishing university at the time in the spring of 1994 and I heard about the genocide happening in Rwanda but really didn’t pay much attention to it…unfortunately along with a lot of the Western world.  What happened is absolutely shocking and unfathomable.

The main building:

After Stanley’s summary, he told me that there were a few different segments to the memorial and the first was the museum.  Stanley followed me, or stood in the shadows, as I read the numerous wall displays depicting the history before the genocide, the events leading up to it, the major players, the horrific killings and the aftermath.  At any time, if I had any questions, Stanley was there to answer them.

 

The genocide started on April 7^th, 1994, the day after the president of Rwanda Juvenal Habyarimana and also the president of Burundi were killed as their plane was shot down as it was landing in the capital Kigali.  Habyarimana was actually a Hutu and it will never truly be known who was behind his assassination but the general consensus is that it was other Hutus who wanted to pin the blame on the Tutsis in order to have an excuse for the genocide.

 

I should back up a bit.  So, without trying to explain the whole reason for the genocide, thanks to some meddling from the Belgians, who had been the previous colonialists before Rwanda gained its independence in 1961, there became a bigger division between the ethnic groups of the area.  The Hutus were the majority, about 85% of the population, while the Tutsis were 14% and the Twa, 1%.  For a while, the groups were defined by how many cattle they owned.  More than 10, you were a Tutsi.  Less than 10, a Hutu, and if you had nothing, you were the lowly Twa.  Later there was a determination based on height and physical features such as the width of your nose.  If you were taller than 167 cm, you must be a Tutsi, shorter a Hutu...etc.

  

The Hutus essentially became jealous of the Tutsis and soon propaganda started to flow, depicting the Tutsis as the “cockroaches” of Rwanda.  Incredibly, there were these 10 Hutu Commandments with items like: 

• Every Hutu should know that a Tutsi woman, whoever she is, works for the interest of her Tutsi ethnic group. As a result, we shall consider a traitor any Hutu who:
• o   marries a Tutsi woman
• o   employs a Tutsi woman as a concubine
• o   employs a Tutsi woman as a secretary or takes her under protection.
• Every Hutu should know that every Tutsi is dishonest in business. His only aim is the supremacy of his ethnic group.
• The Hutu should stop having mercy on the Tutsi.

 

Crazy stuff.  This was broadcast repeatedly on the radio.  Additionally, weapons such as machetes, guns and grenades were purchased over a few years from Egypt, France and some other countries in preparation of the elimination of the Tutsis.

 

Back in university, I remember hearing about Romeo Dallaire, who was the Force Commander of the UNAMIR, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Rwanda, in late 1993.   Dallaire could see some signs that there was trouble ahead, but his calls for help fell on deaf ears at the UN.  When it did kick-off, Dallaire did not have the forces and equipment to stop the killing of hundreds of thousands of Tutsis and Hutu sympathizers.  Tragic.

 

A few months ago, I visited Dachau, one of the Nazis concentration camps in Germany.  What I found shocking was the rawness of the Rwandan genocide versus the Nazi’s attempt to implement their final solution against the Jews.  The Germans were very clinical and methodical whereas the Hutus were simply barbaric and chaotic in trying to eliminate the Tutsis.  People who had been neighbours and even long-time friends picked up machetes and hacked their companions to death…absolutely crazy.

Okay, back to my visit at the memorial.  After the museum section, Stanley took me outside where there was a large hole in the ground that was covered by a tent awning.  This was one of many mass graves dug in attempt to hide the killings.  This one was left open, although the bodies had been removed, as a reminder of the atrocities that had happened here.

 

We continued around the back of the main building and walked down a stone path that ran between 6 or 7 pairs of buildings, one on each side of the walkway.  The layout reminded me a bit of the barracks of Dachau, but I had to remind myself that these were classrooms.  However, what was in these classrooms turned out to be more horrific than the reconstructed bunks of the WWII prison camp that I had visited.

 

Stanley took me into the first room which had shelves of clothes and shoes that had been worn by the victims when they were slaughtered.  Incredibly sad, but it was the next room that was tougher to digest as it contained about twenty mummified bodies on tables about 3 feet high with two by fours spaced out about 3-4 inches apart.  They are preserved using lime.  The first thing that struck me was the smell.  German Julie who told me about this place had mentioned this to me, but I was still shocked.  I immediately had to breath through my mouth as I tried to comprehend what I was looking at.

 

The bodies were barely more than skin and bones and were mostly white in colour.  All of them were in slightly different positions, I gather based on how they were buried in the mass graves.  There were men, women and sadly children, as young as a few years old.  The odd one had a beaded necklace or bracelet or even a piece of clothing such as a t-shirt or underwear.

This is not my photo, as taking photos is not allowed.  I got these from Wikipedia.

I exited the first room and Stanley solemnly asked if I wanted to continue.  I felt that I should, almost out of respect for these people whose lives had been cut short.  Room after room, it was the same horrific sight, but yet different.  These were individuals.  I tried to look at each one, and not just scan over them.   I noticed that there were quite a lot of tall skeletons…reinforcing that idea that Tutsis were the tall ones in the general population.   One cadaver really caught my attention.  It was a woman who was curled up in a fetal position with her arms around her head, as if she was protecting herself from an imminent machete blow.

After the sixth, and final room in the building, Stanley and I returned to the main path.  There were a few polished stone slabs with the names of 50-100 people.  Stanley explained that these were some of the organizers and main perpetrators of the genocide.  It was here that I realized that he wasn’t just a guide at the memorial but also a researcher.  They are still trying to determine those who have yet to be prosecuted for their crimes against humanity and those who were victims.  He pointed out a few of them to me.  “Number 15, he is still in jail.  Number 38, he is living in England somewhere…”  That was shocking to hear that some of them have escaped having to pay for their crimes.

I never did see this room, although it doesn't look as bad as the rooms that I did visit.  This is also from Wikipedia:

Stanley explained that the next building we would enter contained some bodies that had not been preserved with lime.  I didn’t quite understand why, it sounded like they were seeing what the best way was to preserve them but that didn’t quite make sense either as we are now almost 30 years on from the genocide.  Anyways, the room felt more sterile, but more macabre, as there were two rows of eighteen “capsules” raised about five feet above the floor.  The capsules were these plexiglass cylindrical tubes, about 7-9 feet long with a 3-foot radius.  Inside each was a platform holding a cadaver.  Like an exhibit in a museum, there was a small placard off to the side describing the sex, estimated age, injuries and probable cause of death.  The first 4-5 bodies had not been coated in lime to preserve them and therefore there was more detail to observe of the corpse.  Many of them displayed a machete wound to the head and a few of them had severed tendons in their legs, a way that the perpetrators could immobilize their victims while they tortured or raped them.  It felt like I was in some mad scientist’s laboratory. 

 

At the end of the classroom buildings, the path turned towards the perimeter of the property.  There was a square, flat grassy area marked out with some red and white concrete curbs.  Closer to the perimeter of the school yard, the grass was full of mounds and depressions, almost like there had been artillery shelling from a past war.  In fact, these were where more mass graves had been buried.  After the 100 days of the genocide, a French peacekeeping force was brought in under what was called Operation Turquoise.  Supposedly the French military had set up a volleyball court on that spot (denoted now by the red and white concrete curbs) which is still a sore point for the Rwandans, and understandably so.  You could just imagine that a ball hit out of bounds would have rolled down, over the mass graves still filled with genocide victims…how disrespectful

 

We made our way back along the opposite side of the grounds towards the main building.  Lining the path, ragged concrete pillars stuck out of the ground about 8-10 feet and spaced out about 2-3 feet apart.  Leaning up against the perimeter fence were these black, thin rectangular slabs with a list of names of the victims on them.  At first, I figured that it was a new addition to the memorial, and they hadn’t finished it yet.  It turns out that it was relatively new, and they had erected some of the stones between the concrete pillars but strong wind had blown some of them down and smashed the slabs.  I saw the evidence of a few of the shattered memorial stones…how sad.  Hopefully they’ll figure it out.

 

I thanked Stanley for his attention, knowledge and time, made a donation to the memorial centre before making my way back to the Kitabi Eco-Centre.

On my way out:

On my way back on the motorcycle taxi, and later that evening, I swear I smelt that lime/decaying body smell.  I sniffed my shirt wondering if that had picked up the scent, but it had not...I think it was just in my mind.

It was an educational, sobering yet very important visit.