Both churches were in the Bugesera district, an area about 30 minutes outside of Kigali. The first was in Nyamata; 4,000 were killed here but I honestly don’t know how 4,000 people fit inside that tiny one-room church! We were given a tour by a genocide survivor, all in Kinyarwanda. Our taxi driver went in with us and tried to translate, but his English is very limited. Besides, for something like this, there’s only so much translation that you need … or want.
As we entered, we found piles and piles of clothes drapped over the benches/pews; some of the piles were so large you couldn’t see the bench underneath them. They belonged to those who were killed. I think this is the point where all of a sudden, a wall went up for all 3 of us to perhaps shield us from the potentially overwhelming emotions that result from seeing something like this. In the middle of
the room, we walked down some steps into a small basement type structure where there were shelves of skulls and bones of the victims, as well as caskets drapped in purple – the official genocide memorial color. It was hard to really look at them, but the glances were still enough. In some of the skulls, we found arrows; others were almost completely cracked in two, probably the result of a machete. Outside, we found more memorials and “graves.” At one point in the “tour” we even got a demonstration by our guide of how the weapons were used. I know it sounds horrible, but I had to try hard not to laugh. I think maybe it was nervous laughter I could feel surfacing. I mean, it was just so surreal … standing in front of this man who witnessed so many deaths in the way he was re-enacting. Dried flowers were everywhere, probably placed there during the memorial week in April by loved ones. And everything was so quiet … it was a peaceful kind of a quiet, but at the same time a haunting kind of quiet. 
The second church, located in Ntarama, was a lot of the same. This one, however, wassmaller but supposedly was the site of 1,000 more deaths than the previous church. It seems impossible. Really, how could so many people fit in such a small place? Instead of clothes on the benches, they were draped on the walls and in the rafters above. People’s belongings were still there as well, belongings they had brought with them thinking they would stay for a couple days and wait out the madness. Dishes, books, papers, toys, even mattresses. The priest’s quarters beside the church had been cleared out to collect the overflow of remains of people that are still being found today. Both churches were in the middle of a village, one deeper into the village than the other. As we drove through it, I tried to imagine the people who lived there both then and now. What must have been going through their minds as they ran to the church, seeking refuge? Did they have any hope? Did they know that it was a lost cause? How many bodies did they have to step over on their way? Did they have to fight to get in the door of the church? Did they all enter at once or did new neighbors come every day? And then, what is life like in the village for those that live there now? Surely they are haunted every day by the memories. Could I live in a place where something so horrible happened just steps away? How many of these people returned to their original homes? How many homes are still empty to this day?
How many normal lives are these people living? Not just in Nyamata and Ntarama, but in Kigali and Rwanda as a whole. How can life ever be normal after something like they experienced? Perhaps it never will be. But perhaps people have no choice but to live “normal” lives, even if the normalcy is forced. Anything else is just too hard to live with. Is that okay? Is it acceptable? That’s been a question I’ve been wrestling with since I’ve been here, and I’m not sure I’ll ever find the answer.
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