Confronting my emotions (or lack thereof) at memorials

With over 265 genocide memorials scattered around Rwanda, it was virtually inevitable that our class would be paying visits to a few. With that in mind, I tried to mentally prepare myself for the handful of killing sites, mass burials, and museums that I would see––a concept that later proved faulty. I ended up learning the hard way that you can't expect yourself to emotionally respond to things in a certain way, even when they seem patently grim. In truth, the more I found myself wanting to feel sad at the graphic imagery and victim-remains on display at these memorials, the more distant I felt from my psyche entirely.

The first memorial we visited during week one was the Gisozi Genocide Memorial in Kigali. Overall, this one was easier to walk through due to the familiar museum-style setup. After watching a ten-minute long video that briefly relayed the stories of three Tutsi survivors, our class shuffled through a historically chronological exhibit of Rwanda's timeline. Various posters, infographics, and photographs followed the genocide from inception to reconciliation––most of which we had already learned from general lectures on Rwandan history.

The next room was adorned with hundreds of photographs displaying the faces of innocent Rwandans killed during 1994. I found myself awkwardly trying to connect with every photograph and felt guilty for allotting unequal amounts of time to gazing at each one. Have I stared at this picture for too long? Have I looked at this one's face long enough? Am I a bad person for not sobbing right now?

The truly difficult part of this site was the children's room. Enlarged black and white portraits of around two dozen children aged 1-17 who were killed in 1994, hung depressingly on the wall. Underneath each photograph were five facts about the children: name, age, likes, dislikes, and cause of death.

"Nadia, age 8, enjoyed chocolate, milk, and music. Liked jogging with her dad. Hacked by a machete."

Something about reading the favorite foods and toys of a blameless child juxtaposed with their violent demise, didn't sit so well with me. I thought of my two little brothers––about the foods they snack on, the things that make them laugh, how tiny and vulnerable their juvenile bodies are.

About a week later, we visited two church killing-sites in Nyamata and Ntarama. These were places where large groups of Tutsis sought refuge thinking death wouldn't find them under the protection of god. With easy access to vast amounts of Tutsis in single locations, churches instead became infamous epicenters for mass-murder by the interahamwe. Around 5,000 people were murdered at Ntarama and 10,000 were killed at Nyamata.

In both memorials, the churches were filled with one thing in common: clothes. Piles and piles of the final garments worn by victims were stacked on church pews and hung drearily along the walls. It conjured up memories of my first visit to the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C.; I still remember gaping at the mountains of shoes belonging to millions of lifeless Jews.

The fabrics at the churches were stained with age and bodily fluids. I couldn't help but look for blood––as if I needed to see evidence in order to justify and imagine the violence that occurred. I was infuriated at myself for how selfish that effort seemed, for somehow trying to quantify suffering that didn't belong to me.

Oddly enough, the church site at Nyamata was surrounded by modern-day primary schools. Interpreting atrocity whilst being surrounded by pure joy can only be described as bizarre in my opinion. My eyes were looking at bloodied superhero T-shirts fit for six-year-olds, yet my ears were hearing the distant laughter of kids playing outside at recess.

We entered a Sunday school building at Ntarama where children were viciously massacred by the dozen. The brick room was much like all of the others with clothes, papers, books, money and other victims' possessions strewn about. On the back left corner however, a large brown blotch, the size of a window, stopped me in my tracks. It was unmistakably a bloodstain. Our guide later informed us that it was a tinted portion of the wall marking where children were smashed to death at the hands of their killers.

Most of the sites had human remains in the forms of bones, skulls, and coffins. It was only at the Murambi Genocide Memorial during our trip to Butare that we were met with preserved bodies (I'll come back to that later). The thing about seeing skeletal remains of the human body, is how little I relate to them. I find it incredibly difficult to conceptualize skin over a femur bone or hair atop a skull. As a result, I ended up staring at the pieces of white cartilage, and thought of them artifacts and objects, not people. There is however something to be said for the sturdiness of bones in the context of the Rwandan Genocide. Machetes were the main weapons of choice for murder, and I kept thinking of how hard one must've had to swing their blade in order to cut through such a solid body part.

The Murambi Genocide Memorial in Gikongoro, is one of the most well-known around the country for a few reasons. One, it was the site of 40,000 Tutsi deaths (with only 34 survivors), and two, it's probably the most beautiful place I've ever set foot in. I don't consider myself to be particularly religious, but this place was truly Hollywood's manifestation of heaven. I don't think I knew what green grass or blue skies were until visiting Murambi.

The story of this killing site is a little different. It was a technical school selected by Hutu extremists specifically for its location amidst mountains making it an optimal spot for trapping Tutsis in a central area. Tutsis on the run were lured to Murambi with the promise of French protection, food and water. Instead, they were starved and dehydrated before being completely massacred at the hands of the interahamwe on April 16, 1994. The bodies were buried hastily in mass graves on the premises, some of which were covered by the French with volleyball courts.

The Murambi memorial is comprised of several buildings––the first being a more traditional background information/self-guided exhibit on Rwandan Genocide history. The other buildings housed dozens of preserved bodies, frozen in their final contorted positions. Most of the bodies were a chalky white due to powdered lime preservation, but several still appeared to have the tiny characteristics of viability: tufts of hair, teeth, even fingernails. They reminded me a bit of the preserved bodies in Pompeii, not peaceful or resting like mummies, but rather twisted and writhing with outstretched limbs and curled hands.

Another room was dedicated to the most well-preserved of the Tutsi victims. Due to extreme heat underground in the mass graves, these ones were naturally preserved to have a leathery, more skin-like texture and color. Unlike the powder lime bodies from before that were left in the open, these were encased in glass tubes, making the room feel more like a laboratory than a memorial. These were more troublesome to look at, but I couldn't not look at them. I don't know if this was due to the disturbing nature of the subjects or because I was so curious. Every muscle on each of the bodies looked so strained. I think it made me realize how much of a luxury composed death is.

Each tube had an estimated age and a predicted cause of death, which in most cases, seemed to be “blunt force head trauma.” Some of the children's bodies had more grisly aspects such as severed achilles and knee lacerations––most likely an attacker’s attempt to render victims-on-the-run immobile. As soon as I exited the room to congregate with my peers on the bus, a familiar feeling of guilt and confusion overcame me once again.

This is supposed to be devastating right? Yes Helen, people died here, so many people, you should definitely be feeling sad, so why aren't you crying?

Instead of faking an emotion that I simply wasn't feeling, I sat in my discomfort and decided: this too is a reasonable response to the vast majority of information I just consumed in such a short amount of time. Ultimately, trying to place myself in the shoes of Tutsis who died at Murambi, seemed both unproductive and insensitive. I could never relate to those atrocities nor access that pain and frankly I don't think I have the right to. Memorialization isn't a question of empathy or sympathy, it's a matter of recognition.