I forgot to write about two things relating to Semiliki NP in the last entry.
1. In December there was an outbreak of the ebola virus in the area. I didn't find this out until I was already there, and you can imagine how comforting this was to discover. It's contained, apparently, but if my internal organs start hemorrhaging than I will not hesitate to seek medical attention.
2. The Semiliki area is home to one of Uganda's two groups of pygmies. The other group is around the Rwanda, DRC, Uganda border area, and while they're ethnically similar, the two groups are apparently quite different culturally. The group I visited are basically part of a Congolese group in its easternmost extension. I'd heard that its quite weird, somewhat depressing to visit them, but I was in the area and my curiosity got the best of me. I had not wanted to visit them because I think visiting them is kind of like treating them as freaks, and you have to pay, and I don't like the idea of having to pay to see someone. Paying, in my opinion, adds to the feeling that you're at a circus show. In the end my curiosity got the best of me, and supposedly the money does help the communities.
So, the visit was short, and while I don't regret it, I don't think it was meaningful in any sort of way. They all want you to buy their handicrafts, and if you pay even more they'll do a dance for you. The pygmies are small, but not dwarf small, you'll see in my pictures when I post them. Traditionally they lived in the rainforest and hunted the animals, but since the creation of the national park they've been kicked off this land and forced into a govt. built village. Until an agreement was made that gave a certain percentage of park revenue to the community there was quite a bit of tension as you can imagine. Today they are allowed to hunt again in the forest, although not the chimps, elephants, or buffalo. The King of the village showed me his home and his stash of opium, which he was quite proud to show me. They are also allowed to legally grow marijuana, and smoking it is part of their cultural traditions. Not sure about opium, but I doubt they smoke it legally, but I sincerely doubt there's any enforcement of the law in this community. All they wanted was for me to give them money, so after a little bit of walking around I decided it was enough and headed out. The pygmies are discriminated against, often robbed by neighboring communities, their women are often sexually assaulted by neighboring communities' men. In fact the large number of rapes, and subsequent pregnancies in some cases has meant that genetically the pygmies are becoming more and more mixed with non-pygmies, with implications regarding the future of the community. It's small in any case, no more than a few hundred. So their situation is not great, and they'll probably continue to struggle in a last of ways for the foreseeable future.
ate logo, B
Monday, June 9, 2008
Chimpanzees hate me
Hi all, hope everyone's doing well. I'm writing again from Fort Portal, in western Uganda. I've spent the last several days visiting a few national parks in the area. First off, I hate speed bumps. As my parents will attest, I've said for years that if I was ever dictator of the world the first thing I would do is outlaw speed bumps. Uganda is speed bump crazy. You get sets of five in a row, separated by only a foot, and than sometimes they add an enormous one that makes you come to a complete stop. They're everywhere, and I detest them with an exceptionally strong passion. The other thing I'd like to complain about to start out this post is how dangerous the minibus drivers are. On my way back to Fort Portal from one of the national parks I felt so unsafe that I just tapped on the ceiling, the signal to stop and let someone out, in the middle of nowhere about 30k away from Fort Portal. I really thought I might die if I stayed in the bus, and although it took me over an hour before I was able to stop someone to take me to Fort Portal, it was well worth it.
Having said my piece on the drivers and speed bumps I would like to state that I think if Herzl had visited Uganda (did he? I really have no clue, but I'm assuming he didn't) he would not have turned it to down as a Jewish homeland. The country is beautiful, has huge amounts of water, and has really friendly people. Having said that its neighbors, Sudan, DRC, and Rwanda, amongst others are maybe not that good of a trade off from Israel's current ones, and I'm not sure how friendly the Ugandans would be if they lived in a Jewish state. Regardless, I've only been here for a week and half, but the country has made a strong impression on me already.
So, the first national park I visited is called Semiliki NP, and it encompasses the only true tropical rainforest in Uganda, which is also the easternmost stretch of the Congo rainforest. It's technically part of the Ituri rainforest, but that rainforest is just an extension of the Congo. The park is between the Semiliki river, which is also the border with the DRC, and the Rwenzori mountains in the east, which can reach 5k meters in height. The views going there are amazing, and there are some cool geysers and hot springs in the park. It's too hot to go in the water, upwards of 100 celcius, but you can get right to the edge. I just went hiking there for a long day, and although there are forest elephants, forest buffalo, chimps, lions, leopards, etc... I didn't see a thing. It's not expected that anyone on a casual hike will as the foliage is pretty dense.
After Semiliki I spent two days at Queen Elizabeth National Park, which is a few hours south of Fort Portal. It's a savannah landscape, and one of the best places to see animals in Uganda. On the drive into the park I saw buffalo, a big group of elephants, and other antelope, small game stuff. The park is bordered also by the Rwenzori mountains, and through the middle of the park are Lake Edward and George, connected by the Kazinga channel. Lake Edward is also the border with DRC in this area, and where the Semiliki river starts. The channel between the two lakes is where you can take a boat trip to see the gazillions of buffalo, hippos, crocs, birds and other small game along the shore. I also saw a few elephants and a hyeena. It's cool to see these animals, but I still prefer plants. At night in the park its pretty cool though because you hear the hippos going nuts and other birds, and there's just a ton of noise in general. The next day I tried again to see chimps in a small gorge in the park where there is a habituated group. Again, I spent hours going through the forest, but saw no chimps. The guide thinks they had left the gorge and went on to the savannah to find fruit. I seem to be particularly bad at seeing chimpanzees. I've got some good pictures, and when I get to Kampala I'll upload them to some albums.
Before I head to Kampala I'm going to spend a few days in an area with some crater lakes, which is supposed to be nice. The hiking is supposed to be great, and you just wander from lake to lake and pass villages on the way. My favorite hikes are the ones where you just wander through rural areas with small farms and villages, and where the kids love to come out and see the mzungu. So it should be some nice hikes around the lakes, and I'll probably stick around there until the end of the week when I'll head east to Kampala.
The place I'm staying at in Fort Portal is really an NGO helping AIDS orphans and children with AIDS, and they run the hostel to support the organization. The women in charge is originally from Maui, and has been exceptionally nice to me. She's given me all sorts of advice and helped me get to these parks without paying a fortune. She also has this amazing library, and I've been reading quite a bit. She had another Elechi Amadi book, The Great Ponds, which is very good. He's a Nigerian author who I randomly bought one of his books in Zambia and really enjoyed it. I also read Chinua Achebe's Anthills on the Savannah, which is excellent. I ready his most famous book Things Fall Apart in high school, which is very, very good. I read The Hours, which is an amazing book, and when I get back to Israel I'll have to get the movie on DVD, and finally I read a book called We wish to inform you that tomorrow you will be killed with you families. It's a book about the Rwandan genocide, and its very difficult to read, but its very, very, very well written. I highly recommend it if you want to learn about the genocide. He also goes into the aftermath of the genocide as it affected the DRC, which is the part of the story that nobody really knows a thing about. I would try to finish a different book tonight before I leave the place, but there are two really good soccer matches on tonight in the Euro 2008 tournament.
Well, I'll post again once I'm in Kampala, when I hope to have links to picture albums available as well.
tchau, B
Having said my piece on the drivers and speed bumps I would like to state that I think if Herzl had visited Uganda (did he? I really have no clue, but I'm assuming he didn't) he would not have turned it to down as a Jewish homeland. The country is beautiful, has huge amounts of water, and has really friendly people. Having said that its neighbors, Sudan, DRC, and Rwanda, amongst others are maybe not that good of a trade off from Israel's current ones, and I'm not sure how friendly the Ugandans would be if they lived in a Jewish state. Regardless, I've only been here for a week and half, but the country has made a strong impression on me already.
So, the first national park I visited is called Semiliki NP, and it encompasses the only true tropical rainforest in Uganda, which is also the easternmost stretch of the Congo rainforest. It's technically part of the Ituri rainforest, but that rainforest is just an extension of the Congo. The park is between the Semiliki river, which is also the border with the DRC, and the Rwenzori mountains in the east, which can reach 5k meters in height. The views going there are amazing, and there are some cool geysers and hot springs in the park. It's too hot to go in the water, upwards of 100 celcius, but you can get right to the edge. I just went hiking there for a long day, and although there are forest elephants, forest buffalo, chimps, lions, leopards, etc... I didn't see a thing. It's not expected that anyone on a casual hike will as the foliage is pretty dense.
After Semiliki I spent two days at Queen Elizabeth National Park, which is a few hours south of Fort Portal. It's a savannah landscape, and one of the best places to see animals in Uganda. On the drive into the park I saw buffalo, a big group of elephants, and other antelope, small game stuff. The park is bordered also by the Rwenzori mountains, and through the middle of the park are Lake Edward and George, connected by the Kazinga channel. Lake Edward is also the border with DRC in this area, and where the Semiliki river starts. The channel between the two lakes is where you can take a boat trip to see the gazillions of buffalo, hippos, crocs, birds and other small game along the shore. I also saw a few elephants and a hyeena. It's cool to see these animals, but I still prefer plants. At night in the park its pretty cool though because you hear the hippos going nuts and other birds, and there's just a ton of noise in general. The next day I tried again to see chimps in a small gorge in the park where there is a habituated group. Again, I spent hours going through the forest, but saw no chimps. The guide thinks they had left the gorge and went on to the savannah to find fruit. I seem to be particularly bad at seeing chimpanzees. I've got some good pictures, and when I get to Kampala I'll upload them to some albums.
Before I head to Kampala I'm going to spend a few days in an area with some crater lakes, which is supposed to be nice. The hiking is supposed to be great, and you just wander from lake to lake and pass villages on the way. My favorite hikes are the ones where you just wander through rural areas with small farms and villages, and where the kids love to come out and see the mzungu. So it should be some nice hikes around the lakes, and I'll probably stick around there until the end of the week when I'll head east to Kampala.
The place I'm staying at in Fort Portal is really an NGO helping AIDS orphans and children with AIDS, and they run the hostel to support the organization. The women in charge is originally from Maui, and has been exceptionally nice to me. She's given me all sorts of advice and helped me get to these parks without paying a fortune. She also has this amazing library, and I've been reading quite a bit. She had another Elechi Amadi book, The Great Ponds, which is very good. He's a Nigerian author who I randomly bought one of his books in Zambia and really enjoyed it. I also read Chinua Achebe's Anthills on the Savannah, which is excellent. I ready his most famous book Things Fall Apart in high school, which is very, very good. I read The Hours, which is an amazing book, and when I get back to Israel I'll have to get the movie on DVD, and finally I read a book called We wish to inform you that tomorrow you will be killed with you families. It's a book about the Rwandan genocide, and its very difficult to read, but its very, very, very well written. I highly recommend it if you want to learn about the genocide. He also goes into the aftermath of the genocide as it affected the DRC, which is the part of the story that nobody really knows a thing about. I would try to finish a different book tonight before I leave the place, but there are two really good soccer matches on tonight in the Euro 2008 tournament.
Well, I'll post again once I'm in Kampala, when I hope to have links to picture albums available as well.
tchau, B
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Health Spa in Uganda
I'm writing from Fort Portal in western Uganda. For the first time on this trip I'm in the Northern Hemisphere too. After Kigali I went to a beautiful lake just over the border in Uganda called Lake Bunyoni. I had heard about this place from other folks even in Mozambique, and its reputation is well deserved. It was formed when a volcano rose up, blocked a river, and the flooded valleys now form the lake. Because its basically a damned river there are lots of inlets and its shape is quite weird. There are dozen or so islands in the lake too, and I stayed several days on one of them.
I stayed on Nature's Prime Island and I basically was in a de facto health spa for three days. The food is super healthy and very good. Other than chicken, its vegetarian, and even the rice is brown rice. Lots of vegetables, fruits, and I ate really well. Since they had almost no guests they put me in their nice cabins for the price of the tents, so I had this great queen size bed with a hard mattress. It's probably the best bed I've slept on since I've been here, and my back greatly appreciated it. Today's bus ride has taken away any of those benefits, I'm sure, but for a few days it was nice. There's basically nothing to do on the lake, but you can take out dugout canoes as long as you want, and there's great hiking. There's no real forest, everything is developed farmland, but you can walk between farms and villages as much as you want. The hikes are tough, as they go up and down valleys, but the views are spectacular. So I went hiking and canoeing for three days and got some really good workouts out of it. The canoeing is really not easy for someone not used to it, because these are not fiberglass stable canoes most of us are used to. It takes all your stomach muscle power just to stay balanced, and its a good challenge. I did a little canoeing while on lake malawi, which has even less stable canoes, and also in Zambia, so I'm starting to get the hang of these things now. So for three days I ate super healthy, slept on a great mattress, and hiked and canoed all day. Outside of having a masseuse I don't know what else a health spa would have. Lake Bunyoni is considerably cheaper than a spa too, so I think I got a good deal out of it. I had some of the best days of my trip on the lake, and I'm pretty sure I'll come back for a few more days before I leave as well.
I also met a few cool folks on the lake, include one guy who is an aid worker for CARE International in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). I basically heard some of the most disturbing things a human being could ever imagine, and got rid of any desire I might have had to the Congo. The whole area I'm in now borders the DRC and its stunning, and the parks on the Congolese side are massive and not visited at all. But, there's no way I'm going over there now. It's a shame, because the tourism potential in that country is really strong, and maybe one day they'll see a good amount of folks.
So, the place I'm in now is a good base to see the surrounding national parks. The whole region is marked by huge volcanoes and mountains, many of which are over 15k feet and snow covered. There are tons of animals, hot springs, cloud forests, and great hiking. Tomorrow the owner of the hostel I'm staying at is going to help me organize visiting the various parks over the next week+ without paying the rich mzungu prices. It should be some of the coolest stuff I see on the trip.
One thing I will not be able to see are the mountain gorillas, which occupy four parks in the world. Two are in Uganda, one in Rwanda, and one in DRC. Interestingly enough I've seen advertisements for the park in Rwanda saying they have half of the gorillas left, and each park in Uganda also claims to have half the population left. The one in the Congo probably says something similar, leaving a few mathematical problems to be resolved somewhere. To see the gorillas you have to get a permit, which cost 500 dollars. The demand is extraordinary, and there's a waiting list to get a permit. They could double the price and still get plenty of folks. In general, Africa is catered to very rich tourists. Part of this is due to a lack of basic infrastructure. Its not easy to get from place to place due to horrible roads, bad public transportation, and a lack of mid priced accommodation. So people spend huge amounts of money to be driven around in private jeeps and stay at really, really high end lodges in remote places. This is why it costs 80 dollars to be in Mahale Mountain park for every 24 hours, and in general seeing wildlife becomes a very costly experience. Until the general infrastructure improves many places in Africa will probably continue to go in the direction of high end tourism only. It's unfortunate, but not surprising.
Internet is not that fast, and I understand only Kampala and that area has fast internet, so it'll probably be another week or two weeks before I post pictures, but you'll get plenty at that point. Hope everyone's doing well, and I'll try to write again soon.
tchau, B
I stayed on Nature's Prime Island and I basically was in a de facto health spa for three days. The food is super healthy and very good. Other than chicken, its vegetarian, and even the rice is brown rice. Lots of vegetables, fruits, and I ate really well. Since they had almost no guests they put me in their nice cabins for the price of the tents, so I had this great queen size bed with a hard mattress. It's probably the best bed I've slept on since I've been here, and my back greatly appreciated it. Today's bus ride has taken away any of those benefits, I'm sure, but for a few days it was nice. There's basically nothing to do on the lake, but you can take out dugout canoes as long as you want, and there's great hiking. There's no real forest, everything is developed farmland, but you can walk between farms and villages as much as you want. The hikes are tough, as they go up and down valleys, but the views are spectacular. So I went hiking and canoeing for three days and got some really good workouts out of it. The canoeing is really not easy for someone not used to it, because these are not fiberglass stable canoes most of us are used to. It takes all your stomach muscle power just to stay balanced, and its a good challenge. I did a little canoeing while on lake malawi, which has even less stable canoes, and also in Zambia, so I'm starting to get the hang of these things now. So for three days I ate super healthy, slept on a great mattress, and hiked and canoed all day. Outside of having a masseuse I don't know what else a health spa would have. Lake Bunyoni is considerably cheaper than a spa too, so I think I got a good deal out of it. I had some of the best days of my trip on the lake, and I'm pretty sure I'll come back for a few more days before I leave as well.
I also met a few cool folks on the lake, include one guy who is an aid worker for CARE International in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). I basically heard some of the most disturbing things a human being could ever imagine, and got rid of any desire I might have had to the Congo. The whole area I'm in now borders the DRC and its stunning, and the parks on the Congolese side are massive and not visited at all. But, there's no way I'm going over there now. It's a shame, because the tourism potential in that country is really strong, and maybe one day they'll see a good amount of folks.
So, the place I'm in now is a good base to see the surrounding national parks. The whole region is marked by huge volcanoes and mountains, many of which are over 15k feet and snow covered. There are tons of animals, hot springs, cloud forests, and great hiking. Tomorrow the owner of the hostel I'm staying at is going to help me organize visiting the various parks over the next week+ without paying the rich mzungu prices. It should be some of the coolest stuff I see on the trip.
One thing I will not be able to see are the mountain gorillas, which occupy four parks in the world. Two are in Uganda, one in Rwanda, and one in DRC. Interestingly enough I've seen advertisements for the park in Rwanda saying they have half of the gorillas left, and each park in Uganda also claims to have half the population left. The one in the Congo probably says something similar, leaving a few mathematical problems to be resolved somewhere. To see the gorillas you have to get a permit, which cost 500 dollars. The demand is extraordinary, and there's a waiting list to get a permit. They could double the price and still get plenty of folks. In general, Africa is catered to very rich tourists. Part of this is due to a lack of basic infrastructure. Its not easy to get from place to place due to horrible roads, bad public transportation, and a lack of mid priced accommodation. So people spend huge amounts of money to be driven around in private jeeps and stay at really, really high end lodges in remote places. This is why it costs 80 dollars to be in Mahale Mountain park for every 24 hours, and in general seeing wildlife becomes a very costly experience. Until the general infrastructure improves many places in Africa will probably continue to go in the direction of high end tourism only. It's unfortunate, but not surprising.
Internet is not that fast, and I understand only Kampala and that area has fast internet, so it'll probably be another week or two weeks before I post pictures, but you'll get plenty at that point. Hope everyone's doing well, and I'll try to write again soon.
tchau, B
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Mazal Tov!
Today is Ela Gruber's first birthday, and I want to wish her a very happy birthday.
a big birthday hug, Ben
a big birthday hug, Ben
Rwanda
Hi all, hope everyone is well. Happy birthday to Shara, Shani, and Andi. Also, Jodie, you're an absolute angel for the videos you made. Thank you so much for doing it, and thanks to everyone in them as well.
Also, if you notice in the top right of the blog is a link to a google map. I've made a map showing my route so far with a few placemarks for some notable locations. The link stays the same, and I'll update it with each blog post, at least in theory.
So, its late here in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, and the nice rececptionist at my hostel is letting me use their internet for free right now. She's currently fascinated watching Fear Factor dubbed in French. I've spent the last week here in Rwanda, and I've had a very good time, but I haven't been blown away as I have been in other places. When you see places like Lake Tanganyika, Lake Malawi, remote corners of Zambia, its tough to be super impressed with everything you see. Having said that Rwanda is a very pretty country, and its history and its present are very interesting too.
I took a bus from Bujumbura straight to Kigali and planned on staying a few days in teh capital, but decided to leave for Lake Kivu the next day. Before leaving for the lake I went to the Kigali Memorial Center, which is the main memorial center for the Rwandan genocide. Its a very well done memorial and museum and very moving. There's a section on genocides in other parts of the world that was very well done too.
I'm not going to go into any details of the genocide, but there is one thing I found fascinating about the aftermath. There were more than half a million prisoners, its a country of just over 9 million, after the genocide. That's clearly too much for the court systems to handle. An international court was set up in Tanzania and it prosecuted the top people responsible for the genocide. What was set up for the rest is quite interesting. The traditional village court is called a Gacaca, pronounced gachacha. It means grassy area, and its basically a tribal elder sitting in an open grassy area, listening to all sides and making his decision. The government decided to let the Gacaca deal with the vast majority of the cases, and they're still going on today, 14 years after the genocide, although they're mostly done at this point. What happens is the prisoner goes before the Gacaca, any surviving victim tells the elder what happened. The prisoner has a chance to defend himself, but mostly they admit to what they did and repent. The elder than decides a punishment, which can range from building someone a house, a monetary settlement, and jail time. However, since there are just too many prisoners for the Rwandan jail system to take, most people don't go to jail.
The system is considered revolutionary as a way of applying traditional justice systems to a national western system. Prisoners can appeal the gacaca sentence to the main system if they choose. Since the village elder is so well respected, it is a way for the victims, Tutsis, to feel that they can continue to live in that village, and that a form of justice has taken place. Its crucial for any kind of reconciliation in the country, and remarkably, reconciliation in Rwanda is considered a success. The country is rebuilding in an impressive fashion from the disaster the country was in after the genocide. There is construction going on everywhere, although most of it is in the capital, and they have a pretty progressive government that is investing heavily into education.
I learned all of this from the memorial center, and meeting my new Rwandan friend Burt. At the lake, while waiting to use the internet, I met Michelle, an American on her honeymoon with her Rwandan husband, Burt. After talking to them for a while they invited me the next day to one of his friends weddings and afterwards to a coffee plantation, which I told them I was interested in seeing while in Rwanda. They're the nicest people, and the next day we went off to this wedding. I went to what's called a State ceremony, which is the official legal ceremony, and the equivalent of going to city hall in the US. Each Thursday you can go to your village justice center, and a govt. member presides over the ceremony. Both the husband and wife have to have one hand on the flag, one hand in the air, towards God, and recite some official vow. If they screw up they have to start over. A few of the people had to start over several times inciting huge laughs from the crowd. Initially, I felt very uncomfortable being there, but it was clear pretty quickly it was more than ok for me to be there, and it was quite an experience. Most people, after the state ceremony, have a traditional wedding ceremony and if they're christian, which most folks are, they have a church ceremony as well.
Lake Kivu is very pretty, quite forested, and I had a nice few days swimming and enjoying the lake. I spent a few days in a town called Kibuye, where I met Michelle and Burt, and than moved up to the more famous resort town of Gisenyi for a day. Gisenyi is full of huge villas, and is quite a bit more developed than Kibuye. It also borders the Congolese city of Goma, which has suffered quite a bit. It was the scene of a lot of fighting in the Congolese war of the past decade, and a few years ago a volcano exploded covering half the town in lava. That same volcano could easily cover Gisenyi too. Lake Kivu is also interesting in that it has a lot of methane coming out of it. People have died when huge amounts came out, and people basically died of CO2 poisoning while swimming in the lake. Its a risk, but not a big one. There is a methane power plant in the lake, the only kind in the world, which converts the methane in the lake into energy.
Well, I came back to Kigali today and went this evening to the Hotel de Milles Collines for a jazz concert. This hotel is better known as Hotel Rwanda, and it was pretty cool to see it. When I was interning at the Carter Center I met Paul Rusesabagina, the person Hotel Rwanda is based on that Don Cheadle played, and so it was fitting that I would finally see the actual hotel. The concert was quite a dissapointment. It was actually just some cover band playing more blues rock than anything jazz. They did one cover of Take 5, but outside that it was blues rock, and not very good either. The place was pretty empty and most people there were older mzungus(white folks), so not quite what I expected.
Tomorrow I go to Uganda, specifically to Lake Bunyoni. Even in Mozambique I heard from other travellers about this lake, and its supposedly one of the most beautiful anywhere. I could stay there a few days, maybe a few weeks. I'll get there and figure it out, and besides getting to the lake I have no other plans. Its just over the border from Rwanda, so I only have a few hours on a bus.
Hope everyone is doing well, and I'll try to write again soon.
ate mais, B
Also, if you notice in the top right of the blog is a link to a google map. I've made a map showing my route so far with a few placemarks for some notable locations. The link stays the same, and I'll update it with each blog post, at least in theory.
So, its late here in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, and the nice rececptionist at my hostel is letting me use their internet for free right now. She's currently fascinated watching Fear Factor dubbed in French. I've spent the last week here in Rwanda, and I've had a very good time, but I haven't been blown away as I have been in other places. When you see places like Lake Tanganyika, Lake Malawi, remote corners of Zambia, its tough to be super impressed with everything you see. Having said that Rwanda is a very pretty country, and its history and its present are very interesting too.
I took a bus from Bujumbura straight to Kigali and planned on staying a few days in teh capital, but decided to leave for Lake Kivu the next day. Before leaving for the lake I went to the Kigali Memorial Center, which is the main memorial center for the Rwandan genocide. Its a very well done memorial and museum and very moving. There's a section on genocides in other parts of the world that was very well done too.
I'm not going to go into any details of the genocide, but there is one thing I found fascinating about the aftermath. There were more than half a million prisoners, its a country of just over 9 million, after the genocide. That's clearly too much for the court systems to handle. An international court was set up in Tanzania and it prosecuted the top people responsible for the genocide. What was set up for the rest is quite interesting. The traditional village court is called a Gacaca, pronounced gachacha. It means grassy area, and its basically a tribal elder sitting in an open grassy area, listening to all sides and making his decision. The government decided to let the Gacaca deal with the vast majority of the cases, and they're still going on today, 14 years after the genocide, although they're mostly done at this point. What happens is the prisoner goes before the Gacaca, any surviving victim tells the elder what happened. The prisoner has a chance to defend himself, but mostly they admit to what they did and repent. The elder than decides a punishment, which can range from building someone a house, a monetary settlement, and jail time. However, since there are just too many prisoners for the Rwandan jail system to take, most people don't go to jail.
The system is considered revolutionary as a way of applying traditional justice systems to a national western system. Prisoners can appeal the gacaca sentence to the main system if they choose. Since the village elder is so well respected, it is a way for the victims, Tutsis, to feel that they can continue to live in that village, and that a form of justice has taken place. Its crucial for any kind of reconciliation in the country, and remarkably, reconciliation in Rwanda is considered a success. The country is rebuilding in an impressive fashion from the disaster the country was in after the genocide. There is construction going on everywhere, although most of it is in the capital, and they have a pretty progressive government that is investing heavily into education.
I learned all of this from the memorial center, and meeting my new Rwandan friend Burt. At the lake, while waiting to use the internet, I met Michelle, an American on her honeymoon with her Rwandan husband, Burt. After talking to them for a while they invited me the next day to one of his friends weddings and afterwards to a coffee plantation, which I told them I was interested in seeing while in Rwanda. They're the nicest people, and the next day we went off to this wedding. I went to what's called a State ceremony, which is the official legal ceremony, and the equivalent of going to city hall in the US. Each Thursday you can go to your village justice center, and a govt. member presides over the ceremony. Both the husband and wife have to have one hand on the flag, one hand in the air, towards God, and recite some official vow. If they screw up they have to start over. A few of the people had to start over several times inciting huge laughs from the crowd. Initially, I felt very uncomfortable being there, but it was clear pretty quickly it was more than ok for me to be there, and it was quite an experience. Most people, after the state ceremony, have a traditional wedding ceremony and if they're christian, which most folks are, they have a church ceremony as well.
Lake Kivu is very pretty, quite forested, and I had a nice few days swimming and enjoying the lake. I spent a few days in a town called Kibuye, where I met Michelle and Burt, and than moved up to the more famous resort town of Gisenyi for a day. Gisenyi is full of huge villas, and is quite a bit more developed than Kibuye. It also borders the Congolese city of Goma, which has suffered quite a bit. It was the scene of a lot of fighting in the Congolese war of the past decade, and a few years ago a volcano exploded covering half the town in lava. That same volcano could easily cover Gisenyi too. Lake Kivu is also interesting in that it has a lot of methane coming out of it. People have died when huge amounts came out, and people basically died of CO2 poisoning while swimming in the lake. Its a risk, but not a big one. There is a methane power plant in the lake, the only kind in the world, which converts the methane in the lake into energy.
Well, I came back to Kigali today and went this evening to the Hotel de Milles Collines for a jazz concert. This hotel is better known as Hotel Rwanda, and it was pretty cool to see it. When I was interning at the Carter Center I met Paul Rusesabagina, the person Hotel Rwanda is based on that Don Cheadle played, and so it was fitting that I would finally see the actual hotel. The concert was quite a dissapointment. It was actually just some cover band playing more blues rock than anything jazz. They did one cover of Take 5, but outside that it was blues rock, and not very good either. The place was pretty empty and most people there were older mzungus(white folks), so not quite what I expected.
Tomorrow I go to Uganda, specifically to Lake Bunyoni. Even in Mozambique I heard from other travellers about this lake, and its supposedly one of the most beautiful anywhere. I could stay there a few days, maybe a few weeks. I'll get there and figure it out, and besides getting to the lake I have no other plans. Its just over the border from Rwanda, so I only have a few hours on a bus.
Hope everyone is doing well, and I'll try to write again soon.
ate mais, B
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