Flash of Reality

We arrived midday in Kigali after an hour long bus trip over the border and through lush green hills of tea on winding roads. Everywhere so far has been nice and cold, especially the evenings. A good change from sweating everyday.

Our first stop in Kigali was the Hotel des Mille Collines. I'll let you do the research, but it was made famous during the Rwandan Genocide in 1994 housing thousands of refugees.

We explored more of Kigali and found a great mall. Overall a wonderful first impression. Even the motorcycle taxis carry helmets for the passengers. A rare sight in Tanzania.

The next day we met another fellow Canadian who joined us on the way to the Kigali Memorial. The memorial looks new and the road leading up to it as well. Inside is the history and details of the horrific event that took place in 1994 along Outside, mass graves surround the building. The hardest part of it was to walk through a separate wing of the memorial dedicate to children who lost their lives. It described their favourite foods, their personality and then...how they died - by machete. It was very hard to walk through and see all the tiny faces, the last pictures that relatives had of these kids.