August 2009
7 posts
8 tags
I’m leaving on a jet plane…
Don’t know when I’ll be back again… Which is what makes leaving Rwanda so difficult. Over the past ten weeks, I have made great friends and had “wonderful moments.” This experience would not have been possible without the support of so many friends, family members and colleagues. Thank you to… everyone who donated to help me get to Rwanda; Georgetown for its very generous “Improving the Human...
2 tags
Check out this song by Kamaliza called...
5 tags
A Rwandan Name
In our final meeting, Kabera pulled out an invitation from a large folder. “It is for our 13th anniversary celebration. You will not be here, but I wish you could be. His Excellency will most be our guest of honor. It will be a very special day for AERG.” Kabera has dedicated a tremendous amount of work to this event that will take place on August 13th at Amahoro Stadium in Remera. He will...
4 tags
2 tags
One Man's Word... →
Interesting article about Benoit Kabayiza, a Rwandan man, accused of genocide, living in the U.S. The story highlights many of the controversial issues behind gacaca and justice today in Rwanda. I’m pretty sure I don’t have the answers, and there seems to be little concensus here about what to do in cases like Benoit’s.
H/T: Katelin
July 2009
32 posts
4 tags
5 tags
5 tags
4 tags
"You have made us go boom"
Mussolini and Francis, one of his ALSAR colleagues who is also a landmine survivor, met with me yesterday evening to go over the work they have done on their web site and their organizational documents. We have been working on their site over the past two months.
In our past meetings, I had given Mussolini a hard time for being late, but yesterday, he arrived before I did. “Being on time is...
7 tags
3 tags
CNN on Gacaca →
This CNN article gives a nice overview of the gacaca system, its advantages, and the problems it must confront. You can listen to Kagame justify gacaca here.
5 tags
The Fate of R2P? →
Given some of the issues I’ve been learning about and seeing firsthand in Rwanda (as well as Congo and Burundi) which I have discussed on my blog recently, the idea of R2P - the Responsiblity to Protect - raises some interesting questions. At the UN, the utility of R2P is under examination. The Economist article above provides a nice context and varying perspectives. What do you think? ...
7 tags
4 tags
3 tags
A Trip to Rwanda
In an attempt to not reinvent the wheel, here’s a bit about my trip to Gisenyi with Laura and Bryan (my fellow SC fellows) and my housemate, Parker…
lauragordon:
After Bujumbura, Kigali came as a major culture shock. Rwanda’s roads are well known among old East Africa hands, but it still comes as a shock every time. Riding the taxi-moto, I kept bracing myself for the potholes that...
2 tags
WatchWalking back from a day at the beach, we came upon some Rwandan acrobats in the midst of a complex and quite impressive routine.Walking back from a day at the beach, we came upon some Rwandan acrobats in the midst of a complex and quite impressive routine.
3 tags
Attack on Kigali Memorial Center →
While the shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum made headlines across the world earlier this summer, a grenade attack at the Kigali Memorial Center last night has not had quite the same impact on the international community. The attack on the memorial has barely made the news in Kigali. Although no one was killed, the attack - the third in two years - is quite upsetting in a country...
6 tags
7 tags
4 tags
5 tags
“If you knew me, and if you knew yourself, you wouldn’t have killed me.”
– Banner at the Ntarama Church, a genocide memorial site outside of Kigali, very close to Nyamata Church.
3 tags
4 tags
7 tags
6 tags
“Africa is not the crude caricature of a continent at perpetual war. But if we...”
– Barack Obama speaking in Accra, Ghana. Shout out to Kigali…
Lots of pretty rhetoric, but slim on serious, concrete action.
5 tags
5 tags
4 tags
4 tags
“Justice, which is the end of law, is the ideal compromise between the activities...”
– Roscoe Pound, 1906
(interesting in the context of gacaca)
H/T: Neddie Madeira
3 tags
4 tags
3 tags
2 tags
4 tags
TIA
On the day that my shower in Kigali did not provide hot water, my hosts exclaimed, “TIA!” Another time, hanging out with a few American friends at Torrero (an expat tapas bar in the center of town), our waiter brought out the wrong order, and one of the girls sighed, “TIA.” This is an expression I have heard time and again whenever something does not work perfectly - TIA...
June 2009
56 posts
Hiatus...
15 months, 16 days, and some hours ago, Jeremy Menkowitz took Lauren (Teen) Wolf to the site of their first kiss, and while friends hid in cars to take pictures, he got down on one knee and proposed. On Sunday, June 28th, the happy couple will finally tie the knot in Philadelphia.
Although I am not looking forward to what promises to be some grueling flights and jet lag, I am thrilled to be...
4 tags
3 tags
WatchIf my grandmother or mother were more tech-savvy, I would be certain that one of them had created this video.
9 tags
5 tags
Resurrection
In 1993, when Eugine Mussolini was fifteen years old, he stepped on a landmine while trying to join the RPF forces in Rwanda’s eastern province. Doctors performed successive operations on his left leg, amputating more each time. Today, he must replace his prosthetic leg yearly to avoid further infection, and he must pay for this out of his own pocket.
“My first thought was, ‘I...
3 tags
