Last spring I had the opportunity to travel with my closest friends and classmates to one of Africa’s smallest countries: Rwanda. We spent three weeks forming connections with Rwandans while making media projects, learning about the rich history, and exploring the beautiful landscapes. While being immersed in Rwandan culture, there were many interesting things I learned about Rwanda that most people don’t know…
First, many people are unaware of Rwanda’s intensively heartbreaking and bone chilling Genocide of 1994. During this dark period, carefully organized murders of around 800,000 Rwandans (mostly Tutsi) were carried out within only 100 days by Hutus. The Tutsi and the Hutus were the two main groups that made up the population of Rwanda. The local officials and government-sponsored radio stations called on ordinary Hutu civilians to turn against their neighbors, many of those who were Tutsi. Only 25 years have passed since and the country is still healing from the wounds.
This dark patch that Rwanda went through has brought forth a new wave of acceptance, forgiveness and rebuilding both emotionally and physically for the country and its people. This brings me to the second fact that even with this scar, Rwandans are some of the friendliest people you will ever encounter. Whether we were traveling through the urban capital of Kigali or down a rural dirt road, people would stare at us, which is to be expected since we stood out being a group of white Americans, which is not an everyday sight for them. However, their faces would light up with big smiles and they’d wave at us on the bus. The people that we met were so kind and had the warmest hearts.
Not only were they kind hearted, they were also determined in rebuilding their country in a environmentally conscious way. Rwanda is the first country in the world to ban plastic bags as of 2008. This prohibits all manufacturing, use, importing and selling of non-biodegradable bags in the country. This has greatly eliminated pollution in Rwanda and has gained an international reputation for cleanliness because of it, naming Kigali the cleanest city in Africa . Driving through the city I was surprised by just how clean it was. Compared to American cities like New York, Kigali had noticeably less litter and pollution on the streets.
Another surprising fact relating to their environmental and sustainability efforts within Rwanda is a community clean up day called Umaganda meaning “contribution”. This clean up day takes places the last Saturday of every month. Rwandans are expected to show up to their community gathering and help clean and build. I got to experience this first hand while at my homestay in a suburb of Kigali. We gathered in a big community building and listened (though couldn’t understand) to the community members’ speeches on how to improve the neighborhood. Then we all went off to do small jobs such as weeding or shoveling.
The final fact that I’ll leave you with is how naturally beautiful Rwanda is. It is known as the Land of a Thousand Hills because of the rolling, grassy hills covering most the country. It’s one of only three countries in Africa where you can visit mountain gorillas. Although we didn’t get to go gorilla trekking, Ellen DeGeneres did and said it was “life changing”. Ellen DeGeneres’ Campus of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund is located in Rwanda in effects to protect, conserve and study one of the most critically endangered animals on earth. From the lush sweeping hills to the sunsets over Lake Kivu, Rwanda is beautiful a place.