While most of you were celebrating July 4th in the United States yesterday, with Watermelon and fireworks and maybe some barbeque (if anyone wants to drop me a line and tell me what they did, I would help me to live vicariously), I was celebrating Liberation Day here in Rwanda.
Rwandans celebrate 2 major holidays during the same week. July 1st is Independence Day, marking Rwanda’s (and Burundi’s, a neighboring and historically similar nation to the South) independence from Belgium. July 4th is Liberation Day, which celebrates the end of the Genocide. Paul Kagame (current president) and his regime have pronounced Liberation Day the celebration of true freedom for all Rwandans. I am not sure how it is celebrated elsewhere in the country, but here in Kigali (the capital), nearly the entire city gathered at Amahoro Stadium where there was a Parade.

The Parade began with a marching band, followed by the entire Rwandan Army (apparently one of the strongest armies in the developing world, trained by the United States Army). This was somewhat more of a display of arms than anything else. First there were the battalions with the machine guns, then those with bayonets, and then those with hand held missiles, then more with guns. After the military, the different sects of gendarmes, police, local militia (men who volunteer to keep their city in line), and then the security guard companies (totally bizaar). There were also some traditional Rwandan dancers. And then, of course, the president, waving.
After the parade had finished, there were a series of . . . performances, for lack of a better word. There were several groups who did martial arts (of sorts) in some sort of choreographed sparring. Every time that one of the men would fall to the ground, the audience would laugh. They set up different scenarios, including one where a nicely dressed couple walked through the field pretending not to notice the men in fatigues lying in the grass surrounding them. When the soldiers attacked the couple, both the man and the woman defeated about 10 soldiers and the audience went wild. Honestly – I was and am so bewildered that this is how Kigali celebrates the liberation and end of the genocide.
Next there were the knife throwers, and later there was a whole battalion of soldiers who lined up and did some sort of play-fight performance with all of their knives. Then there was some traditional dancing, a very long speech by the president, and an even longer procession out.
I can’t help but be struck by how much violence was present during this day that I would think is celebrating peace. Furthermore, I can’t imagine what effect this has on the thousands of people in that stadium still suffering debilitating PTSD, not to mention those who still have open wounds from the genocide. I am not making this up – there are a lot of Rwandans whose deep machete wounds have still not closed up, and who still are forced to wear bandages, visit the doctor (if they can) and miss days of work because of cuts from 14 years ago.

After the Parade, I also went to my first African Futbol game – which was sooo much fun. Unfortunately this entry is getting way too long. I will have to write about that more later (it’s much more upbeat than this past entry). For now I will just say that I was sitting in the section with Africa’s version of Raider’s fans, and I was rooting for the other team.