Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
watchtowers in each of its four corners and an intimidating metal gate against its south-
west walls. As Boston, Amani and I set up our small, blue tents, my eye was constantly
drawn to this imposing fortress. Even at a distance I could tell that its walls were pock-
marked, not just with natural decay but with the unmistakable marks of bullet holes - vi-
cious reminders of the past.
As we finished setting up camp and brought together kindling for a fire, a crowd was
appearing out of the village. 'Hutus,' said Boston as the chief made himself apparent.
'What is this place?'
In the shadow of the fortress, the village chairman was approaching. A fat man in his
fifties, he wore a tattered blue shirt and a face bearing a benevolent grin. As Amani stood
to greet him, they shook hands warmly.
'It was a prison,' Amani explained. 'Gisovu Prison, for genociders.'
I looked across the riverbank, to where the crowd was growing. Boston gave a firm nod.
'Yes, Lev,' he said. '
These
genociders.'
Amani returned with the village chairman. 'Do you want to see the prison?' he asked.
'They are happy for us to do so. It is . . . full of cows now. The government gave it to the
community after the prisoners were all released.'
Part of me didn't want to see this place, but another part wanted to understand. With
Boston and Amani, I followed the chief up the steep hillside to the great iron gate. When
he pushed it open, I expected him to show us around but, instead, he simply waved us on.
The prison, to them, was a thing of the past, to be forgotten - but to me it felt very real.
Inside, the prison was in a state of disrepair. Walls had crumbled, long grasses had
grown up. Piece by piece, the stone was returning to the earth. Another twenty years, I
thought, and it would be gone, not even the bullet holes in the walls to remind us what had
happened here. The smell of cow manure was strong as we crossed the open yard and into
the cells that remained. Shards of the day's last sun filtered in through shattered windows
and holes in the roof. Spiders had built empires of webs in the corridors and, as Boston and
I clawed through, I saw that the cells were daubed in faded graffiti in a language I didn't
understand.
'What does it say?' I asked Amani, but Amani only shook his head. 'I do not know.' By
the way his eyes were lingering on the words, I knew that he was lying. Whatever the pris-
oners had scrawled on these walls cut into his own memories of that terrible year. Amani,
I knew, was thirty-one years old. It made him eleven in the year of the genocide.
'What happened here, Amani?'
He stared for a while. 'This was a prison for genociders. Eventually, it wasn't needed
any more. Prisoners who confessed could halve their sentences and go and work in the
fields or the city instead. We did not keep them locked up. We set them to work, rebuild-
ing Rwanda. You have already seen some of them, in the village out there. Probably every
