Rwanda is slowly ‘becoming whole’ again
Posted: Tuesday, February 19, 2008 10:10 AM
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On Assignment
By Kevin Corke, NBC News White House Correspondent

KIGALI, Rwanda – Draining.
Before departing Washington with the President Bush on this six-day, five-country African tour, many well-meaning friends and colleagues said the trip would be an emotional one for me. They must have reasoned that this being my first trip to the land of my ancestors, surely that must count for something beyond words.
Unable to grasp their certainty and not being the emotional type, I gave no hint of how lightly I regarded their expressions. But how wrong I was.
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| AP |
| U.S. President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush lay a wreath at the Kigali Memorial Center, which documents the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, on Feb. 19, 2008. |
Today, I was confronted by the most heinous example of evil I've ever seen.
We visited a memorial of Rwanda's 1994 genocide, a site in Kigali where the remains of more than 250,000 victims are still buried. Thanks to the film "Hotel Rwanda," many Americans know what happened then: Close to a million Rwandans were slaughtered by their own countrymen in a 100-day period.
To see pictures of the bodies of hundreds of babies, children, women and men piled up like trash in burned out churches was truly numbing. Staring at the mass gravesites where bodies sent a chill down my spine. Who could do such a thing? Hadn't this poor, starving and struggling country been through enough?
RenewalToday there are signs of hope. To many, the country's resurgence is an absolute miracle. Though still racked by poverty, the lure of commerce and natural resources are attracting increased aid and investment from countries like the United States.
The man who provided tours today, Freddy Mutanguha, survived the carnage of 1994, but lost four siblings and both of his parents.
He spoke in a clear, matter-of-fact tone about what happened then, but managed to rescue us from the emotional depths with an unbowed optimism about the progress here and the future of his country.
Without a hint of bitterness in his voice he said, "We are becoming whole."
Miraculous indeed.