Rwanda's Why

I'm driving through such beauty, this lush rural countryside. I find it hard to believe that my career has taken me to here. Being where I am is so much different to the Highlands from where I reside from. Thankfully my 4 x 4 takes the endless rutting roads with aplomb. Mind you, sometimes they remind me of back home, councils never repairing. As I drive, visually I see scattered belongings. Has the wind carried them to there, as I stare, whilst driving, mm! The long and winding road takes me to where I've come from. The Coffee Plantation that allured me here initially, empowers me to think back to it's early days. The wanting of the locals, hungered for work, steady monies, quaint prosperity from their already empty existence. The next day, I hear on the news, that Habyarimana and the Burundian President, Cyprien Ntaryamira were on a plane, shot down, all were lost. Having met Juvénal Habyarimana before, it saddened me totally. The next day on the local radio, I hear there's been disturbances. Like many places in Africa, it was the norm. Onward I went about readying for work. Off I go, before I reach the entrance, a crowd rushes towards me. Angry to say is an understatement, vociferous they, wielding anything they can lay their hands on. Branches, planks, irons, machete’s to name. I'm now needing to veer, to not hit workers that I recognise. I stop a few miles from home, sweated, shaking, as to why? To get to my Coffee Plantation, I have to travel through the local village, town, call it what you may. As I near, like yesterday, strayed clothes abound, but different, and so much more. This time they're reddened, stained, adorning ripped bodies. Now frightened, I travel on foot, walking through blooded carnage, my stomach churning. Children clutching their mothers, fathers and sons I assume holding hands. Young girls taken, forsaken, their life seeping into their lands from where they lived. As I near the village, town, there's shouting, chanting, the stench of burning flesh. Upon view, machetes wield down on many, amidst cries I've unheard of. Limbs now release, torso's tired, fired, my eyes streaming tears for fears. In frightened stare, I'm spotted, sadly by my neighbour. He points at me, my heart surges, scared, disturbed by what I've seen. Instinct tells me, run, and I run, Lord do I run. Upon reaching, fumbling I am for the keys, this image I'd only thought was in the movies. Now where I ask, knowing where I am. For once amidst this, I think, border, which border, as I decide to head East to Tanzania, knowing we have a sister company there. It's later that day, my eyes now in tears. On the news, knowing people I see. Their hacking children, pregnant mothers, fathers and sons. What's taken this for the Tribes to have undone. I worked with both sides, for many a year. I now look back as I'm summoned, to give evidence at the '100 Days of Slaughter' Caught up I am, to declaring Rwanda's loss, of my Tutsi wife, and our daughters . 11th Oct 2014.