In class

       Both articles, The Rwandan Girl Who Refused to Die by Fergal Keane, and 10 Years Later in Rwanda, The Dead Are Ever Present by Marc Lacey, portray the horror and the devastation that occurred in Rwanda in April of 1994. All of the people in each story have witnessed genocide. They have fought for their lives and have seen many lives taken right before their eyes. These people are a few of the Tutsi survivors, and don’t want people to forget that the genocide happened.

       In both articles, the witnesses of the genocide want to preserve the remains of the thousands of people killed by the Hutu extremists. 'I want people to see the bones. I don't want them buried away. There is no way if you see this that you can say genocide never happened. Genocide happened,’ says Pacific Rutaganda, 48, who survived the church slaughter but lost his sisters, parents and in-laws inside, from the article 10 Years Later in Rwanda, The Dead Are Ever Present. ‘The church that had been the focal point of the massacre had been cleaned up, the bodies removed and placed in a series of rooms nearby. Now the government was preserving them, replete with skeletons and moldering corpses, as a memorial to genocide.’ In both stories, there was some controversy with preserving the scenes of the massacre. Some people were for it and some were against. The majority of the witnesses wanted the genocide preserved, and the others were against it.

       Both of the witnesses that were interviewed in either article had sustained massive injuries and watched their families get slaughtered. Valentina, from The Rwandan Girl Who Refused to Die, suffered a machete slash to the head, and her hands. All four of her fingers were cut off and was losing a lot of blood. Mr. Murangira, from 10 Years Later in Rwanda, The Dead Are Ever Present, was shot in the head during the attack on the school but managed to survive, buried under corpses, while bleeding from his head.

       Valentina and Mr. Murangira relived their past and shared their stories with reporters, and inevitably, the media. They witnessed something indescribable in Rwanda. They watched thousands of people die, and nearly died themselves, but they had the will to survive. People are inspired through stories like these, and that is why I think it’s important for them to be shared. We will never forget the brutality that occurred. “Genocide happened.''