So, it’s been a really long time since I've posted anything. Life here in Rwanda is becoming more and more routine and has really become my home in the past couple months.

I forgot last time, so let me introduce you to one of my favorite people I have met so far in Rwanda. His name is Thomas and he is from Uganda. He is a pre-novitiate here in formation with the hopes of becoming a missionary priest with the Salesians. He has a great smile and is always laughing. I love our conversations. I know he will make an awesome Salesian.

At the beginning of January, school was supposed to start, but the start was delayed until February. So, I started to teach the teachers here English. Some of the teachers has a small vocabulary and can have a simple conversation...while others really don't know any English. This was/is a major concern because the 1st year students here will all be learning in English. I helped teach them for a few weeks, they progressed but I'm sure they aren't really teaching in English yet as they should be.
In the beginning of February, the students all returned and school started back up. Let me explain a little about the first day of classes...maybe it will help you get a perspective on how things work here in Africa. The students all showed up on the first day of classes and I was in the computer lab ready for the first batch of students to walk in and be memorized by the 20 plus computers in the room and the white man with a beard in the front of the class. After about 15 minutes of waited, I walk over to the headmaster to see what the trouble is. Apparently, many of the students hadn't paid any money for school yet, so they decided to cancel school on the first day...I don't think that would fly in the states. It ended up being the 4th day of school before I actually taught my first class for the term.
Lastly, today I went to the second genocide memorial while being here in Rwanda. The first one is basically a museum that describes what happened and it is a Mass grave for tens of thousands of Rwandans. It was quite a sobering museum...but nothing like today.

(The following is a bit graphic)
Today, we took a bus for about 3 hours each way and went to one of the actual massacre sites. We arrived to a lovely technical school that is one of the taller hills in the area. You can see all around you, quite a breathtaking panorama. At this school over 50,000 Rwandans came in a matter of 2 weeks to seek refuge during the beginning of the genocide. The French ended up coming to defend the people from attack. As the conflict escalated, the French army left and nearly all 50,000 Rwandans were killed, using machetes, guns, and other weapons.
At the school they have preserved several hundred of the bodies with their clothes. They have the bodies to see, just as they were when they were killed. You can see old and young, men and women, babies with their mothers. On some of the bodies you can picture there face while others still have hair on their heads. It was a quiet few hours, taking in the scenery and trying to image the utter chaos that unfolded just over 15 years ago. Another quite shocking realization is that all around this memorial, there are people farming, goats and cows are grazing, and children playing...while bodies, bones, and clothes lie motionless to tell their stories to visitors.