july 4, 2007 in kigali

while americans celebrated independence day with potato salad, citronella candles, family, friends, and fireworks, my housemates and I here in kigali also celebrated a national holiday...liberation day. the 13th liberation day, to be exact. while rwanda (and burundi, incidentally) gained its independence on july 1, 1962, which is also technically a nationaly holiday here, the day is not really celebrated. as far as I understand it, this is because many people (most often tutsis) do not regard rwanda's independence from belgium as being a true day of independence for all rwandans. liberation day, it should be noted, marks the end of the 1994 genocide. celebrations happen throughout the country, with the largest held at stade amahoro (amahoro stadium) in kigali. partly because this is the largest of celebrations, people come from throughout the countryside to go to amaharo.

as the stadium also houses the ministry of youth, sports, and culture (where I've been trying to get a research permission from over the last two weeks), I have been to the stade on several days during the rehearsal for this event. a majority of the liberation day celebration is a parade of the military. granted there are police and military officers throughout kigali with large, overwhelming guns on them at all times. but when I've been up to the stade to go to the ministry's office, seeing these soldiers with their guns with bayonets attached and missile launchers has been a bit unsettling. rwanda is one of the most secure countries on the continent; the parade of military yesterday was an emphasis of such military strength. (side note: though the rwandan defense forces are one of the most professionalized forces in the world, this does not mean that all of the soldiers have some staunch sense of decorum. yes, even they called out 'mizungu' as I would walk past.)

in order to make it into the stadium, my housemates and I left our home at 7:15a. after getting taxibuses, arriving to the stadium in two groups, going through security, and regrouping, we waited until 10:00a for the actual ceremony to begin. once the president arrived, the stadium was put on lockdown and the festivities began. two military marching bands, lots of armed soldiers, and a parade of several different ministries (focused on youth issues, mostly) and private security firm officers (odd) started off. there was plenty of blue, green, and yellow (rwandan flag colors) about for the occassion, in the colors of the stadium, the ribbons the decorated the vip section, and on many of the participants' garments. there were presentations of medals of honor, a speech by the president, and traditional intore dance. that I all expected. what I did not expect were the small displays of hand on hand combat (martial arts displays by soldiers, which were a riot to the rwandans sitting around us) and the display of pick ax and knife throwing. the event ended at 1:00p. though we did not exit the stade until 2:00p (as we waited for the masses of people to exit), we were all ready to leave by then.

but no, the day didn't end there. though some of the housemates returned home, three of us stayed about the area, shared a pizza for lunch, and then went back to the stade for the final football match of the amaharo cup. I had been told by a sports editor of one of the newspapers that the match started at 3:30p; it didn't end up starting until 6:00p. (rwandan time?) the actual match of the professional teams was preceded by a game between a team of businessmen and a team of taxibus men. there was a white man who played on the businessmen team and, at first, he flubbed up a bit. this only caused the rwandans to make fun of him and look at us with even more amusement. but when he scored the first goal, he gained a bit more respect (and we were given looks of surprise). finally, this match ended and it was on with the final. though we did not intend to do so, we ended up sitting in the fan section of APR FC, the team that is sponsored by the military. they have one of the largest fan bases in the country and have been a powerhouse in rwandan football over the last several years. sitting in this section provided for a 'purer experience,' as one of my housemates so optimistically put it. once the match was on, we weren't given much attention, which was nice. but when we left the stadium at the half (it was already such a long day at that point), I was definitely touched somewhat inappropriately more often than I care to remember, as well as accosted with seemingly angry tones of 'mizungu.' I suppose there aren't many white girls who come for football matches and sit in the 500 franc section.

all in all, an interesting day, though a tiring one as well. I did feel a bit sad that I wasn't able to see any fireworks or smell any charcoal grills during the day, but this was a unique experience in its own right. next on the list of holidays to look forward to: the birthday.