Our flight to Dar Es Salaam isn't till 3:20pm giving us a whole morning to look around in Arusha. Slept in till 8, packed, showered, had breakfast, stored our luggage at the hotel, arranged a taxi to take us to the airport in the afternoon and headed for a walk in town.
My friend really wanted to check out the International Criminal tribunal for Rwanda. It was set up by UN in 1994 following the horrific hundred-day genocide that same year which claimed the lives of over 800 000 people. The tribunal delivered the world's first condemnation for genocide in September 1998, when former Rwandan Prime Minister Jean Kambanda was found guilty, but has been dogged by controversy for much of its life - not the least of which being the UN's characteristically lavish and ineffectual bureaucracy: over a billion dollars to the end of 2007, the last trials are set to conclude around 2012. Indeed, fifteen years after the genocide, the court has so far convicted just 34 people and acquitted six. Twenty-three remain on trial and eight trials have yet to begin. However, the successful conviction in 2008 of the so-called 'mastermind' of the genocide, Theoneste Bagosora,a colonel inthe Rwandan army, together with two of his cohorts, was seen as a sign thant the tribunal is producing results. All three were given life sentences.
There are court hearings there daily and are open to the public so we went to see one. Sat there for about 30 minutes, listening to the hearing from behind the glass via radio transmitters providing direct translation to English. Hear the person answering questions like "where were you on the 5th of September in 1994", "who else was at the house", "what time did so-and-so arrive", "what did you do on the following day" and so on and so on. It all seems so unbelievable to me that they are putting the pieces in place through such long and painful and slow methods. I guess that is the best there is. Also I could not understand if the guy being prosecuted had any legal assistance or not, did not see anybody with him there. Seemed strange to me that a simple person needs to answer all those vague questions all by him/herself.
Later on walked around in the town, just to see the life on the streets. Got in trouble again taking a photo of a builing :) This time simply erasing the photo did the trick. Had quick lunch in a nice cafe by the post office and headed back to the hotel to catch our ride to the airport.
Stared at Mount Meru that was rising out of the ground right across from the airfield. It is Tanzania's second-highest mountain (4566m) after Kilimanjaro. Kilimanjaro rises over 5km from the surrounding plains to a peak of 5892m being Africa's highest mountain, the world's tallest free-standing massif and one of the world's largest volcanoes covering some 3885 square kilometers. Got to see the peak from an airplane window later on.
To our suprise the flight took a detour through Zanzibar, making a quick stop there to let most people off and let others on board. Yea, we were wondering why the flying time is so long :) We were tempted to get off at the stop as well - Zanzibar was just so nice and inviting :) Arrived safely at Dar Es Salaam. Luckily we got to stay over at P&M's house again. Went out to dinner with P and her friends at a great Italian restaurant. Met a Swedish girl who lives here, girl from Boston who has been in Africa close to 4 years by now and 2 Italian ladies. It was a wonderful evenining meeting new people and exchaning our trip details. My tuna and spicy salami pizza tasted so delicious as well. I'm missing those loads of pizza that I got to enjoy in Italy on the first week of my vacation :)
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