It was only three weeks ago that I got around to watching Hotel Rwanda. Oh, the DVD has been sitting on the shelf for months, just never had the urge to sit still for two hours of dry toast drama. What changed? I don’t know, why does the wind blow up the street on Thursday, Friday it’s on the ave? Nature’s guidance. Just felt like time.

Slid in the DVD and understood completely why Don Cheadle was nominated for Best Actor in 2005.

Don Cheadle depicts the real life story of Paul Rusesabagina, a hotel manager that sheltered African refugees during the Rwanadan genocide.

Sounds really exciting, huh? Actually it was. The director made an effort to focus the story on Don Cheadle’s (Paul Rusesabagina’s) personal story, with the politics and cause of the genocide used as a backdrop. Don Cheadle’s confusion and concerns are completely relatable. Plop. It feels like you’re dropped in the middle of the insanity.

The Rwandan genocide killed over 800,000 people.

Not in some far off date in a dusty history book.. it was 1994.

What did the United States do.. the world.. twiddle their thumbs.

What were “WE” doing.. I don’t know.. partying to Ready to Die.

How ironic is that? *laugh*

The cause of the genocide was complex. Do the BBC?

The dummies version:The genocide was preceded by a civil war. When the president was killed the fighting spread to the civilian population.. more like slaughter of unarmed, helpless people. Africans (The Hutus) killing each other because those (Tutsis) Africans are inferior and the cause of Rwanda’s problems.

They need to be exterminated machete and rifle style.

The ridiculous thing is Hutus and Tutsis look and speak the same language.

Follow the same customs.

Who introduced the idea of one group being superior over the other? Belgium. From BBC..  “When the Belgian colonists arrived in 1916, they saw the two groups as distinct entities, The Belgians considered the Tutsis as superior to the Hutus. Not surprisingly, the Tutsis welcomed this idea.”

If that’s true, I don’t know when the tables turned and the Tutsis became ‘cockroaches.’

Anyway, the movie indirectly asks how the killing of of an estimated 800,000 - 1,000,000 people could occur while the world’s leaders pretended like it wasn’t happening or they couldn’t do anything. The United States position was they would only interfere as much as it affected U.S. interests.

You know.. oil, imagined weapons of mass destruction.

What’s crazy is the same scenario is playing itself out in the Sudan.

I wrote a blurb on it a couple years ago. Honestly forgot about it. It isn’t talked about on TV. Doesn’t come up during political roundtables. Then you look on the net and there it is.. today’s New York Times.

According to that story, 200,000 have died over the last four years. 2.5 million displaced and 4 million in need of assistance.

I shouldn’t say it’s never on TV.

A week after watching Hotel Rwanda. The Today Show did an interview with the Sudanese President. Crazy sense of deja vu.

Killing? What killing?