The people of this tiny hamlet near the Rwandan border killed one another in last August's tribal slaughter. Now the survivors drink beer together.
They have come home from their refugee camps in Rwanda or their hiding places in the nearby marshes as part of what diplomats and U.N. officials call the fastest repatriation they have ever seen.At least 50,000 fled in terror after five terrifying nights of murder in which the government says 5,000 people died and the United Nations estimates 2,700 were killed.
The slaughter began with an uprising of the majority Hutu people against the Tutsi who have run this country for most of the time since independence from Belgium in 1962.
After the latest convoys this week from Rwanda refugee camps, the United Nations estimates that only 2,500 remain in Rwanda.
"For every one person who went by convoy, at least 10 came back entirely on their own," said Joseph Kotta, who as senior U.N. official in Burundi coordinates the resettlement.
Kotta said the U.N. had not expected the repatriation to get under way until the new year.