This week marked the 21st
anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda.
Throughout the week, schools were closed and work hours cut
short as the country paused to remember.
Before coming to Rwanda, I read books and watched films, trying to learn
more about the country I would be moving too.
Most of the stories I came across told of the genocide. And even before arriving, what struck me most
was the resilience of this nation. I
tried to understand what it meant to live through one hundred days of killing,
being on the run, hiding, watching neighbors kill neighbors, perhaps losing
your entire family. And I tried to
understand how a person, let alone a nation of people, could move on after
that.
After months in Rwanda, I still can’t understand or even
relate to the stories of genocide. But
now the stories I hear hurt a little more.
Because the genocide is now more than a story. It is now the tragedy that orphaned my
friends and robbed them of their siblings.
The only Rwanda I know is beautiful, safe, peaceful, and
full of life. But, as the mass grave
next to my house reminds me, the country still holds a deep scar, one that they
have chosen to intentionally remember and learn from. This week, I too have tried to remember but I believe that the stories of the genocide are not mine to tell. So here are the words of a friend:
"As young boy sometimes I was too scared and weak to walk in the
hills full of killers, this is in and during the aftermath of genocide. Sometimes I
felt as if the sky hit me over the head. Other times, the earth became too
narrow to accommodate me as if surrounded by the most dangerous wild beast. As
result, as an orphan surrounded by widows and widowers; we are forced to have
courage but not false one, the courage that must keep our loved ones
alive. Therefore, the 21st anniversary of 1994
Genocide to me is very important not only to remember my loved ones, but also a
day to support the most vulnerable
survivors; widowers and widows, old ones and orphans who are still striving
with the ways of the world, the circumstances in which we found ourselves in .
It is not on the anniversary I remember, I also remember those I loved in every single
decision I make, in every single step I make and I have to cope with a precarious
existence many of survivors had been in,
before and after 1994.
"Probably the most terrible consequence of genocide as a
young child was to be left out without any parental care, fighting for my own
survival like separation with relatives, attending school or self education,
clothing myself, self feeding, making some other tough decisions at early age and
struggling with shelter. It is said that there is always strength from
struggle, learning from both who were younger and older than I was after 1994, gave me a reason why I
was left to live for others.
"One day, a teacher took a list from the shelf, ‘Hutu
students, stand up.” She cleared her throat and said in a loud voice. I was so
surprise and confused at the same time simply because it was the first time to
hear such new vocabularies in our class. Few of us were confused, as my friend
and neighbor Claude stood up I also follow and stood up. Immediately, the
teacher forced me to sit down because I didn’t know where I belong. The class
laughed at me and I felt so ridiculous in my class because of such
ignorance. The following days, I learnt
to stand up at the right time with the right minority in the class. It was such
shame to always stand up in a group of 5 few children in the class of
45 children. I kept on asking why teachers always divided us in such systematic
and organized way. Living in that beautiful but divided classmates, standing up
and list making became a chapter on the curriculum, and also became a daily normal class routine. The first year passed, the second, third and
the fourth until it became a habit, the following year Genocide started.
"In my interest of Shakespeare’s language and accuracy of
words, I am trying to find the right words to describe the hatred I saw and
heard in the eyes of men. It was in the rainy season, the crops were
flourishing both wild plants and crops were growing faster than ever, cows were
enjoying the green pasture. It was few
days Wednesday early morning few days before Easter, it was my favorite daily
schedule to wake up earlier and gather
outside and observe how uncle milked cows while cows chewing things. That moment also was the end of my childhood,
when my great aunt screamed in the God of Israel that we are all finished after
hearing 6:00 am news on national radio that the plane was carrying the the
country president was shot down.
"My great aunt sent me to my grandparent‘s friend. It was like
three or four miles away from home. But to reach my grandparents’ Hutu friend was
another Calvary. In the eyes of the most
dangerous wild beast on earth but in human form; they were hunting people with
spears, machete, pointed sticks, small axes to name few in traditional arms. I
started the journey around 8:00 am but it ended in the evening, after spending
hours under the bridge with tree trunks hiding from wild killers in human
images chanting battle songs, attacking unarmed innocent children and women.
"By the time I reach my destination, I was welcomed by a
courageous woman, fearless and exceeding wise in everything but in loving of humanity.
She gave me a big hug and I tried to
narrate what I had been through, then she replied that was a sign of cowardice
to attack an unarmed group of innocent people but she assured me that all those
who are involving in killing will be too later to face the fury of God. This unknown heroine in the village has never
attended any formal school but she saved many lives. We spent more than two
months in her house; we were about nine people separated in the rooms. I was
located under her bed, surrounded by kitchens’ utensils. Under the bed, the old woman's house became
my providential escape.
"Finally, I am living in a communities side by side with
those who exterminated our loved ones. The ones who witnessed their involvements in
Genocide, their sentences are reduced in the traditional tribunal courts called “Gacaca”. At the beginning of all these tribunals, I used to believe that
consequences for the guilty are too lenient for the crimes they committed. Half
beliefs and half doubts if shame and remorse of guilty ever seized their hearts
if they are never, many are oppressed at once with two sad infirmities, age and
poverty. To me as a survivor, its brave
punishment of discontent men to see me alive, by the disappointment of their
plots to finish all of us. Whatever condition in which they may be in, it
cannot exceed the pain of children born
of rape, the old widows and widowers who still suffering the trauma, women and
girls infected with HIV and the orphans
who gave up their childhood to act as parents
for the young ones." - Shingiro
Shingiro is an English teacher at Rwamagana Lutheran School where I also work. He was one of my first friends in Rwamagana and is one of the most optimistic, cheerful, and inquisitive people I know.
