A woman being led away from the others
when her crying turned to hysterical sobbing. A long, sad face and a weak “I’m
fine” that sounds forced. Heart-wrenching personal testimonies on television.
Marches to remember lost lives. Songs about a bad past and making a better
future played countless times on tv and the radio.
This is the week where Rwandans “remember”
the genocide against the Tutsi’s that began April 6, 1994. In the afternoon all
workplaces are closed and there have been special programs on TV, discussions
at the neighborhood level, marches to sites of mass killings, and ceremonies to begin and close the week with
speeches, music and time to be together to stand for a “better tomorrow.”
Despite all these public and
government-planned activities, I don’t know if I would have known this was the
genocide memorial week if I hadn’t been told (and didn’t turn on the TV). I say
that because most people didn’t (and never do, really) show any of their
emotions – even in regard to something as big as losing family members and
perhaps being close to losing their own life 18 years ago. I think holding in
emotions and appearing to be strong and not have any problems is very common in
this country. Today as I sat at the closing ceremony in the rain, closely
surrounded by many Rwandese people, I thought “the rain is showing these people’s
emotions because they don’t cry.”
I’ve spent the week wanting people to
open up, talk about their experience, or just cry to release the pain – if that
would help. Not wanting to ask directly, I have asked my host family and
coworkers few questions. But one day at work Rachel* (*name changed) brought up
the Femmes en Dialogue (women in dialogue) groups, which help women who became
widows or prisoner’s wives due to the genocide (thus both ethnic groups) reconcile
together. I asked Rachel how she had the idea to start this group, and she
looked at me and said “It’s a long story. It comes from my personal experience in
the genocide.”
I didn’t pry but Rachel looked at me
and went on to tell me about marrying her husband not long before the genocide
started and no one wanting them to get married because they were of different
ethnic groups. Yet they did and although Rachel’s life was threatened multiple
times during the genocide she survived, thanks to her husband. The next 3.5
years involved refugee camps, having 2 children, and trying to build their life
in a devastated Rwanda. Then all of a sudden her husband was arrested (supposed
complicity in the genocide) and put in prison to await trial, as was custom. Now,
18 years later, he still is in prison and hasn’t been tried.
Rachel now has 2
teenage children, a university degree, a job in the church (looks good on the
outside) yet inside she has wounds that will take years to heal. When she was
deeply hurt after the genocide, the Friends Church reached out to her and she received
training in trauma healing. Afterward, she wanted to help other traumatized
women so she started 9 of these women’s groups to bring together women who are
neighbors, one of whose husband might have killed the other’s husband, and
helps them through trauma healing to lasting reconciliation. No one would have
thought it possible, but they have strong testimonies of living together in
harmony now.
Most people think immediately of the
genocide of 1994 when they think of Rwanda, and as such have a bad (and
incorrect) picture of Rwanda. This makes sense, and I’ll admit I didn’t quite
know what Rwanda would be like before I arrived…and hopefully if this was what
you thought before I have helped change your image of Rwanda somewhat. But it
is certainly a part of people’s (hidden) lives here, whether in wounds that
never fully go away, being a widow, having a husband in prison, being an
orphan, extreme poverty, etc. there are many effects of the genocide that
people continue to face today. Yet people here are strong and determined, there
has been a lot of progress in the domain of peace and reconciliation, and
people are sharing about having hope and a better future.
