spring up a well

This semester has already freed me to be more fully myself. Excused from any form of history or back story, I find myself singing more. Dancing more. Quieting my frustration, and laughing more. We laugh a lot. It is a precious commodity to the emotional welfare of this wonderfully draining semester.

The last ten days were spent in the beauty of Rwanda. With green mountains towering overhead and mounds of rice piling on my plate at every meal, we visited churches, sat with speakers varying from the Bishop of Gahini, representatives of World Relief and Cards From Africa, legal reps from the Gacaca Court System, the Mufti and Reverend Emmanuel Gatera. Each day was full, and I paint a mere sliver of reflection here.

Rwanda is best known for the 1994 genocide of more than 1 million people. Less publicly known is the way genocide was rehearsed in the years leading up to the “Final Solution,” with the exile of 700,000 Tutsis 1959-1973 (result of ethnic cleansing encouraged by Belgian colonists), and the “mini- genocides” that occurred: October 1990, January 1991, February 1991, March 1992, August 1992, January 1993, March 1993, February 1994. The political world knew genocide was coming and on 6 April 1994 it was instant. Among the most disturbing things I learned were of the churches, convents, and schools turned into killing centers. Pastors herded their congregations into house after house of God, to purposefully turn around and watch death win: Nyarubuye, Kibungo- 20,000 dead; Nyamata, Buyesera- 10,000 dead; Nyange- 2,000 bulldozed with church. The genocide left over 300,000 orphans, with over 85,000 children at heads of their households. At least 500,000 women were raped by men known to be HIV/AIDS positive.

General Dallaire, UN General in Rwanda, estimated that as few as 5,000 troops could stop the genocide. Instead, by fall of 1994, refugee camps bulged with over 2 million people.

Ibyangywe na jenoside. Devestation.

I fumed with fact after distressing fact. Then I was pressed back into my place by the reminder that it is easier to get angry than be humbled. I shook my arms and turned my eyes upward to see the life that shunts forward in the mountainous beauty of Rwanda. The depth of the wound Rwandans unveil for those willing to peer testifies to their unconquerable hope. Their need for us to move forward in humble recognition that we take part in the very crime that caused genocide in Rwanda and continues to cause it all over the world: the crime of self-interest.

Leaving The Murambi Memorial Centre I wrote in my journal:

I see my mannerisms mirrored in those of the Rwandan genocide victims: sleeping hands curled quietly under a face, just the way I drift away each evening. But these quiet hands are white laced with lime, and this face is not gently drifting into rest. Hundreds of bodies, room after room, of white skeletons. Rid of the skin that deemed them fit to die.

This place is so beautiful- each ride gasps at the landscape. Yet, it is not the beauty of the mountains that seek out God in me. It is the depth of pain. A yearning for some relief to the struggle to stand in the knowledge of such evil. The presence of such evil.

All I can smell is lime. All I can see is white. Empty sockets stare at me.

I left Rwanda the same in at least one way- in awe of the country’s beauty. The same mix of surprise, joy, and frustration at each “mzungu” I hear yelled in my direction. The same admiration for each man or woman carrying a world unknown to me atop their head.

And that is what so much comes down to- this is a world far and wide unknown to me- over my head and I’m without the neck to lift the weight. Still my heart aches to try though, prods my hands and feet to move forward in placing bits and pieces above my snow-white complexion. Like the snail that climbs Mount Fuji, I urge to continue breathing in these volcanic Rwandan mountains, but slowly, slowly.